4 ms·
What do you mean? My son setup his sea monkey set nearly a year ago, and it's still in my office going strong, with only the slightest maintenance.
by larrik 11y ago
What do you mean? My son setup his sea monkey set nearly a year ago, and it's still in my office going strong, with only the slightest maintenance.
- logfromblammo 11y agoWould your son rather have a miniature brine shrimp aquarium, or an Amazing Live Sea-Monkey habitat? The branded humbug is specifically designed to make the mundane seem more interesting, even to the point where someone would actually buy brine shrimp as pets. As a business, breeding brine shrimp for the toy market alone is worthless. You also have to package the reason for someone to buy them, which is the story that makes them a catalyst for the imagination. It's why you can take two copies of the same doll, dress one up as Mr. Milquetoast, forensic accountant, and the other as Muscles McUltrahero, beloved comic book character, and see such a dramatic difference in sales. Obviously, Big Time Toys saw no value in the product itself, as they changed suppliers. The entire value of the box is in the brand, which they stopped paying for. As much as I enjoy the schadenfreude that I feel when I see con artists cheat each other, I have to come down of the side of the underdog with the moxie to sell people fluff and nonsense and still make them love it. Big Time isn't selling Amazing Live Sea-Monkeys (TM) any more. They're selling cheap Chinese brine shrimp.
- SiVal 11y agoI guess we can infer from the name that Muscles McUltrahero is a full-stack web dev, which undoubtedly boosts sales.
- dipnuggetron 11y agoDon't poach my ninja rockstar.
- nqzero 11y agoit was the A/B testing that put him over the top
- Aelinsaar 11y agoAnd they are doing it to the only group on the planet who can be deceived by that kind of marketing (little kids), while other people smile and look at it as a magical thing. It's not. It's such a notorious borderline scam that an early South Park episode touched on it. Rather than $5-$10 million a year in brine shrimp sales.
- cm2012 11y agoIt's harmless, though. Considering nothing in life has an value at all except how it makes humans feel, as long as it makes people net happier than sadder (which it seems to do), then Sea Monkeys are a moral positive.
- Aelinsaar 11y agoIt's 10 million a year, that's what it is.
- unclebucknasty 11y agoI was pretty disappointed with my Sea Monkeys. Can't imagine I was alone in that.
- Zuider 11y agoMarketing aquatic vermin as 'Sea Monkeys'? It could be worse. They could have tried to push cockroaches as 'Fridge Gorillas'.
- logfromblammo 11y agoYou would think that if you were going to con someone, it would be better to con someone with money, or at least a steady income, but no, conning children is also apparently profitable. Because your mark does another con on your behalf to get the money, which works because they have absolutely no idea that they are just a catspaw in your own con.
- tragomaskhalos 11y agoI still vividly remember the awe that my Sea Monkeys inspired in me as a child: what were these little critters exactly? had they really sprung spontaneously into being from that tiny packet? The theatre of it was genius, and knowing the (rather banal) reality would have ruined the magic.
- Zuider 11y agoThe article says that the original variety of brine shrimp grows full sized more quickly and survives longer, giving you a slightly enhanced possibility that you would indeed "amaze all your friends".
- Aelinsaar 11y agoI don't think the longevity of the brine shrimp is the issue, and I'm sorry if that's the impression you took away from my post.