In an act that may defy the “all publicity is good publicity” rule, Best Buy has decided to suspend one of its employees, Brian Maupin. His offense was the creation of the incredibly popular (over 1.3 million YouTube views) iPhone 4 vs. HTC EVO video on xtranormal. Now, as you well know from watching the video at least seven times, the first line of it identifies the “store” (area of forest) as Phone Mart, and unless all Best Buys have moved into the woods since I last walked past one on my commute to work, there is no identifying factor to link the salesman (salesanimal?) or location in the video to Best Buy.
Until now:
Maupin tells TechCrunch:
“They felt it disparaged a brand they carried (iPhone/Apple) as well as the store itself and were fearful of stockholders & customers being turned off to Best Buy Mobile.”
“I issued a statement to them explaining that the video was intended to be comedic and hence, not taken seriously by them or all these stockholders & customers they are worried about [being] turned off to buying from them due to the video.”
While the argument that the video is comedic wouldn’t hold up, the real argument here is that it in no way implicated Best Buy. At all. Even so, Best Buy asked Maupin to leave his job, which he didn’t do, so now they’ve suspended him pending a decision on whether to fire him completely. And even if he is fired, Maupin is optimistic about life:
“I see it all as a blessing in disguise. I’ve wanted to start my career in graphic design/animation for so long, I see this as my kick in the pants to go get it.”
Maybe consider a career in humor writing, Brian. You wrote something funny enough to get 1.3 million people to see it. And anything that can cost your job due to public spectacle is kind of a big deal.
(Via TechCrunch)
