The idea captured the imagination of much of the Internet: a business promising to send an envelope full of glitter through the mail to your enemy or frenemy for only 10 Australian dollars (about $8.22). It’s more whimsical than sending poop, and glitter is way more insidious. What could go wrong with this business idea? Excessive popularity, as it turns out.
We don’t need to tell you about the existence of the site, because at least three of your Facebook friends have already posted a news story about it, along with a warning along the lines of, “don’t piss me off lol!!” What you may not know is that the site has closed itself to new orders and put itself up for sale, now serving as a cautionary tale for how quickly an idea can go viral, scaling up beyond what its creator is even capable of imagining.
The site’s apparent creator is a 22-year-old serial entrepreneur in Australia. He would like someone to buy the website, now, or help him fill orders. Please.
“I’ve received Christmas and birthday cards over the years from family and friends who put glitter in the cards,” Glittermaster Mat Carpenter explained in an interview with Slate. “I hated it, and I wanted the rest of the world to feel my pain. So that’s how the website was born.” Anyone who has ever received a glitter-laden card can understand that perfectly.
The site describes glitter as the herpes of craft supplies, which is accurate, but that’s probably why filling the orders is so bothersome. As of yesterday afternoon, pranksters had placed more than 2,000 orders.
Why did it take off? The site’s text is perfect, not over- or under-selling the product and containing a perfect mix of corporate babble and profanity.
ShipYourEnemiesGlitter.com [Official Site]
The Founder of ShipYourEnemiesGlitter.Com Wants the Rest of the World to Feel His Pain [Slate]
by Laura Northrup via Consumerist