Weirdest mention of MeFi in the press August 3, 2006 4:33 PM   Subscribe

Weirdest mention of MeFi in the press: in a press release about advice for college students by a boardgame company. They googled, got Ask MetaFilter, and printed it. I have no idea why.
posted by mathowie (staff) to MetaFilter-Related at 4:33 PM (31 comments total)

The game they're shilling looks really awful.
posted by Faint of Butt at 4:39 PM on August 3, 2006


Hm... did they send you an email telling you they were linking? Or did you find it by accident / vanity googling?
posted by qvantamon at 4:45 PM on August 3, 2006


google news emails me once a day if "metafilter" shows up anywhere
posted by mathowie (staff) at 4:50 PM on August 3, 2006


They put "Googled" in quotes. How quaint!
posted by Galvatron at 4:51 PM on August 3, 2006




I encourage you all to watch the demo. Enjoy questions such as:
Dan saves money on cable by watching HBO through his neighbor's window. Where's he coming from? Love or Fear.
The answer may surprise you!
posted by boo_radley at 4:51 PM on August 3, 2006


ack
posted by thirteenkiller at 4:55 PM on August 3, 2006


boo_radley:

OMG! You mean that stuff was not made up in Donnie Darko? I saw that stuff in the movie and thought "Wow, that's some good sarcastic exageration"... and now you're telling me it's not exaggeration at all...

I've lost two more pints of my faith in humanity.
posted by qvantamon at 4:56 PM on August 3, 2006


Thanks for reminding me about that college advice thread, it's a good one.
posted by danb at 5:14 PM on August 3, 2006


What I don't get is why the press release at all. It costs something like $350 to make one hit the wire services, and they don't really link the advice for students with their product so I am confused why they spent the dough to spread the word.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 5:23 PM on August 3, 2006


I have no idea how these people got their askme links into their press releases, or why.
posted by cortex at 5:26 PM on August 3, 2006


I'm trying to figure out if it's possible that they actually got the idea from Donnie Darko. The company is less than four years old...
posted by mr_roboto at 5:27 PM on August 3, 2006


It's possible, but I'm betting against. Plotting nuanced human ethical/emotional constructs on simple-minded non-sequitur axes is the sort of bullshit pop-psychology concept that any number of motivated dipthongs could develop independently.
posted by cortex at 5:31 PM on August 3, 2006


Well, you know what Donnie Darko told them to do with it.
posted by First Post at 5:57 PM on August 3, 2006


Can I let all of you in on a secret?
posted by boo_radley at 6:33 PM on August 3, 2006


They probably did it just to get their name out there. They just did a really bad job. It is similar to when doctors send out press releases about how dangerous it is to eat junk food when pregnant after a britney spears interview reveals she eats nothing but tubs of ice cream each day. They aren't treating her, they have nothing to do with her diet, but it is a way for people to start talking about them.

As for the sample question, why would he be acting out of fear? My guess was that he was acting out of love. Love for tv. Love for HBO. Love for Al Swearengen.
posted by necessitas at 6:43 PM on August 3, 2006 [1 favorite]


Totally unrelated, but did everybody already know that we are on The Hype Machine? I go there sometimes because I learned about it on Metafilter. Is someone going to say "Blog links to other blog, film at 11"? Cause I have feeling you know.
posted by ND¢ at 7:00 PM on August 3, 2006


What is The Hype Machine? Like a digg for music?
posted by mathowie (staff) at 7:17 PM on August 3, 2006


I don't really know what an aggregator is, but it is an aggregator. It takes mp3 blog posts and puts them all in one place. If I don't feel like firing up the old music stealing machinery, and just want one fairly common song, I will go over there and search for it. Tonight is was Sexyback. But before I could find it I looked in the "recently updated blogs" column, and there was Mefi Music.
posted by ND¢ at 7:24 PM on August 3, 2006


Totally unrelated, but did everybody already know that we are on The Hype Machine?

No, and thanks, ND¢!

What is The Hype Machine? Like a digg for music?

Well, not exactly, I think. It's an mp3 blog aggregator, counting Mefi Music as an "mp3 blog" here, and my understanding is that it is automatic, no digg-esque rankings. But I could be wrong. My friends raved over it, so I posted it to the blue.

*wonders what boo_radley's secret is*
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 7:28 PM on August 3, 2006


Oh, look, the spamming of that college thread has already begun.

Lovely!
posted by dersins at 7:29 PM on August 3, 2006


Oh, look, the spamming of that college thread has already begun.

Already? It took almost a year!! ;)
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 7:30 PM on August 3, 2006


Wow, looks like coach got inducted into The Rotarians (halfway down, with induction photo!), and we missed it. I would have went.
posted by R. Mutt at 7:57 PM on August 3, 2006


I've seen the idea of wrapping up your schtick in a boardgame before, in a "make money through real estate" context. It's actually kind of brilliant, because you can craft the rules of a boardgame however you want to to achieve your metric of "success". As long as there's a pair of dice involved, people think that it's just an abstract game that proves your theory, instead of a carefully engineered sales tool.

And I think necessitas is on the right track about Nicole Casanova (nice name). She's ultimately selling herself, so she's just culture spamming to establish cred as someone who understands relationships (in this case, parent-child).
posted by mkultra at 8:08 PM on August 3, 2006


Y'all have flagged the shit outta those comment, yes?
posted by cortex at 8:56 PM on August 3, 2006


I've lost two more pints of my faith in humanity.
posted by qvantamon at 4:56 PM PST on August 3 [+] [!]


Your faith in humanity is a liquid? Mine is gaseous, and I store it in a nervous dog. Every time I lose a little faith in humanity, I open the windows and poke the dog's belly and a little bit more of it escapes.
posted by evariste at 9:43 PM on August 3, 2006


I've never seen Donnie Darko.
posted by boo_radley at 8:23 AM on August 4, 2006


Neither did First Post: Donnie never told anyone to do anything. It was a cosmic bunny.

SPOILER
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 8:52 AM on August 4, 2006


NOOOOOOOOOOOO
posted by boo_radley at 9:44 AM on August 4, 2006


Neither did First Post: Donnie never told anyone to do anything. It was a cosmic bunny.

WRONG!

He told the Sparkle Motion lady to forcibly insert the lifeline exercise into her anus.

Maybe you missed that part?
posted by First Post at 1:47 PM on August 4, 2006


Maybe you missed that part?

For chrissakes, FiPo, we don't want to spoil everything for boo_radley.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 2:28 PM on August 4, 2006


« Older Flag Reasons   |   Circumventing the one-week delay by posting to... Newer »

You are not logged in, either login or create an account to post comments