Two by Two. Shirts of Blue.

January 18, 2011 1:37 PM

Does this strike anyone else as odd? This FPP contains two links to a t-shirt store (where the shirts are quite literally blue,) and a third link to an site with an ad/link to the same store.
posted by zarq to MetaFilter-Related at 1:37 PM (46 comments total)

No.
posted by Stynxno at 1:42 PM on January 18, 2011

Imagine the odds. They are so staggeringly large that it can only mean one thing. A government conspiracy. Possibly to try and get people to buy more t-shirts?

As one of those who posted a t-shirt link (and messed up the links in the post), I can now publicly admit that I am just a Government puppet.
posted by greenhornet at 1:44 PM on January 18, 2011

The "two links to a t-shirt store" are the same link. So it has a link to the W3C's website about the new HTML 5 logo, and a link to the W3C's website selling t-shirts with the logo on it. It's not that surprising that the W3C's page about the logo would link to the page where they're selling t-shirts with the logo.

But: The W3C is selling t-shirts of their HTML 5 logo. That's bizarre.

I'm pretty sure the W3C isn't trying to spam Metafilter though.
posted by mendel at 1:45 PM on January 18, 2011

Just dropped by to say I love the title of this post.
posted by bearwife at 1:47 PM on January 18, 2011 [11 favorites]

Yeah we've been talking about it behind the scenes a little. It's a weird post. I mean, I was expecting an HTML5 logo post but that one is odd. It all checks out on the back end as deep as we've been able to dig so far. Maybe I'll ping the OP and have her come over here and say hi.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 1:48 PM on January 18, 2011

mendel: " I'm pretty sure the W3C isn't trying to spam Metafilter though."

This is the company that created the brand identity for and is now marketing the HTML 5 logo: Ocupop.
posted by zarq at 1:48 PM on January 18, 2011

I'm pretty sure the W3C isn't trying to spam Metafilter though.

What is Ocupop? We’re not entirely sure honestly… Are we Creatives? Graphic designers? Web designers? Maybe web developers? Commercial artists? Trend-spotters? Branding experts?

If this were spam, it probably came from Octorock.
posted by kid ichorous at 1:52 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

Yeah there are no connections that we can see between the OP and ocupop. We've been running whois on every domain we can find but there's not even a friends-of-friends connection that we can find, so it looks like more of a clumsy post than anything. That said, I wouldn't be surprised if we were wrong, but if we are, I can't see it yet.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 1:53 PM on January 18, 2011

Does this strike anyone else as odd?

Well, it does seem peculiarly curious, but not crazy, extraordinary, freakish, remarkable, queer or kinky.

But definitely kooky.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 1:57 PM on January 18, 2011

Yeah, lack of anything damning kind of leaves this in "huh" territory but not particularly troubling. The "two links to the same shirt site" thing isn't so weird from my end because I can see that the poster just used the link in both the standalone link field and in the main body of the post; I've seen that happen before, more of a greenhorn posting mistake than anything.
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:57 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

jessamyn: "Yeah there are no connections that we can see between the OP and ocupop."

Good! Glad to hear it!

Greenhornet, I apologize.
posted by zarq at 1:59 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

Ocupop sounds like a real-life version of Frog Hammer from Slings and Arrows.
posted by Sidhedevil at 1:59 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

Also, Kato would never have made that mistake.
posted by Sidhedevil at 2:00 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

Wow, Ocupop is responsible for promoting/branding/marketing Trek Travel? Go bike touring with insufferable assholes, ride expensive bikes. Sounds like fun.
posted by fixedgear at 2:00 PM on January 18, 2011

Surely "here's a new logo and a place to buy it! Do you like it or not?" breaks the guidelines, regardless of whether it's a self-link.

Eh, it's been making the nerd rounds today so I'm not that surprised it's showed up here.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:00 PM on January 18, 2011

Are we Creatives? Graphic designers? Web designers? Maybe web developers? Commercial artists? Trend-spotters? Branding experts?

Lets all just enjoy this bit of .....copy.
posted by The Whelk at 2:02 PM on January 18, 2011 [4 favorites]

bearwife: "Just dropped by to say I love the title of this post."

Thanks. :)
posted by zarq at 2:03 PM on January 18, 2011

It is odd. Who would print a bunch of wrinkly shirts like that?
posted by Devils Rancher at 2:04 PM on January 18, 2011

> This is the company that created the brand identity for and is now marketing the HTML 5 logo: Ocupop.

Oh weird, I assumed it was programmers not designers who came up with the compliance badges, hence their complete lack of linkage between signifier and signified.
posted by stp123 at 2:05 PM on January 18, 2011

No seriously, I'm going to wear this to work from now on. Screw all the haters.
posted by [insert clever name here] at 2:05 PM on January 18, 2011

All logo-related posts should be required to link to Brand New.
posted by shakespeherian at 2:06 PM on January 18, 2011

Hi all,

Before this all gets out of hand... a few things. I created the post being discussed...

A disclaimer:

1. My name us Russ and I own and Manage an Australian based web business called Max Design.
2. I have never heard of ocupop until this thread.
3. I am not associated with the W3C or ocupop in any way.
4. I am not a friend of anyone at ocupop, and while I know some people within the W3C, they work in entirely different areas within the organisation and would not care two hoots if I posted about their logo.

Motivation for post?

I posted the links simply because I found it VERY odd that the W3C would release a logo AND a tshirt for a markup language. I thought that others might also find it weird/interesting/amuzing/puzzling.

There was no other motivation - ie profit, pushing a product, pushing a friends product etc.

Weird double links?

Finally, re the two links within the one post... that was my mistake. My first post and I stuffed up. :(

Thanks all.
posted by greenhornet at 2:06 PM on January 18, 2011 [8 favorites]

Are we creatives, or are we dancer?
posted by Metroid Baby at 2:06 PM on January 18, 2011 [5 favorites]

greenhornet: " I posted the links simply because I found it VERY odd that the W3C would release a logo AND a tshirt for a markup language. I thought that others might also find it weird/interesting/amuzing/puzzling.

There was no other motivation - ie profit, pushing a product, pushing a friends product etc."


Completely fair. Thanks for explaining, and again, I apologize for calling you out.
posted by zarq at 2:11 PM on January 18, 2011

Oops - sorry for the threadshit, I should have checked MeTa first... but linking to a t-shirt storefront? Really? It's not even like the inherent lameness of the graphic in question is out of character for that organization...
posted by OneMonkeysUncle at 2:11 PM on January 18, 2011

I [+] HTML5.
posted by cjorgensen at 2:24 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

My first post and I stuffed up

As penance, you should be forced to wear the t-shirt,
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 2:26 PM on January 18, 2011 [4 favorites]

Brandon Blatcher: As penance, you should be forced to wear the t-shirt,

Please... anything but that! [breaks down sobbing]
posted by greenhornet at 2:38 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

I think you'll get along here just fine.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:39 PM on January 18, 2011 [5 favorites]

[breaks down sobbing]

Oh hey we must be in MetaTalk.
posted by shakespeherian at 2:44 PM on January 18, 2011 [7 favorites]

more of a greenhorn posting mistake than anything.

I see what you did there.
posted by biochemist at 2:45 PM on January 18, 2011

This is just a sneaky way to promote the Green Hornet movie which just opened.
posted by longsleeves at 2:52 PM on January 18, 2011 [4 favorites]

I once worked for a company that turned out to be little more than a funnel for VC money to senior VP pockets. One of the many ways they spent the VC money was a $1,000,000+ re-branding/marketing plan, purchased from a company owned by one of the VPs. It was 'a big thing' in the office in the weeks before it was unveiled. We had a big expensive event planned at a nearby high-end steakhouse. About 2-3 days before the announcement, I came across, I'm 99% certain here at mefi, a website making fun of dotcom rebranding in general. It was all sorts of good fun about "you've gotta have a swirl", "your name should have an i, and e, and a com or net in it", what colors were most E-friendly and why. I'm passing it around the office, people are laughing, one of the marketing folk stops by and quietly asks me where it came from, in something of a huff. It turns out that their rebranding work had produced a new name and logo that looked suspiciously like the one the faux site put forth as the 'ideal'.
posted by nomisxid at 3:18 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

I bet if you did a study on scammers and previous history, you'd find 99.9% of them have <5 comments and 0 favorites or favorited comments/links. That could be confirmation bias on my part, but when I saw greenhornet had 12 comments, multiple favorites and a complete profile, my scam spidey sense dropped sharply.
posted by geoff. at 3:46 PM on January 18, 2011

While editorializing is looked down upon on FFPs (hey, I got away with it in MY latest post), if you're pointing to something you consider rather silly (like an HTML5 logo & tshirt) and you don't give at least a solid hint that you think it's silly (and you don't have a prior rep here), you will be assumed to be a supporter of the silly thing.

Words to that effect should be added to the posting instructions.
posted by oneswellfoop at 4:06 PM on January 18, 2011

I'm hiring Ocupop to make a mockup for my docudrama mockumetary about Octomom.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 4:25 PM on January 18, 2011 [2 favorites]

Surely "here's a new logo and a place to buy it! Do you like it or not?" breaks the guidelines, regardless of whether it's a self-link.

Eh, it's been making the nerd rounds today so I'm not that surprised it's showed up here.

Being unsurprising is not the same as not breaking the guidelines.
posted by DU at 4:36 PM on January 18, 2011

I wish I had a logo.
posted by rocket88 at 6:49 PM on January 18, 2011

Being unsurprising is not the same as not breaking the guidelines.

There is more than one guideline. And "has high interest value to nerds" can sometimes, rarely, override "is a thing for sale."
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:13 PM on January 18, 2011

-------------->88
***rocket88***
posted by Sidhedevil at 7:18 PM on January 18, 2011

 ?
|8|
|8|
\ /
 V

posted by flabdablet at 8:33 PM on January 18, 2011

ROCKET
posted by The Whelk at 8:35 PM on January 18, 2011

rocket88: "I wish I had a logo."

Please tell me you are kidding

(I'm not a huge Buick fan but it is one of my favorite old car logos)
posted by Big_B at 8:37 PM on January 18, 2011

I don't much care for the logo but I like the cut of greenhornet's jib.
posted by NoraReed at 9:14 PM on January 18, 2011

I actually love the logo (I'm a slut for orange and I enjoy the Soviet style) but I don't see how it makes any sense at all for what it is branding. A shield has literally nothing to do with HTML 5.

But then, there are a lot of things I don't understand about the logo decision.
posted by Navelgazer at 9:39 PM on January 18, 2011

I will wear a thin smile as I light, taking the first puff myself, the cigarette (likely Gitane or hand-rolled) and place it between the lips of the blindfolded term "creatives" and square that precious usage against the bullet-pocked wall when my revolution is realized.
posted by vapidave at 2:07 AM on January 19, 2011 [1 favorite]