PRSA’s advocacy in face of Senate investigation of PR is a good reason to pay association dues

Back in 2007, I wrote a post speculating about the future of professional associations. Digital and social media have made it easy for professionals to tap into an abundance of professional development and networking opportunities that don’t require annual dues. Facebook and LinkedIn groups provide a forum for in-depth discussion with professional peers, for example. Both of these channels, along with Twitter and Quora, make it easy to find subject matter experts. Countless agencies and individuals offer free webinars, white papers and ebooks. In-person gatherings like Podcamp, Third Thursday and the like provide opportunities for… Read More »

It’s time for the PR profession to join the opposition to SOPA and PIPA

Earlier today, U.S. House of Representatives Majority Leader Eric Cantor shelved the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), leading many to think the legislation is dead. It can, however, be ressurrected at any time. Meanwhile, its Senate counterpart, PIPA, is still very much alive even as support for it declines.

Despite the fact that the House won’t vote on the bill, Wikipedia and Reddit are among those that plan to go ahead with site blackouts on Wednesday, January 18, designed to raise awareness of the damage SOPA and PIPA could do.

I haven’t heard of a single public relations agency or association planning to join the blackout or even… Read More »

Twitter town hall cynicism is misplaced

Politics breeds cynicism that way email breeds spam. A lot of the cynicism directed at US President Barack Obama’s Twitter Town Hall is misplaced.

To be clear, my opinions would be identical if this had been a Republican president making history as the first President to conduct a Q&A session with citizens via Twitter.

The criticisms fell roughly into three camps:

• It was just a publicit/marketing stunt/gimmick
• It allowed the President to avoid tough questions while promoting his talking points
• It was a clueless use of the technology that failed to leverage Twitter’s strengths as a vehicle for social change

Just a publicity stunt

… Read More »

Crowdsourcing the truth

Crowdsourcing has become more and more common among businesses for everything from product and service ideas (MyStarbucks Idea, Dell’s IdeaStorm) to populating a stock photo service (iStockphoto) to finding a needle in a haystack (the SETI@Home project, searching satellite photos for the wreckage of Steve Fossett’s experimental plane). GoldCorp is still in business because it crowdsourced its hunt for a new gold vein. In the UK, the Guardian asked its readers to pore over documents to find instances of MPs misusing their expense accounts.

The new crowdsourcing project from NPR’s On the Media (OTM), however, is the first time I’ve seen… Read More »

A little respect, please, for government employees

This isn’t a typical post. But it has been weighing on me and I need to get it off my chest.

Whether the murder of Bill Sparkman was truly perpetrated because he was a federal employee has yet to be proven, but the circumstances of his death should strike fear in the heart of any rationale person.

Sparkman was found in Kentucky’s Daniel Boone National Forest. He was hanged from a tree, his hands and feet bound, he was gagged, his clothing was stripped from him, his Census Bureau ID was taped to him, and the word “fed” was scrawled on his chest. Sparkman was a part-time Census Bureau employee. He had been warned by a friend to avoid… Read More »

Public bodies can’t manage a Twitter account? WTF?

Neville Hobson just tweeted a link to a news story in the Croydon Guardian about the suspension of a Twitter account. In a nutshell, the Croydon Council had launched a print newspaper for distribution to residents of the town to ensure they received town news distributed principally through press releases. Someone on the staff had set up a Twitter account and then mistakenly sent was was supposed to be a direct message as a regular old tweet for all to see. The tweet was critical of a reporter at the Evening Standard.

The newspaper was instructed to stop using the account as a result.

It was a couple of quotes from the Guardian… Read More »

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