The brilliance of NBC’s HornyManatee.com
Cory Bergman December 12th, 2006
The other night on Late Night with Conan O’Brien, there was a skit that featured a guy sitting at a computer watching a manatee (another guy in a costume) touching himself. Then Conan cracks an ad-libbed line that he must be watching HornyManatee.com. That was at 6:30 p.m. in the taping — the show aired later that night — and NBC execs realized that HornyManatee.com was an open domain. What if someone put up a porn site? Or worse? Writes the NY Times, “In a pre-emptive strike inspired as much by the regulations of the Federal Communications Commission as by the laws of comedy,” NBC bought the domain. Shortly thereafter, Conan’s staff launched HornyManatee.com, a hilarious spoof on a manatee porn site that encourages users to send in their own “amateur horny manatee pictures or stories” for possible use on the air. (One user sent in a poem with the line, “I want to freak thy blubber rolls.” Conan read it on the air.) By yesterday afternoon, NBC says the site has received 3 million “hits” — which we assume they mean page views — and it’s well on its way to become a viral phenom. Well done. When you think about it, this has to be the fastest launch of a new site by a big media company in history. Sexy screen grab…
9 Comments Add your own
1. Jason | December 12th, 2006 at 10:26 am
My company’s porn blocker software won’t allow me to open HornyManatee. Or maybe we block all NBC/U websites now.
2. invitedmedia | December 12th, 2006 at 10:47 am
speaking of registering domain names…
why, in this era of cost-cutting, anyone would register through verisign vs. go daddy is a wonder.
where else can you immediately cut costs by 60% with absolutely no difference in the service received?
3. Steve | December 12th, 2006 at 10:57 am
I think Conan’s found his own version of the green-screen challenge. Good job.
4. David Johnson | December 12th, 2006 at 11:20 am
at last, hot man on manatee action.
anyone old enough to remember whatbadgerseat.com, mentioned on the simpsons way back in the nineties? miles ahead of their time.
5. Paul | December 12th, 2006 at 11:30 am
Oh the humanatee!
Anyone know exactly how long it took them to launch the site after Conan first mentioned the URL? Around my place it would take a month of meetings to even find out how, let alone what.
6. Dude | December 12th, 2006 at 7:03 pm
They did something similar with Law and Order a few weeks ago with the abduction episode. It was well done as well. The site was left raw, unadulterated and contained content not available int he show that appears to have been shot by the characters.
7. josh | December 12th, 2006 at 7:58 pm
I read that the network wouldn’t have allowed the fake URL to be read on-air unless they purchased it.
8. Tom | December 13th, 2006 at 5:08 pm
That manatee looks like my ex-girlfriend
9. MOJO | January 18th, 2008 at 6:04 am
Wow, thanks for the excellent information!
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