Comments on: Bloggers 1-0 The Sun

By: Fredorrarci

Fredorrarci — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 23:40:59 +0000

I got the same email as Arseblogger. Curious how others seem to have got different ones. Jam, the PR company in question, screwed up through laziness and/or stupidity and/or whatever, and compounded it with a half-arsed response sent with the same belief that the recipient is a bit of a div. All in all, this is a faultless display of incompetence. I almost feel like I want to give them a hug.

@Elliott: With an offer like that, how could I refuse? Literally, how could I refuse?

By: Elliott

Elliott — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 22:06:04 +0000

I find this almost too amusing and am inviting everyone who has commented on this particular post to participate in a future contest. If you comment or do not comment or say no or say yes, I will assume you want to participate. The winner will get a phone call from a Nigerian king that will need your bank account info and birth dates so that you can inherit a small fortune.

By: arseblogger

arseblogger — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 21:28:13 +0000

This is the email I just got.

Dear Arseblog,

Some time ago, we invited you to enter a World Cup bloggers sweepstake competition. Since we did not hear back from you, we assumed you were happy for your blog to be included in this activity.

This included The Sun mentioning your blog on its website as part of the World Cup bloggers sweepstake.

However, we have received some negative feedback from some of the bloggers involved, we’ve taken this onboard and as a result we have now removed the activity from our website and ended any association between your blog and our competition.

Should you still wish to be included in this activity or you have any further comments please reply to this email to let us know.

Many thanks

It’s odd the the way they’ve ‘removed the activity from our website’ yet still ask me to get in touch if I still wish to be involved. It’s either over or it isn’t.

I suspect some serious lessons are being learned by the folks involved. I still don’t think they did anything particularly bad, it was just horribly misjudged.

By: Ian

Ian — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 21:14:07 +0000

I got the email this afternoon, which is about as much as I wanted, really.

By: Tom Dunmore

Tom Dunmore — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 20:56:54 +0000

Richard from The Football Blog has been added to the list - it's worth citing his comment on our original post here, as it shows he actively asked not to be part of the contest, and yet was still included:

Hello, Richard from The Football Blog here … sorry to get in late on the act, I just came home to find this had all kicked out and the news story was featured on The Guardian website! Anyway, I was contacted about taking part in this sweepstake and replied to them saying I wanted no part of it. So not only did they incorrectly take what seems like a number of bloggers’ silence as a thumbs up to go ahead and include them in the sweepstake, they actually went against my request and included me anyway. Were they really that desperate to promote their app? I’m sure those involved have now received the e-mail confirming the termination of the competition, although I don’t remember seeing the word ’sorry’ anywhere in it.

Which is really fucking disgraceful, obviously.

By: Tom Dunmore

Tom Dunmore — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 19:56:08 +0000

Fredorrarci — man, even though this has been a giant mess already, it’s pretty remarkable to learn they’d actually write to you that they had brazenly inferred permission through non-response. You’ve almost got to admire it.

By: James T

James T — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 19:51:05 +0000

@Fredorraci
Ours said nothing of the sort. Just asked if we wanted to keep going, to which I said absolutely not.

By: Fredorrarci

Fredorrarci — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 19:33:24 +0000

I don’t know about about anyone else, but the email I received from the PR company today contained an explanation of events as they see it (essentially, that by not replying to the original contact, they inferred that permission had been granted) and notice that the contest had been removed and that they had “ended any association between your blog and our competition”. It did not contain an apology.

By: SpanglyPrincess

SpanglyPrincess — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 15:55:25 +0000

The ‘prize’ was one of the most insulting parts of the whole ill-conceived thing. Though I would be interested to see Brian Phillips interviewing Shaun Custis, it might be quite amusing.

By: arseblogger

arseblogger — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 15:10:43 +0000

For me the biggest insult was the grand prize of an interview with Shaun Custis – which I assume meant we’d have the pleasure of asking him questions.

When you look at the range of talented writers on the blogs they featured it was hugely patronising.