THE CHRISTMAS "MIRACLE"

Be sure to watch the side-by-side video, comparing the original Home Depot $25,000 contest entry with the "newly edited" version in which Home Depot allowed them to remove FOUR contest rules violations AFTER the contest was over, just to keep them the winner. That and much more as you scroll down.



First of all a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who is linking this blog or the YouTube version of our "side-by-side" proof video. We've had hundreds and hundreds of people checking out this issue. Please keep up the effort! Has anyone tried a letter-to-the-editor in their local paper yet? Let me know what works!

What happened on Christmas Day? Well, in yet another stage of "damage control", Home Depot/IMRE Communications finally deleted this comment from their YouTube contest message board, regarding another video to which they actually applied their rules (gasp!).



On December 24th, it was there... Christmas Day, gone (along with many other user comments). What do you suppose was going on? Maybe a corporate inquiry on that day to see what kind of absolute mess Home Depot/IMRE has made of this? Scrub the "really bad stuff"? Don't worry, we have copies of everything. The other Christmas "Miracle"? Home Depot decided to close down their "feedback" message boards forever, attempting to shutter the discussion without ever addressing the immense outrage that swelled into the threads. "Nothing to see here, please move along". Happy Holidays from Home Depot, indeed.


Be sure to read the following post and take action!

THE PROOF! SIDE-BY-SIDE COMPARISON

Note: Please scroll down to the bottom to keep abreast of the incredibly controversial Home Depot $25,000 Gift Card contest meltdown. It was near-revolt at the Home Depot YouTube message board when they allowed the winning video to re-edit their video after the contest was over, just to meet contest rules (even though they disqualified others). The bottom-most post will fill you in on most of the details.

I have been able to sync up a saved original video submitted by the Longs (that they have now deleted from YouTube) with the newly re-edited version. This is the same video Home Depot declared the winner in their $25,000 contest, then allowed to be re-edited after the contest was over. In this video, we compare the two side-by-side, so you can see for yourself just what Home Depot allowed the Long family to change, just to keep them in the winner's circle, and despite the fact that their video should have been disqualified. (You can see the full, unedited version of the new video here)

The good news is, upon further analyzation, there are four, not five, copyright violations in the original video. I stand corrected on that one. The bad news is, I can find NOWHERE in the contest rules that indicate what Home Depot did was legal. It is the sole responsibility of the contest entrant to ensure they don't violate the rules. It is not Home Depot's responsibility. Am I wrong?



Take a look, and when you've seen enough, click the profile button to the left to contact some of the people responsible for this contest. Or, contact your local media stations and see if they will follow up on this story. Make sure you read all the posts below as well. Send me a comment to tell me what you think.

TODAY'S CHALLENGE: Link as many people as you can to this website or the YouTube version of the video below. Raise awareness! It all starts there!

THEIR FIRST YOUTUBE "MELTDOWN"

Allowing a video to re-edit AFTER the contest, just to meet contest rules? Is that what IMRE Communications, the company hired to handle the contest, thinks is appropriate? Apparently this is their first time running anything like this YouTube contest. Can you tell? During the time the $25,000 "meltdown" contest was being run there was a PRWeek article. Manish Shrivastava, who is president of Home Depot Incentives and one of the people conducting this contest, had some things to say:

"[Home Depot] usually targets different mediums for campaigns, but felt it was time to throw its hat into the new-media ring in a significant way." He said the holiday season and this idea presented the perfect opportunity ... "It's a good way for us to learn and see what works for us in this space and optimize it from there".

If what has been witnessed is any indication, they would seem they have a lot of work to do in ensuring a legally-conducted contest. If you have any questions for them, or want to let them know what you think of the job they did, contact Will Zweigart at IMRE Communications (willz@imrecommunications.com, 410-821-8220).

I have received several supportive comments in the comments section here, but also several "naysayer" posts. But in every "naysayer" case they chose to address something, ANYTHING besides the substance of the alleged contest law violation. So, rather than endure more comments that have no real value other than to fein "concern", I offer a simple guideline for posting here. If you think that I am wrong about ANY information posted here, then just write a new comment saying something like:

"Hey, this is 'journalist' Patti Bond, and those articles that say that I'm going to work for Home Depot eight days after writing a glowing article about the Home Depot $25,000 contest aren't true, because ..."

- or even -

"This is Home Depot headquarters, and the reason we feel we were responsible for helping the Longs re-edit their video to comply with our contest is based on the Georgia legal statute XX-1234 that says, contrary to our contest rules, the entrants themselves are in NO WAY responsible for their own content. If we really like a video, we are legally obligated to help them win."

That last one I would LOVE to see come to reality. I would sleep better at night...

HD/LONGS: "ONE" CHANGE, REALITY "MANY"

In case you're just getting up to speed, there is a major controversy over the Home Depot $25,000 Gift Card contest. Chronologically, posts start at the bottom and go up, so scroll down to the bottom to get all the crazy details.

This post will address the scenes that were allowed to be modified AFTER the contest was over, just so Home Depot could retain them as winner, in apparent violation of their own contest rules. Home Depot and the Long family have now posted that the re-submitted video changed "one brief shot", but we know that is simply not true.

Below you will see messages from both Home Depot and the Long family that say an image was changed, as in singular... one. But all that aside, where in the contest rules does it say that it is Home Depot's responsibility to inform the entrant as to their eligibility? In the contest rules, it places sole responsibility on the entrant. So, allowing the Long family to modify their video and then resubmit AFTER the contest was over seems completely in violation of Home Depot's own contest rules. Home Depot's excuse that they gave everyone that "opportunity" seems besides the point, and more like a smokescreen than a legal justification. What do you think?

(UPDATE: To be fair, this may be a matter of parsing words. Upon reviewing the message threads preceding the re-edited video, the main objection by YouTube posters was the mention of "The Right Stuff" movie poster, which may have led to the "image" versus "images". It was a a seemingly obvious violation, so it was a natural focus for objection. It was only after the re-edited video was submitted that it became apparent the extent of the changes. These seem a little bit "word-smithy", but we'll give them the benefit of the doubt. It still doesn't alter the fact that Home Depot claims it was their responsibility to inform the winners AFTER the deadline that they needed to make some changes, a point which seems contradictory to anything I can find in the official contest rules.)

THE $0 CONTEST - PROVE THIS BLOG WRONG

At least one person has come to this blog to try and rustle feathers and otherwise intimidate the investigation into this contest "melt-down". They choose to post anonymously, and have offered little beyond fact-free threats to this blog. I want someone to prove me wrong on all this, not just come here to complain. If anyone is serious enough to discuss these potentially serious violations, please continue reading.

My challenge to them (and to anyone else) is rather than come here and launch verbal attacks for the sheer audacity to challenge Home Depot's opinion (gasp!), try posting reasons why you think there were no rules violations:

• Where in the contest rules does it say it is appropriate for Home Depot to change multiple content issues that would disqualify the video, AFTER the contest is over? Home Depot says it's what they offered to everyone. But I have yet to see any verifiable evidence that ANYONE was approached mid-contest and told what to change in their video to avoid being disqualified.".
• Will Home Depot go on the record telling us how many people they actually notified and gave instructions on how to fix their violating video?
• MOST IMPORTANTLY: Where in the contest rules does it say that it is Home Depot's responsibility to inform contestants whether or not they are violating the rules? In the contest rules, they do everything possible to lay responsibility on the person entering the contest, not Home Depot. If you were lucky enough to be contacted by Home Depot to fix something (which I highly doubt happened), it would still be a "favor" by Home Depot, not a right given to all entrants via the contest rules. Am I wrong?
• Why did Home Depot disqualify the Bork video from New York for rules violation, but not this video?Where in the contest rules does it say that you can re-submit a video after the December 15th deadline? Show me. Prove me wrong.
• Why did Home Depot (and the Long family) say they reposted a video that addressed the "shot" in question. Note, they say it singularly, as in ONE correction. They don't say "the five or more shots that violated rules". (UPDATE: Please read the addendum to the post above for some clarification here)
  
• Where in the contest rules does it state that after the contest is over, you can fix your video to remove copyright violations, but we'll still use the view count from your previously disqualified video. After all, that's 20% of the vote, according to them.
• Will Home Depot or you explain why a message from someone who said they were the marketing director for Home Depot went on their message board and insulted one of the contest entrants, then deleted his own message, then posted again admitting that he deleted it?
• Why is it alright for Home Depot to begin deleting messages on their board that contradict their opinion on the contest, or that contain information they deem irreconcilable?
• Will Home Depot or you explain why Patti Bond gave such a sunshine review of the $25,000 contest in the publication, then a week later is coincidentally working for Home Depot?

This isn't some mom-and-pop contest. This $25,000+ award puts it in a different category than your local grocery-store giveaway. Home Depot is legally obligated (as they have said themselves) to post the contest rules, and follow them to the letter, without modification. So, I say to all of you... if you want to be upset, be constructive and prove to me that any of these accusations are unfounded. I would be most grateful to you. Until then, this contest seems horribly executed and possibly legally unfounded. It began with the promise of collective intellectual challenges and excitement, and ended with a stink-bomb of people scratching their heads saying "what is going on here?". What say you?

JOURNALIST PROMOTING CONTEST GETS JOB AT HOME DEPOT

Oh...my...goodness... Back on December 12th, 2007, an article was published by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.  This article was written by Patti Bond. It was a glowing review of Home Depot's new marketing tool, the YouTube $25,000 contest.  It included a nice link to Home Depot's contest web site and more. Why then, EIGHT DAYS LATER on December 20th, 2007, did we find out that Patti Bond is no longer working at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.  Did she want to spend time with her family? Not exactly.  She took a new job in internal communications somewhere else. Where, you ask? At Home Depot.  Yes, you read that right.  A little over a week after publishing a wide-spread article promoting Home Depot's $25,000 contest, she resigns so she can go work for Home Depot.  Nice... Are there laws against this?

(Photo from Talking Biz News)

JOB DESCRIPTION: YOUTUBE MESSAGE DELETOR

Above you'll see a few posts on the Home Depot's YouTube contest site (while it lasts) that are either being deleted or reference being deleted. There are many more, take my word for it. When it became exposed that Home Depot coached the winning video through at least FOUR changes to their video to conform with their contest rules, they set up a round-the-clock job for one or more staffers. Their task? To delete any message that they felt was "inconvenient" to their contest.

A post would go up, and within minutes, things would disappear. Night-time, weekends? No problem when it comes to covering their tracks. Home Depot stayed busy around the clock deleting messages. Fortunately, logs had been kept by multiple users that show the trail.

(LATE UPDATE: The Home Depot message board has been removed from YouTube, so don't bother trying to go there. Although we still have logs of all the messages for posterity. Also, the violations have been changed from FIVE to FOUR, since the "study room" shot was unchanged from the original shot, although the "study room" shot may still in fact be copyrighted)

THE CONTEST CONTROVERSY IN A NUTSHELL

On December 15th, 2007 Home Depot concluded a contest it was running that would award one person a $25,000 Home Depot gift card. The goal was for entrants to create a video that shows what you would do with said gift card, then submit it to YouTube via Home Depot's "group". The contest was advertised on Home Depot's web site, and there were articles written announcing the contest (more on that later). There were over 250 videos that entered the contest.

Home Depot was to announce the winner as scheduled, however their announcement came later than promised. They gave no official reason for the delay, but based on information after-the-fact it seems that the video they chose to win was disqualified when they found out the entrants were directly related to Home Depot staff members.

Thus, a new video was awarded the $25,000 prize. The Long's Rap, a family from Houston, Texas. It was a catchy, cute video to be sure. But soon after the announcement was made, there were several objections to the fact that it contained copyrighted material, which is a violation of the contest rules. Why disqualify one video for violating the rules, then award the $25,000 to someone else who also violated the rules, right? It seemed cut-and-dry... a giant frame of "The Right Stuff" movie poster.

So, Home Depot appeared to be doing the right thing when they came back with:

"Pending the resolution of this matter, we will be moderating comments. We are working to address this as quickly as possible. Thanks for your patience."

This is where things got ugly. Home Depot cut off communication for two days while they deliberated. When they came back, they stated:

"As backgound, we reviewed each video when it was submitted to ensure it complied with contest rules. When we found a submission that did not comply, we provided feedback to the submitter and gave them the opportunity to rectify. The winning video was selected because it was the best video and best represented the intent of the contest. Because we never identified any issues with the winning video when we reviewed it initially, we have recently given the winner the opportunity that all submitters have had - to make some minor adjustments to eliminated any potential compliance issues. The very brief image in question had no impact on the judging process. Please note that if you did not receive an email from us at any point after submitting your video, your video was not disqualified. Thanks again for participating and offering your feedback." (emphasis added)

Keep in mind that at this point, nobody else has come forward to say they were given the opportunity to change their video to comply with the violations Home Depot finds. But upon analyzing the newly-submitted video by the Longs, it turns out that it appears they made a change to not just one "very brief" image, but at least FOUR shots that violated the contest rules. They removed "The Right Stuff" movie poster, replaced a photo of an electrician, replaced a special effect shot of an explosion (copyrighted), and blurred the logo on the water heater. There may be more than this.

Then they allowed the Longs to resubmit their video, after the contest was over.

Once people found out about this, there was another uproar on the message boards on YouTube. However, this time Home Depot chose a different tact to deal with discontent... they started deleting messages that contradicted their own rationale. In fact, they had a staff member attending the YouTube site throughout the nighttime, who's task it was to delete "offensive" messages.

(LATE UPDATE: The "study room" shot was removed from this list, since it was unchanged from the original shot, so the total is now four confirmed violations, although the "study room" shot may still in fact be copyrighted)