Posts Tagged ‘twitter’

There was a great post by Kevin Bakhurst on the BBC editors’ blog the other day explaining the changes to the nature of the newsroom in the post-social media age. Bakhurst gives a pretty considered rundown of the challenges posed by social media, not least the fact it almost always has someone else be first with the scoop, as well as its benefits for newsgathering, research, and understanding the zeitgeist. It’s great to see journalists so honestly and humbly engaging with the great communications innovation of our time.

However, I think what really needs to be assessed- not just by journalists, but by all of us in the communications industry- is what exactly the social media landscape means for our role and our image. Journalists no longer find the scoops, PRs no longer control the conversation, Marketing people no longer enjoy hegemony over public information. These are no longer problems to be considered: they are facts, known to public and media alike.

As a consequence, how do the communications industries present themselves and their function? If the newsmakers are, often, not seen as sleuths and explorers, then what are they?
Read the rest of this entry »

Britain’s Got Talent has rolled around again and again the nation is gripped. Out with the old and in with the new. It’s been this way for a while. Remember, it’s not five minutes since the X Factor was all anyone could talk about, but that’s seeped away into the mists of time as BGT conquers the attention spans of the nation.

Like a Chinese meal, it is all you can taste and think about, but when it’s finished it’s forgotten and all you want is the next fix of foodstuff. There’s news, there’s excitement, there’s hyperbole scattered all over the place like MSG – and then it’s gone.

Of course, we are at the point that everyone is most interested in – the freak parade. Never mind the machinations behind the scenes or the commercial value of the brand; this is what the people most care about; the narrative, the crazies.

Given that it’s all about BGT right now, will we ever know the truth of what caused Cheryl Cole’s American X Factor exit and non-admittance to the UK judging panel? I doubt it, as the people have spoken and what they want is the tears, the heartache, the visceral stories, whether good or bad. What use is a nation’s sweetheart without some pain? We’ve used up the divorce tears – here’s the next weepie Cole adventure. Read the rest of this entry »

I have known Keith Schilling for many years; he’s a highly able human being. On many occasions I’ve worked alongside some brilliant folk in his firm and have regularly taken part in their brilliant, thought-provoking, well attended seminars.

In the last few days, Keith has been pictured in many broadsheet newspapers as journalists debate and chew over Schilling’s tactics and, of course, fees. It’s in their nature to feed on these events, but make no mistake, he’s a formidable operator. Read the rest of this entry »

A wry smile crossed my lips when I heard the news that lawyers have applied for a court order to force Twitter to hand over the person behind the whistleblower account. It’s taken one anonymous tweeter to spectacularly out the famous footballer hiding behind his privacy injunction and, in a heartbeat, neuter the legal profession. Now blood lusting lawyers crave a sacrifice: a public crucifixion to warn others not to engage in mass collaboration with total strangers on the web.

I have always believed there has been a calculus of public vs. private interest, but this week has proved that the law is broken. The wider world is not interested in the deliberations of a dusty-wigged UK high court judge. The legal framework must try and understand the new age of free, libertarian speech especially when they are considering a celebrity’s position on his or her commercial value. There appears to be a very obvious point: the law is useless! It’s broken and unenforceable. Read the rest of this entry »

Continuing the debate on the challenges that the PR industries face in the digital age, the Dominique Strauss-Kahn affair underlines some of the issues that I opened for discussion last week.

It’s a hot topic, particularly as the story has broken at a time when many companies are becoming less and less tolerant of any sexual misconduct by their senior executives. A string of high-profile companies have shed their bosses in recent years over such issues. It’s a new and convenient way to ‘get rid’.

Strauss Kahn is being held in New York, facing allegations of sexual assault. Should we be anxious about the current feeding frenzy? Whether the IMF chief is innocent or guilty, his arrest has raised questions about whether he will ever be able to have a fair trial. Read the rest of this entry »

This is the modern age, the age of the super-injunction, the age when celebrities want to keep their dirty laundry in bomb- and journalist-proof cages so that not even the slightest whiff of scandal can escape.

Of course, it’s just not as easy as that, as the furore over someone posting information on Twitter about people who have allegedly taken out super-injunctions proves. My instinct suggests that the poster is simply a nobody seeking a rather risky path to fame; but this does not alter the fact that technology changes at an exponentially faster rate than humanity’s baser instincts, as this outbreak of injunction-exposure, and the reaction to it, shows all too clearly.
Read the rest of this entry »

Is there any excuse for a deferral, hidden behind the familiar “no comment”? For the first time in my career, I find myself pondering this Churchillian aphorism. “No comment” is a splendid expression which I am using again and again.

My old cohorts launched a new offering via PR Week last week, which naturally pasted me onto the front page. Lordy, what a headline. Last week I had nothing to say; I guess when I do, I will. Some wag on Twitter correctly observed that I’m quick to offer opinion as a rent-a-quote on public affairs yet remain tight-lipped on my own. The media landscape can be a funny old vista, if viewed from the outside rather than from within. It’s fascinating to listen to opinion about an idea I’ve provoked; sometimes it’s funny, sometimes cruel, sometimes wide of the mark – but always absorbing. Read the rest of this entry »

The Spider-Man musical has previewed on Broadway to a chorus of boos from the press and I am bewildered as to why Broadway has not harnessed the power of social networking to counter the effect of people like the New York Post’s Michael Riedel, otherwise known as the Butcher of Broadway.

It’s a grossly unfair practice, dismissing a show on its technical preview and amping up the pressure on the team behind it who have millions invested, almost a bloodsport. But that’s the way the media’s moved – into a place where they have to keep creating stories to keep ahead of the Internet.

It bothers me that Broadway haven’t realised that they could get fans of Spider-Man in to blog and tweet about the show first, though. Let’s not forget that the heroic arachnid is one of the most popular brands on the planet – surely the team behind the musical could harness the huge fan base (and possibly even create more fans in the process) by inviting them in to given their perspective online, thus diluting the poison pens of some of the more rabid critics.

The publicists for the Spider-Man musical must be troubled by the reception the previews have had, and by balancing the needs of the media against the needs of the show. Currently, the media seems to be winning, as the flurry of articles claiming that the show is doomed suggests. Read the rest of this entry »

DIY PR was back in the news over the weekend, when Stephen Fry landed in hot water with the broadsheets for comments he made about women’s sexuality and then took to Twitter to try and resolve the furore.

It’s a perfect way to highlight the dangers of do it yourself PR; like some hapless DIY electrician, the celebrity who tries to engage in their own publicity is likely to burn the house down if they are not really careful.

If even an articulate, interesting, engaging and thoroughly metropolitan man such as Stephen Fry, a man who knows how to shimmy around a crowd and impress or charm the best of us, can get into hot water and be unable to fix it via Twitter, there is surely something to be said for good PR after all. Read the rest of this entry »

There has been a lot of debate about the relevance of PR council to the stars since the Twitter revolution. Stephen Fry, Ashton Kutcher and Ross Brydon all do a pretty good job of managing to reach out to their fans. With these examples, and others, in mind, stars like Kanye West may wonder why they need to spend money on a PR when they have the DIY tools at their fingertips. But Kanye is proof positive that some slebs need sound and serious PR advice before they attempt to engage their fans over the net.

West has been letting rip on Twitter with unrelenting detail about himself. He has picked a fight with a journalist from the LA Times music blog who had the temerity to accidentally miss out a word from the title of his album but the incident that generated the most ire was his use of a robot to pump out 300 tweets in a few minutes containing lyrics and some nasty invective.
Read the rest of this entry »