INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Scooter startup Lime has sought to back peddle on an explanationgiven by its VP of global expansion late last week when asked why it had
hired the controversial PR firm, Definers Public Affairs.
The opposition research firm, which has ties to the Republican Party, has been at
the center of a reputation storm for Facebook, after a New York Times report last month suggested the controversial PR firm sought to
leverage anti-semitic smear tactics — by sending journalists a document linking anti-Facebook groups to billionaire George Soros (after
he had been critical of Facebook).
Last month it also emerged that other tech firms had engaged Definers — Lime being one of them
And speaking during an on stage interview at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin last Thursday, Lime Caen Contee claimed it had not known Definers
would use smear tactics.
Yet, as we reported previously, a Definers employee sent us an email pitch in October in which it wrote
suggestively that &Bird numbers seem off&.
This pitch did not disclose the PR firm was being paid by Lime.
Asked about this last week Contee
claimed not to know anything about Definers& use of smear tactics, saying Lime had engaged the firm to work on its green and carbon free
programs — andto try to understand &what were the levers of opportunity for us to really create the messaging and also to do our own
research; understanding the life-cycle; all the pieces that are in a very complex business&.
&As soon as we understood they were doing some
of these things we parted ways and finished our program with them,& he also said.
However, following the publication of our article
reporting on his comments, a Lime spokesperson emailed with what the subject line billed as a &statement for your latest story&, tee-ing
this up by writing: &Hoping you can update the piece&.
The statement went on to claim that Contee &misspoke& and &was inaccurate in his
description of [Definers] work&.
However it did not specify exactly what Contee had said that was incorrect.
A short while later the same
Lime spokesperson sent us another version of the statement with updated wording, now entirely removing the reference to Contee.
You can read
both statements below.
As you read them, note how the second version of the statement seeks to obfuscate the exact source of the claimed
inaccuracy, using wording that seeks to shift blame in way that a casual reader might interpret as external and outside the company
control…
Statement 1:
Our VP of Global Expansion misspoke at TechCrunch Disrupt regarding our relationship with Definers and was
inaccurate in his description of their work
As previously reported, we engaged them for a three month contract to assist with compiling media coverage reports, limited public relations
and fact checking, and we are no longer working with Definers.
Statement 2:
What was presented at Disrupt regarding our relationship with
Definers and the description of their work was inaccurate
As previously reported, we engaged them for a three month contract to assist with compiling media coverage reports, limited public relations
and fact checking, and we are no longer working with Definers.
Despite the Lime spokesperson hope for a swift update to our report, they did
not respond when we asked for clarification on what exactly Contee had said that was &inaccurate&.
A claim of inaccuracy that does not
provide any detail of the substance upon which the claim rests smells a lot like spin to us.
Three days later we&re still waiting to hear
the substance of Lime claim because it has still not provided us with an explanation of exactly what Contee said that was ‘wrong&.
Perhaps
Lime was hoping for a silent edit to the original report to provide some camouflaging fuzz atop a controversy of the company own making
that a PR firm it hired tried to smear a rival.
If so, oopsy.
Of course we&ll update this report if Lime does get in touch to provide an
explanation of what it was that Contee &misspoke&
Frankly we&re all ears at this point.
