In either an obvious attempt to gin up publicity for their new dog tag-shaped ‘MusiQ’ 512MB, US$89 MP3 player or in a display of shockingly pure ignorance and/or amazingly bad taste, BenQ is using an image of the 9/11 World Trade Center ruins, complete with fluttering pieces of paper, search lights, and animated black smoke billowing out of the smoldering remains at Ground Zero, on their Chinese web site.
Roughly translated, the text next to the boy reads, “I believe music makes hope.” Gizmodo translates it as, “”Even if the world is destroy[ed] to dust, I still believe in music.”
We believe BenQ makes disgusting advertising.
Therefore – not that there was any chance anyway – we will not buy any BenQ product and advise our 3+ million unique visitors per month to boycott BenQ as well until the image is pulled and the company publicly apologizes. To be perfectly clear: BenQ can choose to use any imagery they want, just as we can choose not to buy any products from BenQ.
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Wow.
Why doesn’t the f*cking commie govt. crack down on THEM?
Boy – that’s gonna hurt BenQ – a boycott from MacDailyNews/iPod DailyNews…
While we’re at it, why don’t we get all coke employees to stop buying pepsi; all ford employees to stop buying chevys; and all amd employees to stop buying intel chips……..
Not that I don’t love you MDN, but really……
DreamTheEndless,
I applaud MDN for the boycott. It will help – along with Engadget, Gizmodo, and others – to bring notice to BenQ’s disgusting display. BenQ will get a lot of heat – MDN is read by many analysts, tech reporters, and opinion-makers. Watch and see.
On seconond thought….
Never mind.
I have to go change my tampon.
Sorry.
9/11 was an inside job BenQ…and you know it.
Whoda f**k is BenQ???
Holy shit! That’s incredibly crass!
I’m all for freedom of the press, the 1st Amendment and all, but as a New Yorker, that’s shocking.
What is it supposed to mean?
This should be spread to the mass media ASAP!
Let’s get this story spread as much as possible, people.
How about removing the link to their page?
DUH!
Apparently, the designers traveled to the future to copyright this in the year 2007!
Sometimes MDN you can be really stupid.
Since when where there spaces ships floating around the debris of the WTC?
The friggin building looks more like the remains of a church.
How about retracting your accusations and apologizing to BenQ!
I see nothing wrong with this ad.
DogGone, how much of a moron can you be?
http://images.google.com/images?q=WTC ruins
It’s clearly an image of the WTC ruins.
RMN
DogGone,
Those aren’t spaceships, you asshole, those are pieces of office paper covered with the remains of my friends and family. Please visit any NYFD station and tell us all about your ideas: you’ll be “DogGone” in a heartbeat.
I like it. I’d go on a rant about the First Amendment and protected speech, but the site is in China… NOT cool to criticize the Communist Regime, but apparently OK to market our National Tragedy. I’ll wait for Apple to use Hiroshima’s mushroom cloud for the next video iPod.
Nixon – perhaps you should look at the rest of the image – it’s clearly not intended to portray the WTC site.
If some artist used an image for the composition then that’s a stupid goof but saying that the company deliberately produced the picture to stir up publicity is ridiculous.
Boycott BenQ … as if anyone who comes to this site would buy anything other than an iPod anyway.
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Pharaoh, Hiroshima is in Japan, not China. They’re completely different countries.
DogGone,
As “Self-Appointed Defender of the Indefensible,” you must have missed the part where MDN said this could possibly just be “a display of shockingly pure ignorance and/or amazingly bad taste.”
Even if it was just ignorance and/or bad taste and not a publicity stunt, the boycott is completely justified. MDN said it best: “BenQ can choose to use any imagery they want, just as we can choose not to buy any products from BenQ.”
Of all the damn pictures of ruins available to the world, from imploded buildings to wreckages of all sorts, you mean to tell me they just HAPPENED to use some images from 9/11? You’ve got to be shitting me, DogGone.
They knew good and well what they were doing. They wanted one of the world’s biggest disasters as the background for this dumb ass “Hope” campaign.
RMN
barnacle999,
I read about it here just now. Because I read MacDailyNews, this story will be in major media outlets very soon. Bank on it.
What amazes me is that anyone can defend such blatant reactionary takes. Get a grip – it’s an advertisement.
Calling for a boycott over something like that is ridiculous.
Scott Hamilton,
I was just throwing out another “terrorist attack” out as an absurd example.
I wasn’t going to buy one anyway.
Who was? I’m not sure.
Pretty lame boycott.
Get over it. I don’t think there’s is anything wrong with the ad. Many American companies have profitted off this tragedy.
Would you be praising BenQ if they advertised a Marine coming out of ruins in Iraq? I think that’s more of a tragedy.
Why don’t you boycott oil companies and walk to work MDN?