Friday, January 16, 2009

Facebook Sacrifices Whopper Promo

"Facebook has disabled Whopper Sacrifice after your love for the Whopper Sandwich proved to be stronger than 233,906 friendships" - whoppersacrifice.com

That's right, Facebook has put a stop to Burger King's "Whopper Sacrifice" promotion that encouraged members to delete 10 of their friends for a free Whopper coupon. And surprisingly, Facebook's reason for pulling the plug is not because the app is offensive. (Read my original blog post "Trading Friendship for Whoppers" here).

Although the application attracted about 82,000 Facebook users in just one week (and resulted in 233,906 friends removed), the problem is that it violates privacy issues.

The app notified deleted friends, along with their friends via a public news feed, that they were "sacrificed for a Whopper." Usually, no notification is usually sent when a friend is deleted from their friend repertoire.

Even though the application was disabled, the word-of-mouth and media buzz surrounding the "Whopper Sacrifice" is a big win for Burger King. The hamburger chain is once again a hot topic (and a controversial one at that). Facebook members have even created a group to bring back the application, wanting more from Burger King.

And for those who were deleted by someone on Facebook for a free Whopper, Burger King lets you send them a Burger King-sponsored Angry Gram. Talk about expanding the breadth of (debatably) witty branding.

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