Peter Parker — also known as “The Amazing Spider-Man” — is many things: a science-loving nerd, social outcast and secret superhero. But is he a Bing user as well?
A scene in the new movie that shows Parker doing a Bing search is already being called out online as a challenge for viewers trying to suspend their disbelief. A Reddit post highlighting the placement hit the front page on Tuesday as many commenters evoked a similar scene in Hawaii Five-0. (See below.)
Some bloggers have called attention to the placement.
“The ubiquitous product placement was disgusting and absurd,” wrote Nigel Floyd on Letterboxcd. “Peter Parker, a science-loving nerd, uses Bing as his default search engine? He’s a nerd! Nerds don’t use Bing. Nobody uses Bing!”
The talk continued on Twitter: “The Amazing Spiderman is set in an alternate universe where people use Bing to search the Internet,” quipped Chris Baker, a freelance ad agency exec.
Reps from Microsoft could not be reached for comment.
It’s no secret that Microsoft has been trying to get “bing” to take root in the English language as a substitute for “search” and “google.” Though that hasn’t happened, Microsoft keeps plugging away, inserting the term in various entertainment properties.
In the past year or so, Microsoft has paid for Bing to appear in the movie Source Code and the TV show The Vampire Diaries, among others. Microsoft tried to insert Bing into the AMC drama The Walking Dead, but was unsuccessful. Instead, the company ran an ad that showed two actors, presumably from the show, in zombie garb. One, however, just appeared to be an actor and was “binging” the term “eating an actor” as his admirer binged “dating an actor.”
But the marketing may be working: Bing now has about 30% of the search market, if you count the Bing-powered Yahoo. Yet “I’m gonna Bing this” still doesn’t quite roll off the tongue.
What do you think? Does Bing product placement ruin a scene for you or is this just more hating on Microsoft? Let us know in the comments.
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