X-Message-Number: 3559
From:  (David Stodolsky)
Subject: CRYONICS: Re: CRYONICS marketing
Date: Sat, 31 Dec 94 15:49:29 +0100 (CET)

In Regards to your letter <>:
 in 
 Subject: CRYONICS marketing writes:
> 
> David Stodolsky suggests that, since cryonics organizations offer services
> useful to dying people, we should market cryonics to dying people, namely
> AIDS patients (for which he suggests other benefits also).
> 
> Actually, only around 1% of the dying people in the U.S. have AIDS, according
> to 1993 statistics. 

This is not important. If even 1% of these people went into suspension
it would mean something like 30,000 yearly.

The key question is motivational. Someone who has been tested HIV
positive knows they have about 12 years of life left, at the most.
Someone who has AIDS has about 2 years. These time frames are short
enough to highly motivate people to act, note the very high level
of political activism in this group. 

Second, these are mostly young people, who early in HIV infection
feel perfectly healthy. It is entirely obvious to them, that if a
cure could be found for AIDS, they could live a lot longer. This is
not generally true for much older people, who if treated for one disease
would be killed by another within a year or two (statistically speaking).
The cure for senescence is not on the immediate time horizon and there
is not a massive and highly visible investment in research, as with AIDS.

Third, AIDS is not compatible with a high quality of life and many
opportunistic infections are painful. Just how bad this can get has
been made obvious by suspension reports here. This increases interest 
in options.

The many last minute sign ups already occurring indicate that 
this market could become dominant, if targeted.

AIDS activist are natural alleys on the Right to Die issue.
This means they can be familiarized with cryonics in a natural way, 
unrelated any marketing effort, which might be frowned upon as "ambulance
chasing". AIDS activists are highly organized, with their own computer
network, etc. This increases the ease with which the right people can
be reached and reduces marketing costs. The leaders of the movement
are dying regularly, if even one of them went into suspension, it
would become widely know immediately. This is the best form of advertising
I can think of, and certainly the cheapest.

dss


David S. Stodolsky, PhD               Internet: 
Tornskadestien 2, st. th.       (C)         Tel.: + 45 38 33 03 30
DK-2400 Copenhagen NV, Denmark               Fax: + 45 38 33 88 80

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=3559