MyDishBiz runs photo and false testimonial of murdered newlyweds
Ben and Catherine Mullany were murdered while honeymooning in Antigua last July. MyDishBiz, an Ohio satellite dish company, used one of their pre-wedding photos in an advertising campaign, running a false testimonial below their photo.
The photo was downloaded from an internet tribute to the couple murdered two weeks after their wedding a year ago then used alongside the bogus testimonial.A spokesperson for MyDishBiz said: "We are trying to track down who sent the testimonial and picture for inclusion on our website."The testimonial said: "We have made $1,080 alone with your MyDishBiz internet business opportunity.
"We are very happy with this program. This is the best opportunity we've seen online ever. Thanks again."
I'll bet they're trying really hard.
MyDishBiz runs photo of murdered couple giving happy testimonial
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And I was under the impression that hours upon hours of demographic research went into selecting the photos that accompany snake-oil ads like these. I imagine people lined up looking at thousands of photos and selecting the one that stands out most. You know, like that Asian girl who dances for a second and then turns to the camera, her hand lifts to her mouth? The one that sells mortgages.
So the take-home message is that MyDishBiz murders people and then uses their photos for bogus (forced?) testimonials? Interesting...
#2: Not only does MyDishBiz murder people, but just prior to doing so, it has their names legally changed, and then transports them to a different state to write the testimony.
But wait - the folks in the pictures that live near my telco central office really did lose all that weight, and those women really are looking for an intensely intimate (yet oddly brief) relationship in my home town, right?
They aren't deceased honymooners, are they?
I remember a few years back a Nigerian scammer was pretending to control funds from a plane crash settlement a highschool friend of mine was in. Thanks to the internet your memories are recycled for other uses.
"We are trying to track down who sent the testimonial and picture for inclusion on our website."
Assuming for the sake of fun that this was actually "sent" to them, shouldn't the burden be on them to verify the authenticity of a testimonial before they publish it?
Of course it's far more likely that a staffer found the picture online and wrote the "testimonial". Is there still a percentage of people who actually believe "testimonials" in sketchy ads? It seems to me that such "testimonials" are included just to conform to genre expectations, not to actually convince anyone.
I do wonder what the law says about this kind of thing. If a company uses my image without my permission for a bogus testimonial, what is my legal recourse?
What would happen if I did the same thing to them? I could set up a "BetterDishBiz" website, and included testimonials from "MyDishBiz" saying "We here at MyDishBiz think that BetterDishBiz is waaay better than us!"
Hmmmmm. This may require a few stakes through the hearts of some MyDishBiz executives. And a ghost whisperer to free Ben and Catherine's souls.
It would be interesting to find the search terms used in Google image search that came up with this couple's image.
I'm so disgusted I don't even want the employees of MyDishBiz to spend eternity in my fire-lake resort.
This opens up a whole new venue for advertising. Now dead Vegans can sell McDonald's! Ghandi's infomercial for the new Taser is amazing! , , ,
@6,
"If a company uses my image without my permission for a bogus testimonial, what is my legal recourse?"
Probably none, if you are dead. I am not being flippant. I'm just saying, you (probably) aren't a celebrity, so unless your estate/survivors detect this shabby use of a photo, nobody is going to do anything.
Any MyDishBiz will continue to use unauthorized, unpaid photographs of dead people, being the "wonderful" company that they are.
I like how the article stresses that it was an AMERICAN company that did this. Obviously this could NEVER happen anywhere else.
@12 - similarly, the article mentions several times that the couple were murdered in Antigua, as if murdering never happened anywhere else. The Welsh are clearly too nitpicky about matters of fact.
Or it could just be the Wales Online house style is to start stories all caps, as in LEVELS or INFLATION or HALF, as in the other stories linkable to, or indeed if including an article, AN AMERICAN.
@8,
This came up a while ago, so glad Boing Boing put me on to it.
www.tineye.com
Perfect for looking to see other instances of a photo. In this case, it turned up zero results (searched over 1.0960 billion images in 11.673 seconds ).
I wish Google would offer this service.
I worked for a small satellite TV retail business a few years ago in TX, and I can't count how many times it was my job to "find some pictures on the internet for our new ad." I mean banal generic non-copyrighted images of people smiling, or Christmas trees for the holiday ad. Some poor idiot with a job like mine probably just found this with Google Image Search for "smiling couple" or "happily married." Sad!
Aren't many married couple just deceased honeymooners?