Pontiac Offers Money...As Long As You Buy A Car

In a twist on the usual interpretation of "friends with benefits," currently getting play on Boston Legal and because Pontiac says it's on the forefront of social networking (their words, not ours), the company is launching a Leo Burnett Detroit-created Friends With Benefits MySpace site which promises to offer awards to friends of those who buy Pontiac G5s. Pontiac tells us the promotion works as follows:

1. MySpace users buy a Pontiac G5.
2. They register their purchase on the "Friends With Benefits" profile page.
3. They start getting cash benefits through their "Friends With Benefits" debit card, all the way up to $1,000.

Umm, buying an entire car just to join a promotion? Oh sure, we can understand the post-purchase, down-the-line benefits but, whoa, that's some price of entry. Getting a free. Oh but hey, if your gonna buy a G5 anyway and get up to $1,000, what's to complain about? Oh but wait. You have to bribe your friends to get a G5 too in order to earn the dough.

While the program is starting with a car, the site queries participants of the products they'd like to see in the future. That's a good thing. Buying a car just to get a few spiff bucks is a pretty big price of entry to a promotion.

Also launching today, the Digitas-created Pontiac Underground, an aggregation of Pontiac Web communities will ttie together Pontiac's GTO fans, G6 fans, Solstice fans, Firebird fans, Vibe fans, and other Pontiac online communities using Yahoo's socialmedia tools. The site will feature feeds of fans' Pontiac videos and pictures, and is, according to Pontiac, "a new type of web destination. It's a socialmedia site by consumers for consumers." Um, it's an RSS reader. Heard of it?