So frustrating!

[CrunchyLeaf]

The more I learn about fishkeeping, the more frustrated I get at the ignorance of the world. I took my mom into Best Buy yesterday to buy her an I-Phone as an early Mother's Day present.

At the Mobile Phone counter they have a plastic jar with no more than a gallon of water in it. Inside the jar is a Lifeproof brand mobile phone cover and 4 goldfish. There was a small bubbler with a tube pumping oxygen into the water. The bottom of the jar is covered in fish waste. While I was there I watched the employee open the jar and feed the fish a huge pinch of food, more food than I would probably feed my 10 gallon in 2 days, most of which floated to the bottom of the jar to rest with the fish waste.

Why is a fish any less respectable of a life than anything else? If that was a sick puppy in a cage with waste all around it, there would be an uproar...but these are just fish. I don't understand either because the fish are not important to the display. What are they trying to advertise? That their mobile phone cover can withstand water? Or fish poop?

I attached a picture that I took with my cell phone. I actually wrote an email to both the best buy and the company that makes that case (http://www.lifeproof.com/life/). I'm sure it won't do any good, but at least I tried.

[MLBfan]

I can't stand when people just act like fish have no needs and can strive in anything. Besides, the goldfish just make the display look uglier.

[cat_fish_lady]

That's not even nice to look at, let alone being cruel to the fish. Whoever planned that marketing scheme has clearly never owned a fish before.

If I were you I would circulate that pic... put it on every aquarium forum you can find and make people aware. Your emails to the companies were a good idea, but you'll probably make more of an impact if you discourage the entire fishkeeping community to stay away from those brands of covers (marketing scheme probably designed by the manufacturer of the cover, not the Best Buy)

[Trillianne]

Well you spoke up, so there is one person at least!

Its hard to say where the idea of adding the fish for the marketing came into play, it could have been how Lifeproof sent it on... or it could have been someone at that individual Best Buy store that added that little extra to what was supposed to be just a case with phone in a jar of water.

So good on you for covering the bases in contacting both.

[CrunchyLeaf]

Yeah that was what I wondered as well. I don't know if the company that makes Lifeproof cases came up with this marketing scheme or if an employee at the Best Buy said "Hey lets put fish in there!"
I don't want to wrongly condemn one or the other, but if it was Best Buy's decision, then Lifeproof should know how their displays are being utilized and vice versa. If it was Lifeproof's idea, then Best Buy should be able to tell their suppliers that they will not display it.

[ridgenesss]

Stuff like this angers me. It's a shame. Water is enough to show the case it's waterproof. Unless they're trying to market it as fish proof as well....

[MLBfan]

Unless they're trying to market it as fish proof as well....

That's what really puzzles me. Is someone going to say, "Oh, now I can drop this in my fish tank"? It doesn't make sense

[Trillianne]

That's what really puzzles me. Is someone going to say, "Oh, now I can drop this in my fish tank"? It doesn't make sense

You laugh but... while googling the name to see if this was their normal marketing.... I saw a person complaining that they wanted to use it in their fish tank and they put it in and it broke their iphone.

(I laughed )

[Zanethan]

Why is a fish any less respectable of a life than anything else? If that was a sick puppy in a cage with waste all around it, there would be an uproar...but these are just fish. I don't understand either because the fish are not important to the display. What are they trying to advertise? That their mobile phone cover can withstand water? Or fish poop?

I hate that as well! In fact nothing pisses me off more than when people say "Oh it's just a fish...It's not like it can feel..."
No! they have the ability to feel pain just as you or I! Just because something is less than an inch long doesn't mean you can disregard it as a living creature! Sometimes I really hate the human race! #end rant

Also that display would have been JUST as effective, if not more so, if it was just the phone in the jar of water.

[mermaidwannabe]

That water looks awful! And that fish in the rear looks like something is wrong with its eye. People do things like this when they don't really know what they're doing. They think it's "cute". Someone needs to educate them. Where is the ASPCA?

-- mermaidwannabe