Hats off to Astronomer for the brilliant idea
of hiring Gwyneth Paltrow, Coldplay lead man’s ex-wife, for a social media effort in the wake of the KissCam scandal featuring its former executives.
“Actress Gwyneth Paltrow, who was married to Coldplay's frontman Chris Martin for 13 years, announced Friday
on X that she was hired by Astronomer as a "very temporary" spokesperson," according to CBS News.
Paltrow made her debut in a video posted by Astronomer Friday night. “Thank you for your interest in Astronomer. Hi, I’m Gwyneth Paltrow. I’ve been hired on a very
temporary basis to speak on behalf of the 300-plus employees at Astronomer,” the Oscar winner says in the video, according to Variety.
advertisement
advertisement
The video dodges the
controversy quite deftly.
"Astronomer has gotten a lot of questions over the last few days and they wanted me to answer the most common ones," Paltrow says. ”We've been
thrilled that so many people have a newfound interest in data workflow automation. We will now be returning to what we do best — delivering game-changing results for our customers.”
The video comes in the wake of the highly publicized kissing scandal at a Coldplay concert that rocked social media and the news last week.
"The incident
resulted in the resignations of Astronomer CEO Andy Byron and its head of HR Kristin Cabot after the two were allegedly spotted on the kiss cam together,” notes Variety. “The awkward moment went mega viral and was parodied on several late-night shows."
The upside is millions of
people who had never heard of Astronomer are now familiar with the tech company.
Astronomer Interim CEO Pete DeJoy posted on LinkedIn on Sunday thanking actor Ryan Reynold’s Maximum Effort agency for the campaign. He
also thanked the Astronomer staff for weathering a difficult week.
Coldplay also received a bump after the controversy, notes CBS News. Online streams of the band’s
songs jumped 20% in the days after the video went viral, according to Luminate, an industry data and analytics company.