Microsoft Demos NuAds Platform For Kinect-powered Interactive Ads

Microsoft has officially unveiled its recently rumored NuAds platform with a demo at the Cannes International Advertising Festival, showing off branded content that Kinect users will be able to interact with using voice and gestures starting in Spring 2012. In a Microsoft Advertising blog post, the company describes and shows examples of users speaking on-screen commands to receive more information about an ad, schedule a calendar reminder for an advertised TV show, or show nearby car dealerships on a map. Other demonstrations showed users gesturing to share an ad through Twitter, or waving a hand to vote in polls regarding the content of an ad. These kinds of ads will be embedded in the Xbox dashboard and also included in games and video content on Xbox Live starting next Spring, the company said. Microsoft general manager Mark Kroese says NuAds will be easier for marketers to implement than previous interactive ad platforms because all it requires is web-based content that can be appended to an existing 30 second spot. "[Interactive advertisers] have been confronted with an amalgam of devices, clunky interfaces, closed platforms, conflicting development tools, confusing controllers and a whole lot of frustration," he said. "Many brands have avoiding touching this third rail of advertising altogether, opting to wait until a solid solution arrived."