Guinness World Records PR Fail
by bigpresh on Jul.13, 2009, under Wibbles
And the Guinness World Record for failing at Internet PR goes to… Guinness World Records Ltd.
Recently, FAIL Blog posted a story with a screenshot of the Guinness World Records website, showing the record for “Most Individuals Killed In A Terrorist Attack”. Underneath details of the record, was a link cheerily inviting the reader to “Break this record!”.
It’s clearly a standard part of their site template, but was amusingly unfortunate appearing on that particular record.
However, in a show of complete lack of humour and PR, Guinness World Records Ltd decided to send the owners of FAIL Blog a legal bluster email stating that the GWRL logo is trademarked and demanding that it be removed from the page in question.
I’d like to think that use of a company’s logo when talking about them would be covered by fair use, but fair usage is increasingly murky and hard-to-define legally.
FAIL Blog have decided to comply by blurring out the GWLR logo, but I can’t help thinking GWRL have really shot themselves in the foot by bullying FAIL Blog into removing the logo (even if the GWRL name wasn’t mentioned, you’d easily guess).
This is how *not* to do PR in the Internet age, folks.
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9 Comments for this entry
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Are all drivers selfish ignorant idiots?
July 14th, 2009 on 5:09 pm
exelent post! gracias!!!
July 20th, 2009 on 7:35 am
Thanks for this valuable information. I like your post
July 20th, 2009 on 11:53 am
First of all I would like to thank you for the great article! A very helpful post here. Two things work hand-in-hand. High quality original content and getting back links to your site.
August 2nd, 2009 on 7:12 pm
This should be published on theonion
August 6th, 2009 on 4:00 pm
I can see why GWR blocked thier logo, but I think all it has done is bring attention to the mistake.
August 16th, 2009 on 4:19 pm
Very interesting article. Thanks You!!!
August 20th, 2009 on 5:24 pm
This is so sad. But quite interesting. Thanks
October 7th, 2009 on 12:51 pm
Great post sir, Kudos to you. This is a great way for people to learn one of the best ways to fail in terms of public relations especially on the internet.
November 2nd, 2009 on 8:00 am
Well its right on part of GWR folks about removing the logo on trademark infringement.