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Blade, the Uber for Helicopters and Chartered Jets, Had a Fake Spokesperson for Three Years (businessinsider.com) 158

Posted by msmash from the how-about-that dept.
For three years until his departure this January, Simon McLaren served as the director of communications for Blade, the urban aviation startup that went public earlier this year at a valuation of more than $800 million. His work in that time was largely what you'd expect of a company spokesperson -- except for the fact that Simon McLaren doesn't actually exist. Business Insider reports: After Insider sought to verify McLaren's identity, Blade CEO Rob Wiesenthal admitted in an interview that McLaren was a made-up persona invented by him and his colleagues, and that Wiesenthal masqueraded as McLaren in telephone conversations with news outlets. The ruse lasted for years, duped numerous journalists, and included a puzzling public drama around McLaren's purported departure from Blade. None of it was real. Numerous news outlets quoted Simon McLaren as though he were a real spokesperson.

McLaren has no substantial online presence outside of a Blade email address, a Twitter account created last December, and a Medium profile created last November. His personal website, created this January, was registered through a proxy, and he uses a 1966 photo of British racing driver Graham Hill across his accounts in place of a profile picture. Still, McLaren has been treated as a real human by a variety of news outlets since his apparent debut in the pages of Vanity Fair in 2018. Serving as the institutional voice of Blade in stories about the company's compliance with federal regulations, medical supply shuttles, and negotiations with the town of East Hampton, McLaren has been quoted by the New York Times, the New York Post, Curbed, the Washington Post, Fox Business, and CNN.
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Blade, the Uber for Helicopters and Chartered Jets, Had a Fake Spokesperson for Three Years More

Blade, the Uber for Helicopters and Chartered Jets, Had a Fake Spokesperson for Three Years

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  • So: Trust us, we lied to you for years (Score:5, Insightful)

    by luvirini ( 753157 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @01:07PM (#61496836)

    or something like that?

    • When you call tech support and speak to Debbie, guess what? Her name isn't really Debbie. Her real name is Aadhya, and she lives in Bengaluru.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by pr0t0 ( 216378 )

        Debbie: Please hold a moment while I pull up that information. While we're waiting, did you watch that latest episode of "Friends"? That Joey, what a cut-up! Okay, I have your account in front of me now...

        • I had one guy try to insist he was American, and then proceeded to tell me about a football player scoring a "home run".

          Thanks "Robert from Fresno" good talk

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by q_e_t ( 5104099 )

            I had one guy try to insist he was American, and then proceeded to tell me about a football player scoring a "home run".

            Some of us don't care much about sport... Or 'popular music'. Kelly Clarkson could be Jeremy's daughter for all I know. I'd have to look it up. I don't even know if Kelly Clarkson is popular.

  • Who cares? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by psperl ( 1704658 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @01:11PM (#61496842) Homepage
    Why is this newsworthy? A spokesperson is just a corporate mouthpiece anyway, might as well be artificial.

    • Guess we'll find out in this new world if fake people have rights, and can collect unemployment?

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by gillbates ( 106458 )

      Because if journalists are so easily duped, one must certainly wonder what else they've missed with respect to issues such as politics, global climate change, the pandemic, etc...

      A lot of people trust the news to deliver truthful information. In fact, there's a rather vocal contingent of people who ridicule others for not believing what they read in the news. Maybe it's time to stop ridiculing people for what they don't believe.

      • Because if journalists are so easily duped, one must certainly wonder what else they've missed with respect to issues such as politics, global climate change, the pandemic, etc...

        Mainstream journalists are paid to not deliver what else they've purposely "missed". That's how far gone that entire industry is. Like we should give a shit as to how duped they are.

        A lot of people trust the news to deliver truthful information. In fact, there's a rather vocal contingent of people who ridicule others for not believing what they read in the news. Maybe it's time to stop ridiculing people for what they don't believe.

        Maybe it's time to start legally defining what can be called news. We think of the children all the damn time. That should include the adult children incapable of forming their own thoughts.

        A lot of people, only learn the hard way.

        • Learning the hard way is counter intuitively easy. What's difficult is learning pretty much any other way. The only easier option is not learning.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by bws111 ( 1216812 )

        That is kind of dumb. He was purportedly the spokesman for the company. As long as what he says accurately reflects the company position, why would anyone have reason to question his identity? What difference could it possibly make? Did anyone ever make a decision based on who a company spokesman is? What would have materially changed if the fact it was a made up persona was known?

        • As long as what Cap'n Krunch and Tony the TIger say accurately reflects the company position, why would anyone have reason to question their identities?

          Same logic.

          • You conflate 'identity' with 'reality' - their identities exist, but they are not real.

            A good company spokesman merely parrots the company line, we want them to be human because we want to either a) catch them when they make a mistake or b) try to curry favor from them.

        • Well Deus Ex: Mankind divided did show us what influence a spokesperson [fandom.com] could have.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by DarkOx ( 621550 )

          No it would not so I can understand the press not really looking into it. However that leads one to wonder why Blade went through such trouble to create such a person and make it seem like a really person? Why bother creating outside online pressense for him etc?

          If anyone ever did ask hey how come McLaren is a ghost online otherwise why not just come clean and say because he is just a pseudonym used by multiple employees for public communications? Why the effort to make him look like a real person?

      • >A lot of people trust the news to deliver truthful information

        lol

      • "Because if journalists are so easily duped, one must certainly wonder what else they've missed with respect to issues such as politics, global climate change, the pandemic, etc..."

        Are you implying we can't trust Fox News or OANN?

    • Because the spokes-person was not, in fact a robot!

    • At least they had a real/working product. A better example of a harmful fraud would be Theranos. [wikipedia.org]

    • When early-round investors invest in a company, the resumes and bios of its executives are extremely important.

      And if an executive and their background was entirely made up. This is a form of fraud. And if the company has lied about this, it makes you wonder what else the company has lied about.

  • He should run for President (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Subm ( 79417 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @01:14PM (#61496856)

    McLaren should run for President of the U.S.

    Not being real didn't stop John Barron [wikipedia.org] from becoming the 45th President of the U.S., or John Miller and David Dennison. His voters probably wouldn't mind.

  • This is perfect (Score:5, Interesting)

    by omibus ( 116064 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @01:14PM (#61496858) Homepage Journal

    Where public person is scrutinized to the n'th degree, twitter posts are analyzed back to pre-teen years, this is the perfect response. Make a fake person, rotate thru who it is for phone conversations, everything can be scripted, and the person is free of any objectionable past. I'd be surprised if this isn't done more.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hey! ( 33014 )

      Except in this case we're talking about a highly speculative technology startup filling a position whose main purpose is to establish credibility.

      Wisdom is seeing what anyone could see, even when something is your own idea. Whenever a misadventure ends with people asking, "What was he thinking?" the answer is usually "Boy am I clever."

      • An appeal to authority doesn't establish any credibility.

      • The press/investors look to the corporate spokesperson for what again?

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by hey! ( 33014 )

          There's more to it than meets the eye. There's signalling going on, like with politicians and the press. A politician who doesn't bullshit isn't deemed serious because he doesn't know how the game is supposed to be played.

          The usual bullshit is expected. Weird bullshit is a red flag.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by PPH ( 736903 )

      everything can be scripted, and the person is free of any objectionable past

      Or you could hire my pet duck. He's cute and he likes milkshakes.

  • So what? (Score:3)

    by nuckfuts ( 690967 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @01:14PM (#61496862)

    Lot's of businesses use fake personas for interacting with the public. Like nearly every web-chat popup that says something like "Hi, I'm Melissa. Can I help you today?". Does anyone think Melissa is a real human identity? Does anyone care?

    • No to #1 and yes to #2. Because it's a lie. After you've been lied to, nothing else from the individual can be taken as truth.

      • After you've been lied to, nothing else from the individual can be taken as truth.

        That's rather absolute. I sometimes lie. It doesn't follow that everything I say is a lie.

        • If you lie to me it follows that everything you say to me is suspect. It cannot be taken as truth, it must be corroborated.

          Very simple workaround - don't lie.
          • No-one never lies
            • Pedantry is a last ditch effort to obviate an argument. By the way, that was a lie (intentional or not (and, to be pedantic back at'cha)) as there are those who don't lie.

              If you lie to me it behooves me to not believe you afterward. I do not care if you continue to believe someone you've found lying to you (in this case, years worth), I do not have to.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by HiThere ( 15173 )

                I really doubt that " there are those who don't lie", unless you include locked-in cases and corpses. Even my dog lies to me.

                So I deem your simplistic formulation to be wrong. Otherwise everyone who used a pseudonym on the internet (like you) would be totally untrustworthy.

                More particularly, a spokesman for a corporation is not supposed to be presenting personal views. If he does, THEN you could consider him untrustworthy. When he presents accurate reports of company policy, then he's performing honestl

      • Is it a lie when an actor goes on T.V. and pretends to be someone else? Aren't you smart enough to realize that PR personas aren't real people even if they're based on the actors playing them?

    • Are fake persona easier to cancel? Or easier to dispose of if cancelled?

    • Lot's of businesses use fake personas for interacting with the public. Like nearly every web-chat popup that says something like "Hi, I'm Melissa. Can I help you today?". Does anyone think Melissa is a real human identity? Does anyone care?

      No, most people realize that Melissa is not a real identity and so it's not considered deception.

      As to having a fake spokesman... well the Trump administration did have a bunch of fairly respectable well-qualified people working for it, it didn't have many of those in the role of spokesperson. The reason is that spokespeople enhance the brand by putting their own reputations on the line. You know a spokesperson is at least a little more reluctant to lie to you because if they do, you're not going to trust t

      • Maybe when an investor notices the spokesperson is not on the payroll, they think "I've been lied to" but they also might think "great way to save $150K plus benefits/expenses".

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by PPH ( 736903 )

      Please don't tell me that Bill from tech support (the guy with the thick Hindi accent) is fake.

  • I'm not surprised... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Jerrry ( 43027 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @01:19PM (#61496886)

    Years ago I worked for a small company (about six people) and the CEO of the company had four personas. He used his own name as CEO and three different names as director of sales, director of engineering, and director of tech support. I had the office right next door to him and heard him talking with people on the phone where he'd say "hold on, let me transfer you to Bob, our director of engineering", pause a few seconds, and then resume speaking with the caller as "Bob". He never even bothered to try to change his voice. This went on the entire time I worked there and no one seemed to notice.

  • Hollywood did that a long time ago. Authors use pen names for a variety of reasons. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John weren't likely the names of the "authors".

    Nothing to see. Move along.

    • I was devastated to learn that Alan Smithee wasn't, in fact, responsible for many of my favorite movies.

    • "Nothing to see." If you're referring to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John then bzzzt! not "nothing to see" as these are sold as witness accounts to convince you it's not fiction.

      • But the authors never claimed to be Mark, Matthew, Luke, or John.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by HiThere ( 15173 )

        They may be sold as witness accounts, but it is almost certainly true that Luke was NOT a witness. And there's an extremely strong sheaf of evidence that none of the others were either.

        FWIW, Luke is supposed to have been a physician connected to Paul, and Paul didn't become a Christian until LONG after the crucifixion.

    • Those books actually didn't even claim authorship. They were all anonymous. Authorship was assigned to them later by other people.

  • i thought about doing this (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dknj ( 441802 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @01:26PM (#61496904) Journal

    a startup with no C-level execs is not a good look when trying to make sales. so I grabbed some AI generated faces and put some fake names under it. then i went to a lawyer and he laughed me out of the office. it's fraud in so many ways that he did not recommend it. the only way around it was to be up front with customers that they do not exist before you even pitch the product. i then realized its easier to get 12 of my friends to act in some minimal capacity than to risk a potential fraud lawsuit (which will follow you forever).

    avoid this company like the plague, but expect more like them as more conmen wise up to the social media age

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by DarkOx ( 621550 )

      That's always been baffling to me. You see all these startups that are like six guys and each of them is calling themselves C[A-Z]O.

      Kinda looks silly to when observe the "CTO" is responding to software support requests because - yeah he is the only developer.

  • Next you're going to tell me that the Jack-in-the-Box CEO [wikipedia.org] is fake, too.

  • Bullshit job - fake person (Score:5, Interesting)

    by g01d4 ( 888748 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @01:30PM (#61496920)
    I would put this into a 6th category of a bullshit job [wikipedia.org] where the defined responsibilities don't warrant a full time position until someone is hired for it - a corollary of Parkinson's Law. These jobs are quite common in large corporations where the costs of these positions are easily hidden and the positions are created for various reasons such as empire building, crony housing, or in this case status signalling. In this instance faking the person saves on expense.

    • Re:Bullshit job - fake person (Score:5, Interesting)

      by N1AK ( 864906 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @01:44PM (#61496950) Homepage
      Not that I like them but a good spokesperson is anything but a bullshit job; the Trump administration is a great example of how having a spokesperson willing to say anything, no matter how false or ridiculous, can pay off massively because they wear the press down and manage to get their false narrative out there to enough people to create some "grey" about what the truth is.

      Even in more honest companies having someone with extensive experience dealing with the press handling questions makes sense; being able to interact with a professional who would benefit from being able to trash your company isn't something a lot of people can do without extensive training and experience.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by ghoul ( 157158 )
        This company just showed just how lazy the press really is. Doesnt take a lot of skill to handle the press. Just spoon feed them so that they dont have to do any real work and can spend their time at watering holes

  • Very similar to the subplot from Advantageous where the main character learns that her career coach was an AI.

    This isn't bad though, it's better to replace overpaid bullshit jobs with AI or avatars than to ridiculously hyper-reward people for social-climbing their way into them. Hopefully interior decorators will be next.

  • Hanes Inspector #12 will have something to say about this, that's who.

  • Not the first time someone has tried this

    https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]

  • We live in a virtual world. (Score:5, Funny)

    by uncqual ( 836337 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @02:05PM (#61496990)

    I asked both Siri and Alexa what they thought of this situation.

    Both indicated they had no problem with virtual spokespeople. Although, rather unprofessionally, Alexa asked me for Simon McLaren's MAC address as she is fond of race car drivers.

  • "Layers and layers of fact checkers." MSM can suck c**k.

  • Spokesperson (Score:3, Funny)

    by phalse phace ( 454635 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @02:34PM (#61497050)

    Blade spokesperson should have been Wesley Snipes :p

  • So what? (Score:2)

    by kenh ( 9056 )

    Seriously, aside from an 'oh, that's kind of interesting, but who cares' response so what?

    A real spokesperson only repeats what company officials tell them anyway, so the fact that the company officials stood in for this 'person' is not a big deal.

    Now, if this virtual person was drawing a paycheck...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ghoul ( 157158 )
      That would be dumb. Drawing a paycheck means you pay taxes. Pay the person in company stock which is never sold only borrowed against. Voila no tax.

  • Real salary for fake persona? (Score:3)

    by macklin01 ( 760841 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @03:48PM (#61497310) Homepage
    Personally, I'd be interested if the fake personas drew real salaries. That could point to some nasty / illegal financials ..
  • I called Dell tech support and the nice man with the Indian accent called himself Dave, but I'm not so sure.

  • Max Headroom (Score:3)

    by MooseTick ( 895855 ) on Thursday June 17, 2021 @04:49PM (#61497470) Homepage

    Next they'll be telling us Max Headroom isn't real.

  • Does anyone here besides me, remember of software products named Dbase II and Dbase III?

    Company Ashton-Tate was created by some guy named George Tate. Mr. Ashton never existed - Tate invented him.

    Acording to a high tale (may be true or not), since people kept calling and asking of Mr. Ashton,Tate purchased himself a talking parrot and named him Ashton.

    That, and there never existed a Dbase I. Of course, nobody would have purchased a Dbase I, so Tate named it Dbase II.

    Disclaimer: I used Dbase III when in coll

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