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Faking It
December
20, 2002
BROOKE
GLADSTONE: There's a New Yorker cartoon
of a dog sitting in front of a computer tapping
a keyboard, and the caption reads: On the
Internet, no one knows you're a dog. It turns
out no one knows if you're Dow Chemical either.
Activists have learned the fine art of perfectly
mimicking corporate web sites and filling them
with ironic, caustic, would-be promotional copy.
For example the very official-looking fake Dow
Chemical web site crassly excuses that company's
involvement in the gas leak that killed over
20,000 people in Bhopal, India in December of
'84. The fake web site has enraged the real Dow
Chemical and the PR firm that represents it,
Burson-Marsteller, which also by the way has its
very own fake web site courtesy of our guest,
Hampshire College sophomore Paul Hardwin.
Burson-Marsteller is now suing Hardwin and it's
easy to see why. The fake web sites are filled
with incriminating copy, but they look identical
to the real ones.
PAUL
HARDWIN: Well, it's interesting because
as an imposter you have a lot more credibility
on the internet. So if I was walking around,
claiming to be Burson-Marsteller in person it,
it wouldn't go over too well. I'd, I'd get
arrested pretty quickly. [LAUGHTER] But on the
net companies are still just sort of figuring
out how to flex their muscle. They're being
outsmarted a lot faster than they can respond.
The, the purpose of this project is to highlight
what happened in Bhopal on the anniversary and
to highlight the involvement of the public
relations industry and specifically of
Burson-Marsteller which did business with all
sorts of foreign dictatorships, various
corporations with, you know, unethical business
practices, etc, etc. So-- But, but it, it began
as a project just sort of for fun. I mean a
domain named coststendollarstoregister or
something like that.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Well what
does your fake web site say about
Burson-Marsteller that you think enraged them
the most?
PAUL
HARDWIN: The Dow Chemical site is one of
many sites created with a software called
Dreamweaver [sp?]. The way it works is you give
the software a web site address and you tell it
words that you want to switch around, so I have
some examples here of words that were switched
around. Whenever the software found the term
"work force" it replaced it with the term
"profit army." The word "community" was replaced
with the word "marketplace." The word "peace"
was replaced with the words "cheap oil."
Basically it's an automated process, so-- you
know whereas activism takes a lot of time, you
know, you have to make your banner, your
puppets, your posters, whatever -- you have to
get in a bus - drive to a big city - it's noisy
- there's a lot of police around - they beat you
up - etc. - this thing, you know, you do it from
the comfort of your home - your own home, and it
looks like the site is current and-- you know it
pulls the site automatically and switches out
the words, and so you have a fairly automatic
parody machine.
BROOKE
GLADSTONE: Well what struck me is how
similar the -- your fake web sites are to the
original corporate web sites. I was looking at
the Dow web site. The real one has a little
script at the top that said "Did you know" and
then it says "Dow manufacturing experts produce
life-saving pharmaceutical products such as
Renagel [sp?], a promising new drug for kidney
failure patients." Now on your web site, under
"Did you know" you write: "Dow is responsible
for the birth of the modern environmental
movement. In 1962, Rachel Carson wrote Silent
Spring about the side-effects of a Dow product,
DDT -- another example of Dow's commitment to
living, improved daily."
PAUL HARDWIN: Improved daily.
BROOKE
GLADSTONE: I mean that one isn't very
subtle, but do you ever wonder that occasionally
you are being too subtle for your target
audience?
PAUL
HARDWIN: Well it's a very specific kind
of activism, I think. It's a, it's a new
"market" -- it's an "emerging market."
[LAUGHTER] I think the, the experience of
viewing the web site is, is supposed to be a
little bit unsettling. It's not supposed to jump
out at you -- so you're supposed to read it and
you're supposed to, you know, think about it a
little bit and say well-- why are they being so
honest? [LAUGHTER]
BROOKE GLADSTONE: And the
people that you're reaching are actually people
who presumably are looking for the
Burson-Marsteller web site or the Dow Chemical
web site. [BOTH SPEAK AT ONCE]
PAUL HARDWIN: That's right.
That's right.
BROOKE
GLADSTONE: So you are certainly not
preaching to the converted. [BOTH SPEAK AT ONCE]
PAUL HARDWIN:
Right.
BROOKE
GLADSTONE: Which I guess is why you've
elicited some responses like these: Somebody
writing "You are evil incarnate! Have you no
sense of decency?" And "Is this supposed to make
me feel better or is this some mentally deranged
person's idea of a joke?" Are you glad you're
getting responses like that?
PAUL HARDWIN: There's a lot of
lunatics out there. I, I have to think that I'm
more credible than Burson-Marsteller, honestly,
so I, I trust what I'm putting out there.
[LAUGHS]
BROOKE
GLADSTONE: Well tell me how is the
lawsuit going? Are there enough free speech
loopholes to let you slip past? Do they have a
case?
PAUL
HARDWIN: I think they have a really poor
case, but I think they are Burson-Marsteller.
But it's very difficult to make a case in front
of the World Intellectual Property organization
that is successful and that successfully
counteracts one of these complaints. They, they
almost always rule in favor of the complainant,
so. It's really about remembering this incident
in Bhopal, and it's really about getting some
publicity out about this sort of activism and
the way that, that corporations are able to shut
it down really with a snap of their fingers.
BROOKE
GLADSTONE: So what other 900 pound
gorillas are you planning to incite?
PAUL HARDWIN:
I'm working on several of these sites; I have
been for a while. But there's really hundreds of
these web sites out there, so-- my advice is if
you're going to be contacting a major
corporation you, you should use the telephone.
BROOKE
GLADSTONE: [LAUGHS] Paul Hardwin, good
luck and thank you very much.
PAUL HARDWIN: It was great to
be here. Thank you.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Paul Hardwin
is a sophomore at Hampshire College and-- he has
a big career ahead of him as a troublemaker.
[MUSIC TAG]
copyright 2002 WNYC Radio
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