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PR Firm Unwisely Tangles With Penny Arcade
New submitter FSWKU writes "Courtesy of Penny-Arcade, Paul Christoforo of Ocean Marketing provides a perfect example of what not to do when interacting with customers, especially if you are doing so on behalf of another company. There's name dropping, an ego trip worthy of Charlie Sheen, and even what appears to be a promise to commit libel. Other outlets are already picking up the story and running with it, and an examination of Ocean Marketing's website has generated accusations of plagiarism."
At least Charlie Sheen's ego has some success to support it, what has this guy done other than troll the entire internet?
Personally I'd rather have my idiots at home glued to the TV than out doing idiotic things
of how not to do your job. I have been laughing all day at this debacle, and will continue to do so. This is a comedy goldmine.
That must be way they plan to close between 100 and 120 Sears and Kmart stores.
I'd like to propose a new Internet meme: "Dave with a V".
This was a great read this morning!
From the article:
"You placed a pre order just like any software title the gets a date moved due to the tweaks and bugs not being worked out and GameStop or any other place holds your cash and im sure you don’t complain to activision or epic games so put on your big boy hat and wait it out like everyone else."
-----------
Well, now your little tirade has been Slashdotted. I hope you take your pwning like a big boy.
their servers need to put on their "big boy pants"
as in 'you dropped your handbag'?
with people who buy ink by the barrel. That's an old saying about fighting newspapers. What's the best way to update that for the internet? "Don't pick a fight with people who have huge daily unique views." "Don't pick a fight with people whose backlinks beat 5 digits." Help me out here.
I was one of the lucky customers to order an Avenger PS3 on Dec 5th via Amazon. There were only about a dozen reviews on amazon, and mostly positive, so I placed the order. I waited for about a week after the amazon estimated shipping date, and asked why my status was only "Shipping soon". Their first reply was that it was a pre-order, and that Amazon got the date wrong. I never saw anything on the product page to indicate it was a pre-order. They said that the product would be shipping Dec 17th. I waited 9 more days, and asked why it was still "shipping soon". At this point, I suggested that they do the right thing, and contact all the amazon customers and let them know the status. They pointed me to their order page (not through amazon) which had an update, but no specific date on it.
Today, I saw all the posts and reviews at amazon, and canceled my order. I commented that the reviews on amazon had bottomed out, and that I had lost all confidence in the product and company. The reply I got was simply "It's spam". Yeah, 128 1-star reviews from different people, and it's spam. This guy is already living in his own universe.
Now maybe if just N-Control had there own Marketing maybe they would not end up as part of this mess.
Companies get their correspondence hauled across web pages so much these days that potential customers see bad aspects to any approach they could take. A person who reads this thread could find themselves dealing with this same company in the future because it is at least the devil they know.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
"Shit man, I’m really gonna feel bad if I think that sick children may somewhere down the line have fewer avenger controllers because I got into a pissing match with a sad old man"
Oh, the poor children... they'll have to endure not playing video games (with a specific controller)... THE HORROR!
Does anyone involved in there come across as anything but a douchebag? Certainly the PR guy is the worst but the whole thing is a pasty nerd slapfight of the worst degree.
Seriously. Re-read the e-mails and ask yourself, "Does this sound like something a sociopath would say?"
If you don't know what a sociopath is, then read Snakes in Suits.
Go Penny Arcade! Not only do they run one of the oldest and kickass web comics for games, they run their own gaming convention, their own charity called child's play (its mentioned in the email thread) and they've featured jack thompson on the comic a bunch of times along with the modest video game proposal thing:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Video_Game_Proposal
Is it me or is Ocean Marketing website now down and with its reputation buried on WOT?
Bow before me, for I am root.
Thank you for your email. Due to the overwhelming customer feedback we're getting from the situation with Ocean Marketing we are asking those with specific product related concerns to send emails to customerservice@avengercontroller.co Please know that Ocean Marketing is no longer handling any PR or customer service for our company. We apologize to our customers for Ocean Marketing's remark to one of our customers. We at Kotkin Enterprises know that it's our customers are the true arbiters of our products success and we would never intentionally jeopardize what we see as a relationship between us and our customers. We hope that this incident hasn't put you off of purchasing a truly revolutionary controller. Thank you for expressing your concerns and we hope for your continued support in the future. Kotkin Enterprises Avenger Controller Customer Service Team
...of an Internet Tough Guy.
Which, unless you're getting paid to be a jester, is the wrong way to do any job.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
I expect they meant handbags at dawn,
If God forks the Universe every time you roll a die, he'd better have a damned good memory.
The 'Ocean Marketing guy' is a made-up character in a MacHeist stunt that spiraled out of our control. We are very very sorry.
Also, I'm not sure what a pull click is. I meant click.
These aren't personal e-mails. This is akin to Microsoft telling you to fuck off. One bad employee shouldn't ruin it for the whole company, but who allowed this guy to be part of the team in the first place?
FYI, Ocean Marketing is now Ocean Stratagy - same guy, same service - he's even directly insulting magazine editors now!
If this is where the Internet is headed, I'll go back to BBS, please.
Goodbye, you won't be missed.
The reply I got was simply "It's spam"
Here's the problem: I'd bet money that at least 1/2 of those *are* spam. Vindictive pricks who bomb the shit out of product review scores are becoming more common. They'll negatively review products they've never seen from companies or people they've never spoken to because of the author/companies political views, PR gaffs, a nerd-o-sphere uproar like this, etc. They'll organize campaigns to bomb the reviews of every single book from an author or every product from an entire corporation for purely political or vengeful reasons. We've discussed this problem on slashdot many times before.
These self-righteous bastards view it as some kind of justice, when in fact they're just polluting the review ecosystem with lies, hearsay, and crappy manifestos. If the product or company is that bad it will become clear, from the legitimate reviews, quite quickly. No need to break out your weird brand of street justice and fuck up the system for everyone.
This time the people at Ocean Marketing are arrogant, mismanaging pricks; most of the time you can't be so certain when you see this kind of event unfolding.
Honestly, when I was reading the Penny-Arcade post I started wondering whether this was really just a vengeful ex-employee, or even corporate espionage from another vendor. It wasn't until I read multiple older reviews and forum posts corroborating this story that I became convinced otherwise.
Beware internet justice: you never really know who's behind the keyboard or just what kind of destructive, ignorant campaign they're running.
Fairly sure this is the item Dave was waiting on: http://www.amazon.com/Playstation-3-Avenger-Controller/dp/B005CMZJL6/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325024685&sr=8-1-fkmr1
They also have an xbox version: http://www.amazon.com/Avenger-Xbox-360-Adapter/dp/B0051JSJ44/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325024502&sr=8-1
1. Spell your companies name wrong many times on your website and twitter, plagiarizing content for your site from other sites. ...
2. Give cryptic responses to a query on the progress of an order from a customer.
3. Go on a trippy, grammar and spelling free email rage with the customer and an owner of a successful and popular website.
4. Threaten the people in step 3 and name drop any important people you met briefly or have no association with what-so-ever.
5.
6. Profit???
Also known as ... how to implode a company overnight.
These aren't personal emails. They are from the customer service department. Did you READ the thread? Of course you didn't. Because ALL PARTIES gave permission to post this far and wide.
Cool that you feel all burned by the internet though, without even reading the fucking article. Wouldn't be slashdot without dipshits like you!!
http://www.linkedin.com/pub/paul-christoforo/1/295/835
Feel free to use his LinkedIn page to contact those he knows to bring attention to this situation.
While I agree with your sentiment, once you send something to someone else, even a letter, it belongs to that person and they can do whatever they want with it... (and Mike's event, PAX East, was mentioned and he was subsequently CC'd into the thread). As for the reasonableness of the participants, the Golder Rule should still apply -- though I'm guilty of ignoring that too sometimes - as are others here on /.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Kid should try ordering something questionable from overseas and having it shipped directly to his door.
I've done it. From Deal Extreme. Arrives without a hitch, within a week or two and for free. Any other suggestions?
But to post these private messages without permission and set a mob on the guy is completely unethical.
The guy (Ocean Marketing) was acting in his capacity as a Customer Service representative. Nothing he says is private if the customer doesn't want it to be.
This should be entertaining to me; it is a pretty sweet burn to someone that appears to deserve his fate. Yet I can't laugh at the exchange; it's like taking joy in reality television. Many people do, but I just feel dirty watching the downward trajectory of humanity. Is the customer that less of a dick? Is his motivation at making this exchange public to help other frustrated gamers or to make revenge so sweet and cold? The motive is probably somewhere closer to revenge than help.
Penny Arcade told the guy it was going to be published in an article about the events, and the Ocean Marketing response was, "Great !! Love PR".
He shot himself in the foot, emptied the clip and then reloaded.
"But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it,..." - Nancy Pelosi
Don't post negative product reviews to "punish" Paul. It won't (directly, anyhow). It will directly punish the manufacturers of the product, for which Paul is merely a third-party marketing arm. As Dave points out in his emails - the product is great and he truly feels the public should have access to the product. Trying to drive the company which manufactures it into the ground isn't going to help anyone.
Avenger has indicated they'll no longer use OceanMarketing after the events of the past day. This guy should be going down in flames on his own, not taking a great product with him. Sure N-Control, etc, made mistakes working with this guy. Sure, like most companies they saw only the $$$ but this is nothing new or unique to that particular organisation.
"The true measure of a person is how they act when they know they won't get caught." - DSRilk
---
Retrogames @ Feed Distiller
You may wish to review your grammar before calling an entire country ignorant.
These emails are also from the president and founder of the company, not some out sourced customer relations kid. So yea, it probably should ruin it for the whole company.
They sound like a small shop that totally depended on a fast run through customs to make their ship dates, and it didn't happen. (If you can't ship it yet, don't sell it yet! or the internet will eat you.)
Also, Meathead Marketing really ought to be dismissed with grievance - that's just gross Fail there.
Why is this on the front page of Slashdot? It's juvenile arguing at best, who cares? I don't see how it's news for nerds or stuff that matters?
To be fair it was a wall of text.
There *are* laws about delivery promises with mail order, particularly if there's prepayment going on. Notification of ship delays, opportunity for refund, etc.
Perhaps online sales aren't subject to these laws?
Otherwise, the might and fury of the postal inspection service will be visited upon the miscreant.
(and, if the payment was made by credit card, there's all those merchant card agreements to worry about... The credit card companies take a pretty dim view of merchants pulling the "pay now, oops we delayed shipment" thing, and pretty soon, you can't be accepting credit cards any more)
Hi Paul
This sounds too good to be true. Are we sure this isn't an elaborate hoax put on by Ocean Marketing?
He typed these words and hit send:
Welcome to the internet, bitch. That’s how I roll.
No amount of righteous anger makes that anything less than laughably douchey. Especially when it was preceded by a 5 paragraph tirade about how he didn't get his toy in time for Christmas.
Then there's the PA dude who feels the need to mention not once but twice that he's famous.
I just feel so good!
No kidding, and there's a lot more shit coming from arse these days too.
I'm very happy to see that the folks at Avenger Controller reacted quickly and hopefully this will bring them good publicity in the end.
Any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice.
So did you not read the emails, or are you lying about their content? Those are the ONLY possibilities.
Since http://oceanmarketinginc.com/ uses GoDaddy, and the story of Weebly's fun with GoDaddy, maybe we just need to complain to GoDaddy to get the DNS for OceanMarketing removed..
For those who do not know, here is the weebly story:
http://david.weebly.com/1/post/2011/12/godaddy-a-glimpse-of-the-internet-under-sopa.html
I beg your pardon guys, but a WEB MARKETING firm causing a giant uproar on the web? Wow ... that's SURPRISING isn't it ... now everybody knows their names AND the product ... GREAT EFFIN' COINCIDENCE, isn't it? ;-)
Hey Paul, it's too late to fix the shit storm you created yourself.
The best advice I can give you is to legally change your name, get plastic surgery, change career and move to another country.
Ocean Marketing, we're everywhere, we're in everything! Ocean Marketings emails reminded me of Lindal Global (I think thats the name) from the movie "The Other Guys".
Nor is it a valid comment. Anyone writing "Just Wow" or "Wow, Just Wow" is a fucking idiot and needs to stop writing until they pull their head out of their ass.
I never knew that! All I can say is Wow, just wow! Thanks for the enlightenment.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
The Federal Trade Commission's Mail Order Rule applies here. It's real simple:
Staples paid a big fine for this. So did the Beanie Baby people. In the early days of the Internet, a lot of companies were hit by this, because they had web sites accepting orders at high speed, but the back end fulfillment operation was manual and couldn't keep up. Now, most serious online merchants have the ordering system tied to the inventory system, so they stop taking orders when the inventory is used up,
Given how they handled the whole sexism scandal, if I were running a PR firm I'd stay away from Penny Arcade.
(the original comic was fine, but the way they handled the criticism was just bloody stupid)
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
...of what not to do when writing article summaries. There is no way to tell what the article is about or what is going on, and no motivation why we would want click those links.
Crawl back under your rock Paul.
In my book this puts Dave in the same douchey category as the Ocean Marketing guy.
One day, I just wish one of these internet-bigshots-that-shot-their-own-leg guys would write a book about what they did wrong, and what they have learned about it, just so we can see how that has affected them. Not this guy though.... with that spelling, I would prefer anyone else.
Now, please complain about my grammar and potential syntax mistakes ;)
Not only is he apparently a 'roid abuser, but if you follow the article, he sent an email signed with another persons address! That alone may constitute CRIMINAL charges.
Silence is a state of mime.
'nuff said
A few months back, TheBloggess got a generic PR Pitch, completely disconnected from what she blogs about. She responded in her usual fashion, by directing them to a page that, in part, had a photo of Wil Wheaton collating papers. (See: http://thebloggess.com/heres-a-picture-of-wil-wheaton-collating-papers/ ) Usually, the PR companies that get this response don't reply or send back a polite response. A VP at this PR firm decided to reply to call her a "bitch". Did I say Reply? I meant Reply All. Including TheBloggess. An e-mail tiff ensued with VP claiming that the TheBloggess should be grateful that they sent her the pitch as their sending pitches to her was what gave her relevancy. She ended the exchange with "Please stand by for a demonstration of relevancy." Then, she blogged and tweeted about it.
Now, if you don't know, TheBloggess is big in the blogging world. She has almost 200,000 followers on Twitter and has a HUGE blog following. Her followers went berserk and inundated the company's Twitter account. Wil Wheaton who had posed for that photo on TheBloggess' site and who has almost 2 million Twitter followers tweeted about it. The PR company was forced to backpedal big time.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Isnt the first time PA has been linked to /.
Is someone trying to DOS it?
This just keeps getting better.....maybe its his shady Boston connections...
... HBGary decided they would teach Anonymous a thing or two. I think Colbert could work with this.
So if you go to Ocean Marketing's website (www.oceanmarketinginc.com) you'll find it A) looks very amateurish, B) has misspellings (like "Firat Name" on a form) and C) has a phone number that, when called, is "not in service". Not exactly what you would expect a legit PR website to look like. Maybe this company couldn't afford to hire a more professional outfit but something just doesn't seem right.
The "maker" of the controller is a small company that realized that they couldn't make it themselves because they don;t have the capital, so they made an agreement to have a company in china manufacture it for them. The Chinese company probably did it for close to nothing, but the small company that placed the orders didn't get all their ducks in a row when it comes to manufacturing timelines etc. If you've read some previous complaints, they had previously hired another company to do their customer service for them, again most likely outsourcing because of a lack of capital. After a lot of previous problems, they lost that company. It's not clear if that company bailed, or if they fired them.
It then looks like they hired dave, Whose linkedin page basically says he graduated from Newberry college in 1992, then had no job until he started a small SEO company. SEO as many of you know is a soft art, as 90% of SEO firms don;t actually break the search algorithm, they just figure out some of the effects and learn how to game the system a bit. Well for some reason Avenger decides to hire this web guy to handle their sales and customer service! He was probably willing to do that for close to nothing, and had no idea what a Customer Service nightmare it was. Also previous customer service had made a lot of promises that he couldn't possibly keep, because the maker probably didn;t understand what was going on with shipping and customs and couldn't give him good information on what to accept!
That being said, what should have happened is he should have either - told Avenger he wasn't equipped to handle the scale of the problem, or required enough capital to pay for a team of Customer service people. But like most small business owners that fail, he was an idiot and buried himself and the company that hired him.
This stuff happens all the time, because small businesses operate on small margins, and when you grow to fast it is very very hard to control all aspects of the situation. That being said the controller looks pretty cool.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Apparently, this guy *is* the team....
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Some 70+ one star reviews for the product in question have been censored/removed from Amazon in the last couple hours.
Conversely, a few five star reviews are beginning to appear from fresh new accounts with no other reviews. The reviews contain the familiar typo-ridden style from these infamous emails. I bet these won't be removed, even though they're far more bogus than the review bombing.
At least this guy is trying to earn whatever money he's received, reporting all negative reviews while simultaneously astro-turfing. (After all, it's hard to review an item nobody has received.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqV9kx40RG0
If this is "not all that bad", I really need to see an example that fits your definition of "that bad".
Clearly it is bad...but there is worse: Gerald Ratner's after dinner speech. Ratner's used to be a high street jewelry store in the UK. This one speech wiped ~500 million pounds (possibly over $1 billion dollars with the 1991 exchange rate - even more in today's money allowing for inflation) off the value of the company, almost causing it to collapse.
...so even when it comes to disasters this guy is still not all that great!
Christoforo's Ocean Marketing Twitter account has had its name changed from the misspelled "oceanmarketting" to "oceanstratagy," despite the fact that "oceanstrategy" (a name devoid of any misspellings) was available
Paul, I think it's time to lay off the 'roids.
Your wife's face is also not somewhere you put your fist. Lay off that too.
From his twitter: oceanstretagy Paul
yeah keep shitting on me kids, remember I have your CC info from orders. Let's see how tough you are after some nigerians get em. #War
7 hours ago
http://www.gameranx.com/updates/id/4224/article/ocean-marketing-s-paul-christoforo-has-a-history-of-domestic-violence/
Perhaps this is explainable, in the fact that David Kotkin and Paul Christoforo are 'bros' in real life. A bit of internet sleuthing reveals that the two run a business together in Miami called Afternoon Artists Inc. The relationship is hardly as innocuous as they would have any of us believe.
It would seem that Christoforo's own apology (via the previous Kotaku link), and Kotkin's decision to drop him come after the fact that he had been called out for his callousness, rather than from any actual sense of remorse.
Customer who dealt with Paul during the first half of the year:
http://www.natesnetwork.com/Poor-customer-service
Or are they buds?
SteelSeries is the same, abuse their customers and call them idiots and morons when their website doesn't work or their product fails for the fourth time...
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
"I’m born and raised in Boston ..."
Yeah, that part was easy to believe.
Once upon a time you were reminded to be polite by your peers, and there was time to think before (and after) you said something. Those days are long gone, because whilst verbal exchanges can be forgotten over time, the Internet has the "memory" of several elephants and tends to keep your ill fated words buzzing around like angry hornets waiting to sting you, or any other individual unfortunate enough to get caught up in the next social intruige.
To paraphrase Andy Warhol: "Everyone will be infamous for their fifteen minute post of shame".
PS: I hope that the original purchaser gets their controller and is extremely pleased with it. I hope that the manufacturer works out how to manage their inventory and ordering system and above all I hope that everyone else enjoys their holidays with whatever toys they *did* receive for Christmas. Happy Holidays.
That guy gives assholes a bad name. Let this be a lesson to you kids. What your parents said is true: Whatever you send in an email, pretend it's written on a postcard.
Apparently, many men overlooked Newt Gingrich's harassment accusations, thinking that could happen to any male at random given a flakey female. That's why he weathered that storm. But when he admitted to having a 13-year affair, most of the men who supported Newt dropped him because that isn't something that is accidental or unpreventable.
I've been seeing, and experienced more of this lately.
My former cellular provider (Fido) billed me an extra month after I quit (despite a rep assuring me previously my bill would be pro-rated. Reason: On their "bills" and online TOS they mention that you must give 30-days notice before cancellation. This was a cancellation on the day immediately after my contract had expired, and there was *NO* 30 day period mention on my contract (yes, 3 years later, I still have the original).
After dealing with this CS dept and getting the run-around about a half-dozen times (me: it's not on my contract. them: but it's on your bill, me: bill != contract) I made a statement that "you guys are driving me crazy." Response from the support rep "You're doing the same to me."
Perhaps it's just that they didn't give a f*** since I no longer intended to ever be their customer. They insisted that it was impossible to refund a transaction to somebody who wasn't a customer (we can only give a credit, you'll need to back the charge out off your card and we'll bill you back for half)
As they obviously had no intent of dealing with me. I gave up after about an hour of reps and reported them to the regulator and promptly got my money back a few weeks later.
Summary: Customer service is dead.
Ocean marketing offers reputation management services: http://oceanmarketinginc.com/Reputation-Management.php
Wow, Just Wow.
bah.
is that you Paul?
ROFL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqV9kx40RG0
Hi Paul Christoforo!!
"..One hosts to look them up, one DNS to find them, and in the darkness BIND them."
I never said he had no right to be upset. And I said that the PR guy is clearly the worst of the lot.
But Da(n)ve throws a tantrum when insulted, when he has a viable course of action (cancel his order). Why give your money to the roid-raging PR guy at that point? Why write a novel and a half on someone who is clearly a waste of time? Why would you ever non-ironically type the words "Welcome to the internet, bitch"? The reason is that he sounds broken in his own, not as bad but still douchey, way.
Maybe I'm very cynical, but has anyone tried doing background checks on Dave?
1. You have a customer that is desperate for a product despite being screwed around and insulted.
2. The overwhelming message being put out there is that the easily jetisonable PR firm should be demonised, but the controller company is fine
3. Controller is getting huge amounts of publicity for what is essentially a niche product that most people have probably not even heard about before
4. People have discovered links between the controller designer and PR firm principle, but message 2 is still the predominate message,
At this point I have to wonder? Is Chris a PR genius? Is this a high risk/reward viral marketing campaign?
Dale Carnegie's less popular book.
Any more than a guy with a first aid kit is a doctor. He's in marketing which is completely different.
Counseling is not an answer.
I have had counseling. Ugh.
--H