Players of Minecraft will now get three bars on their cell phones, thanks to Verizon Wireless.
With the extraordinary innovations that circle around one, have people ever thought that they would be able to use their phones, actually use it, in an actual game? Well, it is safe to say that thanks to Verizon Communication now one can use their cell phone in the Minecraft. Now the players of Minecraft, a blocky game, will be able to make phone calls to their friends from within the game.
The telecommunication giant, in collaboration with Wieden + Kennedy, an advertising agency and Blockwork, Minecraft’s advertising agency, started working on a cell phone that will be able to work within the game itself. Through this innovation, the players will be able to make video and phone calls to their friends; the only downside to this is that they will be pixelated video calls. Along with a video and call option, there is an option of a selfie stick as well; this feature allows a user to take a selfie and even send it to a friend as the cell phone is also able to send text messages and MMS.
The most attractive part of this is the video calls option as a player can dial a call to anyone of their friends and will be able to see them in block form while the people on the other side of the call will be able to see the avatar of the person from the world of Minecraft. Another attractive yet not so useful feature that the cell phones of the Minecraft world have is that of web browsing. The websites in the game will also be blocked and pixelated, it would be difficult for one to read them.
This whole thing came into being through a lot of hard work from Verizon company and the advertising agency. Along with its partners, they built a customized application by the name of Boxel. This specific custom application takes websites and videos and turns them into block form. It takes these options and turns them into a form in which the game can understand them. This project’s code is made available on GitHub, a software website.
Currently there are two largest telecommunication carriers in the United States, Verizon Wireless and AT&T, along with smaller rivals by the name of Sprint and T-Mobile US. The first two most popular networks are the most strong and reputable networks in America.
Verizon stock has been trading at a share price of $44.93 with a decrease in stock price of 1.43%. The earnings per share reported by the telecom company are 2.51.
In the new advertisement that aired on Thanksgiving, the company wants you to put your phones down and live in the moment.
Telecommunication companies all around the globe would their business to grow, would want higher sales, even higher profits and would want more and more customers to use their cell phones as well as consume as much internet as possible but one such telecom company had done the exact opposite, the company being Verizon Communication. It is quite an unconventional approach that company has opted for as the holiday season arrives.
A new television commercial was aired on Thanksgiving in an attempt to promote the telecommunication company but did the exact opposite. Instead of trying to get more consumers to use their smartphones and increase their internet usage over the holidays, the company promoted that people should spend as much time with their families and loved ones as possible. The aim of the commercial was to remind the people that family and giving them time is more important than spending most of their time on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and other social media website. The advertisement ended with a slogan that said ‘Better Matters.’
The telecom giant is urging its customers to put their phones down itself, even though it is merely a publicity stunt by Verizon but it speaks for the larger audience. The message that the company has tried to send through it advertisement is definitely meaningful and will help a lot of people realize the importance of family. According to Verizon news, the company’s aim was to help people get to their loved one and after they have arrived to meet their families they put their phones down and spend time with them.
Melissa Garlick, the head of Verizon’s creative brand team, stated that Verizon will bring people to their friends and family but once they are there the company wants them to be fully available. She added the point of this is to make the audience realize that Verizon is America’s most reliable network that can get them to their families even at such a busy time of the year.
This is not the first time the telecom company has opted for such a campaign and encouraged people to put their phones down. Back in 2009, the telecom company released a campaign ‘Don’t Text and Drive’ which was aimed at safety of driving and supported the laws based on that. Even though the telecom company has put forward a very simple message for their audience, today’s consumer is much for skeptical and it would probably take much for than a holiday ad to get their attention and furthermore to even change their beliefs, as per Allen Adamson who is a brand expert along with being the former chairman for North America of WPP’s Landor Associates.
