I almost got shot. kinda.
A few days ago, as I was leaving my apartment, a car sped across the parking lot to intercept me. I had just about reached my car when I noticed the driver stopping directly behind my car, blocking me. The two passengers jumped out of the car and came straight at me.
I get a lot of hate-mail and I’ve had more than a few death threats. I keep my address a secret, but I’ve had people track me down in the past. So, when I saw a car speed up and two people jump out, it freaked me out.
One of them asked me if I valued the mind and body benefits of exercise. I said yes and that I needed to get going. They assured me that they’d move the car, but perhaps I wanted to take some reading material with me to look over when I had more time.
So I took their pamphlet. My only excuse is that I thought I was going to get stabbed or something, and I just wanted to get out of there. It wasn’t until later that I looked at the pamphlet. It slowly went from exercise to Jesus. It turned out to be disguised Jehovah’s Witness propaganda, the Watchtower. I figured that they tricked me fair and square, so I felt obligated to read it.
… 
What I learned by this experience
The pamphlet, itself, was kind of Jesusy. But it gave me some fantastic ideas for expanding the Pastafarian congregation. Clearly, the way to get more members is to trick them; make them think they’re signing up for one thing and then – bam – all the sudden you hit them with the gospel-speak, and you’ve got them.
So, I’ve decided that we’re going to do a similar campaign to trick people into joining FSM, specifically, members of other religions, especially the religions who propagandize. I figure that we’ve already got the open-minded people, now we need the gullible ones.
Internet advertising - like magic, but nerdier
You can target advertisements to specific categories of websites. We’re going to be targeting competing religious websites. Any religion who hands out pamphlets is fair game. Lots of religious websites sell ad-space through 3rd parties, and we’ll be able to place OUR ads on their pages, and steal their members.
It’ll work like this: their members will go to the church websites as usual, and they’ll see a small ad suggesting that there is more to their religion. Some of them will click the ad and be brought to a specific catch page, where they’ll hear fantastic arguments on why they should convert.
I need your help with any of the following:
1) Specific strategies for each religion. For example, for Jehovah’s Witnesses, we could push that we, also, reject Orthodox Christianity. And the strategies don’t need to be that on-topic. The Jehovah’s Witnesses got me with an exercise pamphlet, we could just as easily have a pirate angle or something. We’ll have different strategies for the other religions - Mormons, Young Earth Christians, Scientologists, etc. Let’s brainstorm. Either post in the comments or send me an email at bobby.henderson@gmail.com
2) Nich text ads. We need short, catchy text ads that will appeal to each of the target religions. The content of these ads will be more clear once we’ve established our strategies for each religion.
3) Small Image Ads. People with art skills, get creative. Same deal with the text ads, we’re going to know more once we know what our angle is. We’ll need ads in the following dimensions:
200×200
250×250
468×60
336×280
4)Individual Catch Pages. Once they click the ad, they’ll be brought to a page on the FSM site which will expand on the idea presented in the ad and slowly make the argument that they should convert to Pastafarianism. I need help with this.
5) Money. I’ve put aside a few thousand for this. Ads cost between $0.25 and upwards of $5 per thousand views. I’m hoping for a budget of at least $5k. If you want to help, you can either donate, or buy some FSM merchandise.
So, that’s my idea. What do you think?
this is for mr. bobby, a serious question:
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would you be willing to have this fund-raising operation be a totally open-book project? meaning, would your fsm followers have access to the following information: the names of the people who donated money, the amount of money they donated, the names of the advertising sites, et al, and the exact amount spent for each ad?
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i think that if you did this, all the people who are doubting and questioning you now would be more willing to help. right now there are quite a lot of people who are saying youre just short on funds and are trying to fill your wallet. they are shocked and disappointed. please think about this because you may potentially lose supporters who are regularly bringing new people to your site.
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remember, as a couple of the wise people above said, fooling the gullible (and soliciting money from us) makes you no better than a regular, lame church. you will become what you detest. please do not let this happen. the fsm can go very far if you use wise business tactics, but what youve suggested in this thread may bring you the opposite.
just thoughts from a follower who is, understandably I hope, pissed off.
“right now there are quite a lot of people who are saying youre just short on funds and are trying to fill your wallet.”
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So these people have access to Bobby’s financial records do they, or are they just rumour and gossip mongers? I did notice that Bobby’s missive stated “if you WANT to help” I think the poster who mentioned knee jerk reaction had it right after all!
He also said we could support by buying more FSM products, which I have no problem doing! I still need to buy my FSM thing to hang off my rearview window, and if he ever comes out with a hardback version of the gospel, I will be getting one!
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Notice how he also pointed out you could help him come up with an ad, if you were bored and feeling particularly creative.
Who are these “quite a lot of people” and what information do they have which others haven’t?
Spot on kev3056 (:))
I don’t know what’s gotten up this “pissed off’”s arse….sounds like rumour mongering to me! Probably a fundie who thinks they see a chance to try and stir up some shit.
Gurrh…bucket please!
“if he ever comes out with a hardback version of the gospel, I will be getting one!”
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I’m almost 100% positive there is a hard cover version….I remember a few posters discussing this once before. I haven’t got one yet either. I originally was waiting to see if a hard cover was being published. Will get onto it sometime…all the comments I’ve heard about it have been very good. (:))
Mine is hardcover.
ISBN-10 0-00-723160-1
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Gospel-Flying-Spaghetti-Monster/dp/0007231601/ref=sr_11_1/026-9287596-9539662?ie=UTF8&qid=1179574602&sr=11-1
I can’t find it on amazon.com. :(
Shop around if you are in the US.
I have to correct something I wrote earlier. If there were to be a study group to gain more understanding of the Gospel of the FSM, I’d participate.
Yep - mine is hardback too ;)
Fnar fnar!
Ah, I had fun last night :) *Big grin*
@ wench nikkiee
thank you for that link (satire wire). you’ve just made my day.
@ pissed off
funny, my brother said the same thing. erich? i didn’t know you were a “follower who is, understandably I hope, pissed off.” i didn’t even know you were a follower! so that’s where my copy of the gospel went…
To pissed off… do you have the guts to tell us who you really are? Just wondering….
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There’s a hardback version of the Gospel out there?! Cool! I would have bought that if I knew it existed!
Bobby should publish this better, I’m going to go look for one in the US tomorrow to see if I can buy it!
Hello Pete, jon,
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Hopefully you guys will be back? It was such good fun yesterday. Come on guys, take some time off from bothering people at their doorstep and post your naggings here instead. Whereas most people you visit would like nothing better than to shoot you, we actually want you to come back! Most fundies only do one time hit-and-run posts. We appreciate you for a bit of stamina. You certainly lived up to your reputations as JWs, going on and on and on quoting the old fairy tales without ever being bothered by the slightest bit of intelligent thinking. Personally, as a scientist, I got the greatest kick out your posts when you claimed science on your side. Bwahahahaha! Please post again!
@ihatemyspace May 19th, 2007 at 9:34 am
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@ wench nikkiee
“thank you for that link (satire wire). you’ve just made my day.”
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Thank Alchemist. Excellent find. Always good to see the Aussies getting up there. (;))
ah, I also got tricked by Jehovah’s witnesses! Come read my experiences here if you care enough. It was amusing, to say the least. http://www.unsoughtinput.com/index.php/2007/02/13/mormons-god-and-my-driveway/
“Alouette May 19th, 2007 at 8:25 pm “.
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Hahahaha Your story was priceless!
Are you a regular here, using a different name?
If not, please do stick around! You’re Ok by me.
Alouette
Hahahahaha…just read it. Good stuff!
RAmen
I can’t believe no one has said this already but, this whole idea of tricking people by luring them into something that sounds cool then at the end “bam” hitting them with the gospel…
This was totally done on a large scale by the Wachowski brothers when they finished making “the Matrix” trillogy.
I should say, I still don’t know if that whole “Neo is Jesus” thing had a Religious/political motivation behind it or if they were just inspired by that Neon-Genisis Evangelion Anime thing. But my “gut instinct” tells me the former is the truth (so it must be true that the Wachowski brothers are morons, right?).
Anyhow, a cool cyber-punk movie to trick people into believing sounds impossible to do, but I thought I would just put the idea out there.
If you are advertising on Church websites, you are giving churches money. If religious people click on the link then see a phony religion, they will be pissed off, and its likely that they still won’t understand the satire behind it. If they do understand the satire, they will be more pissed off.
I don’t think I could have a clear conscience giving money to churches just to mildly piss of some members. The satire is wasted on jesus-freaks, and in the end the churches have more money to spend on politicians who can push creationism in schools. This idea sounds cool, but only if you don’t pay money to churches.
I like my cyber-punk movie idea better (previous comment), though it is probably impossible.
Mormons- Strippers are like having many wives
Scientoligist and Christians- Ask if they want global warming to stop. Hand them an eyepatch and explain how they can help.