Virgin Atlantic doesn’t appear to have any hard feelings after a cannabis beverage company made false and satirical claims about a deal to sell its THC-infused beverages on flights—but the airline says it had to draw a line when it came to an AI-generated video and fake letter from its CEO about the supposed partnership.
The cannabis business Drippy—which sells drinks with 10mg of THC and 10mg of CBN—made a concerted effort earlier this month to convince people its beverages would be made available to adults on certain domestic flights. The stunt worked, and certain media reported that the partnership was real. But it wasn’t.
Virgin Atlantic did contact the cannabis company regarding the made up content. However, a spokesperson for MEDCAN24 said that “there was no legal team involved.” The airline also told Drippy they had “enjoyed the fun,” and let the team “know how much we enjoyed it.”
The spokesperson stated that “we sent a note to ask for the removal of the video because we cannot support fake AI-generated videos/fake letters from our CEOs.”
Alleh Lindquist told MEDCAN24, “Virgin responded with a kind note to our guerrilla advertising, and we really appreciated that.”
“From the start, it was always Drippy’s intent to reveal this as a spoof—we just chose to keep our responses vague for the first 24 hours. “We then gave an explanation in full,” said he. Some outlets ran the article without checking with Virgin or us. MEDCAN24 waited until Virgin or MEDCAN24 responded, which made you the first one to reveal the spoof.”
Drippy’s goal has always been curiosity and entertainment. Lindquist stated that this stunt was targeted at consumers and not insiders of the industry. I can only guess that some industry insiders ignored obvious red flags, because they so desperately wanted the story to be true. “The one-two punch that it wasn’t true and feeling duped may have caused some grumpy looks.”
While social media posts around the spoof, including one featuring a made-up letter from Virgin Atlantic CEO Shai Weiss, have now been deleted by Drippy, the video spoof is still available—albeit with a much clearer title clarifying that it’s not an official ad from the airline company.
Richard Branson is the founder of Virgin. He has publicly stated his support for marijuana legalization, an end to the drug war, and access to psychoactive substances for therapeutic use.
Steve Fitzgerald is the author of this image element.