News
SanDisk launches ‘iDon’t’ anti-iPod campaign
SanDisk, the No. 2 seller of digital music players in the U.S., has drastically stepped up its efforts to take on the iPod with a new Guerrilla marketing campaign. The company’s ”iDon’t” campaign, launched over the weekend, consists mainly of an anti-iPod website, but also includes paid foot soldiers at university campuses. The “iDon’t” website’s main purpose is to promote SanDisk’s Sansa e200 music player by communicating to consumers that owning an iPod is unoriginal and that iPod users are followers.
“Calling all free thinkers, contrarians, and malcontents. The time has come to rise up against the iTatorship,” the site’s manifesto reads. “To resist the monotony of white earbuds and reject the oppressive forces of cultural conformity. Now is the time to break free from restrictive formats and a single source for music. Its time for choice, for freedom, for self expression—and for independent spirits to stand up and say ‘iDon’t’. You don’t need to follow. There is now an alternative.”
The “iDon’t” website proudly links to anti-iPod websites like Cyber Rodent, Anything But iPod, and iPod’s Dirty Secret. SanDisk is also selling T-shirts and offering free downloadable posters and desktop pictures featuring artwork such as iSheep, iChimp, iFollow, iHerd, iSchackle, iDroid, and iPuppet.
The SanDisk campaign is being handled by Grey Direct, which calls itself “a world-leading direct marketing agency with a focus on maximizing return on investment.” A news entry on the site by “Eric (a.k.a. Da Sheep Herder)” reads: “This site and the iDon’t campaign are the creation of several of us renegades behind the new Sansa player, from SanDisk. And this is our playful way of saying “Enough! Yeah, we’re just fed up with the ever-expanding flock of iSheep swarming through our cities. You’ve seen them. They’re everywhere. Every bus, train and city sidewalk is a mass of white headphones. Blindly they’ve bought into the hype without ever realizing there are other mp3 players out there.”
iLounge has received at least one report of an “iDon’t” representative approaching college students on campus offering free T-shirts. An iLounger reports that he was handed a black tee featuring an illustration of a chimp wearing Apple’s popular white earbuds (shown below). “So today, when I came out of my Monday morning lecture at university, putting my earphones on I notice this girl coming up to with a T-shirt,” he says. “At first I thought she was one of those annoying survey people, but I noticed there was more of them and then when I pulled my ear phone off she said ‘It’s iDont.com!’ staring at the T-Shirt realizing that there is an ape with white earphones. She gave it to me because I have black earphones.”
SanDisk’s director of consumer product marketing, Eric Bone, said in February that the company wants to be ”a strong No. 2 in the MP3 space,” adding that “there are people who, no matter what, will buy an iPod. All I want is for people to think there is an alternative.” SanDisk, which began selling digital music players in November 2004, used its weight in the flash memory industry and strong presence at American retailers to sell one million players during this past year’s holiday quarter, putting it in a distant second place to Apple.
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81
I hate these comments threads but I will say that I would probably like this site a lot more if it was much clearer that this was a Sandisk marketing site, as opposed to some anti-iPod independent initiative.
I don’t think it’s bad so much as deceptive.
Posted by JoshSpazJosh on May 23, 2006 at 6:33 AM (PDT)
82
Thanks sandisk for a nice shirt to contrast muh white earbuds!
Posted by jas on May 23, 2006 at 6:35 AM (PDT)
83
I am not a big iPod fan! Infact I hate some of Apples’s policies! But this is not about that! What pains me is the fact that a great company like SanDisk goes out on a smear campaign like this! Cheap! Ridiculous! Every mp3 player has a lifetime and soon even the most ardent iPod fan will have to look for another iPod or an alternative. What this Ad has done is infuriate all those out there who own an iPod!!
What does SanDisk think? Does packing a lot of features into a product and suppliying it cheap make them the best? No way! Infact, the Sansa was an utter dissappointment!
Nobody is thinking that SanDisk is going to the grave Joe, but I am sure many are thinking why SanDisk stooped so low!
Posted by MotorStreak on May 23, 2006 at 8:10 AM (PDT)
84
I find this campaign to be an insult. Not all iPod owners are mindless sheep following the latest trends.
My iPod has a black iSkin and black earbuds, so I don’t need to tell the world that I am an iPod owner. As a matter of fact, I didn’t buy this device to fit in with the “in” crowd, I bought it because it has the features I need, and is the easiest (IMHO) to use. As has been said before, if Sandisk needs to compete with the iPod, it needs to promote it’s OWN advantages instead of smearing the features of other DAPs.
Posted by ahMEmon on May 23, 2006 at 8:36 AM (PDT)
85
WOW,
For those who are listening to this that is all I can say. If you are really
trying to out do IPOD then why are you totally emulating them? Using “i” in
all of the stuff you are sending out? Making a mp3 player that almost looks
like an IPOD. Looks more with this ad campaign that you are paying homage to
a great player by “trying” to be the same.
Also, what is this with just 6GB??? A video player to boot !! Yeah, you sure
can put your whole collection on there.
It is a very easy thing to do..... this wanting to be #1, just make
something better and believe me you will be #1.
I own an IPOD not because of anyone else but because it is the best that
there is for my money.
Posted by Phil B on May 23, 2006 at 8:46 AM (PDT)
86
i don’t understand why we are upset about this. I think the idea is neat. Negative ads are common place.
Don’t vote for X because he didn’t give to his church.
Don’t eat there because they’re food tastes like wood.
Don’t buy that car, because the sound system stinks.
Don’t do this, but don’t ask me if I am any better.
This has been the climate for years. I am not surprised one bit by this. Heck if it causes people to learn more about their product then the ad worked.
Posted by Jason on May 23, 2006 at 8:47 AM (PDT)
87
“Heck if it causes people to learn more about their product then the ad worked.”
Like I said, there’s no such thing as “bad publicity.”
Posted by Chahk on May 23, 2006 at 10:58 AM (PDT)
88
Go Memorex!!!
Posted by Chenz on May 23, 2006 at 11:15 AM (PDT)
89
The artwork is great, a really nice ad campaign with viral tendencies.
Shame the topic is retarded though!
Posted by Craigybaby on May 23, 2006 at 11:44 AM (PDT)
90
Someone needs to print up a bunch of shirts with the Apple logo and “iLead” under it.
Posted by Craig on May 23, 2006 at 11:53 AM (PDT)
91
I’m guessing this will probably go over about as well as Apple’s “Lemmings” campaign did. Seems pretty basic that the way to go about inspiring people to try and/or buy YOUR product is by NOT calling them “sheep” or otherwise insulting them for already owning a COMPETING product.
Nice going, Sandisk. Bravo. <sarcastic golf clap>
Posted by Rob in Memphis on May 23, 2006 at 1:21 PM (PDT)
92
haha. i totally agree. i didnt buy an ipod cuz everyone else had one, i bot it cuz its a great product. In fact, when i bought my ipod almost no body in my school had one yet. iLead… lol
Posted by eric on May 23, 2006 at 1:25 PM (PDT)
93
so 6gb costs the same as 30gb? ummmm.....
nice marketing too, very low.
Posted by scott on May 23, 2006 at 3:09 PM (PDT)
94
This is an interesting one.
I think the campaign is really stupid for depicting potential customers as donkeys being manipulated with carrot and stick. They aren’t going to get many people to switch from iPods by insulting them.
On the other hand - the monkey picture is really cool. That looks like one intelligent monkey. We are all descended from apes. But this works more as an ad for iPods than against them. It’s true hipster-irony to use an iPod while using a cool monkey T-shirt you got from an anti-iPod campaign. Like the Kinks say - “I am an apeman!”
Personally, I do find the near total saturation of white earbuds rather creepy when traveling on public transport, even though I love Apple products. But there is something even creepier about seeing people use non-iPod MP3 players. They are almost always huge, expensive and clunky bricks, or at the other end of the scale, nasty bargain-basement flash sticks.
The people with those almost always tend to be Dell-laptop-toting imagination free conformists. But they spend so much time fiddling with their brick-o-players, that it makes me wonder if they are trying to be “renegades” by not buying the iPods. Does this type of person think that anything stylish, compact, or easy to use is all about fashion, and an insult to their geeky sensibilities?
I’m trying to understand the mindset that buys huge, heavy laptops, and MP3 player bricks to go along with them. My best guess is that they think that things which are bigger and more difficult to use, must be more “powerful” or geeky.
Posted by Harvard Irving on May 23, 2006 at 3:52 PM (PDT)
95
Here’s the question: Why would anyone pay $280 for a Sansa e270 MP3 Player 6GB when they can pay $300 for a 30GB iPod?
Posted by Brian B. on May 23, 2006 at 4:08 PM (PDT)
96
I should elaborate on my previous comment about bricky MP3 players and Dell laptop users.
If the iPod’s popularity is supposed to be all about “fashion,” then why do people hardly ever show off their iPods?
Whenever I see the Apple earbuds on public transport, the user is quietly enjoying their music. The iPod itself is tucked away somewhere. I very rarely see the actual iPod. They might occasionally come out for a quick glance at the song list, but I guess that smart playlists and other iTunesy stuff means that very little interaction is required. Plus, the owners are usually very polite and non-intrusive. They are a balanced mix of male and female, from different social classes and fashions.
Contrast this to my stereotypical Dell laptop guy. He is usually rude, and seems to delight in whipping out his massive laptop on the train, causing inconvenience to other passengers. He is always a male. He seems to delight in showing off that “I have technology, bow down to my superiority,” while other people are just getting on with life. The MP3 player or Pocket PC is constantly being shown off and adjusted.
Of course, the need to constantly flassh it around could just be due to bad User Interface design or functionality, but it could also be a part of tech-posturing.
But perhaps the iPod is just fashion. If so, it is like tasteful fashion - a nice set of inobtrusive earrings, for example. The Dell/MP3 brick is more like a loud Hawaiian shirt.
Of course, these are huge generalizations, but it almost always seems to be the case in my experience. In public spaces - Dell/MP3 player guys are always men, and almost always obnoxious and lacking in social graces. Apple/iPod users tend to be both genders, and much more discreet and sociable.
Posted by Harvard Irving on May 23, 2006 at 4:25 PM (PDT)
97
I think we should buy their iDon’t shirts proudly wear them with our iPods. Then, post pictures of both in different places around the world in the gallery section of this website. LOL.
Posted by gbendana on May 23, 2006 at 8:49 PM (PDT)
98
iTatorship? Does this have something to do with potatoes? Does it make us iPod users Tater Tots?
Do marketing people think before they make up a word that sounds completely ridiculous? Apparently not.
Posted by Podette on May 24, 2006 at 8:58 AM (PDT)
99
that six gigs is nothing, the first day I plugged my 30 gig into my pc, I had 10 gigs on it within the day....SD can’t be serious about taking out the Ipod if they are going to try and rob people with the price of that thing...280 for six gigs! that’s ridiculous!
Posted by Zach on May 24, 2006 at 10:44 AM (PDT)
100
@ Brian B
Here’s the question: Why would anyone pay $280 for a Sansa e270 MP3 Player 6GB when they can pay $300 for a 30GB iPod?
Here’s another question Brian B: Why would anyone pay $249 for a iPod Nano 4GB when they can pay $299 for a 30GB iPod?
Think you’re comparing apples and oranges here!
Cheers!!!
Posted by MLo on May 24, 2006 at 11:03 AM (PDT)
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