British Gas is getting dragged hard for this awkward David Bowie tweet
LONDON — A tweet from an official British Gas Twitter account using the #RipDB hashtag has drummed up anger on social media.
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The tweet, which was sent out in the early hours of Tuesday morning — a year to the day that David Bowie passed away — has received criticism from people who saw it as an attempt to "hijack" a hashtag for the sake of marketing.
Here's the original tweet:
Image: twitter/@britishgashelp
The responses were not good.
@BritishGasHelp this is a cracking example of how not to do social media.
— Tinfoil Pants (@notquitededd) January 10, 2017
@BritishGasHelp "time flys don't it" My God. "Time flies, doesn't it" is what you were looking for. You know this is visible to the public?
— Brian Keen (@thebriankeen) January 10, 2017
@BritishGasHelp Go home British Gas Help, you're drunk.
— Miranda Athanasiou (@Mirandalife) January 10, 2017
@BritishGasHelp tacky...
— Kirsty Callaghan (@splursty) January 10, 2017
@BritishGasHelp this is the worst tweet I have ever seen
— Luke (@sanctuaryvilla) January 10, 2017
@BritishGasHelp Bit weird
— Yasser Hussain (@yasserthoughts) January 10, 2017
@BritishGasHelp A really brazen attempt to hijack a Hashtag that has nothing to do with your business. Paul - you should be ashamed
— GrumpyMcGrumpface (@grumpyoldchris) January 10, 2017
At the time of writing, the tweet is still live, and the British Gas Help account has been responding to people to apologise for any offence caused.
@tedreally Hi Ted, this is a bit worrying! I'm sorry if we've offended. Please can you DM details of what your post is about? Thanks, Janina
— British Gas Help (@BritishGasHelp) January 10, 2017
@grumpyoldchris I'm sorry if we've caused offence. Please can you DM the details? Thanks, Janina
— British Gas Help (@BritishGasHelp) January 10, 2017
Mashable has reached out to British Gas and we will update this article when we receive a response.
