d Blog

Welcome to d blog, also known as Dan's rant. The content herein is essentially comprised of miscellaneous ramblings and random thoughts on the nature of contemporary existence.

"Marketing Gone Awry"

Turner Broadcasting and the Boston Bomb Scare
A Cautionary Tale

A photographer buddy told me that by donning a hardhat he recently gained unauthorized access to construction projects underneath South Florida bridges. He benignly wanted to take some photographs for his portfolio but we were both intrigued by the easy access to these highly trafficked strategic locations. Apparently the American infrastructure remains exposed in this manner.

As we all know by now on January 31 2007, an outdoor campaign by Turner Broadcasting to promote the Cartoon Network's late-night cult hit "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" triggered bomb scares and the closing of two bridges in Boston on Wednesday. Boston residents reported long traffic jams and mass transit delays as police crews searched for explosives. The police also closed the Charles River to boat traffic. Officials say the Pentagon was alerted, and the U.S. Northern Command was monitoring the situation from its headquarters in Colorado Springs.

The thought processes or lack thereof that were employed by marketing executives deciding to place several IED looking devices in high density thoroughfares in several cities, in the year 2007 are extremely disturbing. It provides a cautionary tale of marketing excess.

Authorities, who must err on the side of caution, did not over react as some seem to think. In this day and age of concern about terrorist activities, all police agencies must investigate every possible threat. While it is easy to "arm chair quarterback" events such as this we must defer to the civil servants whose charter demands that they respond to this ill conceived promotion.

Remember it is not the appearance or size of the package that matters; it is the possible contents of that package and the strategic locations they were anonymously left at that require a public safety response.

Chillingly the precedent created by this does not bode well for our society. Whether complacency sets in and deters a complete investigation of future possible threats or evil doers are satisfied with the economic damage inflicted by simply disrupting the normal protocols of our productivity such as the commuting cycle, this event did not help us.

Employees of Turner Broadcasting Systems and the Cartoon Network obviously did not think this through. They did not seek permits; they did not alert public safety authorities. What were they thinking? I’d like to know the ages of the executives responsible for this debacle. Certainly heads will roll. Monetary fines and civil suits are sure to follow. I would not be surprised if criminal charges and subsequent trials develop in the coming weeks.

Not The First Time
I am taken back to Oct. 30, 1938, when Americans tuned their radios in to The War of the Worlds, directed Orson Welles & the Mercury Theatre on the Air, who made it sound like a news broadcast about an invasion from Mars. As the program unfolded, dance music was interrupted a number of times by fake news bulletins reporting that a "huge flaming object" had dropped on a farm near Grovers Mill, New Jersey. As members of the audience sat on the edge of their seats, actors playing news announcers, officials and other roles one would expect to hear in a news report, described the landing of an invasion force from Mars and the destruction of the United States. The broadcast also contained a number of explanations that it was all a radio play, but if members of the audience missed a brief explanation at the beginning, the next one didn't arrive until 40 minutes into the program.
Inevitably, a portion of the audience concluded that it was hearing an actual news account of an invasion from Mars. People hit the roads, hid in cellars, loaded guns, even wrapped their heads in wet towels as protection from Martian poison gas, in an attempt to defend themselves against aliens.
The panic turned into a national scandal. The victims were subjected to ridicule, a reaction that can still be found, today.

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