Snakes, Shoes and Aston Martins

Want to be like Kobe Bryant? Well, don a pair of Hyperdunks by Nike.

Want to have millions of viewers spread  word of a video for you? Then have the reigning NBA MVP jump an Aston Martin.

But here’s a note. Don’t make the video too slick. Make it look raw. Make it look like Kobe just happens to have decided to go up to the roof of a parking lot with fellow Laker Ronny Turiaf, video camera in tow, and with reckless flamboyance jump a moving car.

For an encore have the man nicknamed the Black Mamba team up with the Jackass crew. This new video shows Jackass regulars like Chris Pontius (Wildboyz tv show) and Jason Acuna along with Kobe Bryant playing around a pool of snakes. And yes, eventually after various Jackass members dive in Kobe jumps the pool to make a dunk.

Of course these videos are viral marketing gold. The Aston Martin video has spawned over 3.5 million views with the Snake Pool video garnering a healthy 200,000 views in three days. What truly makes these videos great is that even non-basketball fans are debating what’s real and what’s Hollywood. That debate has created an exquisite amount of buzz. Like any good viral video there were spoofs spawned of the car trick but thankfully no one to date has actually gotten hurt trying to actually jump a moving car.

Therein lies the inevitable controversy of the social responsibility of the media creator. It is an old debate that stretches from cartoons to video games. Will kids imitate what they see on Youtube? Maybe. Personally I feel it is the role of adults in a community to help educate youngsters as to what is realty and what is made for Youtube. What is great about the social media form is that the community can serve to help decipher that question.

As Kobe glibly responded in a courtside interview, “If Rambo can take on a whole army, I can jump an Aston Martin.”

So wear the shoes if you think it will help your game, but please don’t try this at home.

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Haven’t seen the videos in question yet? See below:

Aston Martin:

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Snakes in a Pool:

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About Angel Djambazov

Born in Bulgaria, Angel Djambazov has spent his professional career in the fields of journalism and online marketing. In his journalistic career he worked as an editor on several newspapers and was the founding Editor-in-Chief of Wyoming Homes and Living Magazine. Later his career path led to online marketing where while working at OnlineShoes he earned the Affiliate Manager of the Year (2006) award at the Affiliate Summit, and In-house Manager of the Year (2006) award by ABestWeb.

For four years Angel served as OPM for Jones Soda for which he won his second Affiliate Manger of the Year (2009) award at Affiliate Summit.

Currently Angel serves as OPM for KEEN Footwear and MedicalRecords.com. His former clients include: Dell, Real Networks, Jones Soda, Intelius, Graphicly, Chrome Bags, Onlineshoes.com, Vitamin Angels, The Safecig, and Bag Borrow or Steal.

Angel is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Publisher for ReveNews.com and ReveNews.org.

Angel lives north of Seattle, spending his free time reading up on obscure scientific references made by his wife MGX, while keeping up with a horde of cats and a library of books.

You can find Angel on Twitter @djambazov.

  • Brad Waller

    Do you remember the Corvette “Dream” commercial that was banned because parents thought it was dangerous to show a kid dreaming about driving a Corvette and doing dangerous stunts?

    I’m amazed that Chevy gets creamed over this and Nike has not had as much trouble. Maybe Chevy should have released the commercials to YouTube instead of broadcast TV?

  • http://www.affiliatefairplay.com Kellie

    Great piece of marketing. Kobe did do the mandatory legal CYA at the end of the Aston Martin jump. Seems a bit silly to have to do that though as it’s usually the most obvious things that end up with the disclaimer. Maybe they should start saying it on the evening news.

    So Angel can we expect to see a video of you jumping over 9 cats anytime soon?