Could Sony's End Of World Viral Marketing 'conspiracy' Backfire?

Oct. 20, 2009 - PRLog -- With so much hot air being blown around the stratosphere by the world's leaders about the environmental damage caused by human activity and what they're not going to do about it, culminating in the Copenhagen Climate Conference 2009, it would seem that Sony's Armageddon scenario has been designed to jump on a juggernaut of fear to create a huge publicity splash.

This movie's internet marketing campaign, if you can call it that, does indeed exploit a fear-based scenario. Cynically, or perhaps cleverly, the moviemakers must surely be salivating over the prospect of the film's success in leading the false charge in the final battlefield of Megiddo, and of making bags of cash in the meantime by stirring up a New Age interpretation of the world's demise.

The year was taken from the Mayanist Mesoamerican Long Count calendar, which is said to have lasted 5,125 years and will terminate on 21 December 2012. The phenomenon is of itself as a "cultural meme" that proposes a cataclysmic and apocalyptic event will occur at that time.

The Y2K hysteria worked so well it seems that the "2012" hoax could well create a similar social reaction. Indeed, their website offers a pseudo survival kit lottery to decide who will be the "lucky few" to be rescued from the global devastation of a cataclysmic planetary collision. It is, of course, pure fantasy, hoax marketing. The campaign's website, TheIHC.com, is operated by the fictional Institute for Human Continuity, where you can even vote for the leader of the post-2012 world, like Dan N, 24, from Phoenix, Arizona, who proposes apples and bananas as part of the "three basic necessities of life" for survival.

According to a tongue-in-cheek report on the huffingtonpost.com website: "Many people are feeling a shift in consciousness happening now and some are predicting a major planetary shift around the year 2012…the Earth comes into alignment with the centre of our galaxy for the first time in 25,000 years in 2012, and more. The Mayan calendar ends in December 2012 and other ancient cultures predicted unprecedented opportunity through these times."

The fictional planet about to bring humankind to the point of near extinction is called Nibiru and is supposedly on a collision course with planet Earth, which certain sub-cultural groups believe will take place in 2012. Wiki says that the idea was first proposed in 1995 by Nancy Lieder, who describes herself someone who can "receive messages from extra-terrestrials" through an implant in her brain. Although the name "Nibiru" is derived from the works of ancient astronaut writer Zecharia Sitchin, he denies any connection between his work and claims of a coming apocalypse.

However, we live amongst many gullible folk that fear this so-called Nibiru collision is real and streams of panicked emails have already been sent by the general public. livescience.com states: "The emails have been increasing of late. And recently one concerned citizen went a step farther and called and left Brown a voice mail: 'I've got kids; this really scares the hell out of me. Is there something I should be doing? Is this real?'"

However, the Institute for Human Continuity's site's fantasy foreboding assumes the following: "The IHC has uncovered evidence indicating that the disasters of 2012 are both real and unavoidable. We believe with 94% certainty that...cataclysmic events will devastate our planet and many who inhabit it. 21 December 2012 cannot be ignored."

On the examiner.com, they conclude that, "Although TheIHC.com site is dramatic and exciting — and it may even be truthful to the extent that most markers point to the world being in deep trouble — it is not a real organisation and is obviously designed to increase ticket sales for Sony's coming release "2012." A hoax, a fraud, a spoof and a farce, but clever marketing nonetheless, just like all the biblically-based apocalypse merchandise."

Maybe it is clever marketing but this campaign could easily backfire. Nasa has taken the issue so seriously that an astronomer at the agency has spoken out to condemn the use of the hoax website. Dr David Morrison, a distinguished scientist at Nasa's Astrobiology Institute, said that the marketing behind the film was "making some people so scared that he feared they could harm themselves". He also said he had "received more than 1,000 enquiries from members of the public who were concerned that Nasa scientists were involved in a conspiracy to deny that they were tracking the movements of Nibiru, a hitherto undiscovered planet on a collision course with Earth".

Vikki Luya, Sony's publicity director, said: "It is very clear that this site is connected to a fictional movie. This can readily be seen in the logos on the site, including the Sony Pictures Digital copyright line and the reference to the '2012 Movie Experience'. It is also evident in the user-generated videos, as well as the numerous online references to this marketing campaign."

But Ms Luya, certain members of the public do in fact take their own lives on conspiratorial evidence that it is untrue. In this case some people could conclude that the Mayans were in fact right, that your denials are a cover-up and that they would rather die now than experience the impending apocalypse. Virally clever it may be, but it is also alarmingly stupid if Sony's image were to be permanently damaged by this brouhaha.

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