Crunchies Sponsor Offers Service to Cheat on Crunchies
’)UPDATE 2: Subvert and Profit has removed the offer to sell Crunchies votes. It seems all is back to normal and right with the world on Christmas.
UPDATE: After this was brought to the attention of Techcrunch, Subvert and Profit appears to have been removed from the sponsors list. We have inquired about sponsoring the Game Room Demo.
The Crunchies, Techcrunch’s annual technology awards, are being sponsored this year by social media cheating firm Subvert and Profit. That in itself is odd, but to make things weirder, Subvert and Profit is offering a service for nominees to buy votes and win the Crunchies. How could Techcrunch not see this coming?
On Techcrunch, their Crunchies2009 page lists the sponsors for the event in the right sidebar. This year’s event, the 3rd annual, is being hosted by Techcrunch, Gigaom, and VentureBeat. Subvert and Profit is listed as the Game Room Demo Sponsors.
The irony there, of course, is that S&P have built a reputation of “gaming” many of the larger social media sites such as Digg, StumbleUpon, and YouTube. How could they resist not helping to game the Crunchies as well?
They couldn’t.
It’s right there in the first paragraph of their homepage:
“Subvert and Profit runs an ever-expanding black market for votes on social media sites. We are simultaneously the easiest way to make money online and the cheapest form of advertising in the web 2.0 sphere. We are the crowdhackers, and we are very good at what we do.”
Very good indeed. For a bargain-basement price of $.10 per vote, candidates for the Crunchies can use Crunchies sponsor Subvert and Profit to win this year’s award. There’s no need to expand on any of this. Words wouldn’t do the hilarity of this situation justice.
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This post was mentioned on Twitter by cymil: Crunchies Sponsor Offers Service to Cheat on Crunchies http://su.pr/8aiMqf @techcrunch #wtf #irony…
WOW! Hey I can sellz votez for Crunchiez? KTHNXBAI