What disturbs me most with the Adult Swim electronics is that they were able to install all those things without anyone going "What are you doing?" You'd hope someone would be suspicious by strange people fiddling around under bridges and such.

The people who placed them shot videos of the devices being placed. They did it at night, and used telescoping poles to place the devices. The devices had magnets on the back so they just needed to be placed against metal. It actually only took a few seconds for them to place each device, and considering that they did it at night they could easily look to make sure no one's watching for the few seconds it took.

While I know that viral marketing is all the rage these days, if this marketing plan was in any way examined or approved by the executives, I do NOT understand how anyone looking over the plan didn't think, even for a millisecond, that it needed to be run by Legal, and that they definitely needed to get permits and the like from each city in question, even if it also never occured to anyone that they might be mistook for bombs.

well, the dr. didn't say so, but I am pretty sure it is a rare thumb cancer.

well, the dr. didn't say so, but I am pretty sure it is a rare thumb cancer.

Did you catch it from bon?!!

Other viral marketing campaigns haven't bothered with permits. About 7-ish years ago, IBM got into trouble for a viral marketing campaign for Linux. They had people spray-paint Tux the Penguin (using stencils) on sidewalks in a half-dozen cities, which was illegal. I've also seen viral marketing stuff that involved fake crime-scene tape....

Other viral marketing campaigns haven't bothered with permits.

But that's because the cost of getting busted isn't so high, usually. It's illegal here to have ads on scaffolding (or whatever it's really called -- I can't pull the term to mind at the moment), but companies do it all the time anyway, because the fines aren't that high compared to the value of the advertising, which is huge.

well, the dr. didn't say so, but I am pretty sure it is a rare thumb cancer.

Did you catch it from bon?!!

Snerk.

t fuddy-duddy Hmph, scofflaws. t /fuddy-duddy

I get the hipness POV, but it's still dumb. I think I'm getting old.

Viral marketing is edgy -- don't you know that? Edgy people do not get permits. Also, even if they'd been granted, the permits would have been expensive. Viral marketing isn't worth doing unless it's cheap.

You'd hope someone would be suspicious by strange people fiddling around under bridges and such.

Well, as Tommy notes, they could do it quickly; but also, the place the first one was found? A bus stop. Directly next to the T station. Underneath an overpass.

It is like, How did Jimmy get his boogers into his sister's hair? Well, they were two of the nine chidlren mashed into the back seat, so it's possible he just breathed too hard on her.

so it's possible he just breathed too hard on her

And if he aimed just a little bit, well, it was probably by accident.

if this marketing plan was in any way examined or approved by the executives, I do NOT understand how anyone looking over the plan didn't think, even for a millisecond, that it needed to be run by Legal, and that they definitely needed to get permits and the like from each city in question

I suspect there wasn't much oversight and outsourcing to boot. No place for the buck to stop which is why the top dog is now the one going down for it.