Archives: June 2010

Woot.com, an e-commerce company which sells “one item per day until it is sold out or until 11:59pm central time,” has been acquired by Amazon.com. Here’s how they announced the news:

Holy crap! Woot has signed an agreement with Amazon – yes, the Amazon – to become an independent subsidiary of the ecommerce colossus. Woot HQ will remain in Carrollton, Texas, and will operate as autonomously as other Amazon companies like Zappos and Audible. More details forthcoming after we pick our eyeballs up off of the floor. Anybody see where Lefty rolled off to?

The followed it up with a more serious announcement. But still: that is refreshing, no?

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That quote comes from Sam Firer of PR agency the Hall Company. Firer, who represents a number of restaurants, says it’s getting harder and harder to discern which food bloggers and reporters are requesting free dinners for their actual work, and which are abusing the privilege.

It’s certainly becoming harder and harder to draw the line, agrees well known restaurant publicist Jennifer Baum, who told The New York Times that the number of requests she’s received for free grub has soared.

The debate was re-opened when food writer Josh Ozersky devoted his June 15th TIME.com column to “great wedding food,” and featured the food and chefs at his own wedding reception.

He received all the food for free, but didn’t disclose that fact to readers. He has since made a clarification to the story in which he stated, “it was dumb of me not to be more explicit about the fact that I did not pay for any of their delicious contributions, and I was wrong not to make this clear to my editor beforehand.”

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Our sibling blog AllFacebook.com reports on Google’s potential Facebook competitor, “Google Me.”

On our weekly podcast this morning, we discussed the end of Larry King’s long run on CNN, and what it means for PR. Next, we looked at a recent analysis of press releases revealing the most overused words–there are 161,000 “leaders” out there!

We then turned to Politico’s Patrick Gavin to find out more about what makes the publication’s newsroom tick.

Reporters are expected to know their beat on day one, have a personal brand and be incredibly fast. “Everyone [in D.C.] is fighting to post something or tweet something 15 seconds before the next person, and strangely that matters,” said the multimedia reporter and former editor of mediabistro’s FishbowlDC.

We asked Gavin about accusations from the media that a beat reporter would have reported the Rolling Stone Gen. Stanley McChrystal profile differently, holding back some of the damaging items to maintain access and the relationship. “I have a hard time believing that a beat reporter would sit on that story,” he said.

We also managed to squeeze in discussion of what’s behind Dave Weigel‘s resignation from the Washington Post.

WPP said at its annual meeting on Tuesday that public relations and public affairs are up 2% over the first five months in 2010, an slight improvement over the company’s advertising and media investment management businesses, which saw 1.7% growth over the same time period.

In December 2009, WPP CEO Martin Sorrell projected that 2010 revenues would be flat.

“It has been a pretty bumpy ride – and it is not over yet,” said chairman Philip Lader. “Nor, in one sense, will it ever be over. There is never a time in a competitive market such as ours when our companies can sit back and relax and let the business roll in.”

WPP’s PR holdings include Hill & Knowlton, Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, Burson-Marsteller and Cohn & Wolfe.

Here’s a quick news alert: Yours truly will be speaking at the Business Development Institute’s (BDI) Social Convergence and the Enterprise Conference in New York on July 21st.

We’re excited to share our thoughts on the following topic: “Content Matters: Forget About the Delivery Method, It’s WHAT You’re Delivering That You Need to Focus On.” Let us know if you’ll be there.

Conservative political organization American Crossroads has hired Jonathan Collegio as communications director.

Collegio, who starts in early July, will manage media and online relations for the political organization.

He has been working as vice president of strategic initiatives at the National Association of Broadcasters.

Larry King, a CNN staple for 25 years, has announced that he will be leaving his nightly talk show this Fall. He will transition to a part-time role at the network, hosting occasional specials tied to breaking news and events.

King has been represented by Howard Rubenstein for quite some time. We’ve reached out to him for comment.

As one PR executive remarked to PRNewser, “King is usually the first place to go when you need an extended amount of time to tell a story.” TVNewser has much more.

After the jump, the media alert sent out last night at 7:34 p.m. Eastern Time by King’s CNN publicist Ryan Jimenez.

Read more

TalkingPointsMemo: DNC Invites Voters To Capture The ‘Macaca Moment’ Of 2010

Gawker: Vatican Loses Appeal to Avoid Sex Abuse Charges

eMedia Vitals: Why Google is good for journalism

FishbowlDC: Breitbart Willing to Cough up 100K for Journolist Archive

Reuters: Analysis: BP PR blunders carry high political cost

This past April, online marketing strategist David Meerman Scott analyzed 711,123 press releases distributed by North American companies in 2008 through Business Wire, Marketwire, GlobeNewswire, and PR Newswire to come up with the most used press release buzzwords.

According to his analysis, “innovate” was the top word used.

Now, Adam Sherk, search and PR strategist for Define Search Strategies, part of The New York Times Company, has taken a look at PRWeb’s archives and come up with the top 75 terms used in releases.

Not surprisingly, “leader” and “leading” are number one and two, respectively. Full list here.