Comments on: The New Movie “2012″ Trailer Tells You To Google For No Apparent Reason!

By: Steven H. Taylor

Steven H. Taylor — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 02:41:47 +0000

I agree with the original post, except that the viral was actually there. Apparently overlooked by all.
By now the search results are quite different and they include http://www.whowillsurvive2012.com which is the official movie site as top result, but the site appearing as second (sponsored) link in the Google results above, http://www.InstituteForHumanContinuity.org (with a large question mark next to it) is the obvious viral site. The site is still online and now branded as “part of the 2012 movie experience”.

By: Mark

Mark — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 20:53:06 +0000

The point is, you dont prepare 6 billion people for the end of the world, there’s no information out there, it will happen and you’ll have no warning
You can argue about whether that’s the best marketing strategy, but that in itself generates a buzz

By: Manda

Manda — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 06:53:13 +0000

So maybe none of you understand the point of viral marketing…
Viral marketing is traditionally aimed at hardcore fanatics – Xbox, The Dark Knight, and so on. It’s not geared toward the general public, so the marketing takes a little effort to find. *That’s the point.*
If you’d taken a little time to actually look at the paid ads that came up when you Googled, you’d have found the Institute for Human Continuity – which is actually a Sony-owned page that contains a lottery. You put your name in, you get a number, and you wait to see what to do with the number. It creates suspense as participants wait to find out what the next piece is and what the point of their lottery numbers are.
If everyone were participating, it wouldn’t be “underground” and it wouldn’t be as appealing to those who are playing the game, so to speak. That’s why viral ads are unique – the masses have trailers and commercials, movie fanatics have this.

By: Alex

Alex — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 02:07:28 +0000

You guys seriously! Dont Get it! Search 2012 to educate yourself about the theory, which will then get u thinkin of it, interest of it now when the movie comes out. You gonna go see it, because u probably spoke to ur friends about it and etc…. Would it have been nice for them to have a site that was built by them but has no evidence to be connected wit them? sure yeah that would be nice. But why do that if there have been real people posting about it for years.
People tend to get scared when a large amount of people believes it. so me reading shitty sites about it make me believe, shit its true… its my opinion. plus why pay to get a site done, just use whats already out there.
The Windows commercial to not promote linux…. OK well Linux is an OS, Windows is an OS. Competition. These sites about 2012 are not competing! they not gonna release a movie about 2012, they write about it.

By: Unico

Unico — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 01:14:31 +0000

Hate to be an ass but cant you see they say to search so you can learn about the mayan prophecy. Not so you can look up the movie. Thats all they want. They dont want you to walk into the movie and start bitchin as to why they depict that as the end of the world out of no where.

By: andrewstras

andrewstras — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 12:27:38 +0000

Nice post. I agree 100%. here’s some more info on watch movies online

By: Robert

Robert — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:11:02 +0000

Personally I think it’s a massive mistake. They could at least cash in on the “viral” market that they have created. I mean… when was the last time Microsoft got into the marketing business only to allow all those spent dollars go to marketing Linux? Oh wait, that was the PC vs Mac thing…
While the idea might be that people get searching, they really should have made a site that was the hub of a search. Some place that would provoke questions that the visitor would have to research to find out more.
Then again with everyone telling the audience to search online, perhaps their *hint* of “Nothing there” is the punchline as they build up an interest and then offer nothing – kinda lame, but then again so too was the Y2K Bug!

By: occhiblu

occhiblu — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 23:02:44 +0000

There are conspiracy theories that hold that a lack of information on Google means that the government has suppressed the information. I would assume that’s what the “Hint: Nothing there!” is playing on. The *lack* of info is exactly what they’re playing up.

By: eric

eric — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 23:01:40 +0000

I agree with all of this.
I saw this a few weeks ago and thought the same – why not buy some ads or whathaveyou.
Then I realized that they are just trying to get people interested and informed on what the year stands for, etc. and not the movie per se.
What they SHOULD have done was set up a fake site about the year and it’s mayan history and then paid for the links to drive people to that – a site that explored the history in detail and made you crap-your-pants-scared and interested.

By: Sam Haldeman

Sam Haldeman — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 22:19:08 +0000

Just like the first comment, mine is the same… the entire point of this viral marketing if for people to get enthused about the 2012 idea not the movie 2012. If people are interested in the doomsday scenarios to a fever pitch from informing themselves this will do much for for the movie’s success than many of the search suggestions the author proposes. People will want to see a recreation of the scenarios they’ve been reading about much more than “John Cusack 2012″.