They appeared in the night sky above Texas: a swarm of purple lights, arranging themselves into an enormous symbol that floated over the city of Austin. To the dismay of UFOlogists it was not a message from another civilisation: instead it was a QR code, a giant floating barcode in the heavens, formed by more than 400 drones, advertising a television series.
Earthlings who pointed their mobile phone cameras at it received a link to a trailer for the show, a science fiction series based on the computer game Halo.
Many were nonplussed. “It’s a crummy commercial,” wrote one on a local internet forum. Another lamented “the slow descent from ads being something you find in magazines to now, where ads are literally invading the night sky”.
Others were more impressed. Daniel Murray, who hosts a marketing podcast, hailed it as “awesome” advertising. Dennis Hegstad, the co-founder of a text message marketing company, posted photographs of it on Twitter. He wrote there was “no noticeable noise [from the 400 drones] when I was inside but the moment I went on my balcony it sounded like a swarm of bees x1000”.
The advert had been timed for the South by Southwest Festival, the tech, film and music jamboree that is held each spring in Austin. It was created for Paramount by Giant Spoon, which bills itself as “the agency that stirs shit up”.
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The drones formed other configurations in the sky on Monday, assuming the form of the logo for Paramount or spelling out “HALO THE SERIES”.
Last night Giant Spoon told festivalgoers to “be sure to look up” for another spectacle, adding: “There may be 400+ drone light shows — towering as tall as the Statue of Liberty and as wide as two football fields – flying over the city of Austin”.
