A couple of great logical, sensible posts, Seabear and Mike.
With all due respect for those who only want this thread to quietly disappear, I would like to comment on Mike's
In reply to:
If you think there is no marketing angle, great. I can't view it as such. Look at the discussion it spawned about the company, keeping the name SQUARELY in all of the people reading/posting/lurking on this and other boards.
Two points to make. One, This has been discussed on av123 forum, of course; here in this thread; and it came up in an unrelated thread about Rockets and av123 on AVS, but was hardly the focus of that thread. That's three threads on three different forums. And only on this forum and av123's forum was the thread ABOUT the makeover. To my knowledge it has NOT come up, in any incarnation on the Home Theater Spot, the Home Theater Forum, the Secrets of Home Theater forum, Audioholics forum, AudioCircle forum, or any other forum. In all these places there are many more threads spawning discussion where the company's name is already SQUARELY in front of all the people reading/posting/lurking there.
Two, the marketing issue seems to focus on intent. Let's just say, for the sake of argument, that Mark and av123 INTENDED to use their gift for marketing purposes. I want to state that
I DON'T BELIEVE, FOR A MINUTE, THAT THE INTENT OF MARK, OR AV123, WAS TO MARKET THEIR PRODUCTS, but let's pretend, just for a moment, that it was.
SO WHAT?
I was watching ABC's Home Makeover Sunday night, The Sears name was prominent all the way through the show, including a commercial, disguised as a "thank you" for letting Sears be a part of the makeover, and making sure that Sears contribution was well documented. It is far more likely that Sears' intent was to exploit the marketing aspect of their donation than it was Mark's and av123's intent to do the same. Nobody seems to be ragging on Sears for their intended marketing coup. And for good reason. Regardless of their intent, the fact remains that
SEARS DID A VERY NICE THING BY DONATING ALL THAT NICE STUFF TO THE MAKEOVER. It seems ridiculous, to me, that we should negate Sears generosity, because they want to score points for that generosity.
So, even if Mark and av123 had marketing in mind, and again I point out that
THERE IS NO EVIDENCE THAT THEY INTENDED ANY MARKETING, that should not, in any way, detract from the kindness of the act. After all, what the did was no less kind and generous than what Sears did.
I just don't get it
