Ethics

Protesters in Bahrain on August 7. AP Photo/Hasan Jamali

We included this story in this morning’s Ticker, but we think it’s important enough to give it a little more detail.

Salon reports that Qorvis is working with the ruling family of Bahrain (the country’s King is Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa) at a rate of $40,000 per month (plus expenses) with the goal of improving the government’s image. The firm has issued a statement following a raid on what the government says was an unlicensed Doctors Without Borders office in a residential building. A spokesperson for the nonprofit denies this, telling NPR that the group has been upfront with the government.

*Clarification after the jump.

Read more

New York Times tech columnist David Pogue has been banned from accepting certain speaking engagements with publicists that have been deemed in violation of the newspaper’s ethics policy.

The issue arose last week when Forbes published a story questioning whether Pogue’s participation in a Ragan Communications video seminar called “Pitch Me, Baby!” was in violation of the Times’ ethical code.

Today, the Times’ public editor, Arthur Brisbane writes that, after an “internal review[...] Pogue is barred from making any more speeches like this one to public relations professionals.”

Read more

USA Today reported this morning on a “whisper campaign” launched by Burson-Marsteller on behalf of an unnamed client that targeted Google’s Social Circle feature for Gmail. (The USA Today article and this one from Business Insider has a bit of detail about the feature, which taps into your info to make “social connections.”)

Citing consumer privacy concerns and Google’s issues with the Federal Trade Commission, two of Burson’s high-profile publicists — former CNBC anchor Jim Goldman and former political columnist John Mercurio — sent a pitch to reporters suggesting an op-ed slamming Google. One of those pitched reporters, Christopher Soghoian, a former FTC researcher and blogger, posted the pitch online. And, actually, according to the email, Mercurio said, “I’m happy to help place the op-ed and assist in the drafting, if needed. For media targets, I was thinking about the Washington Post, Politico, The Hill, Roll Call or the Huffington Post.”

USA Today says Goldman was in contact with them about the story. And the paper writes, “After Goldman’s pitch proved largely untrue, he subsequently declined USA TODAY’s requests for comment.”

We were in touch with the firm to find out if this is standard practice and how the firm will address the obvious ethical issues this situation raises. We received this statement from the firm: “The situation that led to the USA Today story is highly unusual and does not represent standard practice at Burson-Marsteller. We regret that it was not handled well and we are reviewing it thoroughly.”

Read more

ProPublica published a story today (with CJR) discussing the rise of PR’s influence on the news process, which is happening as the number of journalists and the number of news stories has fallen. While the story isn’t an outright attack on PR or publicists, it does take issue with a few things, including the “gray area” between truth and untruth that some publicists tend to operate in and the lack of transparency of some PR efforts.

Gary McCormick, former chair of the PRSA, defends the PR industry, saying that lying is not the way to grow a PR business, but rather to destroy it. Still, it’s the “truthiness” of some information that sources in the story frown upon.

Read more

Legacy Learning Systems, producer of a DVD series featuring guitar lessons, and its owner Lester Gabriel Smith has settled with the Federal Trade Commission over charges that it deceptively promoted its products using online affiliate marketers. These affiliates posed as ordinary consumers and posted positive reviews and endorsements about Legacy Learning. Sound familiar?

Legacy Learning is settling for $250,000. According to the FTC’s press release, “such endorsements generated more than $5 million in sales.”

Read more

Anti-government protesters in Yemen. Photo: AP

The uprisings taking place across North Africa and the Middle East have revealed relationships between PR firms and some of the repressive governments in the region. In one case, a PR firm decided to give Tunisia the boot, severing ties with the country’s leadership because “the facts on the ground” didn’t jibe with the image they were trying to portray. We’ve touched on this issue here as well.

In today’s guest post, PRSA chair and CEO Rosanna Fiske discusses whether PR firms should take a pass on working questionable clients. Are there some clients that PR agencies must reject? Please feel free to chime in with your thoughts.

Read more