ThinkGeek gets cease & desist letter from pork board over unicorn meat

ThinkGeek, a web retailer of general geekware, usually comes up with some pretty awesome fake stuff on April Fools Day, which is a major holiday on the internet.

Among this year’s pranks was Canned Unicorn Meat, and while the product’s page is still up, placing it in your cart redirects you to giant words indicating the product isn’t real. Apparently this and the fact that unicorns don’t exist, in County Meath or anywhere else, escaped some lawyers working on behalf of the National Pork Board. A cease & desist letter was sent to ThinkGeek on behalf of the National Pork Board due to this portion of the page’s copy:

Pâté is passé. Unicorn – the new white meat.

Excellent source of sparkles!

Unicorns, as we all know, frolic all over the world, pooping rainbows and marshmallows wherever they go. What you don’t know is that when unicorns reach the end of their lifespan, they are drawn to County Meath, Ireland. The Sisters at Radiant Farms have dedicated their lives to nursing these elegant creatures through their final days. Taking a cue from the Kobe beef industry, they massage each unicorn’s coat with Guinness daily and fatten them on a diet comprised entirely of candy corn.

ThinkGeek has kindly posted the whole legal threat for users to point and laugh at, and issued a press release, saying use of the term is protected as parody:

“It was never our intention to cause a national crisis and misguide American citizens regarding the differences between the pig and the unicorn,” said Scott Kauffman, President and CEO of Geeknet. “In fact, ThinkGeek’s canned unicorn meat is sparkly, a bit red, and not approved by any government entity.”

The web retailer has offered up a coupon code for $10 off $40 purchases to smooth over any hurt feelings over porkgate:

We’d also like to extend a special discount to everyone we offended with our portrayal of Unicorn Meat as “the other white meat.” For a limited time, take $10 off any order of $40 or more by using the code PORKBOARD at checkout, good until 6/30/2010 at 11:59PM ET.

Is anyone else dying to know how much this cost the National Pork Board in lawyer’s fees?