In a series of Boston newspaper ads today, Time-Warner group apologized for the confusion caused by their guerilla ad campaign for Aqua Teen Hunger Force. Should they have? What did they do? Nothing as far as I can see. The apologies should come from the Boston P.D., for being so stupid that they thought a lite-brite was a bomb, and from this administration, for so scaring a populace that someone would actually think that a child's toy could legitimately be a an explosive device. Time-Warner should have said "Go fuck yourselves you scared idiots", but it didn't. Instead, it chose to apologize for the mind-blowing stupidity of others. No respect here for Time-Warner today.
Friday, February 2, 2007
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3 comments:
Agreeing that it was likely a bit of paranoia symptomatic of the terror created in the nation in the last five years, I don't really find it too surprising. And generally you don't get to advertise on city property without paying for it.
They are not in trouble for not paying for their advertising, they are in trouble for perpetrating a "bomb hoax" which was not their intent. They perpetrated an advertising campaign and the "hoax" was the ignorance of the Boston authorities. It's not their fault that Bostons bomb specialists can't tell a bomb from a child's toy that has been an American staple for at least my 36 years on the planet.
That's not entirely true. You're right in that it's not the lost revenue that they're "in trouble" for. But it is the result that they're paying for. They didn't ask the cities for permission to place the items on city property. Since they didn't, the city didn't know it was part of a marketing campaign. As a result, with the paranoia mixed in, they cost the city a lot of money. The were the original cause.
Also, it's a bit of an oversimplification to call these children's toys. They were electronic boxes that apparently weren't too different than boxes used to detonate bombs, with circuit boards attached, placed underneath bridges (among other places). That the circuit boards had an image of a cartoon really doesn't mean anything, other than it makes the story funny. Also, I don't think we really have sufficient knowledge/experience to really make a judgment as to whether it was legitimate to view these as potential threats. How do you know that some bombs aren't made with children's toys? If you're trying to disguise a bomb, that would be a good idea.
Boston was perhaps paranoid, but that doesn't change that TW was wrong. They know this, they know that their error (combined with other factors) cost the city several hundred thousand dollars. Rather than spend lots of money on litigation that likely would result in them losing in the end anyway, they just paid up front. Seems like a wise economic choice, and not incorrect.
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