Mediaboss Marketing

A small New York web development company pulled a fast one on the Internet this week when it pretended to launch a website associated with Kanye West's yet-to-be-unveiled startup.

And as the famous West/Jay-Z song says, it got the people going.

WhoDat.biz lit up Twitter on Wednesday and was reported by a couple of credible news sites, including the Washington Post.

"Quick! Invest in @kanyewest's Donda Media. They just reinvented technology that has been around since the 80's," said one Twitter user, who likely hadn't yet realized the site was a hoax.

By the end of the night, it was obvious the site was not legitimate, especially considering it's nothing more than a simple who-is website that looks up websites' information. Gizmodo debunked WhoDat.biz after discovering the real creators behind the site, cleverly enough, by using the fake West website to look up their phone number.

OKFocus the team of web developers behind the hoax, pulls this kind of stunt once a week, said co-founder Ryder Ripps.

We try to do one of these kind of projects a week just to keep our own spirits up and have fun," he said. "Thats the main objective, and prove to our future clients that were good at the Internet.

OKFocus decided to make an interesting who-is website on Monday. They chose to go with a gangster-style who-is but decided they needed something more to make it interesting and catch people's attention.

And West's startup, named Donda after his deceased mother, presented an opportunity. The rapper announced the venture in January on Twitter, but he has yet to reveal what it is.

It was something that didnt have any sort of presence on the Internet yet, Ripps said. We could interpret it to our own liking.

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Fake Kanye West startup website fools the Internet