wgite psp

The new white PSP is coming to Europe soon, and Sony’s marketing department has put together an ad that will certainly be “controversial” (read: racist). The billboard shows a white woman, white hair and white clothes “abusing” a black individual. I bet she’s thinking “white PSP power”. Clearly this doesn’t appeal to anyone else than Starbucks Moccachino-drinking buzzword-throwing Manhattan marketers. I feel like getting rid of my (black) PSP in protest.

You can find the ad (and other images) on the Dutch PSP site. [Thanks, Joseph]

[Update 1] Sony has responded to the criticism while speaking to gameindsutry.biz, defending the ad campaign:

“A variety of different treatments have been created as a campaign to either highlight the whiteness of the new model or contrast the black and the white models.

“All of the 100 or so images created for the campaign have been designed to show this contrast in colours of the PSPs , and have no other message or purpose.”

Sony is saying there are no racial intentions, but there’s a reason many people have expressed discomfort over this. Sony also said that they have no plans of running the ad in the UK. Perhaps because the black poplulation is far greater in the UK than in Holland?

[UPDATE 2] Sony has now removed the controversial ads from their Dutch PSP site. I think that’s the last we’ll see of it.

[UPDATE 3] We have a follow-up story here.

[UPDATE 3] I’m closing the comments, things are getting a bit out of hand. You can read the follow-up story if you’re interested. Thanks to all that participated.

Tags: News