Impress Chris Anderson With Your “Awesome” Friends, Get Free Copies of “Free”

Wired editor Chris Anderson is giving away 200 free copies of his book, Free! (Pause for light laughter.) There are two ways to get a free copy of the book, he blogs. One is: “Impress us with your cool friends (you get FOUR books!)” Can’t pull that off? “Impress us with your social media skillz (you get one book).” Wow. It gets… I guess the word is “grosser”?

Here is his application process:

Do have friends in high places? Or low, but very cool, places? Maybe kinda inbetween places but big in Japan? Just know awesome people?

Yes? Excellent. We’d like you to send them the book yourself. Here’s how:

Send us an email to freethebook@gmail.com with the following:

Subject: Four books please!

I’m _____ and I actually know __[impressive person 1]__, __[less impressive person 2]___ and __[impressive to me even if you’ve never heard of them person 3]___. In fact, I know them so well that I know where they live! (Or at least I can ask them for their mailing address). Send me four signed books, and I’ll keep one and send the other three along with a personal note from me.

Genius marketing? Totally horrible? ONLY THE MARKET CAN DECIDE.