Monday, November 24, 2008

Teenage Rape Video: Director of Operations Writes


As the Auteurs of the delightful if rather mendacious Hoodie Rape Lone Female in Car Park 101 - like one of those delightful urban myths involving lone female, plausible stranger, rope and gaffer tape in the boot - not Sonassi mind, have arranged for this authorised Trafford Centre video to be removed from YouTube - leaving only a couple of hundred copies in circulation - it seems only fair to let them speak:

Chris,
Regarding the video - it has been removed from youtube - it would appear as though youtube takes some time to action this across its proxies and cache server but I can assure you that it is no longer on our account.
Yes the video was put up on our youtube account, but purely for ease for content management.
As representative of The Trafford Centre asked this morning for it to be removed and out of good faith it has been.
As I stated on your comments page, we are not affiliated with Peel Holding in any way, we simply asked for permission to shoot on the Trafford Centre premises, again out of good faith.
Also as stated, we do not class the video as a piece of work made by our company. Yes, I work for the company as well, so as a result I put the video on our hosting (there is capacity and it was more cost effective.), but it was produced as an item from The Free Manchester partnership, in collaboration between myself and a number of other parties.
I also understand the relevant "plot holes" in the video, however the video is not meant to be taken too seriously, and I apologise if you saw it that way. It was aimed at the youth of the Facebook generation, and the majority of feedback I have off them has been positive and that they find it funny.
The video in no way meant to imply the Trafford Centre was unsafe, in fact I have always found the place to be a lot safer than most other places in Manchester! Neither was it suggested in the video that the girl was going to be "raped" - this thought never crossed anyone's mind during production, we were thinking more of having her bag stolen.
Regarding the website, I am unsure what you class as "poor HTML" - the site validates against W3C strict standards, and the code is simple, clean and concise. Sure the layout is "simple" with no pictures, but that is the approach we deliberately went for.
I apologise if you found the video "offensive" in anyway but like I said it wasn't meant to be too serious. Also, might i add that in the end, the women doesn't actually get attacked. Sure that is not shown, but that's artistic direction of the director for you!
I might also add we are not teenagers - and everyone is entitled to their opinion. Even I see the benefits public transport improvements would bring to the city, but I don't think charging at the M60 is the right call. If it were simply the inner ring road to have the charge I might even consider voting Yes. For people living in Urmston, we are rather cut off - we pretty much have to cross the M60 boundary to get anywhere!
Also, evening if the congestion charge comes in - it will still be be cheaper for me to drive in with a passenger, and park, than to get two return tickets on the train. We would also get there quicker, and in greater comfort.
I hope this clarifies things a little
Kindest Regards,
Dave Carlson
----
Director of Operations
Sonassi Media Services
Email: dave@sonassi.com
Web: www.sonassi.com
Please consider the environment before printing this e-mail.
Sonassi Media Services is a trading name of Sonassi Media LLP.

Dave, writing as Sonassi, commented that it was just a bit of fun, comedy, sarcasm etc and explained how the "dad" was in Urmston - even though that would not be a chargeable pick up.

Sonassi people APPROVED the concept/treatment/script.

Sonassi people GOT PERMISSION for the shoot, using their membership of GMMG as their calling card and bona fides.

Sonassi people MADE the damned thing.

Sonassi people DEFENDED and EXPLAINED the thing.

Sonassi people MADE THE CRUMMY WEBSITE which may be W3C compliant (or not) but does not even display in the rather common Firefox browser on Macs.

Apart from that they, Sonassi, had nothing to do with any of it.

Believe you me Dave I know about Urmston, Partington and Cadishead. Last time I was working there was Saturday evening, before I went to the frankly very deserted and desolate car parks of the Trafford Centre.

There were quite literally lads in black hoodies and jeans wrestling in the gutter (Manchester Road, t'other side of Ship Canal) for something to do of an evening.

It is a great touch asking people to consider the environment before printing the email. Excellent.

Some further questions:

Did the Trafford Centre or anyone else from GMMG see the treatment or script ahead of granting approval for indoor car park, outdoor car parks and driving shots on their estate?
Did the Trafford Centre or anyone else from GMMG receive a message from Sonassi or Dave or anyone involved saying the video was up?
Did the Trafford Centre, anyone else from GMMG, or their PR and clippings agency get an alert notifying them of this related content?
Who chose "Dad's" comedy curtains?
When did anyone involved in GMMG outside Sonassi first know about this Rape themed and factually outrageously wrong video?
Why did it take a poor blogger's story to get it spotted and removed by anyone in authority?
And why did it take 24 hours to happen?
Who on earth are the "Free Manchester Partnership"?
Were the actors and crew paid relating to this work?
If so by whom?
Are any members of the production team and cast or the wider Free Manchester Partnership, whatever that is, members or activists in far right organisations?
Are genuine people with concerns about the proposed scheme being continuously and deliberately misled about that scheme?
Are people with the true facts and bona fide concerns being let down by a bunch of wingnut idiots running a campaign of lies and ha ha ha comedy rape videos?

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Your blog has gone funny with the title it says asome foramt html tag saying center big strong, obviously the format, that will affect your page rank. If i was you i would fix that. It could damage your blog ranking.:

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...

damage the blog rating! you're having a laugh

Dick the Prick said...

I wouldn't bother - I only pop along out of courtesey with the other 4 people. Good grief man - there's no need to go on about it - a perfectly nice reply etc. Get over it man.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Chris Paul said...

You're barred and deleted EHT.

[EHC commented on the lack of comments]

Clearly the number of comments go down by half when EHC, WR etc are not posting.

And they ebb and flow according to subject matter.

No Rochdale = less comments.

I don't know who this anon is. But the page rank - such as it is - is not a great concern just now, or ever.

Chris Paul said...

Dick the Prick: There is nothing nice about this Free Manchester Partnership. Apart from the Rape video they have also been forced to remove two disgraceful posters which many reasonable people would have reckoned to be the work of the far right. We'll cover that soon.

Anonymous said...

Temove other people's posts if you must, CP (even under the alias of 'a blog administrator' but don't then mangle what they have said.

I read that post and it specifically said that the number of contributions on LoL had significantly decreased ever since you were shown to be anonymously posting on your own site (and on others, come to that).

Anonymous said...

The rape of a young woman funny??

These people need their heads testing. Can't see the "Facebook generation" signing up for that.

Anonymous said...

At no point in this video is it implied or explicitly shown that anyone is sexually assaulted.

Also, any allegations of Sonassi's involvement with this video are unfounded and I would go so far as to say, libelous.

Attempting to defame a company's name in order to gain some interest in an otherwise mundane blog is somewhat pathetic.

When Mr Carlsson has clearly explained the level of Sonassi's involvement, which is clearly indicated as 'not class[ing] the video as a piece of work made by our company. Yes, I work for the company as well, so as a result I put the video on our hosting (there is capacity and it was more cost effective.), but it was produced as an item from The Free Manchester partnership, in collaboration between myself and a number of other parties.'
Your level og ignorance is abhorrent to accuse the involvement of the company to be any more than that.

As a 'Manchester' blogger, you should be proud of a mancunian home grown company surviving in the adversity of your current financial climate. Not trying to ruin it. This page should be removed from any search engines to reduce the impact this could have on an innocent company.