Comments, observations and thoughts from two bloggers on applied statistics, higher education and epidemiology. Joseph is an associate professor. Mark is a professional statistician and former math teacher.
Last week, a staffer at Need to Impeach, an organization that advocates for the impeachment of Donald Trump, received an outrageous proposal via email. Jerry Media, the viral marketing agency famous for promoting the ill-fated Fyre Festival, was now working in an unofficial capacity with the anonymous creator of the World Record Egg, and the company was hoping to broker a deal between the nonprofit and the egg.
Over the past few weeks, the egg has become an internet phenomenon. On January 13, the account’s first post became the most-liked Instagram photo of all time; by the time Jerry Media approached Need to Impeach, the account had more than 9.4 million followers. Since then, the account has posted a series of photos of the same egg with a progressively larger crack, suggesting something inside. In a slide deck, Jerry Media proposed that the egg crack to reveal the words Impeach Trump as Trump popped out and did the chicken dance. The agency even created a short animated video demonstrating the stunt.
Need to Impeach ultimately passed on the opportunity. “It was interesting,” said Aleigha Cavalier, a spokesperson for Tom Steyer, the founder of Need to Impeach. “But I probably get 20 to 25 crazy ideas a week, [and] this didn’t move further than that.” Mick Purzycki, the CEO of Jerry Media, confirmed the details of the proposal, but stressed that the goal of the stunt wasn’t monetary. “We liked it for noncommercial reasons,” he said.
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