Was the island offer for the BlackBerry 8830 World Edition smartphone legit?

Question

In September 2007 (or possibly earlier), Sprint put out an advertisment that appeared in TIME magazine, and probably others too. The advertisment depicted the BlackBerry 8830 World Edition smartphone, and claimed that if you paid ten and a half million dollars, you would get the phone plus a free private island. The fine print listed the finer details -- that this offer was only available to the 100 wealthiest people in on Earth, pricing details, etc.

It seems almost absurd, and I vaguely feel like I'll be ridiculed for even bothering to ask, but the ad was fairly convincing. Was it legitimate, and why (plus a source, if applicable)?

Answer 1

There was a lot of talk about this some time ago. I found it cool :)

It was actually a marketing joke to get the customer's attention. Sprint did not actually have an island to sell, but if someone was crazy enough to ask, they would refer them to a broker that was "unrelated" to Sprint, and while you did need money to buy an island, you didn't need to qualify as being one of the world's richest.

The whole commercial was genius. Nextel had a cool commercial some time ago too about the nationwide walkie-talkie antenna being so tall it was seen from space....cool :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7Wyh0-Q_...

You can watch the commercial here: http://www.intomobile.com/2007/08/28/spr...