Mike Orren Staff

I spent much of my day in non-editorial-related wheelings and dealings, so I missed phone calls from both Paul Andrus (founder, president, CEO) and Clint Hughes (VP marketing, business development) of Data Drive Thru. My particular apologies to Clint, who apparently was a victim of my repeated fumbling during a call-waiting imbroglio this afternoon. (Hey, we do the internet. Telephony confuses and frightens us.)

They wanted to tell their side of the story, and apparently didn't realize that this comment board is an open forum for them and anyone else to do so. Meantime, they did tell their story to Robert Wilonsky, and you can find that here:

http://www.dallasobserver.com/blogs/?...

They also were unhappy about the chimp photo above. Clearly they're new to our site and our whole "find a funny photo when we don't have good art" ethos. I can assure them that our regular users don't take any of our photos seriously.

That said, I personally find PETA's position here preposterous, and "Major companies, including Yahoo! Inc., Honda, PUMA, and Keds" posturing equally so.

(How can Honda possibly sell cars without monkeys?)

In fact, I hereby resolve that we'll find a way to work a monkey with an unlicensed semiautomatic weapon into a Pegasus ad campaign within the year.

And we'll pay him in bananas and cheap liquor...

2 years, 10 months ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )

Mike Orren Staff

I suggest everyone get together and resolve their differences by staging a production of Stop the Planet of the Apes, I Want to Get Off.

2 years, 10 months ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )

Mike Orren Staff

This from Clint Hughes:

Mr. Orren,

In regards to Data Drive Thru using a chimp in our advertising, in your blog you stated "I personally find PETA's position here preposterous" As you commented, we are not familiar with your site or with your sense of humor. However, this is very serious situation and PETA is trying very hard to stir up animosity toward our company through their email campaign.

The real issue is animal abuse and we at Data Drive Thru are against animal abuse in any way. shape or form. Many in our company have been involved in causes to help abused animals, and abused children, for many years. That is what we were trying to convey to PETA in the correspondence in the link you directed your readers to in your blog.

We are your corporate neighbor and having a picture of a chimp with a gun, even though you might have a humorous disclaimer, might give the wrong impression and fuel this unreasonable fire.

If you feel you have to have a picture to accompany the story please find a differnt one. If you really do feel that PETA's position is preposterous then why give it any "air time." We hope that you will remove the article and the picture all together.

Clint Hughes

VP of Markeitng and Business Development

What Clint doesn't understand is that my feeling that a position is preposterous doesn't mean it doesn't get air on our site. This isn't my personal ideological sandbox, and I'm sure that some of our staffers and many of our readers quite agree with PETA.

Clint, no amount of lobbying on how this story is presented is going to change the way we do business. Instead of lobbying for that, I'd use the opportunity of communicating freely with your neighbors here to tell your story, which I'm sure is compelling.

And I know this is an uphill battle -- and this is not just for Clint -- we're not a blog.

2 years, 10 months ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )

Mike Orren Staff

Jen, I really hesitate to ask this, because my spidey sense says to leave well enough alone...

BUT...

While I agree that Cody would have been better off swinging in the jungle and had he not fallen into the hands of this Sid Yost, that genie was out of the bottle before the ad was conceived. And, assuming he is being treated well now (which I'm not hearing any evidence to the contrary), how can you possibly know that "he’d be turning down the Data Drive Thru gig."?

I'm an animal lover myself. And many of the animals I love also love being the center of attention. I worry that those who purport to know what animals want do them a disservice different from those who abuse them, but a disservice nonetheless.

2 years, 10 months ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )