AP Photo/Charlie Riedel
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If you're looking for info on the Gulf oil spill, your search results may be a little skewed—BP has purchased phrases on search engines so its own website comes up as the first result.
ABC News quotes a BP spokesman making it sound like a kind-hearted effort: "We have bought search terms on search engines like Google to make it easier for people to find out more about our efforts in the Gulf and make it easier for people to find key links to information on filing claims, reporting oil on the beach and signing up to volunteer."
But a lot of people, including "Leroy Stick," the guy behind the @BPGlobalPR Twitter feed, aren't buying it. He's not the only one who believes BP is putting more effort into its public relations efforts than it is into cleaning up the mess in the Gulf.
In case you've missed the buzz about @BPGlobalPR, it's the fake Twitter feed that has almost 150,000 followers, compared with the 12,000 people following BP's official feed. Leroy wrote an explanation of why he started @BPGlobalPR—here's the general idea:
I started @BPGlobalPR, because the oil spill had been going on for almost a month and all BP had to offer were bullshit PR statements. No solutions, no urgency, no sincerity, no nothing. That’s why I decided to relate to the public for them. I started off just making jokes at their expense with a few friends, but now it has turned into something of a movement...
Why has this caught on? I think it’s because people can smell the bullshit and sometimes laughing at it feels better than getting angry or depressed over it. At the very least, it’s a welcome break from that routine. The reason @BPGlobalPR continues to grow is because BP continues to spew their bullshit.
Leroy tweeted this today, after news broke of BP paying for search results: "We're paying Google a lot of money to make sure you only have access to the best possible info on the oil spill: our info."
So careful how you search for information, and who's provided the information you end up with—with BP and anything else that matters.
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