[vox] (iLoo) MS marketing in the toilet (& a stink raised in the press)

[vox@lists.lugod.org]

UK MS marketing project gets flushed:

http://www.msnbc.com/news/912835.asp?vts=51420030728&cp1=1

excerpts:

Microsoft changes iLoo story again

Net-enabled portable toilet not a hoax, but dead anyway

By Helen Jung
ASSOCIATED PRESS

SEATTLE, May 13 — What’s true with the iLoo? Microsoft Corp. and its
public relations firm changed their story — again —Tuesday about whether
the United Kingdom division had been developing an Internet-enabled
portable toilet.

...

The U.K. division likes to run clever and innovative marketing campaigns,
Gurry said, and had thought an iLoo would appeal to the British. MSN
typically allows its units to tailor their own campaigns to their regions,
she said.
       But MSN’s executive team, which had heard of the iLoo through news
reports, took the unusual step of killing the project on Monday,
she said, believing that the portable toilet “wasn’t the best
extension of our brand.”
       It’s still unclear how much work was ever done on the iLoo. Gurry
said she did not know how much time or money was spent on it.
       The company had said it was building a prototype and was in the
process of converting a portable toilet. But MSN marketing manager
Tracy Blacher said Tuesday in London that the company had not done
that. Rather, Blacher, who described the project in the original
news release that quoted her repeatedly, said MSN had some
discussions with portable toilet manufacturers, which she said she
could not name because she was not at her desk.

...