unforum

[TallulahBelle]

[Pixiestix]

1) the eye rolling is because they flat out told you thy were a business selling something.
2) there was not even a smidge of sarcasm in my post. Bluntness, yes.
3) survivalist crazies are not unique to the US - infact I'm finding it Quite common in Europe. I was easily able to find a handful of info on survivalists in Sweden.
4) who said anything about being smarter than anyone? I was simply frustrated that you expressed pity without reading what was written.

[TallulahBelle]

[Pixiestix]

Wow. Being a moderator doesn't mean I'm not allowed to express myself. Nor did I throw a "I'm a moderator so I'm better than you" card. Perhaps there is a cultural issue here, but my being blunt is obviously being taken by you as way more hostile than it needs to be. Take a step back. And no, I'm not saying that as a moderator (nor has any of this been said as one)

[TallulahBelle]

[thebruce]

[Pixiestix]

Mmmmm stroopwafels!!! I wonder if I have some hidden around here still....

[Seadevil4]

And there's me thinking that blan-kits was a nice play on words even there slogan works as well: "We've got you covered"

Appeals to my dry sense of humour. They've got to have a Brit working for them

ETA: Love their facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/BFD2012

[archeologist]

Their website seems odd, like it's not a real website. Are we sure this is a real company?

[Seadevil4]

Whilst I agree with you on the website front they do have a number of items on CafeExpress site to sell.

Perhaps it is just a marketing angle to sell a bunch stuff much like in the 90's when UFO merchandise was sold by SCHWA/USA. I still have one of their T-Shirts: "WARNING! This image is 2 feet from your face and 2.9 seconds in the past. Light is pretty funny."

[MisterMudd]

It was definitely in poor taste to leave the site up for so long after the Boston event, but I am glad they decided to eventually take it down and post their explanation. I wonder if they were contacted by a law enforcement agency before being inspired to make that decision.

Invoking/exacerbating paranoia to market products aimed at paranoid people. Reminds me of some news outlets.

[thebruce]

Ok, personally, if they had explicitly used the Boston event to their own gain, THEN I'd be bothered. But if they simply 'left it up' having been created/started prior to the event, then it could be for any reason that it wasn't taken down immediately. Plainly, lack of immediate action isn't proof of mal intent. There's no reason, imo, to get out the pitchforks against them; other than that perhaps they could have been more attentive and proactive.

That said... I am still iffy about the name being real seems too..I dunno, cliche, cheap punny, or something. "Blan-kits Family Defense, Inc." sounds sort of video-gamey

[bluesylvia]

I'm pretty sure Blan-Kits is a legitimate company, just run by a guy who is painfully new to running a business. Although itcouldhappentoall.us and the Blan-Kits site are relatively new (both from January 2013, according to whois) their "CEO" is definitely a real person with a Facebook account that has been active since 2007 and surely no PM would be daft enough to connect his real name and the real name of his fiance to a game. Not to mention Blan-Kits has been listed as part of various job fairs around the Chicago/Illinois area.

The site had been getting attention for a while (at least two weeks' back from this Y!A post) so I don't think they were trying to "cash in" on the Boston marathon. Just the discovery of itcouldhappentoall.us happened to unfortunately coincide with a terrible event, both in the same city as one another. I think the slowness on part of the company to respond can be blamed on probably the fact that the guy lives in Chicago so he probably had his mind on other things and probably forgot about his little campaign in the moment.

I think his response to the matter was fairly mature, although I personally find his company Facebook page quite distasteful for a variety of reasons.

All in all, the goal of his campaign was to bring attention to his company. And, in the end, it still ended up doing exactly that for him. But I don't think there's anything more to this story.

[Pixiestix]

I simply have a huge distaste for companies like this. And if you look at the Facebook page, yes, companies like this use every single disaster (and in their minds, just about everything is a disaster) as fair game to instill fear to work up business. I'm not saying they did this "game" in response to Boston - but he fed left it up too long, and I do believe only took it down to save his own butt.

[TallulahBelle]

They/he should have taken it down right away. Unbelievably tasteless, and I can't help feeling they left it up a bit too long to get more hits from people who are freaking out, ie their target group.