Madonna and Missy Elliott are appearing for the Gap. Catherine Zeta- Jones touts T-Mobile and Jason Alexander can’t get enough of KFC. The celebrity spokespersons just keep on coming.
Glancing at a poster that depicts him in glorious golden gleam, it appears that the newest posterboy for salesforce.com is the soft-spoken, witty and wise Dalai Lama. The spiritual leader perceived with affection and respect as a worldwide symbol of philosophical serenity, is shown in deep meditation, eyes closed, the image under a slogan in large faux-Tibetan letters: “There is no software on the path to enlightenment.”
The exiled Tibetan, featured by the company as the center of “A Magical Evening With His Holiness the Dalai Lama” on Sept. 5 at Davies Hall, has unwittingly become visual front man for a company beating its chest for being “the first on-demand provider to reach 100,000 subscribers.” Insiders at the Himalayan Foundation, which is sharing $100,000 with the Tibet Fund as a result of this link, are chagrined that the company seems to have parlayed a block of 500 tickets they purchased for the event into a marketing ploy.
The Dalai Lama’s speech will follow his earlier appearance that day at the University of San Francisco, where he will receive an honorary doctoral degree.
A news release from the Office of Tibet in New York says that tickets to the Davies talk are available through the Himalayan Foundation, but the foundation’s Web site showed those to be sold out as of Tuesday afternoon. Some of the company’s 500 tickets were still available, at www.salesforce. com/100K.
A notice at the bottom states that the $100,000 contribution has been made “in recognition of salesforce.com’s milestone.” The Dalai Lama will be speaking, says company representative Lauren Stein, on “the human approach to world peace,” a subject that may be close to the company’s heart but seems far from its cause of corporate pride.
The poster also specifies that the speech will be followed by a party at the Asian Art Museum, with music by Tainted Love and catering by Paula LeDuc.
