Journal·
Deepfaking Our Founder Into a Hostage Situation for Earned Media
A 90-second clip of our CEO blinking in morse code from an undisclosed location generated more inbound press than the previous decade of trade write-ups combined. We have notes.
Leonard Krasner
Executive Creative Director
1. The Brief
The client wanted earned media. The budget did not support earned media. We asked ourselves what kind of story a journalist physically cannot ignore, and the answer is, of course, a kidnapping.
We trained a model on every piece of video footage of our founder, generated a 90-second proof-of-life, and seeded it to a single mid-tier crime reporter with a demonstrable hunger for a Pulitzer. The footage went up at 4:42am. Bloomberg picked it up at 5:11.
2. The Insurance Surprise
What no one told us, and what we will not be making this mistake about again, is that our key-man insurance policy auto-triggers a payout on credible evidence of duress. Our CFO discovered this when he opened his email at 7:00am to find a wire confirmation for an eight-figure sum. The carrier has been polite but firm in their belief that this is now their movie, not ours.
3. The Earned Media
The earned media was, in fairness, exceptional. We logged 4.1 billion impressions, a 38-point lift in unaided brand awareness, and a moving tribute on a primetime news show. The client’s product, which is a hummus, was mentioned in 71% of coverage on a non-sequitur basis. We consider this a creative win.
4. The Sequel
Phase two of the campaign was to deepfake the successful ransom recovery, including a tearful press conference and a triumphant return to the office. We had to scrap this when the actual founder walked into a board meeting on Tuesday and was, for the first time in his career, asked for ID.
We are now rolling the proof-of-recovery footage into a Q4 social campaign as “founder’s message,” with the hostage framing fully removed. Internal call sheet refers to this as the “Lazarus Ladder.” Performance is encouraging.