Worst of the Week: Sleep tight, iPhone

Hello!
And welcome to our Thursday column, Worst of the Week. There’s a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for us at RCR Wireless News to rant and rave about whatever rubs us the wrong way. We hope you enjoy it!
And without further ado:
So I’ve been thinking about the iPhone. I’ve been wondering whether it will be successful. And yes, as you may have noticed, I don’t have much else going on.
See, Apple paid several million dollars to advertise the iPhone during last week’s Academy Awards. Apple’s commercial compiled a montage of clips from 31 different movies and TV shows, with appearances by John Cusack, Robert DeNiro, Cameron Diaz, Sarah Jessica Parker and the animated Betty Rubble. Each character answers a phone before a spinning iPhone is shown, followed by a full-screen caption “Hello.” The commercial ends with “Coming in June,” and at no point mentions the device by name.
I for one cannot wait to go buy an iPhone. I always, always do what famous people tell me, and when famous people like John Cusack, Robert DeNiro, Cameron Diaz and Sarah Jessica Parker-ESPECIALLY Sarah Jessica Parker-tell me to go buy something, I’m definitely going to do it. After all, famous people know stuff. Because they’re famous.
But really, the ad got me wondering: How exactly is Apple going to advertise the iPhone? Perhaps it’ll be something like “Hello. The iPhone is coming in June. It’ll be $500. Start saving now!”
Probably not.
Or maybe it’ll be like those commercials for Mac computers. You know the ones, with those two guys: “Hi, I’m a Mac,” and the other one says, “Hi, I’m a PC.” I love those commercials. They’re funny because the PC guy is dumb.
Here’s how I think Apple should advertise for the iPhone using this same scenario:
iPhone: “Hi, I’m an iPhone.”
Regular Cellphone: “Hi, I’m a regular cellphone.”
Chuck Norris: “Hi, I’m Chuck Norris.”
iPhone: “Hey, regular cellphone, can you do visual voicemail?”
Regular Cellphone: “No.”
iPhone: “Can you play movies from iTunes?”
Regular Cellphone: “No.”
iPhone: “Do you have a touch screen?”
Regular Cellphone: “Are you coming on to me? Because I’m not interested.”
Chuck Norris: “One night you’ll close your eyes, and when they open, I’ll be there. And it’ll be time to die.”
iPhone: “What did he say?”
Chuck Norris: “I don’t step on toes, I step on necks.”
iPhone: “Who is this guy?”
Chuck Norris: “Sleep tight, sucker.”
And then Chuck Norris would totally roundhouse kick iPhone to the face. To the face.
Wouldn’t that be an awesome commercial? I would totally go buy whatever Chuck Norris told me to. Because if I didn’t . I’d be a dead man.
OK! Enough of that. Thanks for checking out this Worst of the Week column. And now, some extras:
–A company called Neochroma put out a press release about how it has a technology that can expand the images on a cellphone screen. (Note: The company said it has a prototype of this only, but that “the technology has the ability of getting to market within two years.”) This is definitely a product I want: To be able to project my blurry camera phone photos onto a movie screen, or to be able to show everyone in a room that my phone has no coverage. Yessir.
–Ithaca College is holding its second annual CellFlix Festival, a contest for 30-second films made for cellphones. The organizers of this event said they expect over a thousand entries to this contest. I’m hoping I win with my 30-second video of me wailing on my Dan Meyer-shaped punching bag.
–A prepaid MVNO called XE Mobile announced that it scored a distribution deal with electronics retailer CompUSA. The very next day after this announcement, CompUSA announced it would close more than half of its stores in the United States. I can almost hear executives at XE Mobile now: “D’oh!”
–Motorola unveiled its newest cellphone, the M900 for AT&T Inc. What is the M900, exactly? It’s a “robust, high-performance unit easily installed into service vehicles used by the military, federal, state and local government and emergency management agencies,” according to AT&T’s press release about this news. After reading this press release several times, I came to the stunning realization that the M900 . is a car phone. That’s right, the follow-up to the smash-hit, super-slim Razr is a 2-watt car phone that features “a high-resolution graphic display . adjustable blue backlight contrast . (and) well-spaced tactile keys.” The sad part of all this is that I know a number of people who would prefer this phone over any new feature-packed 3G phone.
–Amp’d Mobile announced it’s going to broadcast a new animated series, following on the success of its “Lil’ Bush” series about President Bush and his cronies . I mean staff. The new series from Amp’d is called “Lil’ Hollywood” and is about celebrities such as Britney Spears, Mel Gibson and others. Said series creator Donick Cary: “We realized, ‘Hey, these Hollywood celebrities are pretty funny-why doesn’t anyone ever make fun of them?'” Yup, that’s right, apparently this will be the first time anyone has ever made a joke about Britney Spears.
–And finally, Verizon Wireless launched Vcast Mobile TV today in Denver, and I do not have a trial phone with which to check it out. I ache with sadness.
I welcome your comments. Please send me an e-mail at chuck@norris.com. Actually, I’m just kidding. My real e-mail address is mdano@crain.com.