The Intrigue Of Joost’s First Advertisement

Would you call the first Joost commercial to be released peculiar? Perplexing? I’d say not, but I’m not the demographic the advert is targeting. I knew what Joost was prior to the release of the beta, all the way back to “The Venice Project.”

So does the Joost commercial succeed in getting the message across, without exposing too much of the product to warrant any immediate snub by the viewer of the advert? I think it’s safe to say yes, but there are a few things about the one-minute clip that has me questioning the thinking behind the plug.

While the Joost “lesson” is being shown, the narrator talks of a service with equal parts television and Internet-based technologies, and community. But the atmosphere of the production doesn’t seem to go quite so well with what’s being sold.

I’d like most to know why its creators went with dark and mysterious as the theme. Don’t get me wrong. The subject in the video is visible. But it appears as if he’s showing you a secret safely shown only in a dusky, mostly featureless basement. A secret whose glowing ingredients you can enjoy if you only agree to visit the lair.

Also, what’s with the polygonal shards floating in the midst of one another, drawn by generous swipes of the man’s arm? I want to know who was behind that. The visual is cool. It’s different; it’s unique. I only wish to know the symbolism. It likely has some abstract correlation to the three-part mixture the advertisement’s muted exhibitor dipped his paw into, but the trail of events looks easy and inexplicable all at once, and thus it is distracting. You want to rewind and play the clip back in slow motion to see if you missed something, maybe an undercurrent of logic your cranium had a difficult time comprehending the first, second, third, and four time around.

I can’t help but have puzzlement written across my mind after the minute’s up. I’m sure I’m reading too much into it. I’m sure most will view the floating red, green, and blue thingamajigs as just that: thingamajigs. Still, my curiosity about the clip’s mysterious facets lives on. And that leads me to wonder whether, when all is said and done, I am indeed one of the many Joost is targeting with this advertisement. I’m still thinking about it, am I not? I guess I’ve been taken, hook, line and sinker.

Watch the Joost commercial here.