Back when I worked on a restaurant trade mag in the early ‘90s, we ran an annual diner survey that polled U.S. customers about their favorite chains and menu items in a number of different industry categories. And every year we ran that survey, there were two categories of restaurant calling to get the results the minute they were in: the fine dining white-tablecloth places that were fighting for nationwide bragging rights; and Burger King.

See, the King had grown accustomed to running TV spots that trumpeted the fact that people in this survey consistently placed their burgers above McDonald’s for taste. (And they did, at least during the years I worked on that staff.)

Now Burger King and its agency Crispin Porter & Bogusky are running an ad campaign around a global “taste test.” And the results, at least in the urn-up to the online release of the “results”, are causing a furor among Web visitors to www.WhopperVirgins.com.

The concept behind the campaign is that to get a “pure” taste test, Burger King has supposedly airlifted shipments of Whoppers and big Macs into remote corners of the globe that have never wrapped their hands around either one. TV spots teasing the “test” suggest that consumers in Greenland, Rumania and Thailand were involved.

Okay, enough with the quotes. But just remember that this whole promotion is a large nudge in the ribs, and that no one is claiming it’s scientific—or even real, for that matter.

That said, the Web site has a video with a documentary feel and a countdown clock marking the days and hours until the results of the taste test are revealed this Saturday. As yet, the site contains no shareable video. (And you don’t want to know what comes up when you search YouTube for “Whopper virgins.”)

The campaign is obviously intended to drive people from the television ads to the Web site, where the best guess is that we’ll see smiling faces of people in colorful native garb enjoying some flame-broiled goodness.

But reaction on the Web has been mixed to negative, with some very forceful spokespeople for anti-hunger campaigns speaking out about the poor taste of using foreigners as props in any advertising, much less for questionable dietary choices.

“What might irk people is the concept that Burger King is taking its fat-laden fast food to people who aren’t used to this stuff in their diets, who aren’t usual[ly] subject to our crass commercialism and who probably don’t really care too much,” writes blogger Beth Pinsker in WalletPop.

And Sharon Akabas of the Institute of Human Nutrition at Columbia University told the Daily News that the campaign is “outrageous” and “insulting.”

This is the latest ad campaign to come under fire for having a tin ear. A few weeks ago, “baby-wearers” rose up and smote a Motrin online ad that seemed to make light of the habit of carrying babies close to the body.

But the difference is that in this Burger King example, the TV spots and the Web site are getting people riled up basically before the campaign has fully revealed itself. We can of course assume that the “third-party experts” (sorry, the damn quotes again) monitoring the taste test are pure fiction. Suppose all the test subjects filmed are too? Suppose the campaign is meant to poke fun at taking advertising too seriously?

After all, burgers of any kind may not be what the malnourished or even the badly-fed world need. But let’s face it, they symbolize America, along with blue jeans, Cadillacs and rock and roll.

Or here’s a crazy thought: Suppose the whole intent is a buzz marketing campaign to get people talking? From the agency that brought you the “Subservient Chicken” and the “BK Freakout”—ya think?

It would be something of a risky gamble, and might not be one worth winning. Questions of world hunger and poor diet loom large at any holiday season, and this year may see a lot more stories than usual, unfortunately, with charitable giving at a low ebb. In that context, jokes about sending burgers to the third world may be a real sour note. The

To find out if the campaign has any merit, we’ll just have to wait until the weekend to see the test results, and until next Monday to see the documentary that will be posted to the WhopperVirgins.com site.

Meanwhile, a note to Burger King: To turn down the heat from critics of the campaign, how about sending a big fat check to Oxfam or Unesco—or at least dispatching to some needy nations a few container shiploads of those healthy menu options you tout when you’re not pushing the beef?