It’s more money for Alicia Keys as she steps into the forefront of the Blackberry brand as its Global Creative Director. The talented singer attended RIM’s Blackberry 10 launch event where BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins introduced her as the company’s new Global Creative Director.
Most companies would struggle when faced with a rapidly declining market share, but not BlackBerry. It may be losing customers to Apple and Samsung all over the place, but it knows exactly how to reel them all back in – by unveiling Alicia Keys as its new creative director.
It’s a genius move. Nobody understands BlackBerries like Alicia Keys does. In retrospect, it’s clear that most of her songs were really about smartphones all along, If I Ain’t Got You was about the time she lost her BlackBerry and had to temporarily make do with a substandard Nokia, for example, and Girl On Fire was about the time she made the regrettable decision to buy a Kindle tablet instead of a BlackBerry Playbook. Surely Alicia Keys will lead BlackBerry into a brave new future; a future where all the ringtones sound like generic R&B and Alicia Keys has to be careful not to let anyone photograph her using an iPhone.
“I have been using the BlackBerry 10 for a few weeks now, and I’m truly inspired by its innovation,” she said. “It has entirely revolutionized the experience. I know the potential this platform has to help creative people be more productive, and help productive people be more creative.”
BlackBerry isn’t the first tech company to draft in a celebrity to beef up its credibility. Three years ago, Lady Gaga was named as the creative director of Polaroid. She even designed a printer for the company. Admittedly it couldn’t have looked any more generic if it tried, and people only buy Polaroids ironically now, but it’s the thought that counts. Two years ago, Will.i.am from the Black Eyed Peas was named as the director of creative innovation at Intel; a move that suggested a horrible future where one day he’d mumble disinterestedly over a loop of the company’s jingle for three minutes and release it as another godawful single.
Let’s see how far Alicia Keys is able to take Blackberry, or maybe she’ll be just another celebrity creative director. [Vibe,Guardian]
