T3 announces new marketing and “stratagy” consultant

January 1, 2011 – Top Tier Tactics is pleased to announce that it is hiring Paul Christoforo of Ocean Stratagy (formerly Ocean Marketing) to handle all PR, Marketing, and “Stratagy” needs. “Mr. Christoforo is exactly what we need to promote our site. This English major was first brought to our attention as a chief PR executive during his work for N-Control, promoting the Avenger, ” said Rabid Ferret at today’s joint press conference. “We are pleased to know a man who is so well connected. Mr. Christoforo is able to name drop people like Kevin Kelly of G4, and Scott Lowe of IGN. And even knowing the mayor of Boston? How could anybody not want to hire this badass?”

WiNGSPANTT, Editor in Chief of the site, had this to say: “Mr. Christoforo has had some hard times recently. The debacle with Penny Arcade was universally derided throughout the internet, but we see it in a different light. As a company that deals extensively in customer relations, we strongly feel that insulting the customer, and name dropping everybody you’ve ever had a passing conversation with is the best way to go about every situation. Mr. Cristoforo has since apologized and we feel that this was a heartfelt apology. Anybody who thinks this is just a response to getting caught is clearly a silly-billy.”

Of course, Top Tier Tactics has acknowledged that Christoforo’s problems may not be limited to his most recent, unfortunate transgressions. With allegations of steroid use, there may be a forthcoming investigation from the feds. However, we are sure that this will blow over, and Mr. Christoforo will come out scoff-free.

After all, nobody can prove that “TheAngryPimp”  on steroid.com is in fact Mr. Christoforo, nor is continuously posting an email address that is listed as his contact in many of his tweets damning evidence. T3 and Ocean Stratagy are officially denying any claims that the Penny Arcade incident was a bout of ‘roid rage.

Rousing recommendations

T3’s decision to take on Ocean Stratagy is in part due to a large number of industry nods that left us now choice but to go with the worldwide front-runner in customer service relations.

Brandom Leidel (former head of PR for N-Control) also came forward with a glowing recommendation,

We fired N-Control as a client about 8 months ago due to constant shipping delays (which we had to deal with) and their association with Paul Cristoforo who is a street thug masquerading as a self proclaimed “Marketing Professional”. This guy is a complete fool and somehow strong armed his way into working with the company so we walked away. I am not surprised in the slightest bit by what’s going on right now. In fact, we told the owners of the company on many occasions that this would eventually happen.

I wasn’t going to chime in but since he is replying as me, I can’t resist. I personally can’t stand him.

Of course, the allegations haven’t ended there. @AvengerControl tweeted that Ocean Marketting was holding their email accounts hostage. When asked how this could happen during an AMA on Reddit, Moisés Chiullan replied the following,

I’ve been trying to get him to give up the access to these things he’s been holding hostage (email accounts, Twitter, etc) by asking nicely for a couple of days. The gloves are off now.

Paul told me on the phone two hours ago that “Eight months ago, I locked down all this stuff so they wouldn’t be able to fuck with me. If they don’t give me what I want, it’s war.” His demands include a contract written on his terms and substantial compensation, both immediate and for as long as the company continues to exist. He flaunted the PR debacle he created as proof that he “made the company a success”, citing all the media and public attention as the “best thing that ever happened to Avenger”.

He didn’t count on the fact that I anticipated all of this and have been a computer hardware and web tech since I was 14.

The thing we did have is control over the AvengerController.com domain. It was transferred away from its original account, which Paul has complete control of. Because of how GoDaddy works, that old account retained all of the email addresses and their master control settings (forwarding and so on). He has continued to respond to customer emails from his personal GMail account and lied to me repeatedly about doing so.

I tried to play nice, and Paul played stupid, acting like he didn’t have access to this master account, blaming his “Indian outsourced tech team” being on vacation. I gave him two days to give over N-Control’s digital property.

He finally leveled with me tonight that he knew I wasn’t that stupid and that he was lying about his access to all these accounts. That’s when he issued the above-mentioned threat. He reiterated that he had the hosting, email, and everything on lockdown.

Again, this is all clearly a misunderstanding and we feel that this too shall pass and Mr. Christoforo’s name will be found clean. Ending today’s joint press conference, Mr. Christoforo had this to say on Twitter,

I didn’t know who the dude was at Penny Arcade – I really didn’t do anything wrong, and my reputation is ruined forever. I don’t know the mayor of Boston. But I do know a lot of people. I was born and raised there – my whole life. I can walk into any club that I want, anywhere I want, anywhere in the city, drinks are free, I don’t have to wait in line, do anything I want. Because I have a lot of connections – the city itself is my roots. So I probably have some connections that I could make a call, get me into the convention center if I wanted to attend the show, whether he wants me there or not. Doesn’t make any difference – I could probably get in.

…

Basically what game did is this If you were in a bar, drinking and hanging out with a bunch of people and in that group of people was one guy that you didnt know was a mixed martial arts champion. He knows he can kick the shit out of anyone in that bar and you happen to pick a fight with him. He doesn’t tell you what he is you take a swing at him and the next thing you know you have a broken jaw and youre on the way to the hospital.

…

Im going to keep doing what Im doing, you know? Ive got buyers all over the world who will buy whatever I sell them. I work with a lot of companies in the UK Italy France Japan Australia Canada the US Mexico South America I have buyers all over the place and my buyers are going to buy from me.

“At the end of the day, Top Tier Tactics hopes that its endorsement as one of Mr. Christoforo’s clients will help show the rest of the gaming industry that he is, in fact, a wonderful man. Not a roid-filled uneducated thug who thinks he can name drop his way to becoming a PR professional,” said Rabid Ferret, who was then forced off stage by the hail of rotten tomatoes flying at him.

UPDATE: Paul has taken control of the site. Don’t believe anything you read. Everything is a lie. HE WON’T LET ME OUT OF THIS BOX.