Inside PR 446: Bad news for independent podcast creators

• • Inside PR

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Is podcasting on the verge of tipping from a creator-driven medium to an advertiser-driven channel? UNU predicts the trends. Microsoft gets LinkedIn. And crises bring out the best in both social and mainstream media. Gini Dietrich, Martin Waxman and Joseph Thornley tackle these topics and more in this week’s Inside PR podcast.

#IPRMustKnow

Midroll acquires Stitcher

A big deal by podcasting standards. Podcast advertising broker Midroll has acquired Stitcher. I think that independent podcasters have reason to worry that, if successful, Midroll/Stitcher will do to podcasting what Facebook did to the open Web. Martin and Gini are still making up their minds about this. Whatever your view, if you care about podcasting, this is an #IPRMustKnow.

Who knew UNU?

UNU is a site that uses the wisdom of the crowd to answer questions and predict trends. Very 2008.

Microsoft acquires LinkedIn

The news that Microsoft is acquiring LinkedIn broke just before we recorded this episode. So here you get our first impressions of the potential benefits and downsides of Microsoft’s integration of LinkedIn with its Office suite.

Crisis brings out the best in us

Finally, in the wake of the Orlando shootings, we reflect on the current state of crisis communications, how news flows through social media and the important role of mainstream media to establish context, discern authoritative, credible witness testimony and curate the reports from social media.

We’d love to know what you think.

Leave a comment on the blog, send us an email or an audio comment to [email protected], join the FIR Google+ Community, join the Inside PR Facebook group, message us @inside_pr on Twitter, or connect with Gini Dietrich, Joseph Thornley, and Martin Waxman on Twitter. And we have a favor to ask: If you like this podcast, please rate us on iTunes.

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Thank you to the people behind Inside PR. Our theme music was created by Damon de Szegheo; Roger Dey is our announcer. Inside PR is produced by Joseph Thornley.

Inside PR 361: Justine Sacco, poor judgment and the mob mentality

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Martin here…And as I said on the podcast, I was waiting for Google to write this post for me…

We start 2014 talking about the mob mentality you sometimes experience in social media.

Picture this. You’ve had a busy year and it’s almost the holidays. You’re traveling halfway across the world to head home for some much-needed R&R. It’s a long and maybe a bit of a dull plane ride. There’s no Wi-Fi, so you’re unplugged. The perfect way to unwind.

Sounds tempting.

But when you land…you notice something’s different. Strangers recognize you. Are they pointing fingers? You get reconnected only to find out you’ve been fired with no warning – over a tweet.  The decision had been made when you were in the air.

I’ve just described what happened to Justine Sacco, who was a senior communicator for IAC. As in, past tense. The reason for her firing was a racist tweet she posted before leaving on the flight.

Let’s be clear, we don’t condone any racist remarks and this was clearly a case of very bad judgment (just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should).  If you followed the story, you’ll know it blew up when she was in the air and didn’t have access to Wi-Fi, there was an avalanche of critical posts, hashtags, a twitter storm and, of course, she abruptly lost her job.

Now that we’ve had the opportunity to reflect on the situation from the perspective of a few weeks, we thought we’d discuss these questions:

– Is it wise to let the community do your thinking for you?
– When should you wait to make a decision and when should you react immediately?
– How do you deal with a mob mentality when you’re trying to make a change?
– If you react quickly, is your decision strategic or just designed to stop the noise?
– Do you dump first and then ask questions later?
– Shouldn’t everyone have an opportunity to answer for their actions before they feel the consequences?

It’s a complex and multi-layered issue, as you’ll hear in the podcast. Have a listen and let us know where you stand.

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We’d love to hear your thoughts.

Inside PR is part of the FIR Podcast Network.

Send us an email or an audio comment to [email protected], join the FIR Google+ Community, join the Inside PR Google+ Community, join the Inside PR Facebook group, leave us a comment here, message us @inside_pr on Twitter, or connect with Gini Dietrich, Joseph Thornley, and Martin Waxman on Twitter.

Thank you to the people behind Inside PR

Our theme music was created by Damon de Szegheo; Roger Dey is our announcer.

Inside PR is produced by Kristine D’Arbelles and Ashlea LeCompte.

Inside PR 2.64: PR and the Murdoch Affair

• • PR

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Jeff Jarvis unloaded a real roundhouse on PR and the News of the World affair and Rupert Murdoch’s appearance in front of Parliament.

The blog post discusses how coached Murdoch seemed during his appearance and how he completely missed transparency in his answers.

Joe Thornley, Martin Waxman, and Gini Dietrich set the stage for PR and the Murdoch affair and discuss who we, as PR professionals, are responsible to.

It’s an interesting topic, to begin with, because it seems impossible for people to disconnect how we (as a generalization) feel about a personality and the reality of what’s really going on. How the news media portrays a man and how we, as a society, condem him for something his employees he did.

But we all agree that, as leaders, it’s our jobs to take responsibility for the mistakes our employees make…even if we weren’t aware they were going on. The communication is something such as, “I don’t condone what my employees did. I take responsibility for their actions. And this is what I’m going to do about it.”

The conversation then turns to true PR, just like marketing, should be in the best interest of the customer. Not in the best interest of the company. Not in the best interest of the stakeholders. Not in the best interest of the employees. But in the best interest of the customer.

We all need to ask ourselves: Are we helping our clients spin a story (as you know, Spin Sucks) that makes them look better or are we helping them effectively communicate with their customers?

And the last point was one raised first by David Weinberger where he says:

If I were Edelman PR, I would probably agree to take on NewsCorp, but only if I were satisfied to a reasonable degree (yes, them’s fudge words) that NewsCorp was ready to tell the truth. (Clients do lie to their PR companies. The first time Edelman catches NewsCorp lying to them, Edelman should quite publicly drop them.)

From there we discuss how our jobs, as PR professionals, is to be there for the public interest and to tell the truth.

Joe raises the question of hubris of the super rich. He wonders, aloud, if they feel like they’re above the law and don’t have to be honest with anyone, including their agency.

All three of us hope that is the case with Rupert Murdoch. We hope the industry isn’t shady enough that our peers would suggest their client lie and blame his or her employees without taking any responsibility. But maybe we’re all really naive.

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Do you have an idea for a topic you would like us to discuss? Send us an email or an audio comment to [email protected], join the Inside PR Facebook group, leave us a comment here, message us @inside_pr on Twitter, or connect with Gini Dietrich, Joe Thornley, and Martin Waxman on Twitter.

Our theme music was created by Damon de Szegheo; Roger Dey is our announcer.

This week’s episode was produced by Kristine Simpson.