Who says the Christmas spirit doesn't exist?

[Seth]

Watch this!

[mistermack]

It's a good advertising stunt.

For a tiny fraction of the cost of normal advertising, they got huge exposure, and managed to look generous and caring.

If I was running the local news media, I wouldn't have run the story. It's been done before, in various guises, and usually makes money, unless they fuck it up.

[pErvinalia]

Fantastic advertising campaign.

[Seth]

It's a good advertising stunt.

For a tiny fraction of the cost of normal advertising, they got huge exposure, and managed to look generous and caring.

If I was running the local news media, I wouldn't have run the story. It's been done before, in various guises, and usually makes money, unless they fuck it up.

No, it's a fucking GREAT advertising campaign! It was also a wonderful gift to the beneficiaries. Charity and profit motive are not always mutually exclusive goals.

[pErvinalia]

No one gives a shit about charity in that company (as a company representative) outside of what positive benefit it can garner for the company. Companies are in the business of, and have a legal obligation to, making money. That's it.

[Jason]

Yeah rEv, and money is a means. To be charitable you need the means. To have the means you have to make money.

What matters is intent.

[pErvinalia]

Yep.

[PsychoSerenity]

That's not charity in any sense of the word.

[pErvinalia]

In Seth's corporate love-fest world, that's charity.

[Seth]

It is charity. That it has additional benefits to the giver is not relevant. The Catholic church runs charity programs of many kinds. It's charitable activities encourage and persuade people to donate to the church so the charitable work can go on. One can't say that the airline is going to substantially increase it's charitable giving (which I'm reasonably sure it does, because most corporations do for tax reasons) but one can't say it isn't either. And the charity to the passengers is independent of whatever additional revenues the airline might or might not see as a result of the program. Who knows, it might decide to donate a bump in income that can be attributed to the program to charity....

Just because the giver of charity has some motive other than pure compassion doesn't render the charity any less charitable. Some people give money to good causes out of guilt or a desire to salve their conscience because of something they've done. That motive doesn't diminish the value of the charity to the receiver.

[pErvinalia]

It's definitely charity of a sort (depending on whether they really needed charity) for the receiver. But to call what the airline did "charity" is ridiculous.

[Seth]

It's definitely charity of a sort (depending on whether they really needed charity) for the receiver. But to call what the airline did "charity" is ridiculous.

It fits the textbook definition so it's perfectly correct. The airline gave its passengers something for nothing as a gift.

[pErvinalia]

It wasn't for nothing. They did it for positive advertising for the company so that they could make more profits.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

It's definitely charity of a sort (depending on whether they really needed charity) for the receiver. But to call what the airline did "charity" is ridiculous.

It fits the textbook definition so it's perfectly correct. The airline gave its passengers something for nothing as a gift.

The poor bastard that said, "World Peace" is still fucking waiting!

[Gallstones]

I hate red and green. I hate xmas music and xmas decorations.
I hate xmas.