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• Going topless for cancer (nsfw) (Nudography)
  
• Lifestreams and activity feeds channel your online brand (PR 2.0)
  
• Perez Hilton covers Perez Hilton (23/6)
  
• As Shakesbeard put it, farting is such sweet sorrow (Regret the Error)
  

To Alice, Sara, Geoff, Brian, Cam, Rich, Owen, John, Cathy and Katie ... THANK YOU. The best is yet to come.

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• Austria ... Australia ... Australasia ... what's the damn diff? (Regret the Error)
  
• Will somebody rescue ABC News' recession coverage? (Occam's RazR)
  
• V is for vegan -- not (Deceiver)

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• Ralph Nader: Thought process flow chart (23/6)
  
• Starbucks employees take a really long 15 minute break (Breitbart TV)
  
• Stop the Twitter madness! (The Buzz Bin)
  

The GOP's wheels keep on turning
Wanna get rid of Gov. Siegelman
If they sing some songs about the Southland
Maybe we'll forget they lied again
And they know it's a sin, yes

Well I heard Mr. Rove set up Gov. Don
Karl got him sent to the Big House
I hope Karl Rove will remember
He put Forrest Gump in the White House

Sweet home Siegelman
In prison got the Oakdale Detention Center blues
Sweet Home Siegelman
Lord, what's a good Alabaman to do?

In Birmingham we loved the governor
But Karl Rove's a tricky SOB
He fooled us with trumped-up charges
Now Karl does your conscience bother you?
Tell the truth

Sweet home Siegelman
Poor fellow's got the prison blues
Sweet Home Siegelman
Lord, what's a good American to do?
Here we come Don

[Story.]

Labels: Don Siegelman, Karl Rove, Political Spin

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• We don't like "60 Minutes" in Alabama, y'all (HuffPo)
  
• Yo, Aborigines: We're REALLY sorry (SpinWatch)
  
• "Girls Gone Wild" shoot features added bonus -- gunfire! (Breitbart)
  
• Michelle Obama: black "militant" (Media Matters)
  

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• Reputation of reputation management (Flack's Revenge)
  
• Social media is not the final frontier (PR 2.0)
  
• Shrewd PR defense for McCain (O'Dwyer's PR Blog)
  
• Listen to the voice of morality, porn lovers (PR Week)
  

Remember, the team that presents...



...is not always the team you get.



If you're conducting an agency review, we recommend you follow the Idea Grove's tips for selecting a public relations agency, which includes a printable score sheet.

Labels: agency reviews, baitandswitch, Marketing Views, PR advice

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• What is Obay? A teaser campaign for college (Adland)
  
• No More Bad Hair Days blog launches (What's Next)
  
• NYT to McCain: Shut up and let us destroy you (NewsBusters)
  

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• Courtney Friel: newsbabe extraordinaire (Gawker)
  
• Keyword research for bloggers (Copyblogger)
  
• Trust is like a tight-fitting ringer T (PR Newser)
  
• Naked Playboy model = perfect Big Pharma sales rep (PharmaGossip)

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• Bush appointee arrested for DUIWCD (driving under the influence while cross-dressing) (Pensito Review)
  
• YouTube reinstates pro-life show after removal (NewsBusters)
  
• Without academic partnerships, tobacco industry loses power (PR Watch)
  
• Attention whore Hohan strips naked (Egotastic)

For Presidents Day:

Rush Limbaugh and the right-wing talk radio crowd have been doing a lot of talking lately about who is, and isn't, a "conservative." It's not an unimportant argument, because how the word "conservative" is defined impacts how words like "moderate" and "liberal" are defined as well.

Were this the 1964 presidential campaign, John McCain would have been considered to the right of Barry Goldwater on many issues. Goldwater was considered a right-wing extremist at the time; Limbaugh and his ilk are working very hard to position McCain as a "moderate."

What would that make Goldwater today? Certainly he was no fan of the religious right. And specifically, he was pro-choice. Those facts alone would prevent him from achieving the "conservative" imprimatur in today's politics.

Limbaugh lays out his requirements this way:

I don't want to have somebody who is pro-choice called a conservative. I don't want to have somebody who is for tax increases, income tax increases, or opposes, more importantly, tax cuts, called a conservative. I don't want to have anybody who stands in the way of individuals prospering on their own, triumphing on their own, called conservative.

Labels: Political Spin, Rush Limbaugh

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• Top 10 Twitter hacks (Strategic Public Relations)
  
• Southern Beauty magazine roasted (Pierce Mattie)
  
• Media jobs sink as marketing services jobs rise (Micro Persuasion)
  
• 27 proven freelance marketing tips (Bad Language)
  
• Pentagon joins BlogTalkRadio to create Internet talk shows (PR Web)
  
• PR and social media evolution continues (Buzz Bin)

[Story.]

Labels: barack obama, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Political Spin

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• Dog Valentines from Purina (Adland)
  
• Heidi Montag in tears over public response to her horrific music video debut (Deceiver)
  
• Heart-shaped vag lays an egg with Seattle Times (Adrants)
  
• Tech geeks are sexy (Strive Notes)
  
• The murky world of pay TV pirates (Australian Financial Review)

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• Thank God we have The L Word to tell the honest story of true-to-life lesbians (plus bikini oil wrestling!) (YouTube)
  
• Facebook and MySpace are slipping (ValleyWag)
  
• Every little move of Julia Allison still being chronicled by Gawker (Gawker)
  
• What's up with Hillary Clinton's Scarlett O'Hara act? (The Root)
  
• Kanye West is an a-hole, part 643 (YouTube)
  

You want to make it big in journalism today? Then make it about you.

That's right. Make it about you rather than the actual story you're covering, the publication or news outlet you work for, or -- God forbid -- your audience.

Call it the Kanye West Guide to Journalistic Advancement.

Yes, it's egocentric -- even narcissistic. But in a environment where legacy news organizations offer little in the way of job security, and where everyone under 30 who's not famous seems to see themselves in a perpetual state of "pre-celebrity," it's only natural that individual journalists would increasingly view themselves as brands that need to be nurtured. Brands that demand shelf space in the form of TV face time, Internet followings and other career enhancers.

This "personal branding" approach to journalism has certainly worked like a charm for Julia Allison, the young journalist who first attracted attention with her affair with then-Tennessee Congressman Harold Ford, Jr., which some claim helped to cost him a seat in the U.S. Senate in 2006.

Now, at 26, she's the toast of New York as a magazine writer and on-air commentator on CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, CNBC, E! and elsewhere. Although ridiculed by the New York Press as a "Faming Asshole," Julia's template for success is obviously an effective one.

For that formula in a nutshell, check out her blog. Or her photoblog. Or details of her romantic breakups (including e-mail exchanges) on other blogs. Or just read Gawker, where her every self-promotional effort is lovingly chronicled.

I'm sure the journalism and communications students I occasionally speak with are far more impressed by Julia's roadmap to success than any drivel I can tell them about the Five Ws, Edward R. Murrow, and the founding fathers' vision of the role of the fourth estate.

Like it or not, Julia's dream is their dream today.

Forget the Five Ws. Today's journalism is increasingly about one letter -- "I."

I should add that I don't blame Julia for her fame. She's a talented writer and obviously a driven person. I can't begrudge her success any more than I can blame Britney Spears for the amount of coverage she receives.

She doesn't control it, after all. The rest of us do.

Labels: journalism, Julia Allison, Media News

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• Brian Solis offers the "definitive" social media news release (PR 2.0)
  
• Actually, Brian, I think I like THIS one better, especially the creepy robot voice (YouTube)
  
• Forget SEO; how about "HRO"? (MarketingProfs)
  

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• CNN's Andrea Koppel gets a PR job (PRNewser)
  
• The best spam messages ever (Geekpreneur)
  
• Mystery of the missing Maureen Down quote -- solved (Talking Points Memo)
  
• Paris Hilton celebrates Harvard visit with ... wait for it ... a nip slip (Celeb Parasite)

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• SeenThis? Facebook app has potential (Copywrite, Ink.)
  
• Does anyone care who Perez Hilton endorses for president? (HuffPo)
  
• Best of the PETA babe ads (The Land Salmon)

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• How will the PR biz fare in a recession? (Pierce Mattie)
  
• Wonderbra ad special for Pancake day (Adland)
  
• "I'm going to take Dr. Phil down." (AP)
  

Labels: barack obama, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Mitt Romney, Political Spin, Super Tuesday

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• Gay magazine editor not gay enough (Gawker)
  
• Murdoch appears on Fox News Channel, lies (News Hounds)
  
• Tip to O'Reilly: Colbert is kidding (News Hounds)
  
• Lindsay Lohan takes the edge off (Deceiver)

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• Bad co-branding ideas: Rice Krispies Treats and Barbie (Collateral Damage)
  
• Analyzing Target's blogger relations screwups (Copywrite, Ink.)
  
• Bush and his flunkies made "at least 935" false statements in the two years after Sept. 11 (HuffPo)
  

Since we've written more than 2,200 posts over the past three years, we like to occasionally repost a few of the more evergreen items for our newer readers. Here are 10 posts you may find of value on a topic near and dear to our hearts: the journalist/flack relationship.

• Why Journalists Are Right to Suspect That PR People Are Liars
  
• Why Journalists Actually Prefer PR People to Be Liars
  
• Why Journalists Think They're Better Than PR People -- But Aren't
• How Journalists Get Better Stories By Lying
  
• How Journalists Butter Up Their Interview Subjects
  
• Forbidden Love: PR Consultants and Journalists
  
• Trend: Reporters Changing Careers to PR
  
• Do PR Execs Avoid Hiring Ex-Journalists?
  
• Where Journalists and Marketers Collide: Capitalization
  
• More Capitalization Issues
  
• Why I Love Journalists
  

A couple of months ago, someone doing media relations for me got screwed over by a TV reporter. Here's how it went:

1. We wanted the reporter to do a preview story on a consumer event that one of our clients was sponsoring. The event was targeted to a particular kind of consumer within this reporter's beat.

2. The reporter expressed interest and said she wanted to interview one of the consumers who would be coming to the show. She laid out a set of criteria for the kind of person she wanted to talk with.

3. Our media relations person said, "No problem, I'm on it!" and set about giving the reporter what she wanted. Since the event hadn't yet occurred, you can imagine how difficult it might be to find a consumer who was planning to come to an event before the event. Particularly given the reporter's criteria, it wasn't easy.

4. Lo and behold, our person scored! She found the perfect candidate for the reporter's story, which obviously would be a great hook for the reporter's preview of our client's event.

5. The reporter was excited to learn that our person had found the perfect interview subject for her. She apparently had been looking for this kind of consumer for some time with no luck. The reporter went to the consumer's home and interviewed her for more than an hour.

6. When our media relations person followed up to find out when the story would run, the reporter said she "wasn't sure" if she would be able to do a preview of the event. "What do you mean?" our person asked. "Didn't the interview go well?"

7. It did go well, the reporter replied. Only she really had wanted the interview for a future story she was planning, and just didn't have time to do something before the show. In fact, when the story did run, it wouldn't be mentioning our client at all.

I know how journalists can be with PR people -- and I know that PR people sometimes deserve it. But this is ridiculous.

I want to out this bitch so badly I can't tell you. But I guess I'll settle for sharing this little story in hopes that it will comfort you the next time you get screwed.

Labels: Marketing Views, pr, public relations

A crazed Vietnam vet. A bunch of sissy right-wing pundits who wouldn't know real combat if it blew their last limb off.

God have mercy ... because John McCain Rambo won't.







Who says he's too old to still kick some ass?

Labels: Hugh Hewitt, John McCain, Michelle Malkin, Political Spin, rambo, Rush Limbaugh

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• Getting duped: How the media messes with your mind (Scientific American)
  
• The Heath Ledger video that entertainment TV shows are afraid to broadcast for fear of a star boycott (Ninja Dude)
  
• Marketers say spam works (Copywrite, Ink.)