Media relations

Perhaps taking a page out of Third Point’s activist investor guidebook, investment advisor Starboard Value has launched a proxy battle against AOL to get seats on the board and then push to unload local news outlet Patch.

Patch has had a lot of troubles. The latest effort to turn things around includes a restructure and cutting 20 managers. According to Forbes, “The days of AOL treating Patch like a garbage disposal for money are officially over.” So Patch, and by extension AOL, are having business model problems.

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Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.

When being interviewed, it’s OK to admit that there are things you don’t know or need to follow up on. But when you’re the CEO of a company and you’re unaware of the big things happening in your industry, that’s a big ‘ol fail.

Case in point: Time Warner Cable’s CEO Glenn Britt says he has a dream to put the Internets in the TV. “Britt went on to lay out his vision for the future, seemingly oblivious to the fact that it basically reads like a product description for AirPlay, a service that wireless[ly] streams videos from your iPhone, iPod or iPad to your television via the Apple TV box,” Business Insider reports. And also, The New York Times reported it. Zoinks.

Muck Rack has compiled a list of PR pet peeves from journalists and posted them on its blog. Business Wire‘s global media relations manager Raschanda Hall is taking it a step further on Storify. And now, they’re also gathering some of things that irk PRs about journalists.

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MSNBC’s top spokesperson Jeremy Gaines is heading to the Gannett Company to lead the corporate comms division as VP, effective May 21. Gannett owns USA Today, a number of broadcast stations, and tons of other media properties. NBC News’ lead spokesperson Lauren Kapp is heading to The Huffington Post as of April 30. NBC has not announced replacements for either position. [via]

Speaking of USA Today, two of the papers journalists say they’ve become the target of a “smear campaign” after reporting on “government propaganda contractors.” We tweeted the PRSA response; here it is as well. [via]

Salon has a new look. Thoughts? Separately, the site’s press release for the redesign says the number of monthly unique visitors has grown 30 percent to 7.7 million since 2011. [via]

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We were looking around the Internet a little bit today and noticed a gaggle of wide-ranging Google stories.

A big newsmaker was the earnings announcement last Thursday. Besides the good strong numbers, the company also announced a stock split that has had people talking over the past few days.

“Cleverly, Mr. Page, along with his other co-founder, Sergey Brin, and the company’s chairman, Eric E. Schmidt, created the stock split so that Google could issue a special new class of shares to current shareholders. The catch: the new class of shares has no voting rights,” writes Andrew Ross Sorkin for the Times’ Dealbook section today.

In fact, the news about Google over the past several days has been like that — some good, some not so good, some in the middle.

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In your efforts to reach moms across the Hispanic community, Piera Jolly, CEO and co-founder of Latina Mom Bloggers, would, of course, recommend outreach to Latina mom bloggers.

“Latina moms are online all the time,” Jolly told us during a recent phone call. “We want to hear from people who are like us. Latina mom bloggers are able to provide a culturally relevant voice that’s authentic and honest.”

And how important is language when targeting Hispanic mom bloggers? Very, says Jolly. But which language is dependent on the blogger.

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Oprah Winfrey‘s OWN has announced a number of big changes. First we had news that The Rosie Show, the talk show hosted by Rosie O’Donnell that was introduced with great fanfare back in October, has been cancelled. (Rumor has it the two aren’t speaking.) Among the problems with the show cited by The Daily Beast is its location; Rosie moved to Chicago to film in Oprah’s old studio. “‘People don’t go to Chicago on media tours anymore,’ says one publicist who turned down his clients from appearing on the show.” Yikes.

And now news today that OWN has laid off 20 percent of its staff, 30 people. Their duties will be assumed by remaining staffers and Discovery Communications employees. Deadline Hollywood has the whole run down.

HGTV Magazine is launching with a June/July issue, and three more for 2012. The rate base will be 450,000 readers.

The New York Times has lowered the number of free articles that non-paying readers will have access to, from 20 to 10. The new rule goes into effect in April.

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We here at Mediabistro opened The New York Times today and saw something very familiar — a fire engine red stiletto pump. One that is exactly the same as the two at left, currently resting on the desk of our TVNewser/TVSpy blogger Merrill Knox. The one on the left is a size 9 and on the right, a size 7. But the fact that we have two gives us the one up on The NYT.

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With attractions ranging from the great outdoors to the great indoors, the Northwest of the U.S. is a destination for tons of travelers each year. Every other month, 600,000 AAA members get Journey magazine to help them make their vacation plans.

Journey is looking for travel-related pitches from across the PR industry. According to the latest “How to Pitch for PR” feature, about 30 percent of pitches turn into stories.

“I get a lot of information from the PR people,” says EIC Nicole Meoli.

Have you got a pitch that fits the bill? Click here for more information about how to pitch Journey. [Subscription required. Not an AvantGuild member? Click here for more detail about how to join.]

In the second set of results from blogger research conducted by The 10 Company and Gotham Research Group, the companies take a look at blogger relations, particularly interaction with CEOs.

Based on interviews with 10 corporate and business news bloggers from top-tier national, regional, and trade publications, the research found that bloggers feel there’s a lack of respect from company CEOs and senior staff members. Moreover, they think they don’t get enough access to CEOs (an interview a couple times per year would suffice). And bloggers would like credit for the audiences that they attract, in some cases, very large and influential audiences.

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