Commercials in life science research: Roche

A few months ago I commented on a ad by the people at Eppendorf [Are you tired of pipetting?]. They even created a whole website and a music video featuring a boy band to promote a new system called epMotion. Before that, BioRad made a whole bunch of scientists around the world laugh with their "PCR song". Several other companies are now making use of the Web 2.0 to promote their lab equipment and new technologies. Instead of (or mainly in addition to) distributing boring serious flyers (although I know they have to), companies like the ones mentioned and others are composing funny and attractive videos or setting up whole websites to promote their technologies. These videos, as opposed to the aforementioned flyers, are indeed watched from beginning to end by users and are continuously forwarded to their friends, when attractive, provocative or just plain hilarious (In my case and of those close to me, we never read flyers completely, except when you are REALLY interested in the product being sold, but we always thank a funny video on any new technology. Let's face it, we have a lot of downtime in research). These videos will normally take about 2-3 mins. of your life and can really get you thinking on what they are selling, even if you will never ever buy it. At least it will keep circling in your mind, and that's what a good commercial is supposed to do.

After this short commentary, let me introduce an ad by Roche on the LightCyler 480:

[Thanks to Greg Laden]