Bad Strategy: Announcing The Target Of Your Robbery On Facebook Before Giving It A Go

from the strategery dept

While dumb criminals doing dumb criminal-y things with technology aren't exactly new around Techdirt, we can't help but be amazed at the things some of these folks think they're going to get away with. That said, much of the silliness tends to occur after the fact. A murderer takes a selfie with his victim after the crime is committed. A phone thief uses the stolen phone to upload selfies of himself to his victim's account. A teen pimpette brags about her crimes after committing them.

But, in what may be a first, today we bring you a UK man who proactively used social media to post the location of his to-be-committed robbery before then committing said robbery. Not surprisingly, it didn't take long for the public and the police to put two and two together.

Andrew Hennells, 32, posted a comment on his profile which read: "Doing. Tesco. Over" at 19:25 GMT on 13 February. Just 15 minutes later, after he had held up the King's Lynn store, police caught Hennells with a knife and £410.

I must commend Hennells on his attempts to streamline police action this way. With all the fervor we've heard about attempts to use technology for so-called pre-crime efforts, folks like Hennells might give potential investors of those prospective systems pause as they negate their use entirely. Now, police weren't solely reliant on the Facebook posts to put Hennells in cuffs, but they obviously didn't harm the effort.

Sgt Pete Jessop said Hennells's Facebook confession had made it easier to secure a guilty plea.

"It was a bizarre and unusual case," he said. "The pictures and posts on Facebook helped us confirm what we already knew. None of this takes away from the seriousness of the crime or the trauma experienced by the victims of the robbery."

No, but it sure is good for a chuckle at the stupid. God's speed, Mr. Hennells.

Filed Under: announcing robbery, criminals, social media, stupid criminals
Companies: tesco

UK Supermarket Starts Making Its Own Movies

from the the-industry,-she's-a-changing dept

Whenever we talk about new business models, we get questions about how company x can stay in business with such a business model -- often with the implication being that if company x (e.g., a record label or a movie studio) can't do this, then it can't possibly work for the overall industry. But the fact is that markets are changing, and some of the end results may mean that non-traditional players end up making music and movies. We've already seen how different consumer products brands like Kraft and P&G have jumped into the music business, and now it appears that UK supermarket chain Tesco is getting into the movie business, producing a series of movies that are designed on purpose to go straight to the DVD shelves in Tesco. The company is working with some well known authors (the first movie is an adaptation of a Jackie Collins novel) and a small studio set up specifically for this kind of thing.

While they admit there's some stigma with direct-to-shelves DVDs, they're hoping to get past that with the name recognition associated with the author. The article also notes that Tesco has taken a complete hands-off approach to the film production. There's no product placement and no attempts to weave in Tesco-related marketing. Apparently, Tesco's only requirement is that the film not stray into pornography.

I have no idea if this will be a success. In fact, I have my doubts that this particular setup will work well for Tesco. But it does highlight an important point. There are alternative means to finance a film, and if there's demand for this kind of creative work, someone will figure out a way to get it made, even if it's not some big Hollywood studio.

Filed Under: business models, jackie collins, movies, supermarket
Companies: tesco

Retail Giant Tesco Gets Into The Movie Business

from the alternative-means dept

Even as the movie business has had yet another record breaking year at the box office, we still hear claims from Hollywood that online downloading of unauthorized movies is going to kill the movie business. And yet, where there's demand, new business models will be created. ethorad points us to the news that UK retail giant Tesco is getting into the business of producing movies itself based on the books of some very famous authors. The movies will be direct-to-DVD and direct-to-the-internet, but the idea is for Tesco to use these movies to generate more traffic to their stores (both online and off). In fact, if you look at the retail business, music and movies have long been used as a loss leader of sorts, to drive traffic to get them to buy other, much higher margin, goods. This is really an extension of that, but all the way to the point of helping to fund the production of the movie itself. Also, while it will have a window of exclusivity at the beginning, it sounds like Tesco is quite open to other stores selling the movie as well. Either way, it's interesting to see other third parties recognize that they benefit from having movies made, and thus are willing to partially fund the production of those movies.

Filed Under: funding, loss leader, marketing, movies, promotion
Companies: tesco