The future has arrived, people.  Video advertisements will start to populate your magazines this fall!*  In a joint venture with PepsiCo, CBS will be promoting its fall TV season lineup in the September 18th issue of Entertainment Weekly with an interactive video advertisement.  More specifically, the ad will promote the CBS Monday prime-time lineup and PepsiCo’s PepsiMax soda.  They call it “Monday to the Max.”  This issue will feature the first video ad to appear in print, said George Schweitzer, CBS marketing president.

The battery-powered advertisement is manufactured by LA-based Americhip.  CNET has the details on the technology: “the screen, which is 2.7 millimeters thick, has a 320×240 resolution. The battery lasts for about 65 to 70 minutes, and can be recharged, believe it or not, with a mini USB cord–there’s a jack on the back of it. The screen, which uses thin film transistor liquid crystal display (TFT LCD) technology, is enforced by protective polycarbonate. It’s a product that has been in development at Americhip for about two years.”

Advertising Age got the scoop on how it’s going to work: “When Entertainment Weekly readers open the magazine to the ad pages, they will see a small screen flicker on and start to load a video. A brief segment featuring actors from “The Big Bang Theory” will explain how to use the player, while talking about features from Entertainment Weekly and the different video selections a reader can choose. By pressing one of five different buttons, readers can watch a video montage of [the CBS Monday lineup programs].

*The insert advertisement will only appear to EW subscribers in the New York and Los Angeles areas.  Subscribers from elsewhere and newsstands will receive regular print versions of the ad.  So if you want to be one of the first to witness the potential future of advertising, find a friend who is a subscriber to EW in those areas…or move and become one!

Schweitzer: “It was axiomatic: If you ran an ad in TV Guide, people would watch your program. Not anymore.”  Does this new ad tech seem gimicky?  Yes.  Could it potentially be the future of ads?  Who knows.  Although no pricing was specified, I am sure the decision to use video technology on a battery-powered chip in a magazine did not come cheap.  Let this first try be a test run for marketing companies.  I am interested to see if such a promotional ploy could work.  Be on the lookout this September and decide for yourself.

[Via Gizmodo; CNET; Advertising Age]