h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'll tell you, I'm sick hearing about that bleedin' ship.

'Every night in my dreams...'

and it isn't the Titanic eitherit's it's sister ship, they changed the names over before the voyage

Not quite, but they did change the order they sailed in.

apparently the names were changed, from various sources that's told me ? over the years. But I suppose that this could be one of the many conspiracy theories that lurk around on many subjects etc

They did change the name of the third ship - Majestic sailed first, then Titanic sailed and sank, so they turned Gigantic into Britannic, because they didn't want to associate her with the other two too closely.

So no, they didn't give Titanic the name of her sister ship, that must be a corruption in the story.

cheers Mal

Prof's on about the insurance scam theory: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Titanic_alternative_theories#Gardiner.27s_Ship_That_Never_Sank

The number of rumours, urban legends, etc, about that event fill libraries, I suspect. Amazing how long that particular disaster has been talked about, isn't it?

Okay, here's my Titanic story. Back when we taught English in Cologne, some of our clients were local businesses. At one of the firms, I had a student who was a native French speaker who worked in their translation department. She was taking English because she thought the English translators in her department weren't doing a very good job.

For instance, they translated 'Kleinbilddias' as 'candid slides'. This went into the catalogue, and made people think that they were being offered pictures of the company's office party rather than slides of their products.

She wasn't very happy with the marketing department, either. Apparently, they had made expensive posters advertising a part that is used in ship navigation. They said, 'If Titanic had had our technology, it needn't have sunk.'

They wanted to send this to the UK. She talked them out of it.

that'll be it KB - cheers to you as well my friend

I could see that Titanic ad slogan being a big hit, Dmitri. And I'm not being sarcastic when I say that!

On the theory that there's no such thing as bad publicity?

Well...for example, there was an ad for some kind of microwave convenience food years ago.

You remember Captain Oats' famous self-sacrifice at Antarctica, when he walked to his death to conserve supplies for the others? "I may be some time..."

Well, the advertisement had him leaving the tent, after giving the famous quote...and sniggering away while tucking in to his secret stash of microwave noodles as soon as he got out of sight.

That's awful. But really funny.

Yeah, I think gallows humour is a regional thing.

When I was a kid, Quaker Oats had a popular ad for their new puffed wheat and rice. The gimmick was that the grains were, in essence, 'shot from guns', that is, they were blown with force some way.

The commercial used the finale to the 1812 Overture.

'This is the cereal that's shot from guns...*boom*'

Now, I suppose that could be considered offensive, if you were a veteran of the Napoleonic Wars...

On the other hand, this one is an attack on Southerners. Nobody's talked like that since shortly after Lee's surrender. (It's funny, though.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTvt9bK4YSc

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Actually he was badly frost bitten, which made him very slow and he walked out to his death to give the others a chance of reaching the supply dump, I think the ad says a lot more about the sort of people who work for ad agencies than it does about Oats.

That's what I was saying. The Titanic one wouldn't surprise me.

Seeing as Tayto is now doing Titanic crisps in "sea salt" flavour...

So you're saying it's open season?

Let's face it. If it wasn't for marketing - marketing of a book, of a film, of newspapers, of crisps, of tours, of little plastic ships, of museums, of whatever else - then a damn sight fewer people would even know the name "Titanic" these days, at all.

I want one of those t-shirts that say "she sailed, she sank, get over it".