...just don't do that kind of PR stunt next time, ok?

retronaut

You were not vindicated - the event as described happened. The only difference I can see is that we find out that the entrails were actually delicious Greek soup. While I don't defend the Mail's use of exaggeration and hyperbole, it was, essentially, a factual piece.

The Commissar

shaselai

Infradead

Shadowmist

Its not like Sony came out with another rootkit
or another DRM scheme
Or created another game like Star Wars Galaxies

They weren't screwing their customers this time, they just invited a decapitated goat to a party, nothing wrong with that. The Sony execs probably needed somebody to hang out with, thats all.

Soupgoblin

The "entrails" of the goat was in bowls, it was never placed inside the goat for people to eat. The goat was never stuffed with food to begin with.

Valhallan

I don't think they were biased against Sony, as they would pull this kind of crap regardless of who did it. It's a tabloid, after all.

They did exaggerate it beyond recognition (reaching in to eat the still warm guts, anyone?) But it's a tabloid, it's what they do.

I said in the last thread that I'll certainly leave open the idea that they did indeed pull this stunt. Sony's PR as of this generation has made it clear that they are not above such activity described in The Daily Mail. However, I wanted proof before taking it as true.

I believe that was vindicated.

@boogieordie:

I grew up with a friend that lived on a farm raising cows. They killed their own to fill up their freezer every year, sold the rest. They also had chickens, though they only had enough for their own personal use.

Me and my friend would go out and kill, pluck, gut, and cook them ourselves. Standard way was just to grab them around the neck, and give them a good circular swing. Their necks would snap and they died just as quick. Seemed better than the stereotypical lopping off the head, where their mouths and heads keep staring at you for almost thirty seconds before you stop thinking they are accusing you of something before they die.

Just the way you live in the middle of BFN.

PapaBear

Sony = high standards of conduct?

From the company that employs the basest form of viral marketing and uses its delusions of grandeur to push its own HD format at the expense of its gamer base?

Puh-leeze.

P53protein

The event reported was not the event that occurred, according to the official Sony story.

LostToys

tooltrek

Buck up, ya pansies!

RiptideReo

RDaneel

boogieordie

Also, the nice thing about video games is you can do all kinds of stuff you would never do in real life. All video games lovers assert and re-assert: "Video games do no cause violence." Sometimes you have to yell it. Now here Sony goes and in the name of video games beheads a poor goat. It is disgusting. Ironically, I just rented God of War 2 the day I saw the article and do not care to play it now. Will stick to Guitar Hero 2 on the 360. No goats were killed in the promotion of it, I hear.

sativamistress

sxp151, the happy-headed nose

All I, and others, wanted was confirmation from more than a rag with the credibility of Mad Magazine. It turns out that this story was PARTLY true, yes, and that's fine. But even still, the Daily Mail was the only one reporting this at the time, and the "facts" supporting their claim just didn't have enough weight behind them to be taken at face value.

To many people just accept things they are told without question. Why is it such an offense to you to demand that accusations be backed up with more than hearsay and rumor?

PapaBear

Not that I am any supporter of the Daily Mail - Richard Littlejohn was on the radio this morning and I took vicious pleasure in switching him off. (By way of playing an old jungle track, which turned out to contain copious ganja references, bonus...)

quen

evilplushie

So guess what? The original Daily Mail article was completely confirmed. The only thing they apparently didn't know is that the OPM's writer had exaggerated the article to make it seem even more offensive than it already is.

How am I the only person to notice this? Nobody ever claimed that the goat was killed onstage, just that there was a dead goat with its head hanging off and topless women walking around to promote a fucking video game.

sxp151, the happy-headed nose

Tabloids thrive off that kind of attention. They have budgets set aside for just this sort of inevitability of getting sued.

It's best not to give them any more attention than they have already received.

PapaBear

FatCatLim

Bemaggot

When you've been getting very bad press you need to be extra careful, I would imagine. The story was exaggerated by The Daily Mail, yes, but Sony's explanation really doesn't help. There's a big difference between a cooked, stuffed pig center piece and this goat.

What they really need to do is think before executing something so they don't have to issue an apology later.

PBnZelly

RobotVampire

Screw the UK press. I lived in London for some time (I'm American) studying journalism. I heard the "guest lecturers" (high-ranking British pressman) admit to all sorts of heinous infractions against good journalism. I also got to meet and drink with a rank-and-file journalist from the Daily Mail -- he was the BIGGEST asshole I have ever met.

Sometimes, for fun, I try to fact-check some of the weirder articles published by the Daily Mail -- to no avail. They are complete liars.

Tudo-Legal

You've obviously never been to Michigan. I used to break the neck of chickens for dinner that night.

We used to hunt wild turkey, and if you got one, you smoked the bird and had everyone over for dinner with it's taxidermied head displayed prominently over the table.

A friend of mine told me that when he was in the Philippines visiting extended family, the caught a pig, drained a little blood, hosed it off and stuck it over a fire. Didn't gut it or anything, because they said it "ruined the flavor." They then offered him a piece of face, because it was suppose to be the most tender and thus given to the guest as a gesture of honor.

Point is, what is considered barbaric or weird in some cultures is just kind of par for the course in others.

I am going to Ireland in a few months for the Honeymoon my wife and I never got to take, and I have already been warned about how duck and goose are served (with head still attached and eyes looking at you accusingly.)

PapaBear

StocDred

Dark-Pen

As for StocDred, didn't you just prove my point? Isn't it true that studies show that a very large percentage of american 7-10 year olds don't know where meat, milk, eggs etc come from?

I am a bit influenced by Major Nelsons latest podcast of course.

MartenKL

I'm going to guess that the religiously insensitive comment referred to Catholics. I can't be sure, but that's what I'm going with.

As for the story, I think we can find a middle ground: Sony held a FUBAR PR event (well, maybe not beyond ALL recognition), but it wasn't meant to be a new national ad campaign. I won't red flag the Daily Mail for saying "Hey, wait a sec..." when OPSM printed a story of it. I will red flag them for saying "OMGWTFBBQ TEH SONY BLOOD ORGY!!!" in order to sell papers.

Trystero

And thousands of people carve up turkeys on Thanksgiving dinner table. But I doubt you'll get the same enthusiastic response bringing a freshly slaughtered, nearly headless turkey as a display item to a party.

Valee

Ilia Chentsov

number8888

So let me get this straight. They went to the effort of gutting the goat and having it stuffed with food. However no one was allowed to touch the goat or eat anything?
I smell BS. Why stuff it with food if it no one is going to touch or eat it?

Zim

archioverload

So ya it happened, but not in the "horrific" way everyone was led to believe. I still say its a matter of comparing social standards, whilst it may appall those of us in the US (and I guess the UK?) I've not heard a single peep from the people who attended the party so it couldn't have been too dramatic to them.

I'd hope people would take a lesson from this one, but.....well we all know the internet.

A-Rude-Hero

dieoptix

This is all I needed. I don't see any problem with this, as per cultural reference this kind of thing isn't THAT far off center. It would make me squeamish, to be sure, but you're talking a country that cooks a full goat over a spit and have folks carve off their own chunk.

Still weird, but not borderline satanic as everyone was making it out to be.

PapaBear

Richie

To be fair, it is remarkably graphic in its violence. In fact, it's easily the most gratuitously violent game I've ever played. I'm not complaining, but I can see why the Mail might get upset.

cdammers

The sad fact is all they have done is make people squeemish about the fact the burger they just chugged down once had a face. All this makes it easier for the producers to hide the fact that the animals were kept in horrible surroundings and fed on antibiotics and steroid for their miserable short lives. If people understood where their food came from better then they would care more about it not less. Putting people into denial just makes the bad prectices easier to brush under the carpet (not advised, sheep guts make the shagpile all soggy).

Yes I eat meat/animals. Yes I know it was alive previous to its career as a lamb chop, steak, or bacon but I would rather it grew up normaly before I ate it... It tastes better that way.

Brutalitarian

It is clearly cultural differences and the lack of empathy for other customs.

This was not a party for Greek people- the journalists invited were from all over Europe. Even if it was, I'm pretty sure the greeks don't have a traditional custom of killing goats and using them for decoration at parties. If they do it then its for something with meaning.

Why is it wrong to teach children we kill animals for food?

The goat was not killed for food and as a prop it was used for a sacrificial scene which has nothing to do with eating. It was killed in order to be a decoration for a party.

kama_sheva

should read :Sony is a company whose PR fails half of the time, and has to deal being the popular whipping-boy the rest of the time.

TitillatedOcelot

So what that this article was written by someone who didn't even show up. Stupid? Yes. Devoid of journalistic integrety? Yup. Suprising? Hardly.

An open question regarding association:

How the fuck does a creepy man and goat innards, real or fake, make you want to buy ANYTHING?

Again, leave an opening and the media takes it. Absolutly, totally, fucking amataur.

Pimpbot9000

what's bad is all this stupid stuff Sony doesn't just reflect bad on the PlayStation brand but also on the entire gaming industry!

BigChiefSmokem

The really mind-blowing thing about this isn't the entire event, just that Sony managed ANOTHER PR mess-up. It's incredible. I don't know how any one company can mess up like this with such regularity.

I would say that this proves that they don't even have to mess up. Some rag-tag tabloid calls them out on wild accusations that only minutely hold true and it became a fiasco two months after the fact. What this tells me is that Sony whose PR fails half of the time, and has to deal being the popular whipping-boy the rest of the time.

The hack that wrote the article wasn't there. If journalists attended the party and it was the orgy of depraived carnage as detailed in the article, why are we only now hearing about it? They wouldn't sit on a story like this long enough to leave the party, never mind waiting two months.

If it were my party I would have had the PS3 levitate a live goat and detonate it in mid-air. That'll give that creepy baby doll something to cry about. Well...and the press, I imagine.

TitillatedOcelot

I'm gonna dig out the Sunday paper and see where it glorifies the PS3 or computer games in general. It'l be there or the world will break. Probly only about 4 sentences long.

Maybe Sony should think about hiring a better P.R. company or at least getting them to roll out faster when a paper prints something up that stinks of muck

Mazen

@SpaceWhale: I don't know how any one company can mess up like this with such regularity.

I don't get it either. At which point do they say enough is enough?

PBnZelly

SpaceWhale

It wasn't a public event. It was a private PR event for journos. Even the OPM journo who wrote the piece did not attent, much less anyone from the Mail group.

JonC

God of War II isn't a 'kids toy'. It is rated for 18 and above.

JonC

Didn't think so...

It's totally inappropriate, and that's why people are upset.

number9

We expect better of Sony. It's not a company run by rednecks. Or maybe it is.

Valee

Kotae

The_Drone

I though Sony pulled the picture from the official playstation magazine. The subscription version still has it (My nephew subscribes) but, the shelf versions doesn't. Not sure what the daily mail had to do with anything, apart from pre-printing the picture and pointing out what a stupid way to promote a kids toy it was. They (the mail) didn't make the picture up though. It did appear in the official magazine!

penhalion

That's why organizations like "crazy PETA" exist, to perhaps maybe make people think about the ass-fat greasy slaughterhouse burger they just ate.

StocDred

alx_non_working

Rurouni_Kenshin

It is clearly cultural differences and the lack of empathy for other customs.

Why is it wrong to teach children we kill animals for food? Is good of war not the most violent game, violence that we do not need to understand.

In the US, it is taboo to talk about how burgers are made but the news pumps out killings of humans. But no, no animals were hurt during the making of this show. PETA Wins, crazy people respecting animals more than human. This is of course not restricted to the US, The northwest of Europe has similar ideas.

My guess is the greeks are confused when they hear the outcry, especially that it is too violent.

MartenKL

topgeargorilla

If it had been The Mirror, then Sony would have killed it with their bare hands.

If it had been The Sun, then it would have been a terrorist ritual to abolish computer games, encourage mass illegal immigration and give all the female journalists huge boobs.

Silent_Shark

Anyway, I hate goats. Never liked them, never will. It must be those evil eyes they have that weird me out...

pupaboy

endaround

The only surprise for me is that its not for Manhunt after all. Come to think of it though the idea of killing "Scum", "Murderers" and "Nonce's" (one for the brits there then) is probably in keeping with the real life views of its target audience.

The fact it was for a 2 month old marketing campaign makes much more sense to me.

Brutalitarian

Devr

It's not an advert. It's a picture that the magazine writer attached to a story about a press junket which he didn't attend. Didn't you read the story above?

Sockatume

Sockatume

penhalion

I await the next Sony PR stunt. It'll probably be another round of "Nah, they can't be that stupid" => click on link => "Ooops, Einstein was right about stupidity"

Valee

Typical Mail.

JonC

mmm... mutton curry *slurp*

anyway, i find it weird that they actually rented a dead goat

cyhborg

Super_Nintendo_Chalmers

People and journalists will remember this(isn't this what PR should do?), and of course while being a bit brutal, what y2julio said is true.

Sony trash talk is like an old joke; those old jokes are funny when they are new :)

Jubnut

Sanguis_Malus

y2julio

Cell9song

Hopefuly people remember this and other past Daily stories the next time they talk about video games. Don't read, and you will be better off for it.

Kenofthedead

It tastes as good as it sounds.

Protofunk

Cwolf267