9to5 Mac have pointed to a “LOLWTF” video by “RIM Speedwagon”, a band consisting of some RIM VPs including Alec Saunders (VP Developer Relations and Ecosystem. When I was at Microsoft as a Windows Phone Champ, I used to say “Well, at least my job is easier than Alec’s.”
Done to the tune of REO Speedwagon’s 1981 hit, Keep On Loving You, the song in the video is a message to developers: just hang on a little longer, and we promise that you won’t be disappointed.
I don’t think it was a good idea to pick a tune that was already retro when many of today’s mobile developers had yet to be conceived, but perhaps they’re aiming at the enterprise developer demographic, who are an older crowd. The song may resonate with those of us who grew up in the ’80s, but to the millennial crowd, it may cement BlackBerry as “the old folks’ phone”. I remember growing up in the ’80s and being annoyed at all the ’60’s nostalgia that the then-guardians of pop culture were shoving down our throats; surely it must be like that for the young’uns today as we expose them to old MTV era tropes.
Still, I have to say that cheese-tastic as RIM Speedwagon’s song is, it’s still a damned sight better than the Bruce Springsteen homage in this internal “Sell more Windows Vista!” Microsoft video aimed at their sales team:
Come to think of it, I think the only techie-focused music video featuring an ’80s tune that ever made any kind of good splash was Here Comes Another Bubble:
I think it’s time to declare a moratorium on these things.