Worth the effort?

I came across the following article in the Times this morning that discusses a blog by L'Oreal for one of their men's hair care products.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/19/business/media/19adco.html?ex=1355806800&en=a9398920634b186f&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

Reading through, and then visiting the web site created just for the campaign, it struck me how much time and money has gone into making this effort so elaborate. I mean, they shot a fake TV show for crying out loud! Needless to say, I AM impressed by their committment.

I had another thought, though. In the article, L'Oreal confesses to trying to market to men in the 18 - 34 window who are "extremely savvy" to a variety of advertising techniques and gimmicks. So this viral campaign is meant to become an underground attraction to the proposed target market. Because this isn't a mainstream campaign on all the major networks and in the most popular magazines, just knowing about it makes you "cool."

But is it working? I'm not really feeling it, but is that because I'm not in the target market? Even for a buzz, viral campaign, it seems really forced. I don't feel like the concept "matches" the product, if that makes sense. Does that even matter?

What do YOU think?