Here’s a good example of “no such thing as bad publicity”. I think.
A social network called Beautiful People issued a press release today to announce it had expelled 5,000 people from the community.
Most (1,520) of these people came from American, the next biggest chunk of losers (832) came from the UK and Canada just squeezed into the third place on the expulsion list with 533 of its population booted out.
What had these people done wrong? They’d eaten too much over the holiday break, posted photographs of themselves to the social network which revealed they had put on too much weight to be considered “beautiful” any more.
BeautifulPeople.com’s press release says that vigilant members of the site demanded action. Other people wonder whether it was a marketing stunt.
The reaction? Robin Wauters at TechCrunch wondered whether there was a social network called DespicableBehavior.com yet. The Telegraph and the BBC are among the mainstream press running a “can you believe it?” story.
The tactic has had quite a few PR blogs tsk-tsking.
There’s even a real-time stream on Google
Really, though. Beautiful People (dot com) really has managed to grab a lot of attention and headline space with the stunt. It may make the site less appealing to many of us but, in a way, may help boost its exclusively and kudos to just the sort of person who might want to join.
What do you think? PR winner or PR looser?
January 4, 2010
PR