Difference between revisions of "1327: Mobile Marketing"

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==Explanation==
 
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Hat Guy was hired by the Cable News Network to increase its popularity, presumably long-term. However, he just texted one million people implying that a huge, unbelievable event was happening. While this technically did increase viewers of CNN, this was most likely only for a few minutes before the viewers realized nothing had happened. Because of this, Hat Guy did absolutely nothing to help CNN.
 
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Revision as of 05:36, 7 February 2014

Mobile Marketing
We're firing you, but the online headline-writing division wants to hire you.
Title text: We're firing you, but the online headline-writing division wants to hire you.

Explanation

Hat Guy was hired by the Cable News Network to increase its popularity, presumably long-term. However, he just texted one million people implying that a huge, unbelievable event was happening. While this technically did increase viewers of CNN, this was most likely only for a few minutes before the viewers realized nothing had happened. Because of this, Hat Guy did absolutely nothing to help CNN.

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Transcript

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Discussion

The sad thing is that when I saw the name "CNN", and then the title text, I knew exactly what this comic was referring to. https://twitter.com/waxpancake/status/426390907038887936

And ohhhh dear, looking at the latest news/results for this, they've somehow messed up even WORSE than before. https://www.google.com/search?q=cnn+the+news+will+shock+you http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/innovations/wp/2014/02/05/dear-cnn-please-be-careful-about-copying-our-headlines-sincerely-upworthy/

But, I think ironically the best part is how practically everyone that's piling onto CNN for this is also doing the same manipulative, emotive, Upworthy-style headline bait tricks as well. (Looking at you, Slate, Salon, Washington Post, The Atlantic, BuzzFeed, ThinkProgress...)

Mudkip3DS (talk) 07:24, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

BTW I'm not sure how exactly I would phrase this, so I'm not going to add it, but I think one of you should add a reference to those two incidents (the "murder shock" and "rape surprise" ones; though the first one is what I remember making more news, the latter is very recent). It almost seems clear, looking at the comic and text, that it's referring to them. Mudkip3DS (talk) 07:28, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

Ah, and from the first panels, I thought it was going to refer to NBCNews.com's new site redesign. CNN hired Blackhat to redo NBC's website to drive visitors from there to CNN... I mean, who /watches/ the news anymore? 108.162.221.57 07:30, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

It is also worth noting that sending a message to turn on the news to random numbers is very unlikely to drive people to CNN in particular as there are many other competing news channels that they could choose. 162.158.7.28 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)