May 14th, 2008
What a schmozzle.
The recent uproar after the firing of an employee over her decision to give a free bite-sized snack to the young child of a customer lead the Tim Horton’s chain to unfire her.
The optics of firing a single mother for an act of kindness put the fast food chain in a bind.
Is […]
By Eric Eggertson -- 2 comments
May 14th, 2008
If a little bit of advertiser involvement in podcasts is good, a lot is better, right?
No!
Let’s look at two business podcasts and how they treat their advertisers (or “sponsors”, if you want to pretend it’s not advertising).
On For Immediate Release, Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson talked openly about adding commentaries prepared and voiced by their […]
By Eric Eggertson -- 26 comments
April 30th, 2008
Lawyers are often very good at helping organizations achieve their goals. But when it comes to plotting effective public relations moves, they too often forget how that legal action can be seen as aggressive overkill to the average person.
Case in point, the chill effect attempted by lawyer Clifford Shoemaker on behalf of his clients, who […]
By Eric Eggertson -- 0 comments
April 26th, 2008
You see this all the time.
A page that is left blank for the print version of a publication (the reverse side of the table of contents, for example) is left as a blank page in the online PDF version.
This helps maintain consistent pagination between the two versions, but what a waste. Most people don’t […]
By Eric Eggertson -- 2 comments
April 26th, 2008
A photographer is spotted taking pictures of children. Someone worries he might be up to something, and calls the police.
They track him on community security cameras and a cop pulls him over.
His question, after being stopped for possibly taking inappropriate photos: Why didn’t the person just ask him why he was taking pictures?
This is […]
By Eric Eggertson -- 1 comment
April 15th, 2008
A student of public relations can see a belligerent pattern in the Chinese government’s reputation defence during the past year.
Accusation: producing unsafe productsDefence: blame sloppy manufacturing specs provided by clients.
Accusation: human rights abuses in TibetDefence: allege Dalai Lama’s of conspiracy to cause deaths of ethnic Chinese
Tactic: Olympic Torch Relay protestsDefence: glorify noble athletes standing […]
By Eric Eggertson -- 3 comments
April 10th, 2008
Talk about having your symbolism hijacked. The Chinese government and the International Olympic Committee have seen the usual positive tenor of the international torch relay degenerate into a platform for political protests over human rights.
The challenge now is to pretend that the torch is being peacefully passed from hand-to-hand with the world looking on […]
By Eric Eggertson -- 0 comments
April 7th, 2008
After my send-up of the dangers of Earth Hour last week, I got pinged about an excellent critique of the world-wide event.
The source - a high school in Australia - was a bit unexpected, but the quality of commentary is excellent. Here’s a quote from Greenwashing - Raising Awareness or Breeding Complacency?, by Jimmy […]
By Eric Eggertson -- 0 comments
April 6th, 2008
Stealing someone’s identity to defraud someone is a serious criminal offence.
Borrowing someone’s identity to take the piss out of them, as the Brits would say, is a time-tested satirical technique.
The skewerer gets props for cleverness. But the one who is skewered often also gains visibility, possibly a wider audience, and kudos for having a sense […]
By Eric Eggertson -- 5 comments
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