Accentuate the Positive, 3.0

We’ve all heard of “shooting the messenger.” However, NBC has taken this to a new low, by shooting messengers in the back.

I thought the whole point of viral marketing was to get other people to carry your water. Take advantage of the relationships and networks millions of individuals maintain, and allow them to evangelize your message and your brand. Thanks to LiveJournal and MySpace, kids who flunk the genetics part of a high-school biology test understand exactly what a “meme” is.

So how is it that a show like Saturday Night Live — which has been lively in name only for years — gets smothered so recently after coming off life support? Instead of allowing fans to spread the news, the messengers get plunked from behind.

The Natalie Portman rap wasn’t the classic that “Lazy Sunday” was — yet the thought of a foul mouth on sweet little Natalie was enough shock-value to get people talking about the show. And sharing the clip.

Here’s the way the listing looks on YouTube:

4-1/2 stars. Impressive. Don’t bother Googling it —
the Peacock has snatched it away:

Now you can go to NBC’s own site and watch it for yourself… as one person pointed out, “without all that bothersome resolution.”

Now, instead of searching the web for “borrowed” NBC highlights, you can go to the source! We’ve taken your viral favorites and gathered them into one convenient location. Watch. React. Tell a friend.

Yes, NBC owns the content.
Yes, NBC has the right to pull it.
Yes, NBC has done nothing wrong.

Just seems a little strange to call it a “viral favorite” when you’re so rigidly controlling the infection. And shooting your messengers in the back. There’s got to be a better way.

I suggest allowing the fans to post what they see on the air, and reserve a special “director’s cut” of the Digital Shorts for the NBC site. Best of both worlds, as fans spend time watching both to see what comes extra in the “official” release.

(A tip of the ole fedora to Scott over at Media Orchard.)

Journalists were quick to jump on James Frey for shattering his credibility into a million little pieces, and didn’t cut Oprah much slack for not smacking him around quickly enough.

Journalists talk tough when it comes to credibility… at least when they think no one is listening.

CNN legal guru Nancy Grace is now in the hot-seat, after what appears to be a case of perjury in the court of public opinion. Grace has been very open about her drives, ambitions, and influences in the past. Now those statements are coming back to haunt her.

We’ll let others deal with the fallout and the outcry. I wanted to peel back the skull of the collective journalistic consciousness, and let you see how they perceive this. A sample reaction:

Clever Login Name: When does an embellishment become a lie? I’ve never watched NG, so I have no opinion of her work … but this evokes kind of an ‘eh’ from me. That said, you’d think people in her position would be more careful about the wording of their resumes and profiles.

WARNING: This is a broadcast journalism message board. There is no guarantee that the people you see making posts are actually in the business, but most of them are. Read at your own peril.

When I left teevee news, you could have heard a pin drop in newsrooms across town. Some of my coworkers thought I’d be the last guy to leave. Big-J Journalism, through and through.

As I started my fledgling steps in the world of public relations, I was quite fortunate to do it in a market where I had worked for seven-and-a-half years. I knew the reporters and the gatekeepers, and they knew me. Some questioned why I would go over to “the dark side.” For the most part, I knew they were kidding.

Apparently, some aren’t kidding when they make comments like that.

Again — having been shielded — I never stopped to think about the source of this antipathy. (At least not in a deep, philosophical way.)

Others have written about this in the past, so I’m not going to rehash with a war story. (And a tip of the hat to Scott at Media Orchard.) I instead offer an allegory:

A great wall divides two camps. On one side, you’ll find a scattering of wells, mines, and other resources. On the other side, you’ll find all of the roads that go to market, and the keys to the fence.

The first tribe knows it must befriend the second tribe if they want to get the most exposure in the market. The second tribe knows they can forage for themselves on the other side, but they can find what they want more quickly if the first tribe guides them in.

It’s a somewhat symbiotic relationship that still appears to favor the tribe with the keys. (If you are urging me to use the word “parasitic” instead, you might be too close to the situation!) I say “appear” because there is a final dynamic at play: competition.

The “keymasters” ought to be living on easy street, but there are too many of them to act as a bloc. As much as they want to exploit the guide-tribe, they know they’ll lose in quantity and quality if they go it alone. If they are the last to market with the wool/water/gold/firewood, they lose.

That’s how competition balances the relationship — but that same competition sours it when misplaced. Journalists are predatory in nature. They seek. They stalk. They hunt. And they do so in an environment where they are competing with several other news-related outlets. And they also compete in-house with the very people that ought to be helping them. When you see nothing but competition in your own editorial meeting, and nothing but competition coming from the other shops in town, and nothing but competition for the ever-fickle consumer… it’s easy to see how that competitive drive ends up aimed at the PR practitioner.

The attitude of many journalists is that they are out for a “higher calling.” That the PR people have “sold out.” The PR people have something to hide — and (here’s the competition) the game to reveal “the truth” is on. “The truth,” of course, fitting their template.

The real irony at play is that the “Big-J” journalists like to adhere to the old line about “giving hope to the helpless and voice to the voiceless.” In other words, providing a platform for those who would not otherwise be heard. But if that “voiceless” person happens to own a business or be somewhat successful — well, all bets are off. There’s no need to “represent” these people fairly, or help them communicate their point of view.

Tribe #2 had better get its collective (cooperative) act together… the tools are changing, and those of us on the PR side are getting less-and-less reliant on their precious keys and gates…

Friday the 13th has brought forth a traditional media meme: how to parlay silly, outmoded superstitions into “lifestyle” news.

Disney has taken it one step further, actually commissioning a survey to find out “What scares you?” As happy coincidence would have it, Disneyland is opening its new “Monsters Inc.” attraction.

The survey seems somewhat useful, in a slow-news-day kind of way:

The survey found that 86 percent of adults and 91 percent of youngsters admitted to being very scared of something. Nearly one-in-five adults (18 percent) also said they are scared of more things now than they were as a child. Adults admit to other scares, including snakes (38 percent), fear of heights (36 percent), watching scary movies (22 percent) and the dark (eight percent).

Of course, when this gets reported (as I saw on the full-screen Good Morning America graphic), it winds up as:

Biggest adult fears:

• 38% – Snakes
• 36% – Heights
• 22% – Scary Movies
• 8% – “the Dark”

Gee… what ever happened to “public speaking?” Wasn’t that conclusively proven to be the number one fear, above death?

Thanks to this, my new number one fear is that newsfolk don’t have the brains or patience to sort through statistics and surveys, and will basically pass on whatever someone hands them. “This just in… two out of three teevee newscasters cannot handle simple fractions. Mary, that’s almost half.” (Maybe it’s time to move beyond aspiring to be an interview coach/media consultant. The real market is in snake removal.)

Thank you, Oprah. For redefining what it means to be “true.”

As I feared, what people feel is more important than what they reason. She called the Larry King Show Wednesday night, and relayed a carefully-crafted statement in between softballs:

“But the underlying message of redemption in James Frey’s memoir still resonates with me, and I know it resonates with millions of other people who have read this book.”

“What is relevant is that he was a drug addict who spent years in turmoil from the time he was 10 years old drinking and tormenting himself and his parents, and stepped out of that history to be the man that he is today and to take that message to save other people and allow them to save themselves.”

“To me, it seems to be much ado about nothing,” she added.

So, I guess it’s okay to lie as long as your story is compelling enough. (Helluvablog draws parallels to partisan political attacks that don’t have to be true, just sound bad.)

Which doesn’t bode well for us at all. Think I’m overreacting? Then please bookmark this page, and come back to comment the next time a client of yours gets libelously trashed, and you can’t refute anything because the lie “resonates” with “turmoil.”

Update:

NEW YORK Jan 12, 2006 — Future hardcover and paperback editions of James Frey’s disputed memoir of addiction, “A Million Little Pieces,” will include a brief author’s note that refers to the content of the book, his publisher said Thursday.

Doubleday spokeswoman Alison Rich declined to offer details about the note or to comment on why it was being added. She would not say if the note was an acknowledgment often found in memoirs but not in “A Million Little Pieces” that names and events had been altered.

Public relations professionals have a hard enough time getting people to accept messages, even the ones that are incontrovertibly true. For many people, the idea that we are paid to pass along information immediately makes the truth value of the message suspect. Now, we have another threat to our effectiveness — a declining standard of truth.

It’s now coming to light that “A Million Little Pieces” author James Frey played fast and loose with the truth of his account of addiction and redemption. (Think “VH1 Behind the Music,” without any actual, you know, music.)

While Smoking Gun ferreted out the truth, questions about the book go back to 2003, and the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.

(From Editor and Publisher): “Twin Cities public relations executive Jon Austin said he was hardly surprised when he read about the Smoking Gun findings this week in USA Today. ‘I remembered that there were problems about the veracity of his story when the book came out,’ said Austin, a former spokesman for Northwest Airlines.’

“In July 2003, shortly after the book was published, Austin told the Star Tribune that ‘no way, no how, nowhere’ would Frey have been allowed to board a commercial jet covered in blood and vomit, with a hole in his cheek and four front teeth missing, as the author claimed in the first paragraph of ‘Pieces.’

What is most troubling is Frey’s blatant disregard for criticism over his tomfoolery.

At the time, Frey brushed aside questions about his book’s accuracy. ‘I wrote what was true to me,’ he told the Star Tribune. ‘If people want to pick apart the facts, they can.’

What. Was. True. To. Me.

Is there no objective standard of truth anymore?

Well find out in the coming days. The book is part of Oprah’s club, and website has not yet acknowledged any of the controversy. And it damned well better, because far too many people will take a cue from Oprah that “feelings” are more important than “facts.” In that nightmarish future, no amount of truth will save a PR practitioner as long as people “feel” their employer is evil or unfair.

Maybe she can flash “Writer’s Embellishment” underneath Frey like Letterman used to do.

Update: Random House is offering refunds for people who bought “A Million Little Pieces” directly from them. Other retailers may follow suit.

If nominated, I will not run… but I will absorb the free publicity that comes with it.

Master media manipulator Donald Trump has done it again.

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Donald Trump is considering running for governor, a leading Republican said Friday. Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno on Thursday suggested that a big-name candidate could be flirting with entering the 2006 contest. On Friday, he confirmed to News Channel 10 in Albany that he had been referring to Trump.

This sounds like the sort of trial balloon that a proto-candidate would float. Not that anyone could ever prove that he did such a thing overtly.

No matter… within a period of two-and-a-half hours, the entire thing was blissfully reversed.

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — The Donald does not want to be the governor.

Donald Trump, mega-developer and star of NBC’s “The Apprentice,” said he has no interest in running for governor of New York this year.

“I’m not going to run for governor because I’m having too much fun doing what I’m doing now,” Trump told the New York Post.

Trump — who also told the New York Daily News that “I have no interest in running for public office at this time” — didn’t immediately respond to a telephone message left Tuesday at his New York City office by The Associated Press.

If Donald does end up running, it will only be after being dragged kicking and screaming by the “good people of New York” who have “begged” and “pleaded” with him to “sacrifice himself” for the “sake of the Empire State.”

(That way he doesn’t have to spend only his own money on the campaign.)

While we’re at it, I do have one question… Why is the second photo darker than the first photo? Shades of O.J.?

‘Tis the season to jack up some free publicity, using an attorney, timing, and hungry journalists.

The days in and around Christmas are bad for newspeople, because most of what they cover and do dries up. If you’ve got anything that might merit attention, you can maximize it by dropping it in the dead zone from Christmas to New Years.

That’s what Jews for Jesus has apparently done.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Christian evangelical group Jews for Jesus is suing Google Inc., saying a Web log hosted through the Internet search leader’s Blogspot service infringes its trademark.

The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in New York on Wednesday, seeks to force Google to give Jews for Jesus control of the site as well as unspecified monetary damages.

“We have a right to our own name and Google has allowed the use of our name on Blogspot without our permission,” said Susan Perlman, associate executive director with Jews for Jesus.

“Our reputation is at stake,” Perlman told Reuters.

Yeah, their reputation is certainly at stake. The guy who had the site had a whopping three posts on there, all between January and June. Apparently, the organization contacted him a while back about getting the rights to the blog name. Funny that they should wait until almost Christmas to file the suit…

Actually, there is a pretty substantial legal issue here: Do corporations and organizations have the right of first refusal when it comes to the naming of subdomains? If I suddenly have an infatuation with Jennfier Aniston, can I be prevented from storing my pictures at http://jenniferaniston.positiveposition.com?

Or maybe a million of them? Or 5,700,000 of them? That’s how many people ultimately got the rootkit spyware injected into their computers as a part of a copy protection scheme.

Angry consumers have already started stirring the pot with talk of a HolidayChristmas season boycott, and now the news gets worse for Sony. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott is adding charges that the company violated anti-spyware laws.

The new charges brought by Abbott contend that MediaMax software used by Sony BMG to thwart illegal copying of music on CDs violated state laws because it was downloaded even if users rejected a license agreement.

Wow.

That’s going to take a while to recover from right there.

You can throw out all of the original apologies, because now it seems Sony had to know that it was digging around hard-drives. You don’t “accidentally” create an installer program that ignores the EULA.

The readers at Slashdot have already played out the same scenario, involving catfood.

Some have perfected the art of the stunt, and some haven’t.

One entity that has played the stunt card well is GoldenPalace.com. The internet casino has paid people to streak, box, and climb buildings wearing temporary “Golden Palace” tattoos.

You might be more familiar with the company’s rather unusual collection of weird eBay items, made famous at the end of most local newscasts.

The Jesus Cheeto

$22.50

The Christ Pierogi

$1,775

The Monster Flake

$156

Gigantor the Lemon

$29.99

The Pope Hat Dorito

$1,209

The Grilled Cheese Mary

$28,000

Well, here’s the latest:

The bat that all-time baseball hit leader Pete Rose used for his 159th home run will be sawed in half to determine if it was corked, according to the Internet casino that purchased the bat at auction for $103,631.

Mike Heffner, the president of Lelands auction house in New York, said before last week’s sale that the black Mizuno bat showed signs of having been corked.

GoldenPalace.com, the betting Web site, said in a statement that it will saw the bat in half to see if it’s been enhanced, an event that will raise money for charity and draw media attention for the casino.

Good for them. Not so good for Donald Trump.

Yeah, I’m picking on him again, for mixing his messages like he wants us to mix our drinks.

On this morning’s radio commentary, Trump talked about his late brother Fred who had problems with alcohol. He talked about his agonizing decision to lend “Brand Trump” to vodka, having seen the effects in Fred Trump’s life. Donald reasoned that someone else would be selling vodka if he didn’t, so he announced he’d be giving all of his vodka profits to MADD.

Funny — none of that altruism was mentioned three weeks ago when it was initially announced.

Sounds like a backstroke, Donald. Your PR people are fired. Again.

You know, when I was putting together the previous entry, I thought I had done my due diligence…

I did a Google News search for “Marty Evans” just to make sure I wasn’t missing anything.

Well, lo and behold, just a little bit later stuff start spilling out on the Red Cross Congressional hearings, and the resignation of “Marsha Evans.”

Yeah, her resignation is going to raise a hell of a lot of red flags for those people who aren’t plugged into the reasons I outlined previously. But what are you to do?

Well, first of all, you take on some of the assumptions in the Brian Ross piece on ABC.

After both hurricanes, many local officials complained the Red Cross was often missing from the worst-hit areas. Survivors found it impossible to get through on the organization’s phone hot lines. And witnesses today claimed the Red Cross turned away victims who were disabled.

“One Red Cross official told me, ‘We aren’t supposed to help these people, we can’t hardly help the intact people,’” said Marcie Roth, executive director of the National Spinal Cord Injury Association.

First of all, you aren’t going to find Red Cross volunteers in the “hardest-hit areas” because as a rule, they aren’t safe. We don’t set up shelters in places that are inherently dangerous.

Phone problems? You betcha. Point taken.

As for the remark about the disabled being turned away… I’d like to know more about that specific allegation. Speaking on behalf of what I know with regards to Alabama, the Red Cross here does not operate medical needs shelters. If there are any folks with specialized needs for life-saving equipment, power, or medical supervision, it’s not our thing. Couple that with the fact that there were so many untrained spontaneous volunteers pressed into service, and I can see where someone was directed to an appropriate facility by someone who did not have the knowledge nor the sensitivity to explain why.

(Side note: find me any organization with 220,000 “associates” where there are absolutely no customer service issues raised.)

More from the ABC piece:

Leaders of other charities say Red Cross’ ability to raise money — $1.8 billion after Hurricane Katrina — outpaces its ability to spend it wisely. “Their reputation is that of a charity quick off the mark to raise funds but very slow in spending it effectively,” said Richard Walden, president of Operation USA.

For anyone with knowledge of how the Red Cross operates and the role it plays, this statement is laughable. From Day 1 with Katrina (and going back to pre-landfall) the organization was spending the money just about as fast as it came in. “Other charities” aren’t tasked with immediate response. “Other charities” don’t open evacuation shelters. And in what is the ultimate slap, “other charities” work hand-in-hand with the Red Cross, which is able to coordinate assitance to eliminate duplication of services. When you’re asked to be the first link in the chain of recovery, you don’t sit back for several days and wait for the checks to clear.

I cannot claim psychic knowledge of the balance sheet for every day of the operation, but I’d be willing to bet that the dollars coming in didn’t sit for more than a day or so at most. In fact, there were several days the ARC was operating on float. That’s not something you’d ever want to publicize to donors, because no one likes the idea of their contribution going to retire a debt — they want it to go to direct service.

Sorry for the rant — but man, this crawls under my skin. Bring the criticism, but bring it from a level field.

Everyone can be a spin doctor — just be prepared for your past to jump into someone’s web browser.

A little exposure for Jennifer Aniston? Who’duhthunkit?

While most people are reading about the “Friend Next Door’s” newest nudist nuisance suit, let’s look a little closer at the “innocent paparazzi” who says he didn’t break any laws.

Brandt denies he broke the law, and claims that the incident took place at Aniston’s Hollywood Hills home three weeks ago, and not at her more secluded residence in Malibu, as some accounts have suggested. He claims he was standing on a public street, about 300 yards from her house, hoping to get shots of Aniston with Vaughn, who is reported to be dating the actress.

“She has no fences around her backyard,” he said. “I did not trespass.”

“When I saw her come out topless, I go, ‘Oh, God, this is not what I want, this is not what people want to buy anyway,’” he said.

What a nice guy Brandt is. Not your garden-variety slug. He really feels sorry that he accidentally sent those topless shots to those magazines that wouldn’t print them anyway. Really. Really sorry. But he didn’t do anything illegal.

But even now, after Aniston filed a lawsuit, Brandt says he’d be within his rights if he wanted to publish the topless photos. “I didn’t think I did anything illegal,” he said.

“She exposed herself to everybody in the neighborhood,” he said. “I happened to have a camera so I wouldn’t have had a problem.”

Brandt’s celebrity photos have appeared in People magazine and the New York Post, among other publications. He says he once worked for The National Enquirer, but he says he’s grown to loathe paparazzi photographers.

“There is a group out there today who are extremely aggressive and I hate them, I’ll say that to you,” he said. “They have made the so-called paparazzi business as it is, the worst that it’s ever been.

In the publicity circles of yesteryear, this would qualify as a victimless crime. Aniston wins by finding out how much her nude layout would fetch without risking her reputation to openly ask. Brandt wins by being a nice slug.

Only, now there’s this internet thing, which totally destroys Brandt’s credibility.

It has been said that members of the paparazzi enjoy a lucrative trade. Candid celebrity photos can be sold to gossip mags like National Enquirer – which sells over two million copies a month – for between US$150 ($268) and US$150,000.

Or, sometimes, millions of dollars, as in the case of the late Princess Diana and her boyfriend Dodi Al-Fayed.

Small wonder that one infamous lensman, Peter Brandt, was willing to part with US$15,000 to trail Noah Wyle on a private beach holiday.

He said: ‘I get triple that amount (after selling the pictures).’

Slug, indeed. So much for your image makeover, Pete.

There’s something about that word that still rubs a lot of people the wrong way, yet there are those who put adverstising and marketing dollars behind it.

Ghetto Fries, it turns out, are French-fried potatoes topped with Merkt’s cheddar cheese, giardiniera, gravy, barbecue sauce and raw onions.

Apparently, the PR firm touting the fries got a little overzealous relying on the shock value of ‘ghetto’:

“GOT GHETTO? Max’s Famous Italian Beef Serves Gotta-Have Ghetto Fries,” shouted the publicist’s headline.

“Got Ghetto on the brain?” the release continued. “You’re not alone,” then went on to describe the aforementioned Ghetto Fries as a “dish that has captured the attention and appetites of Chicagoans from the North to South sides.”

When you’re looking for help with interview coaching, you get what you pay for.

Try Googling “media relations” sometime, and see what turns up. There are a number of firms out there that put information on the internet (this one included.) What they rely on is a mistaken public notion that “if it’s in print, it must be true.”

Here’s some of the advice I recently found on the PR Zoom Newswire:

“When talking with a reporter:

• Make a note of the reporter’s name and the name of the media when the caller first offers identification. This serves two purposes: you have an accurate record so you can follow up to see how the story appears; and you can use the reporter’s name during the interview, to help you build rapport with the reporter.

Boy, does this get abused. I can’t tell you how many people I interviewed who thought that starting every other sentence with “Well, Ike” or threw in a “The problem with our widgets, Ike, is…” It actually got in the way of getting the information in a usable form, and was highly annoying. You don’t talk to your friends that way, do you?

• Provide sufficient evidence for your statements. Reporters love numbers: try to give them numbers whenever you can — particularly when it helps you sell your own agenda.

Yeah, reporters love numbers. NOT! The vast majority of reporters are actually very bad at math (just like the rest of society.) Some wear it as a badge of honor. Unless they operate on a specialized beat that requires background knowledge, you can count on a reporter to need help deciphering statistics, financial statements, polling data, economics, and just about anything else involving numbers you can’t reach with your fingers. Seriously. If you just throw a stats at them, you are just as likely to have them misreported or misrepresented out of ignorance. Give them the context, and make sure they understand them. Don’t try to obscure the truth with a flash of digits.

Reporters are, as a rule, experts at nothing. Treat them with respect, but don’t assume they know everything. There is a lot of ego invested in being a “public figure” through the media, and many reporters (the young ones especially) will be hesitant to ask a question that appears elementary, or even stupid.

Being good conversationalists, they skirt the issue of the “dumb question” in the hopes of gleaning the answer through later context. If you’ve got a delicate detail, point of law, or sticky statistic, by all means take the extra time to make sure the reporter “gets it.” You’re less likely to insult their intelligence, and more likely to cause them a sigh of relief for answering the question they wouldn’t dare ask.

(Note: Yeah, I use the internet to market myself too. The difference is that I have 16 years experience in news from which to tell you how a reporter thinks. I also have dozens of “articles” on this very blog that back up what I proclaim. Caveat Emptor.)

Today, we add one more reason why smart celebrities and athletes should get media training and interview coaching (past examples here, and here, and here.):

So you can avoid becoming the next Terrell Owens. The talented wide receiver may be one of the best in the game, but he doesn’t think he’s among the best compensated.

Head Coach Andy Reid sent him home for a week for mouthing off. (Yeah Terrell, we know he yelled at you first. That’s what coaches do.) Reid told the media that he wouldn’t have any further comment on the matter — that the next conversation about it would be between himself and Owens. Fair enough.

Did Owens adopt a similar strategy? No way! With his agent by his side, Owens went on ESPN for more than eight minutes last night and blasted the team and the coach and the ownership and the media. It’s all our fault that he isn’t treated like an adult.

Had he sat there silently while agent Drew Rosenhaus did all the talking, it would have made for a better appearance. But this was more about “not getting disrespected.” Never mind that the whole thing is a turn-off for the fans who can forgive his salary if he performs on the field.

T.O. needs to G-O and find some media coaching, and fast. Especially since he was recently with the San Francisco 49ers, and we know the quality of the media training players got there.