HP’s ‘Everybody On’ Upsets Geeks, Shows Average Users What TouchPad Can Do

In case you missed the Grammys last night HP was a big presence showing off the HP TouchPad on stage and in a commercial featuring the voice of Lou Reed. The HP ‘Everybody On’ campaign we showed you last week is about showing users how they can use HP products to follow their passions, which the Lou Reed spot continued to do with a remix of Reed’s “Walk on the Wild Side”.

While it’s arguably not a good thing to mess with the lyrics of Lou Reed, the response to the ad goes far beyond musical purists with complaints coming in from Engadget, CNet and Switched. Most of the complaints address the decision to change Lou Reed classic lyrics to, “Everybody touch, everybody tap, everybody move, everybody app.”

Sure, the HP Lou Reed  didn’t have an upbeat Apple indie rock jingle, but it did do what to many tech companies forget to do — show average users what their product can do. Do I think that HP could have done a better job? Sure, but the ad didn’t “cause nationwide cringing”, nor was it a “walk on the bile side.”

Let’s hope that HP at the least will continue to show users what they can do with their products during this ad campaign. Perhaps they could look for a better song, like say The Black Keys’ Your Touch. Could there be better lyrics for a Tablet commercial than,

“What I want, you got it. So much, I’m crazy for your touch, your touch, your touch, your touch.”

On things for sure, it at least showed users a taste of what they can do on the HP TouchPad, unlike Motorola’s Super Bowl ad which seemed to be an exercise in showing geeks that Motorola watches old Apple ads. Perhaps the team at Motorola should watch the latest iPad ads to see how to show people what their tablet can do, lord knows the Xoom is priced high enough for a second commercial.

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