James Delahunty
29 May 2014 8:35
Ninemsn offices evacuated and bomb squad called in after a 'suspicious package' was delivered to a journalist.
Ubisoft has admitted that it was a PR stunt that simply went wrong. A courier delivered a safe to Ninemsn offices in Australia square earlier this week, with a letter informing a journalist to check his voicemail. However, the journalist had no voicemail.
When staff entered a pin code into the safe, it began to beep. Unsure of what to do, they called the police and evacuated staff from the area.
The bomb squad arrived and opened the safe in the basement of the building, finding only a copy of Watch Dogs, a beanie and a baseball cap, along with a note saying it was embargoed until 5pm.
Ubisoft admitted that the PR stunt didn't go according to plan, as the publisher was unable to leave a crucial voicemail for the journalist explaining what was going on.
"This is definitely the other side of the line in terms of what it's safe for a PR company to send anonymously to a newsroom. The thing was black, heavy and slightly creepy," Hal Crawford, editor at Ninemsn, told Mumbrella.
"We did check with other newsrooms to see if they had received a similar package as we thought it was a PR stunt, but no-one else had. We weren't panicked at any point, but given there was no note explaining what it was, we had to take sensible precautions."
That seems like quite an overreaction - who actually believes that bombs delivered by courier would look like that?
As for Ubisoft saying that the stunt didn't go according to plan - that may be true, but it definitely got a lot more publicity than it would have if it did go to plan.
Source: mumbrella.com.au