The latest publicity stunt by the vile BeautifulPeople.com dating website seems to have backfired rather gloriously, with the site currently being taken down by a denial of service attack.
The site claims to only accept members who pass an ‘attractiveness’ rating, and today they released a press statement claiming that it had been hit by a virus called “Shrek” which allowed “30,000 ‘ugly’ people to invade the site.”
Here’s what their loathsome Greg Hodge, MD of BeautifulPeople, said in a press release:
We got suspicious when tens of thousands of new members were accepted over a six-week period, many of whom were no oil painting.
We responded immediately, repairing the damage from the ‘Shrek Virus’ and putting every new member back into the rating module for a legitimate and democratic vote. The result is that we have lost over 30,000 recent members.
We have sincere regret for the unfortunate people who were wrongly admitted to the site and who believed, albeit for a short while, that they were beautiful. It must be a bitter pill to swallow, but better to have had a slice of heaven then never to have tasted it at all.
Unfortunately, a whole load of newspapers were taken in by this improbable yarn, which on further inspection is very similar to a press release they posted in Jan 2010, where they claimed to have kicked off 5,000 ‘fatties.’
Here’s how the Telegraph reported the (non) story at the time:
Robert Hintze, founder of BeautifulPeople.com, said: ”As a business, we mourn the loss of any member, but the fact remains that our members demand the high standard of beauty be upheld.”
Letting fatties roam the site is a direct threat to our business model and the very concept for which BeautifulPeople.com was founded.”According to the site, managers have been kind in breaking the news to former members.
Each is said to have received an email encouraging them to re-apply when they are back to looking their best. They have also been sent details of recommended boot camps.
Although it’s obvious that this ‘virus’ only ever existed in the minds of the company owners, it seems a bit of a risky strategy to try and stir up publicity based on supposed security breaches.
Either way, the site appears to be getting its come-uppence in no uncertain fashion right now. And no, we won’t be linking this story to their horrid site.
