Samsung's VR stunt at the Oscars was cancelled at the last minute

For the past few years Samsung has been a major sponsor of the Academy Awards, commonly known as the Oscars, who can forget the infamous Ellen selfie with A-list celebrities that generated a lot of buzz for the Galaxy Note 3. It was a planned promotional activity for Samsung and it paid dividends as that selfie became the most retweeted tweet on Twitter. Samsung only filled the first ad spot at the Oscars this year with which it pushed the new flagship handsets and its virtual reality technology but it turns out that the company had a bigger virtual reality stunt planned for the Oscars this year which was cancelled at the last minute.

Samsung hired YouTube vlogger Casey Neistat to cover the Oscars as part of a promotional activity for the Galaxy S7 and the company's new Gear 360 camera. Neistat revealed in his vlog today that Samsung really wanted to push virtual reality in a big way at the Oscars. It was initially planned to have Neistat skateboard down the aisle at the Dolby Theater with Samsung's new 360-degree camera, he would have shot past Leonardo DiCaprio and jumped onto the stage holding the camera during the live broadcast of the proceedings. It would have been an amazing stunt and would have yielded an amazing virtual reality video. Samsung pushed the Academy and the TV team to go ahead with this stunt as everything had already been rehearsed but it was cancelled hours before the broadcast started.

Adnan Farooqui - Executive Editor

[email protected]

First Samsung device: SGH-E900

Adnan Farooqui is a long-term writer at SamMobile. Based in Pakistan, his interests include technology, finance, Swiss watches and Formula 1. His tendency to write long posts betrays his inclination to being a man of few words.

Via Virtual Reality Gear 360 Samsung Virtual Reality