Is it stolen yet?

The folks at Wieden + Kennedy just took sports billboards to a new level. Their work for ESPN features astro-turf mats promoting Monday night football in bus shelters and along city walls in six major metropolitan areas.

In my opinion, the billboards are clever and engaging, but that's not the point. People are jacking them at an alarming rate. In just seven days, nearly 10% of the mats were lifted in NYC. And not just in the Big Apple. Thefts also occurred in Boston (3), Chicago (6), San Francisco (2), and Washington D.C. (5). And this is no small undertaking. Some of the mats are 72"H x 96"W in size.

So now ESPN is halting the re-installation of the stolen billboards. So here's my question: Could encouraging fans to take your advertising just be a genius PR stunt?


Here are my points:
-If they wanted to bolt those suckers down they would have
-If they didn't want people to touch and interact with them they would not have put them at street level
-What are they really losing? Both ESPN and WK are getting positive press from this

And even if ESPN is a innocent victim in all of this. Maybe there is a lesson for all of us.