It’s hard to tell if it’s his PR doing it or if – and this is perfectly possible – he’s so plugged in to the web that he’s acting on his own. His digital promotional skills are pretty strongly evident – just look at his YouTube channel and the large following it has. His online fan club shows his social media prowess of to very flattering effect.

His response was to the effect that he’s a big fan of Malcolm Hardee and that he approves mightily of the satirical awards, even if they come at his expense. And, most perfectly, the email states that: “Yes. I care about money. But I do kind of hate myself for it.”

It’s a great counter-play no matter whether it was he or his PR who made it – someone has moved very quickly to counter any accusations of being po-faced, before the story had a chance to take hold. I suspect that it was Burnham himself who stepped up. Despite a minor – and extremely brief – slip, he is a very modern entertainer, one who matches onstage brilliance with online dexterity. He has got it all and when a crisis looms he just seems the type to step forward, front and centre.

This year the committee chose to nominate US stand-up Bo Burnham for the inaugural ‘Act Most Likely to Make a Million Quid’ Award. Burnham’s London PR company, whose clients include a Wealth Management company and an insurance broking, risk assessment and financial services company, wrote to the Award organisers saying of Burnham: “making money is not what he’s driven by at all and (we) don’t think he’d be at all comfortable with receiving this award.”

As a consequence, the Malcolm Hardee judges have now nominated Burnham for their main Malcolm Hardee Award for Comic Originality because “for a modern day stand-up comic not to be interested in money is entirely original”.

They have had a lot of sport with the PR company’s decision – award organiser John Fleming saying: “{Malcolm] would have admired Bo’s disregard for money. So we have asked the PR if Bo would like to lend us £500 or £1,000, which we promise to pay back. We haven’t had a reply yet, but we live in hope.”

What exactly drives people to make these decisions? Surely they know that the best thing they could have done was deflect the award nomination with wit and guile, rather than push their client right into the hands of any satirist who wants to have a go? The Malcolm Hardee awards have some serious satirical chops – let’s see where this goes and how little Burnham’s PR like it.

Burnham, being American, might have an excuse for not knowing how the Edinburgh Festival works, but his British PR ought to know better. Malcolm Hardee is surely laughing his ethereal socks off from beyond the grave at all this.

There’s a proliferation of websites emerging at the moment, offering emergency PR advice for Edinburgh, but what use are these with ten days of the Festival left to play with? A show or act needing to get reviews needs help from an experienced publicist. Of course people need to start somewhere, but recognition for Liz Smith will hopefully highlight the need for both beginner publicists and producers and acts to seek out the x factor brought by experience if they are going to make any of their incursions into digital or traditional media work and work well.

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As the true scale of the disaster brought about by the worst flooding in Pakistan’s history becomes clear, it’s good to see that the British tabloids are supporting the humanitarian aid relief by giving acres of coverage – to the aftermath of the first episode of X Factor. Good to know they have their priorities in such well-oiled working order and are so keenly supporting the disaster zone that is the early rounds of Simon Cowell’s show.

The groundbreaking campaign for Archaos we conducted for Archaos was the foundation for the Borkowski ethos. One of the immutable things about the company is our attachment to a good yarn, a great tale, a strange story, a bit of salacious gossip, a secret confidence, an odd anecdote or an outlandish rumour. We work with the stuff of conversation – the sort that fuels all social interactions. Barnum knew it, and he knew how to get conversations going to his commercial advantage.

We started out as theatre publicists who sought to follow in Barnum’s footsteps: getting bums on seats by getting people talking about stuff we got in the press. There wasn’t any money to mount costly media occasions or events, so we used guile and whatever creative means we could think of. We were relentless and ruthless in our pursuit of column inches. We ducked and weaved, thought fast and improvised.

We used stunts, hype, scams, and bizarre photo opportunities on the streets and we researched, promoted and invented every possible story angle in the search for ones that would secure coverage in every possible kind of media outlet. We didn’t restrict ourselves to targeting the obvious publications and programmes. We saw our job as spreading the word, wherever and whenever we could. We didn’t doubt that PR was a serious business but, at the same time, it had to be serious fun if it was to work.

The stunts were gripping, and they were absolutely expressive of the celebratory, life-affirming, invigorating and exciting spirit of the shows. People heard about what was happening on the streets, because we made sure – through gossip, whispered hints, press releases, questions in the house and whatever else it might take – that the media were on hand to witness it all. What was witnessed was published (how could they resist?) and anyone who had the slightest admiration for the edgy and the anarchic wanted to see these freaks in the flesh, and so they rolled up and Archaos played to packed houses wherever the production went.

And that is the cavalier, buccaneering spirit upon which Borkowski was founded. It may have moderated over the years, as we shifted into consumer PR, but it’s a spirit that still sits right at the heart of the agency. I find it hard to believe that 20 years have passed since the spectacular end of Archaos, but nonetheless, a group of us have combined forces to celebrate their legend with an exhibition celebrating their brief and wondrous life, which will be taking place at the Bargehouse, Oxo Tower Wharf as part of the Thames Festival programme from Thursday 9th and Sunday 12th September.

As part of the exhibition, I will be revealing – for the first time in over 20 years – some of the deepest, darkest secrets behind the “mad, bad and dangerous to know” Archaos images as well as the dark arts I employed to help make them one of the most infamous circus troupes of all time. Understand what we did with Archaos and why, and you will understand much about the nature of Borkowski PR.

My talk takes place at 4 p.m. on Saturday, 11th September. The exhibtion is open 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. on the 9th and 10th and 11 a.m. to 8.30 p.m. at the weekend. Entry is free. Hope to see you there!

Here’s a link to an article in the Independent on the exhibition.

In the brave new world run to the tune of the ten minute news cycle, where traditional media has been reduced to merely commenting on and affirming stories that are broken on Twitter and in the blogosphere, almost at the speed of thought, and where advertising budgets have been slashed down to the stump, what else is there but PR?

I’ll be discussing Captivating Narrative and how compelling and effective stories can be utilised to unite social media, traditional media and word of mouth into one powerful, viral jet-stream of information to promote brands, stars or anything one wants to apply them to and how truth plays second fiddle to manufactured fiction.

Captivating Narrative is the next step up from the public conversation that brands must maintain in the internet age if they are to survive. Brands and stars live or die on the way they are perceived and if they can control their own narrative and make it fascinating, they are far more likely to survive. A compelling story draws people in and spreads more easily by word of mouth. They can apply to anything!

I’ll be dissecting the image and reputation of some of the biggest brands and names going, as well as looking at the people who manipulate them. The show examines brands and personalities as diverse as Toyota, Al Qaeda, Paris Hilton, Somali Pirates, the England football team, Tony Hayward Joseph Goebbels and Asda.

To book tickets, click here.

The book can now be read guilt free, knowing that the proceeds will not be lining Blair’s pockets but helping soldiers returning from the frontline. It’s got all the talkability that Mandelson’s book lacked, it’s released in a season when most politicians are on holiday and the only serious competition it has for the front pages are Kelly Brook celebrating naked month by dyeing herself orange and parading in a series of ever-skimpier frocks and Joe McElderry coming out of the closet in the hope that it’ll shift a few more units of his debut album.

Tony Blair may have had support in the past, but this proves he’s learned how to keep his name in the public eye, and his reputation safe, all by himself – if the book tanks, he won’t suffer and he’ll be seen to have tried. He’s protected himself in a hermetically sealed aura of ‘nice guy’ once again and it’ll be interesting to see what happens next with his memoirs – and how the people who have wanted to see him accused of war crimes will react.

Ever since flight attendant Steven Slater swore at a passenger over the PA, grabbed a beer and descended to the tarmac at JFK airport down the emergency chute, the entire internet has been leading the response, whilst JetBlue’s corporate arm squashed the company’s previously golden child social networking department’s ability to respond. JetBlue were caught between a rock and a hard place. The brand was powerless, trapped in the headlights of an extreme action, one which captured the global wave and birthed another fabulous internet nobody.

For a while, it seemed like JetBlue had been revealed to be wearing a fur coat but no knickers – after all, although they were right to withdraw support from a panicky attendant, they could have so easily done it with grace on the internet. There is always a need to balance the ‘must do’ corporate PR with the caring embrace the stressed out Slater clearly needed. Despite having the whole of the web against them, it took the corporate arm of the company quite a while to retreat and allow their message to match that of the social media that had previously allowed the company to appear to be a cut above companies like Ryanair.

Simply, they learned, the hard way, what most PR savvy brands have to know; you must have a plan in place to survive incidents like this or you’ll lose the image that you’ve so carefully nurtured by looking like a corporate dinosaur. All brands are fumbling around with social media wise up at the moment and are having to work out ways to plan for the unexpected – how does one plan to deal with a modern-day everyman hero like Slater, who channelled the collective frustration of working people everywhere by doing something so unexpectedly decisive? Of course, duty of care is vital, but so is the careful continuation of the brand’s narrative, alongside a serious dose of blue sky thinking – something all good airlines should really be adept at.

After the initial hiccup, however, JetBlue came back with a graceful blog post: :it wouldn’t be fair for us to point out absurdities in other corners of the industry without acknowledging when it’s about us. Well, this week’s news certainly falls into that category. Perhaps you heard a little story about one of our flight attendants? While we can’t discuss the details of what is an ongoing investigation, plenty of others have already formed opinions on the matter. Like, the entire Internet. (The reason we’re not commenting is that we respect the privacy of the individual. People can speak on their own behalf; we won’t do it for them.)

“While this episode may feed your inner Office Space, we just want to take this space to recognize our 2,300 fantastic, awesome and professional Inflight Crewmembers for delivering the JetBlue Experience you’ve come to expect of us.”

Sometimes the best response to a potential PR disaster is a couple of well-written paragraphs that wink at the reader without giving too much away. JetBlue certainly pulled on a sturdy pair of knickers at the last minute.

We sat down for a cup of coffee and I asked her what she was working on. She told me that this was her second Edinburgh and that she was working on three shows for a producer who was going places. Alarm bells went off in my head at this, so I quizzed her a little about her circumstances.

It turns out that, after the 13 hour coach journey up to the Festival, she was bunked down in a flat procured by the producer, which she was sharing with two other people, and that she was earning £100 a week for the entire four week run of the Festival.

This struck me as deeply exploitative – a producer who wouldn’t even stump up the train fare had hooked an enthusiastic young publicist on the promise of greater things to work on if all went according to plan. She thought she had her foot in the door, but these are the sort of opportunities that wither and die as soon as a client makes it big – what actor, after all, would name check their British agent or publicist if they had the opportunity to work in America, where such names would be worthless currency?

I hope I’m wrong in her case, but I suspect not – I saw her the next day and the impossible demands she was getting to work with, on a budget of hope and water, were classic examples of the sort of demands the all-swallowing uber-producers of PR nightmares past might make.

There is too much hope around, and not enough recognition amongst fledgling entertainment publicists that if everything goes well, you will rarely get the credit, whilst if all goes poorly, you will be first in front of the firing squad.

These fledgling publicists need to learn, and learn quickly, that no matter what they do, nothing is big enough or can generate impact fast enough for an unrealistic and unsupportive client. I get a sense there are not many clients running around the Festival with an appetite for brash, brave and iconoclastic campaigns.

Successful producers almost always demonstrate achievement by ruthlessly grabbing all they can at the expense of the little people. Young PR folk are the first to be trampled under foot. My advice to the young publicist in Edinburgh, and everyone starting out in entertainment PR, is to give the middle finger salute to anyone who can’t or won’t pay proper fees and to maintain dignity and integrity at all costs.

Whilst it’s great to see all these performers building themselves up into a state of anticipatory frenzy, I am left wondering why the Scottish media aren’t doing the same. I’m particularly puzzled as to why they are more excited about the Edinburgh Tattoo, and the musty smell of Empire that only comes with a collection of people charging around with cannons.

There is an extraordinary level of ambivalence from the Scottish media, particularly the BBC and the Scotsman, to the Fringe Festival. Its three-week run is a huge economic success for the city, but where are the BBC cameras and where is the love? Why are the media not moving in to cover the Fringe in the same manner as Glastonbury is covered?

Is it because of all the English people coming up for the Fringe? Is it because it isn’t seen as relevant to little old ladies living in Orkney?

If the Scottish media do not embrace the Fringe, what chance does it have? In a time when the traditional media is failing, surely it makes sense to reach out to the Fringe and embrace it rather than push it away as if it’s producing a bad smell. The international media is not as present – and cannot afford to be in the current climate – but surely that is the perfect excuse for the Scottish media to move in and exploit the internet to promote Scotland in a more varied and forward-thinking light than it does by only venerating the Edinburgh Tattoo.

What does ‘interesting’ mean, anyway? How do you define interesting? The people seen as interesting in the brave new webworld tend to be the types giving away news about techie developments which is frankly only interesting to a vocal minority.

When I tweeted that Kanye West was following one man from England it was deemed interesting, briefly at least, but few have the capacity to formulate an effective online presence beyond the confines of same-as-the-next-man. Do you try being witty? Wit doesn’t get picked up in America – in fact, I defy anyone to find a really good example of online American wit. Humour, interest and subject matter often get held up at international borders or lost in transit.

The blunt truth is that the people who get retweeted most tend to be those who say you must be interesting without giving a concrete explanation of what interesting actually means; the ones with the killer search engine optimisation skills but little or nothing to actually say.