Which 2017 Social Media Fail are You?

Not every social media post or campaign is going to be successful for a company. 

Pick a soft drink:

a. Pepsi.

b. Coke. 

c. Gatorade.

d. I only drink water.

Pick a social networking site:

a. Youtube.

b. Anything without two-factor identification.

c. Twitter.

d. Your own corporate website.

Pick a plastic surgery:

a. Lip injections.

b. Liposuction.

c. Emergency corrective dental procedure.

d. Facial reconstruction surgery.

Your s/o catches you sending flirty messages to someone else on your phone, what’s your excuse?

a.  “(s)he was coming on to me.”

b. “Someone else was using my phone.”

c. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

d. “Maybe if you weren’t so crazy I’d be more loyal.”

Pick a hip hop artist:

a. Travis Scott.

b. Young Thug. 

c. Lil Yachty.

d. xxxtentaction.

Pick a kink/fetish: 

a. Sexy cop roleplay. 

b. BDSM.

c. Missionary with the lights off.

d. Mile high club.

Results:

If you picked MOSTLY A’s

You’re Kylie Jenner/Pepsi’s tone-deaf advertising:

You’re fake-woke as it gets. You’ve never read any actual literature on social reform, yet continue to virtue signal with 101-level knowledge by “calling out” illiterate rednecks in Facebook comment threads. In ~10 years you’ll look back and laugh at your “political phase” as you vote for the Conservative party because they promise to lower property taxes.

If you picked MOSTLY B’s

You’re McDonald’s hacked Twitter and anti-Trump tweet:

You’re the type of person who can’t be trusted to dog-sit a chia pet for a weekend. Basically, the human embodiment of Murphy’s Law. When you have a group project, you always get the easiest part. That way the people you’re working with know there’s an easy fix when you inevitably fuck it up. “YOU LITERALLY HAD ONE JOB” is the de facto phrase people yell at you in anger.

If you picked MOSTLY C’s

You’re Adidas’s Boston Marathon Tweet

You’re an okay person, but your painful lack of situational awareness means you have literally no social life. You lost all your friends at the last party you went to because you made the host cry and spilled some sort of sticky liquid all over the carpet. You haven’t had a second date in six years, and you probably think it’s because “nice guys finish last”. You can’t help but say the wrong thing at the wrong time, putting you on the fast track to being “creepy uncle” at family events.

If you picked MOSTLY D’s

You’re United Airlines’ Passenger Dragging Fiasco:

Congrats, you’re literally the worst type of person there is. You’re an abusive partner, a backstabbing friend, and the shadiest of businesspeople. What’s worse is your Machiavellian complex won’t allow you to feel remorse in the wake of all the failed relationships in your life. Luckily, you’re really productive at work, partially because you literally cannot sleep at night. Actually, you probably sleep like a baby, you sick bastard.

Which social media fail are you? Comment your results below!

Earned Media for Assholes

Anyone who read my Newtown article in 2013 knows I don't pay much attention to mass shootings anymore. One major reason is because they happen like every week, so I'm kinda over it. The other reason is because I vote with my dollar/time/clicks, and I'm not letting these troglodytes domestic terrorists run a free media campaign on my watch.

Even before Eric and Dylan got a shout out from Marilyn Manson in Bowling for Columbine, deranged lunatics have seen perpetrating heinous acts of violence as a way to get the attention their parents never paid them. It works really well too. Searching the Vegas Killer's name on Google News returns 12,900,000 results from the last month. My name, by contrast, returns 5,700 results in the same period of time. There are thousands of paid media campaigns happening right now which can only aspire to that level of coverage. The Vegas shooter got it for free. All he had to do was kill 60 innocent people in cold blood.

Why is earned media for assholes such a bad thing? There's plenty of anecdotal evidence to suggest mass shooters are motivated, at least partially, by the promise of notoriety. What's even more concerning is the legit scientific evidence suggesting media coverage of mass killings incites people to go out and do the same thing within a week or two. Turning these people into celebrities motivates more of them to exist.

Some people suggest the solution is to stop publicizing the names and motives of the shooters. Like that's gonna happen. CNN et. al draw way too many viewers putting a lunatic dressed like Batman on Front Street. Fox knows nothing drives engagements like linking a 200 page fascist manifesto to their Facebook page. "If it bleeds, it leads", they say. Since people eat this stuff up, it's going to be front page news. Unfortunately, so long as it's front page news, it's gonna keep happening.

I think the obvious solution is for people like you and I to stop engaging with these killer's public profiles. I can understand reading the story the day after a shooting happens, but is it necessary to refresh Twitter all week looking for "more information"? Here's what all these shootings boil down to: some asshole shot a bunch of innocent people in public. The end. Anything more than a cursory search for information is giving these shooters what they want - notoriety and a platform for their hatred.

Think of a mass shooting as a PR campaign. Every click/comment/share strengthens the brand metrics. Especially considering these are campaigns of hate, where "any publicity is good publicity." The story published three weeks post-shooting about the killer's girlfriend's aunt's dog is a titillating read, but it's also giving the wrong people earned media coverage they don't deserve. Let them take out billboards and pay for sponsored content if they wanna be famous. Don't click those links.