Mashable Editor Is So Excited About Press Releases

The press release.  Nothing generates more debate and confusion in the industry and adjacent professions than the purpose of the not-so-humble press release. But what about the language within, and the use and abuse of executive and “expert” quotes to bolster such incredible stories?

Mashable’s business and marketing editor Todd Wasserman found so many releases peppered with the word “excited” he decided to Tumbl a daily stream of them–with links to PRNewswire and BusinessWire–on “Everyone’s Excited in Press Releases.”

According to an interview with PR Rock & Roll blogger Drew Kerr, Wasserman promises to run pull quotes and the links to the actual releases on Tumblr till the practice of excitedly lazy quote writing stops.

Wasserman however, keeps it automated and devoid of snarky annotation. His breaking point was early this month when Netflix CEO Reed Hastings was excited about expanding to Latin America and the Caribbean. I guess he should’ve said, “We’re totally going to stock up on copies of The Motorcycle Diaries.”

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