Gawker's "crackstarter" campaign - a brilliant viral idea - hat's off to John Cook and Nick Denton

 Ever since I was aware several years ago that Toronto's Mayor Rob Ford didn't like bikes on the streets of Toronto, I haven't liked Rob Ford.

So when Gawker [1] initiated it's "crackstarter" (pun on Kickstarter) campaign in the middle of May to crowd source $200,000 to buy from some drug commerce folks the video which purportedly shows Mayor Ford smoking crack - I was impressed.

What a great idea!  

CRACKSTARTER!

The crackstarter campaign itself was so novel and creative - it was advertizing genious.  

You want people to read about Mayor Ford purportely smoking crack?   the campaign itself captures massive attention making any actual video practically irrelevant.  

It turns out that there is a murder which may be involved with the video.   And 5 of the Mayor's staff have been fired or left the Mayor's office. 

Rob Ford needs to get a better attitude.  About bikes. 

You can read about Mr. Ford's travails here [2]at the Guardian.

John Cook is the Gawker editor who went to Toronto to view the cell phone captured crack smoking video.   Jian Ghomeshi on the CBC radio station program "Q" interviewed Mr. Cook this week - debating whether or not it was appropriate to pay for a video.  You can hear the discussion here [3] on Q.   One of Mr. Cook's comments struck home with me - he said the Canadian media handled the Mayor with kid gloves - no tough questions -   Gawker doesn't get revenue from the Canadian advertizing market, but Cook realized that shaking it up was in order.   Good call IMHO.