Through the Wire

eBay Sellers Cash In on 'Mooninites’

Those light boxes installed in major cities across the nation to promote Cartoon Network’s Aqua Teen Hunger Force first triggered a terrorism panic in Boston, then triggered some commercial exploitation on eBay.

Fans have designed and are selling T-shirts taking off on the crisis, caused when law enforcement officials in Beantown two weeks ago treated the lighted figures of a “Mooninite” character from the show as possible explosive devices.

One garment for sale on the online auction site has a replica of the character’s image from the light box, with middle finger upright, bearing the slogan, “Up Yours, Boston.” The seller, labeling his effort “silk screened with hilarity,” was seeking a $15 opening bid.

Outdoing that effort was another design, with the same picture, only worded, “Pull my finger, I go boom.”

The day after the little billboards shut down Boston, Wire contributors spotted one of the light boxes for sale on eBay, drawing bids of $400 plus before being withdrawn (got a sales slip for that, buddy?). Last week, another one was up on eBay, this one relieved of its placement on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, according to the seller. “You too can own a piece of guerilla art history!” the pitch read in part. If this sale goes through, it’ll show why people bother: last Thursday, just before noon, the auction closed with the winning bid of $2,605.

Lots of Ersatz 'Butters’ On the MySpace Scene

Elsewhere on the web, Comedy Central and viral brand marketer Big Fish Marketing of Los Angeles are amazed at all the “new” South Park characters cropping up on MySpace pages.

For the show’s 10th anniversary (have they really been killing Kenny that long?), the duo created MySpace pages for the kid characters, as well as an anniversary site where MySpace users can create individualized characters by choosing from among various hairstyles, eyes, clothes and accessories.

When a user creates a character, it appears on that person’s MySpace profile. Friends who visit the profile see the character and can link to the character generator to create one of their own.

Big Fish chief operating officer Steve Roffer said the pages launched in October, and word of mouth keeps adding to the response. By last week, the sites cumulatively had more than 17 million views, growing by 20% per week, he said. “It’s a snowball effect of epic proportions,” he declared.

The site will remain up indefinitely, Roffer said, adding, “I’m sure we two will figure out how to take it to the next level.” South Park returns for its 11th season on March 7.

Patience Has its Reward, In the Form of Pizza

Before it settled its retransmission-consent dispute with Sinclair Broadcast Group, Mediacom Communications in Cedar Rapids had made arrangements to give away pizzas as a gesture of appreciation to its customers.

That’s because subscribers had lost Sinclair’s CBS affiliate KGAN, and were about to suffer the inconvenience of watching Super Bowl XLI by way of rabbit ears. But even when the cable company settled its dispute with the broadcaster the Friday before the big game, it went ahead and gave away 10,000 frozen pies that Saturday.

“It was more about thanking people for their patience, not about did it [the Sinclair deal] get done or not,” said Phyllis Peters, senior manager of communications for Mediacom’s North Central division.

The giveaway effort involved more odd duty for Mediacom’s Iowa employees. In early January, after losing carriage of Sinclair’s stations, Mediacom workers had to assemble and distribute thousands of antenna kits.

A few weeks later, they were shifting gears to hand out the pizzas at two locations, a mall in Cedar Rapids and a sports arena in Waterloo. The giveaway drew big crowds.

“They were lined up often 300 or 400 people” deep, Peters said.

Fat Green Monster Fights Childhood Obesity

What’s next: Bill O’Reilly urging viewers to support the ACLU?

An ad campaign developed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which kicked off Feb. 1, features characters from DreamWorks’ Shrek telling kids to get off their fannies and “play an hour a day.”

It’s part of HHS’s fight against childhood obesity; more than 10 million school-age children in the U.S. are now considered overweight.

“Be a Player” public-service spots, in both English and Spanish, are running on Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network, and are also being supported by Univision, Discovery Communications and Comcast Spotlight.

You’ll recall Shrek as a fat, lime-green ogre, with a Scottish accent voiced by Mike Myers. He looks like he’s downed more than a few meat pies. Or maybe lots of 2-liter bottles of soda and Big Macs: PepsiCo and McDonald’s are among the campaign’s supporters.

But HHS and others involved with the ads argue that the point is, if Shrek can make an attempt to stay active, anyone can. So should we expect a thinner, trimmer Shrek in Shrek the Third? Stay tuned this May.