Palm Pre lets you command an army of Asian dancers, new ad says

Hot on the heels of the glamorous Hollywood launch of Palm’s much-anticipated Pre smartphone, you can now watch what is apparently the first television ad for the device — to which my initial response is: “Huh?”

Palm is hoping the Pre will be a strong competitor against the iPhone, and early product reviews are certainly promising. But you probably recall Apple’s memorable “there’s an app for that” iPhone ads, which both demonstrated specific tasks you can accomplish on the phone and reinforced the bigger point that it’s a broad, powerful tool.

In comparison, what is this Pre ad trying to say? I mean, besides wowing us with the, uh, surprising choice of what looks like a vast troupe of Beijing Olympics-style dancers? Here’s what I learned from the commercial:

• The Pre merges your family, friend, work, and play lives in some vague way.
• The Pre has a touchscreen.
• The Pre has a calendar.
• The Pre lets you look at photos.
• The Pre will let you use Pandora.

Pretty amazing, huh? This ad is going to have people tossing out their iPhones in droves, all right.

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