Budweiser has so many bad ideas. For instance, putting a Clydesdale'a handler alongside a parade route when children are milling about. Everyone knows a Clydesdale will make a run for it if it sees the handler who raised from a foal before selling it to a beer company. Horses slip when running on pavement, anyway. Everyone knows that too. Tear up all you want to at the company's popular Super Bowl ad about a horse/human reunion at that parade, but it's just freak luck some poor kid wasn't squashed.
In addition to bad parade tactics, questionable beer quality and stupid expenditures on bow-tie shaped beer cans, Budweiser is touting a new idea that is actually interesting, or at least it could be with a few tweaks. The HuffPo reports today that Budweiser BRAZIL has created a "Buddy Cup" that is integrated with Facebook. Tap Buddy Cups with a stranger and that will automatically make you Facebook friends.
The original article that ran Friday on The Drum explains the technology created by Agencia Africa of Sao Paulo: "The glass works by instantly making people friends on Facebook when they toast using the beer glasses." For now the Buddy Cup will be used at brand sponsored parties, concerts and festivals.
Fail or genius? We're withholding judgment for now. While it's doubtful many people want to open up their Facebook lives to random strangers they bump glasses with in a bar, we here at City of Ate are very technology minded. Imagine this: beer goggle warning cups. They're mugs hardwired with a small digital camera, facial recognition software. Bump one with a stranger late in the evening, and a tiny speaker blasts the sound movie submarines make when crash diving if you're in danger of doing something you'll regret in the morning. Now, that could help solve one of the more frequent "friending" problems caused by consuming too much Bud. Get on it, someone.