Yet Again, What Were They Thinking?!?

.:MILF Used To Be Intimidating...:.

In the Philippines, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front is indeed a fearsome countenance. A group of Muslim separatists that split from the erstwhile revolutionary Moro National Liberation Front, the MILF is often considered a terrorist group by international observers, allegedly with ties to the likes of the Jemaah Islamiyah and the Al Qaeda. Despite ongoing peace talks, there is no question that the MILF remains a force to be reckoned with and one that must be dealt with very carefully at all times.

And then American Pie came along. And the MILF never meant the same thing in this world after that.

So imagine my amusement when I saw this headline...

You can "declog my river" anytime, baby!

Obviously, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front isn't to blame for the unfortunate alternate meaning of their acronym, but there's been a significant drop in bad-@$$edness for these guys ever since American Pie came along. And now, they just turn into a lousy punchline whenever they do something that ends up getting them in the papers.

.:Bubba Tea Licious: Really?!?:.

If there are three things you can count on, it's death, taxes, and sniggering over a name like "Bubba Tea Licious" everytime it's said aloud, especially in the Philippines, of all places.

Ang sarap mag-Bubba Tea!!!

Did these guys even bother to think about this when they picked up the franchise? How'd that franchise meeting come up? Imagine if yours truly and Maro decided to start a tea franchise.

Hey! We're gonna franchise milk tea!

So what are our choices?

Well, there's the party teahouse place, Tea Gang...

No, that sounds too dry.

How about a tea delivery place like Tea Call?

That seems a bit too self-serving.

Well, maybe Proh's Tea?

No, that's too easy.

How about the one from the couple? Tea Gus-Anne?

Now, that's too hard.

Well, the last one we have is Bubba Tea Licious, so I dunno...

That sounds explosive! Let's take that franchise!

And thus, Bubba Tea Licious was born! Awesome tea, tea-spurting name!

P.S. Bubba Tea Licious, please don't sue me. MILF, please don't kill me.

Et Tu, Supot.PH?

.:A Su’pot.ph Epilogue…:.

So.

A couple of days ago, I wrote about the hilarious but unfortunate implications of running a website called su’pot.ph (Accent for clarity. LOL.), expressing my bemusement over the whole thing and wondering if they actually knew what they were doing when they bought that domain name.

Then just yesterday, someone I have zero common friends with invited me to Facebook, and in one of those rare times, I actually went and accepted the invitation. He didn’t take too long before he introduced himself to me, though. This is how that innnnteresting conversation panned out…

So far, so good.

So the guy just complimented me on my blog, and naturally, I thanked him for it, since hey, I’ve been doing this stuff for almost nine years already, and every tiny bit of recognition I get is a tiny bit that I totally appreciate.

In any case, it seemed like it was no big deal, right? Suddenly, his initial praises for my blog turned reeeealllly awkward, when…

Did I mention this was reeeealllly awkward?

If you were in my shoes, I dare you to not feel that he was being sarcastic or passive-aggressive when he said he "enjoyed" reading what I had to say about his site, considering how I wasn't very flattering of their name choice.

Now, I’ve mercilessly criticized Willie Revillame, and was fully prepared to be sued and sent to jail if it came to that over my statements. I did the same with Manny Pacquiao, and anyone who follows my writing on the POC knows I probably ingratiated myself to GMA, P Noy, Chiz Escudero, Herbert Bautista, Nick Perlas, and a host of other powerful people, if they ever bothered reading what I had to say about them.

And really, that’s fine. If (knock on wood) I died or went to jail for the sake of my strong beliefs on these various matters, then at least, I paid the price for a worthy cause.

So paranoid old me didn’t want to suffer the indignity of being sued over a joke I made, especially since I never even went for the joke and only implied it. That would've totally sucked.

I was kinda surprised, because it seemed like a huge disconnect between telling me my blog is interesting, and then being informed that the person I’m speaking to is the owner of the site I’ve been poking fun at just the other day.

So regaining my senses, I replied to him.

Saved.

Thing is, the head of su’pot.ph isn’t just a good sport, he’s actually pretty clever, when you think about it. It’s obvious now that he knew what he was getting into when he bought the domain, and if you asked him what he was thinking, it was exactly the same thing we all are now: it could be misunderstood, and open to a lot of uncut jokes. Which translates to instant buzz about their fledgling site. Which can only be a good thing for them, even if their name sounds funny. I pretty much realized that the fact I joked about his website was exactly the desired effect of picking the domain name!

Because really, if they’re pushing a good product, a funny name could only make them even more memorable and not take anything away from the quality of their services at all.

Do I take back what I said about the unfortunate implications of naming your site su’pot.ph? Obviously not. Those implications still stand, and I’m sure I’m not the first person to notice it, since even the CEO himself knew it from the get-go. Before he said goodbye to me on Facebook, he even squeezed in a “Go Team Supot” battlecry, which I actually chuckled at aloud, because it seemed so self-aware, coming from him.

But do I now realize that it was all part of the plan because it was all about getting people to talk about them? Absolutely, and I obviously fell for it hook, line, and sinker. Remind me to interview you guys next time to get the full story behind the site, because right now, the fridge logic of the whole thing is only beginning to sink in.

Well played, su’pot.ph. Well played.