The Emma Watson hoax was created to make money.
Not to shut down 4Chan,not to punish those who hack cell phones of actresses,just to make money:
Rantic itself doesn't actually exist, but is instead the work of the prolific pranksters behind another countdown hoax. Made up of people who go by the names Jacob Povolotski, Yasha Swag, Swenzy, and Joey B, the group is occasionally referred to as "Social VEVO." Last year, Social VEVO ripped copyrighted materials from Fox and created a similar countdown clock that promised to reveal information about Brian from Family Guy. That, too, was a hoax.
Convincing the internet that anonymous men would punish women with sexual and violent threats turns out to be remarkably easy, and that’s because it's completely within the realm of possibility. The fake Rantic expertly manipulated the internet outrage cycle, not because the mainstream media “listen[s] and believe[s] the feminist victimization narrative,” as one particularly obnoxious Reddit user put it, but precisely because women are regularly victimized online. Povolotski and team also managed to take advantage of 4chan’s terrible reputation and turn it against them: Of course 4chan would punish an outspoken feminist by publishing her nudes, people thought. That’s what 4chan does.
In the end, for Watson, the threat still existed, even if it didn't come from 4chan, and the message was clear: Speak out as a woman about gender equality and you'll be punished. In this way, Rantic's actions are almost as indefensible as 4chan's. Both compounded the feeling that women are not safe on the internet.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/09/rantic-marketing-4chan-emma-watson-leak-hoax.html?mid=twitter_nymag
They've done it before and it seems to be about generating youtube and other media clicks in order to attract advertisers and their money,here's an explanation of how it's done and how they've done it in the past:
SocialVEVO, the group behind Brian’s Announcement, isn’t your average marketing firm. By ripping off the trademarks and images of some of the world’s most recognizable products and organizations, SocialVEVO has duped millions of people into doing more than just liking something on Facebook. It’s all about making money.
And this is how they do it.
What he had done was manipulate YouTube views through botting, a controversial practice that has dogged the site since at least 2009. It’s also a frighteningly easy thing to do. Last August, Daily Dot contributor Chase Hoffberger purchased half a million views for his otherwise unnotable cinnamon challenge video in online black markets. He paid a mere $500 for the fake views, and it took YouTube five months to notice.
There are various methods of botting, traded on shady Internet forums, but all of them exploit YouTube’s API to inflate view counts. The more views a video gets, the more advertising revenue it pulls in and the better chance it has at generating real buzz, which makes generating thousands of fake views a lucrative business.
And that’s where SocialVEVO comes in. One of its founders, who goes by “Jacob Povolotski” online, is a major player in the YouTube botting game. He first made a name for himself in 2012, when he drove 8 million fraudulent views to a self-produced rap video called "Pickles.” In the video, Povolotski—whose comedy rap name is “Yasha Swag”—sports a mop top haircut and spits utter nonsense atop a headache-inducing beat. The original video has been deleted, but the legend live
http://www.dailydot.com/business/socialvevo-family-guy-hoax-company/
= new reply since forum marked as read
