Samsung is hoping it hit a second selfie home run. And it picked the White House as its latest big stage.
On Tuesday, a Twitter photo of Boston Red Sox slugger David Ortiz and President Obama emerged. The shot was reminiscent of the "selfie heard around the world": Ellen DeGeneres' celebrity-packed shot from the Oscars snapped with a Samsung Galaxy Note 3. Samsung, an Oscar sponsor, claimed the shot was unplanned.
The latest shot came as the World Series champion Red Sox visited the White House. The tweet showed President Obama and Ortiz -- affectionately known as 'Big Papi' -- grinning beside a presidential jersey, with other team members in the background. It looked spontaneous, too.
But this time, it appears Samsung had sent in Ortiz to swing for the fences.
Shortly after it was posted, Samsung had it making the rounds as a promoted post on Twitter. The company's U.S. Twitter feed also mentioned that the shot, like the Oscar's, was taken on a Galaxy Note 3. Then Sports Business Daily, a trade publication, reported that Ortiz was on the job: He was shooting images during his team's visit for Samsung, which inked an endorsement deal with him as its "MLB social media insider."
What an honor! Thanks for the #selfie, @BarackObama pic.twitter.com/y5Ww74sEID
— David Ortiz (@davidortiz) April 1, 2014
"Similar to the selfie Ellen was able to capture during the Oscars, this was an opportunity for David to share the incredible moment with his fans," Samsung said in a statement to the Boston Globe.
Thus far, Ortiz's post has scored over 39,000 retweets. That's significant but dwarfed by the Oscar tweet, which won 3 million repeats in its first two days.
White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told Businessweek that the President was unaware of the advertising effort.
The selfie comes days after "Saturday Night Live" opened with a skit of Mr. Obama's social-media team talking him into taking ludicrous selfies -- one with Kim Kardashian, another kissing Justin Bieber on the lips -- in an attempt to boost sign-ups for the Affordable Care Act.
