Potty-mouth Cameron: Next he'll be talking about "birds" and "booze" to Zoo magazine

According to David 'man of the people' Cameron (assuming said 'people' are independently wealthy and went to Eton), the people of Britain are “pissed off with MPs”.

I think it must be all the staged media opportunities and the insincere and unconvincing use of pre-prepared profanity during chummy radio interviews.



During the same interview Cameron also said "twat". He probably wasn't the only one.

My liver may disagree, but...

...I've been to a couple of good networking bashes this week. First up, on Wednesday was the Greenbang second birthday party. Major hat tip to my good friend and former colleague Dan Ilett for getting Greenbang up and running and turning it into such a hit over the past two years. Good to see so many people there too.

And last night I got myself along to Hyde Park to catch up with some of my former CNET – now CBS Interactive – colleagues and assorted other PR and media types. CBS was running a charity rounders tournament in aid of Byte Night, with some kind sponsorship – read ‘beers’ – from Daryl Wilcox and the Features Exec team.

Unofficial winners – as the event was curtailed by torrential rain – appeared to be the team from Hotwire PR who won their first two games before the rains came, though CBS Interactive were also closing in on a second win before rain stopped play. It looked like that would have been 'the final everybody was hoping for'.

But an honorary mention though to the team from Sagem who didn’t let the fun or charitable nature of the occasion dull their competitive edge, which is something I admire in any sportsman or woman. Just because it’s supposed to be fun, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t intimidate your female opponents with a bit of the old ‘chin music’. Personally, as a competitive soul myself, I thought it was a shame to see such effort go unrewarded.

The benefit of the heavens opening of course, especially for those of us who were mere spectators, was we all got to the pub a lot earlier. A good night. Thanks to all who organised it.

Social media strikes back

Picture the scene: You work for United Airlines, so life already ain't that great. An angry customer comes to you and tells you that he saw baggage handlers throwing his guitar around, and now it's broken.

You explain there is more chance of your airline giving him his own plane than a refund or reimbursement for the damage done. He walks away. You consider the issue over and done with.

What's that you say: he's recorded a song about you and stuck in on YouTube? Oh well... nobody watches all that stuff...sorry, what's that, it's been watched by more than 3.5 million people? Oh shit...



Thanks to Chris Ayers on The Times for flagging this. The always excellent Daniel Finkelstein on the same publication has gone one better and dug out some other classic examples of social media revenge from the archives.

The Media Blog: Going strong

It's two weeks since I announced on this blog the launch of a side-project, a blogging collective if you will, called The Media Blog (it's a blog, about the media). And I'm delighted to say it's had an excellent first fortnight in the blogosphere. There are 39 posts up there, from a collection of commentators and the site has attracted more than 2,500 unique users.

Check it out if you haven't already. We're also still looking for contributors to join the excellent stable of bloggers already posting over there. Drop me a line to find out more.

In the meantime, here are the top 10 posts from the first two weeks:

1. Citizen journalists given their days of thunder

2. Final thoughts on the Morgan Stanley story

3. Nick Davies: "Hard to resist" notion of NOTW cover-up

4. ‘Oi Freddy! Write my headline for me’

5. Silly season makes a science of irony

6. Hyperboring? In defence of hyperlocal

7. Robert Peston’s singular failure

8. The Independent adds video. Why?

9. Media students: There is life after graduation in 2009

10. Shocker: 'Kids prefer the web to newspapers'

Who wants to drop the kids off at the pool?

I spotted an interesting promotion being run by loo roll manufacturer Andrex currently. The more toilet rolls you buy the more Andrex Puppy Points you collect.

Points of course mean prizes.

And you will notice from the picture to the right that one of the prizes you are eligible for - as well as sending your child back in time to a 1980s 3D cinema - is a trip to a water park. That’s right, you can literally ‘drop the kids off at the pool’…how appropriate! (Though having collected rolls and rolls worth of points already it could be argued that might be something of a busman’s holiday.)

I can only imagine what the other prizes are; an Indian meal for two perhaps or a holiday in Mexico?

They're just drumming up business through subtle suggestion.

Shock: Twitter not just a US phenom

“Who or what the hell is a Flintoff?”
“Why is ashes trending? That’s my cat’s name.”
“Who are these Lords?”
“Don’t know why ashes is trending but guess it’s kinda cool… #ashes”

…just some of the comments from across the pond as Americans have woken up each morning for the past five days to total confusion about why trending topics don’t make sense within the parameters of the American-English vernacular and their own introspective cultural references.

Genuine surprise, disillusionment and utter incomprehension typify many of the responses regarding this alien language of trending topics, overrun while they were sleeping.

The fact so many even look to this list daily, also flags just how dependent many Tweeters are on trending topics for guidance on what should interest them and what they should be commenting on.

Many Brits doubtless spot topics all the time that make no sense, and accept that's the nature of Twitter. But many of the US tweeters I've observed regard an alien hashtag topping the chart the same way they would a stranger in their living room.

In the largely English speaking world of Twitter it’s good to see the cricket-obsessed populations of England and Australia, and their respective diaspora challenge the status quo of the Twitter trending topic lexicon.

It’s also nice to wind up the Aussies from 10,000+ miles away… or is Earl’s Court a little nearer than that?

Bloggers get their days of thunder

I flagged earlier an interesting story (on TheMediaBlog) which is indicative of the way the media is going, but atypical in terms of how big business reflects that change.

US motor sport association NASCAR has announced a list of 30 bloggers who are to be accredited members of the press corps following the sport. This means trackside access and treatment similar to that afforded members of the mainstream sports media.

"We have been overwhelmed by the positive response since our initial announcement to form the NASCAR Citizen Journalist Media Corps last month," said NASCAR managing director of corporate communications Ramsey Poston. "More voices speaking about NASCAR is good for the sport and is fan-friendly. We intend to make the most of the changing media landscape."

Nagging doubts about tokenism to one side, this is a laudable move and one which acknowledges that bloggers will increasingly provide a voice of authority and influence around many businesses and industries.

How this can scale is less clear and businesses looking to NASCAR's example will need to work out what constitutes their own 'magic circle' of bloggers. Will businesses require insight into analytics, so bloggers prove their reach and readership before being handed the kind of access other fans (which bloggers typically are first and foremost) would kill for? And will these bloggers be subject to any guidelines, regarding brand, image rights or coverage which could prang their independence?

All things being equal however, such top-down acknowledgement must be excellent news for the bloggers concerned, making a self-fulfilling prophecy of the fact their value has been recognised.

While I know as much about NASCAR as I do about 16th century Moldovan poetry, as an experiment in embracing the changing media world it will be an interesting one to watch.

Obama pays tribute to Walter Cronkite

"In an era before blogs, cell phones and cable, he was the news."

Credit where it's due...but did this ad work?

Hats off to the people at Red Consultancy. I just saw their full page ad in PR Week.

I don't think an ad could be much cleaner or more efficient while still cramming in messages such as 1) we're a young and fun place to work, 2) we 'get' Twitter, 3) we're growing, and most importantly, 4) we're hiring.

Strong visual, nice concept. Good ad... or is it? [continued after pic]


Perhaps the only question is over whether the ad has bridged the chasm between print advertising and audience/digital engagement. Has the ad actually worked, or does it just look good?

My measure here is the number of followers gained by @Carriegoss over the past two days since PR Week came out - no more than a couple - which seems a relevant metric given the content and focus of the ad: learn more about Red's people.

The Twitterverse is incredibly promiscuous, and as such you may have expected a sudden spike in followers would inevitably have resulted if the ad had actually engaged people.

Of course Red wants PR Week readers to go online and visit the company website, look for jobs and find out more about what the agency does. And perhaps they did. But if Red wants to sell itself through the experiences of its people then the level of Twitter engagement following the publication of the ad tells its own story.

So the jury's out. It's a great ad - in theory -but did the company pick the wrong media or tactic?

If the face fits...

The media do love a good photofit story. It’s visual, it’s quirky… it fills some space. Often they are composite faces mapped to certain qualities – so earlier this week we met the ‘Future Face Of Business Leaders’ courtesy of a PR stunt by the University of Kent. Previously we’ve seen what makes for a trustworthy face. Other times, we are shown what a mysterious or largely undocumented figure from history looks like, such as Jack The Ripper.

And today it is Dick Turpin’s turn to be recreated. It’s a great PR stunt by York Castle Museum which has muscled its way into many of today’s papers to advertise a forthcoming exhibition on Turpin’s final hours.

It’s an especially good hit with the schools breaking up this week and much talk of staycations in the UK. It's creative, opportunistic and will undoubtedly deliver value to the business. A great example of effective PR in action.

In fact, I would even go so far as to say it's a case of PRs spending cash on looking flash and grabbing your attention... but the lyrical reference would be lost on far too many of my peers.

Oh, but I just said it anyway.

The purrfect space filler...

I posted earlier on The Media Blog stating that the silly season is likely to lead to an increase in the science of the bleeding obvious…

Well have you heard the one about the cats who purr and meow when they’re expecting to be fed…?

“New research has finally laid bare the degree to which cats exploit humans.

“Dr Karen McComb, a specialist in mammal vocal communication at the University of Sussex, said that by employing an embedded cry, cats appear to be exploiting innate tendencies that humans have for nurturing offspring.

“McComb began the research into domestic cats after noticing the "manipulative" purring of her own cat, Pepo. "I wondered why this purring sounded so annoying and was so difficult to ignore," she said. "Talking with other cat owners, I found that some of them also had cats which showed similar behaviour."

This ticks two boxes. 1) It’s nonsense science that fills some space and gives rise to a fun headline, 2) It allows newspapers to use pictures of cats – animal porn – to make people go ‘aaw, how cute!’. (Such cynicism hasn’t stopped me including a photo of my own ethically sourced moggies).

Get used to it, we've a couple of months of this still to go.

Why URL licensing plans are utter lunacy

A spat is raging in cyberspace and the PR industry, following suggestions the National Licensing Authority is to charge PR agencies to distribute URLs to clients.

PR Week ran the story a couple of weeks ago but only now are people really picking up their jaws, getting back in the chair they fell off and discussing the implications of this foolishness. The normally sound and even-handed Stephen Waddington isn't impressed for starters and even the director general of the PRCA Francis Ingham is venting.

"They’re not talking about the forwarding of material –they’re talking about charging agencies and their clients for URLs," wrote Ingham. "We’ll be fighting this all the way – if you feel the same, then be vocal about it, support us in the media, and let the NLA know that they have gone too far."

I couldn't agree more. To charge for the distribution of URLs is the most ill-thought-out example of analogue thinking I've seen in a long while, from an anachronistic organisation which clearly has little idea of how it can credibly protect revenue and IP in the 21st century. Its members should take note.

URLs are a mechanism to distribute content, they are not content. It would make little more sense to charge Microsoft, Mozilla, Google or the ISPs for their role in this alleged larceny.

The argument goes that PR agencies charge to collate reports containing URLs and sell media monitoring and clippings as a service to clients. Therefore some of those revenues should reach the content providers.

But it is a flimsy and ridiculous argument born out of desperation and made all the more laughable by the fact the organisation which has pulled this idea out of its proverbial has in doing so shown a fundamental ignorance of digital media and the web. In showing its hand thus, the NLA has also shown it is poorly placed to answer inevitable questions about the implications for RSS feeds and Google Alerts, for starters, that would need answering.

Because let's not forget this is all part of a wider ecosystem. Isolating two related factors within that ecosystem and assuming their relationship can be monetised in this fashion ignores the very nature of an ecosystem and suggests the NLA should be careful what it wishes for.

The NLA is assuming its members are the dominant force within the ecosystem. But what if Google started charging content providers to index content on Google News? Or if browsers manufacturers charged content providers to display online content? Then who holds all the cards.

Of course Google et al wouldn't act on behalf of the PR industry, but it serves as a reminder that attempting to ring-fence any element within a dynamic and democratic ecosystem, purely because you only see the benefits to yourself, is short-sighted if not utterly ignorant.

The internet has changed business forever, but the NLA is still trying to live in an antiquated world of product, price and sale that supported commerce for thousands of years. But history is littered with companies, countries, governments, organisations and entire species who failed to adapt and paid the ultimate price.

And on the 8th day he made some snacks, a ham sandwich and a novelty cheeseboard

I see God's up to his old tricks again, this time putting the image of the Virgin Mary in a tree stump. And I am as sure as anybody that it is in no way a PR stunt by the Holy Mary Parish Church, or the people who claim to have found it.

I'm sure you'll also agree, it's uncanny. Uncannily like a tree stump that is. Or a posh cheeseboard.

Perhaps slightly spookier is the fact that just last night myself and some colleagues, having already covered politics no doubt, were discussing religion in the pub and specifically the Almighty's tendancy to manifest in his well-documented mysterious ways.

My theory on this goes thus: If God is real (work with me here). And he is all-seeing and all-powerful... he really needs to do a better line in the 'signs' he sends us to prove it. Getting over his obsession with snack food would be a start (tree stump / cheeseboard notwithstanding).

Barely a miracle happens on Planet Earth that doesn't involve The Almighty making his presence known via the medium of potato- or wheat-based snacks. Just check out 'Cheesus' the holy Cheeto, following previous incarnations in crisps and the lid of a jar of Marmite. Or the Virgin Mary (or possibly Marlene Dietrich) toasted ham sandwich.

I'd hate his signs to be mistaken for PR stunts by snack food manufacturers or online casinos. And I can't help thinking when Judgement Day comes and atheists and agnostics protest their objections to hell and damnation they may just have a case.

"Is it any wonder we didn't believe in you, you didn't exactly make yourself known."

"Did you not see the Cheeto I sent you, shaped like my only son? Or the toasted sandwich... or the crisp? What more could I have done to prove the existence of one all powerful divine being?"

"A tree stump shaped like a cheeseboard perhaps? Oh..."

I had a Virgin Mary appear in a drinking glass once. But it's just not the same without the vodka.

The ideal candidate will have 250+ followers on Twitter...

My colleague Eb Adeyeri flagged this yesterday, amid a mix of confusion, surprise and nodding agreement from the Twitterverse.

Best Buy is recruiting for a marketing role and has requested that applicants have 250 followers on Twitter.

On the surface that sounds 1) chronically over-obsessed with the web’s latest, greatest fad, 2) an entirely arbitrary number to choose and 3) a shameless attempt to get people talking about Best Buy.

So let’s consider 3) a box ticked.

But I don’t agree with 1). I don’t think Twitter will go away any time soon and actually I think it’s very relevant that a brand like Best Buy would want somebody who understands the value of Twitter. The likes of Dell have well proven now that it can deliver value.

But why 250 followers? What does that prove? I’ve previously criticised the tendency to rank people’s importance, relevance or worth by crude Twitter figures and I stand by my criticism. If the job went to somebody purely because they had the most followers, or Tweeted most frequently then this would be laughable.

Best Buy is clearly trying to draw a distinction between ‘yes I’ve signed up for Twitter and I’m followed by a handful of friends’ and ‘yes, I actively Tweet and engage in conversations and other community activity’. 250 followers may sound arbitrary but most people don’t have 250 friends they could implore to follow them. By setting the bar there Best Buy should get people who are actively using Twitter and building community.

Could NOTW gossip on 'tap' be good for journalism?

Bear with me here…

Anybody who has read Nick Davies book Flat Earth News will know it opens on the premise that the unspoken rule of Fleet Street – as was – is that dog doesn’t bite dog. Davies, once more, and The Guardian therefore tread a fine line with claims that phone tapping, and systematic breaches of the law were commonplace at The News of the World.

But I don’t think anybody would say this story comes under the bar that divides news in the public interest and paper scoring points over paper.

And could this furore also be good for journalism in the long run?

Firstly, it raises a question which sits at the very heart of journalism. What price truth, and do the ends justify the means?

Journalists must be allowed to protect their sources but it is clearly a privilege that has been abused. And journalists should also enjoy freedoms to investigate if the story justifies their actions. But that doesn’t mean breaking the law in pursuit of celebrity gossip.

Investigative journalism must be encouraged and its value understood. But it must be done responsibly. This furore may focus that debate.

Forgetting what the NOTW’s housekeeping may have done for the reputation of tabloid hacks and the other protagonists in this story, there is the other side.

The Guardian was obviously injured by the success of The Telegraph in recent months with its coverage of MPs’ expenses. But now it has its own scoop.

Of course it won’t have the same long tail but coming so soon on the back of The Telegraph’s victory, the hope must be that this will focus news desks on the value of the big scoop rather than cheaply following the pack to the same on-diary comfort zones.

I’d like to be a fly on the wall at The Times right now.

New blog launched: Introducing The Media Blog

Some of you may already have seen The Media Blog (themediablog.co.uk - does what it says on the tin), launched this week by, well, me.

But while Sturgeon's Law will continue in much the same vein, the grandiose vision for The Media Blog is that it will become a blogging collective exploring all areas of the media from multiple perspectives, with multiple authors - all authorities in their own way. There has never been a more important time to better understand the value of the media or how, and why, it works.

I am now enlisting authors to join in with this project and drive a discussion on all areas of the media. Among those already signed up is Jon Bernstein, former multimedia editor of Channel 4 News, and a former colleague and boss from my own journalist days. And I'm still looking for others who can represent a cross section of ages, experience and areas of expertise across the wide range of industries and media that create this industry.

As the site starts to grow and content starts to appear, let me know your thoughts.

Porn, vomit, er, Microsoft... what's not to like?

Apparently the following advert, attributed to Microsoft, has been pulled after people started complaining...tsk, some people!



Putting aside the fact it features an obvious reference to a piece of pornography so vile it makes a grown woman vomit, what is there to get upset about? Sure, Superman then comes on the screen and tells consumers how they can browse such hardcore pornography without getting caught, while a man writhes around in sick... but... hang on, this defence is crumbling.

Could Microsoft really have thought this was a good idea? Surely it's an elaborate hoax? Though it does conform to a tried and tested PR ploy - get an ad either banned, or at least stir a shocked reaction from more sensitive souls. However, I think this ad skips freely past any reasonable line in the sand and bares both buttocks in the direction of common sense.

I can see the pub from here!

While waiting with a client for a journalist, who eventually failed to show, without calling or emailing to say he wouldn't make it, I filled my time taking photos looking out over London from Tower 42. We've not got bad views from the 22nd floor of the Millbank Tower but it's always good to see things from the other side of town (click to enlarge).

File this one under ‘I would say that, wouldn’t I’

What do you know, you wait ages for one article about professions trying to hermetically seal their gene pool, and then two come along, practically at once.

In the face of such self-preservation, anybody would think there was a recession going on.

According to an article in PR Week: “…journalists …planning an escape route into PR… are likely to find their options limited as agencies prioritise genuine industry experience.”

On a couple of levels that makes absolute sense. One argument within the article appears to suggest PR companies are wary of journalists who see PR as little more than a meal ticket in difficult times – or at least a life raft away from the sinking media industry.

And quite right too. I had a journalist email me a while ago who said: “I reckon it’s time I put my feet up and sort out a nice fat salary, have you got any jobs going?”

I think he was serious.

So, if the article was about recessions being no time to hire staff who think they can simply spin their wheels while drawing a fat salary then it’s spot on. But that isn’t limited just to former journalists of course. I suspect many PR professionals – even those with “genuine industry experience” – have also been found out by this recession, lest any of us imagine the economy can’t be both an excuse as well as a reason for losing staff.

I also agree PR certainly isn’t for all journalists. The work rate will leave many floundering from day one and the difference in culture and politics won’t always suit deserters from the other side of the fence. So yes, journalists also represent a gamble if the agency hasn't done its homework. (But that's true of all staff again, right?)

However, to address the basic premise, “genuine industry experience” is a slightly worrying term whose understanding owes more to an individual agency’s ambitions and its approach to PR - and the expectations of the clients they've surrounded themselves with as a result - than it does to the fittingness of journalists to work in PR. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure the article is correct, I just question, to a degree, the logic upon which it is built.

Journalists – if you find one who can keep up with the pace and not lose heart or focus in the face of a political culture shock – can still add a great deal to any agency aspiring to a value proposition above and beyond press office and admin. Fresh perspective is no luxury, nor is the level of media consultancy or training - both internal and external - that an experienced journalist brings to the table. Likewise they should also bring creativity and pragmatism to the kinds of tactics the PR industry has been peddling in the same way, for too long as a result of the closed gene pool apparently still favoured in some quarters. And then of course there is a new biz 'wow' factor if you get the right journalist who can bring specific industry knowledge, media savvy and some presentation and communication flair.

Sure, if an agency wants somebody to top and tail US copy and hit send on emails to bought-in press lists then a journalist would be a luxury, but so would "genuine industry experience". It probably boils down to the ways in which people react to recession. There are those who say 'we must do what we currently do, but do it better' and those people will look to broaden their gene pool, expand their offering, roll out new services and aggressively target new business. Then there are those who will think 'we must hunker down and see this thing through' and naturally those people won't be hiring journalists any time soon for the above-mentioned reasons.

In that regard, I suspect this article is more about self-preservation, on many levels, and the fact many agencies lack the skills sets and the vision to work out how the right journalist can add real value to their business. Too many still think a former journalist will either be a copy jockey or a luxury to wheel out for meetings and pitches.

Michael Jackson STILL dead reports the BBC...and stands by its coverage

More than 700 people complained about the BBC's blanket coverage of Michael Jackson's death, according to The Guardian. I'm really not surprised. By Friday morning it was preposterous but by Sunday it was beyond a joke and was a real black mark against the editorial standards at the BBC, who clearly took the opportunity to lazily programme hours and hours of coverage with little thought to content, relevance or importance.

Despite this, Mary Hockaday, head of the BBC newsroom has understandably defended the excessive output. According to The Guardian:

Hockaday described Jackson as a "huge figure internationally" and said BBC News "went into gear to report a big breaking news story". "We've had a number of complaints about our coverage, the main charge being that we simply did too much: that his death didn't justify the prominence and scale of our reporting through Friday and into the weekend."

Breaking news? By lunchtime Friday the news was well and truly broken. By Saturday it was in a million pieces, scattered all over the media.

There are too many gags about dogs and bones to write a clean headline

This story from today’s Independent came up for discussion over lunch (probably not the time, but work with me here):

“A man who filmed himself having sex with a neighbour's dog was given a six-month suspended sentence. Derek Jeffrey, 59, of Camber, East Sussex, denied bestiality with the Staffordshire bull terrier, Ronnie. Hove Crown Court was told he lent his camcorder to a friend but forgot to erase the dog scenes.”

For such a short story, it raised a lot of questions (beyond the obvious: who does something like that?!):

1) Did they really need to tell us the dog’s name? Seriously! After all he’s been through doesn’t Ronnie deserve some anonymity?

2) What are relations going to be like on that street? Frosty, I’m guessing.

3) Who films that? Who gets half way through such an act and thinks ‘I should probably be filming this’? What, in case the people at work don’t believe you when you tell them?

4) If that’s the sort of thing you film, would you not be a little more vigilant about lending out your video camera with the tape still in it.

5) Is it wrong that I read the story and thought ‘…a Staffordshire bull terrier, really?’. It’s not so much that I find other dogs more attractive, I assure you, but aren’t Staffordshire bull terriers aggressive enough already? I can’t imagine anything this man did made it any less likely to attack him afterwards.

I assume the report came over the wire from a court reporter. Amid domestic disputes and a raft of minor offences I can only imagine the degree to which the court reporter pricked up their ears when this case got called out.

See, I can be positive... more advice for students

Having yesterday taken issue with one list aimed at journalism students, the Journalism.co.uk blog has come up trumps today with a list of things journalism students should do this summer to help them understand the way social media is defining the future of journalism. It's a great list, read it in full here.