UK Blogger Propels Fake Restaurant to the Top Rated Spot on 'TripAdvisor' in London
UK Blogger Propels Fake Restaurant to the Top Rated Spot
on 'TripAdvisor' in London
By STEPHEN KRUISER JANUARY 24, 2018 CHAT
This is SUCH a 21st-century tale.
There are pranks and then there are what shouldn't even
be called pranks because the perpetrator has elevated it to an art form.
A writer for Vice in the UK named Oobah Butler decided to
see if he could create a real buzz around a restaurant that didn't exist using
the online review site TripAdvisor. This is a long video but it's pretty
interesting. It is a mini-documentary that walks us through the entire journey
from the time he was thinking about the concept.
The amount of preparation Butler puts into this should
get him whatever the prank version of an Academy Award is. And if there isn't
such an award, one should be created just because of this. We can lament the
laziness and lack of imagination of millennials all we want but this kid put in
some sustained effort to make gullible adults not only believe that this
restaurant existed, but actually get them writing reviews as if they had eaten
there.
What did Butler need to get all of this rolling?
A phone number. Then a website, of course. After getting
his "restaurant" listed on TripAdvisor, the work of pretending the
place was booked began.
Butler's attention to detail and level of effort here are
most definitely impressive but his personality makes this fun to watch. He
wears goofy hats and he is very personable. One could easily imagine him making
a smooth transition from imaginative prankster to incredibly successful con man
if he put his mind to it.
The woman who recently wrote the thoroughly pedestrian
short story "Cat Person" for The New Yorker was given a seven-figure
book deal after that pile of dreck went viral. What Butler has done here is
infinitely more imaginative and entertaining.
One thing is certain, you'll never trust an online review
again.
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