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CBC’s Blogging Guidelines – A Step Too Far

07.08.05

As reported on the Inside the CBC blog, the CBC seems to be cracking down on the online activities of its employees (thanks to Joseph Thornley at Pro PR for flagging it on his blog):

Any CBC employee who wants to start a personal blog which “clearly associates them with CBC/Radio-Canada” now requires their supervisor’s permission, according to a new “guideline document.”

I see this as a step too far. From my perspective, your supervisor is responsible for your activities at work. If your activities are outside work, they are also outside your supervisor’s control.

There’s a bit of a grey area, though. This policy refers to blogs that clearly associate the blogger with CBC/Radio-Canada. In those cases, the line between work and home is blurred. Is it really outside work if the employee talks about their employer? What about if the organization is only mentioned in the ‘about me’ blurb?

Grey areas aside, it’s common sense to be careful. In fact, I agree in principle with the CBC’s new Facebook policy – it’s common sense. Given frequent cases of corporate employees being fired for their online activities (see here, here and here), perhaps it’s helpful for corporations to set the boundaries rather than leave them vague.

However, why does the organization need to get involved so closely with blogging? Why introduce general guidelines for Facebook and stringent controls on blogging?

I’m firmly in the camp that says working somewhere doesn’t give that organization blanket control of your life. Bottom line: the CBC has gone too far in this case. Hopefully clear thinking will prevail soon, and the CBC will move from policing to guiding its employees.

Shel Holtz says it way better than I could:

The solution is simple: Establish and communicate policies governing what employees can and cannot do online. The policies should recognize that business value can accrue from these activities and that some personal activities are acceptable, assuming it’s not interfering with the ability to get work done. Supervisors should be trained to identify abuse so that policies are enforced by exception. (emphasis mine)

Posted in: blogging, facebook, media

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YearlyKos Convention: Senator Dodd Confronts Bill O’Reilly

07.08.03

Just a quick thought.

Check out this video of Senator Chris Dodd calling Bill O’Reilly out on his real agenda for criticizing the YearlyKos Convention and the US presidential candidates that are attending.

This reminds me a little of Jon Stewart’s infamous interview on CNN’s ‘Crossfire’ (transcript here) that resulted in CNN cancelling Crossfire.

Is it too much to hope that the same will happen with the O’Reilly Factor?

Posted in: blogging, media, politics

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Media Pitches – Tips From The Other Side

07.07.31

Media pitches are a big part of any significant announcements, but have you ever wondered if we’re doing them well? If we’re drawing journalists into our stories, or driving them away? If we could pitch more effectively?

If you have, check out this Inside PR podcast where the hosts, David Jones and Terry Fallis, interview two producers from Breakfast Television and get some tips on pitching stories for TV (if you don’t have an MP3 player, don’t worry, you can play the show through the website).

Here are a few tips I gleaned from the interview:

  1. Be honest. If it’s not a good story, don’t pretend it is. The producers will remember, and while you may get coverage this time, they’re less likely to cover your future story when it really matters
  2. If you can add some spice to smaller announcements, you’re more likely to be successful. Think visuals, experts (especially controversial ones) or the people-angle
  3. Build a relationship with your media contacts. It won’t help you get coverage on a weak story, but your effectiveness will rise considerably if you know how they like to be reached (phone? Email?) and when (for Breakfast Television, between 9am-1pm)
  4. Bottom line up front. Your email subject should be, “World’s biggest pizza maker comes to town,” not, “Great story for Breakfast Television.” Producers don’t have time to dig down to find the news
  5. Be flexible with your ideas. The producers may suggest a different approach, or push back and ask for something else. If you want to get on the show, you may need to compromise on your original pitch
  6. Don’t get too comfortable. You may have dealt with a producer before, but that doesn’t mean you know it all. Give them all the information and let them choose
  7. Remember: this is a two-way street. You want coverage of your announcement; they want interesting TV. If you do your job well, everyone wins and you’re more likely to be well received next time you pitch a story.

Posted in: media, media relations, podcast, pr, public relations

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Facebook: Where’s The Line?

07.07.29

Check out this article by Pat Walters at the Poynter Institute, talking about Facebook and what’s in it for journalists. While Facebook is, itself, becoming the news (see here, here and here for just a couple of recent stories), Walters asks — what can the social networking site do to help journalists with ‘regular’ news stories?

I recently enjoyed a posting by Andrew Smith, discussing the uses of Facebook for PR professionals (and journalists by extension). Meanwhile, Walters refers to a great post on Jeff Jarvis’ blog, where he notes that local news is more about the people than the content.

Facebook is one of many sites that contributes to the localization of our news by bringing people together. If someone dies, you can ‘facebook’ them, find their friends and contact them. If you’re looking for background on someone, check out their profile. The question, in my mind, is and ethical one: where should we draw the line with this? How far should journalists dig into these social networks?

I think there are several sides to this question:

  1. People who post openly on Facebook know (or should) that this information is available to everyone. If they don’t want people to see or use their information, they can adjust their security settings to limit who can see what they post. The problem is that, as Alfred Hermida points out, users of sites like MySpace and Facebook don’t think about this. They consider their pages to be their personal space. How ethical is it to mine peoples’ friends lists for contacts for the purpose of journalism?
  2. Journalists will use Facebook because, as Walters points out, they can’t ignore it. To do so would be, well, poor journalism. Heck, recruiters look at it; why shouldn’t journalists?
  3. Can journalists really trust what’s on Facebook? Wikipedia learned the hard way that user-generated content can’t always be trusted, and Wikipedia entries can be corrected by anyone. When you look at Facebook, you’re looking at information generated by one person, and you might not even be looking at the right person.

I think in today’s media environment, journalists need all the help they can get. Sure, look at someone’s profile – they’ve put it up there. Look at their contacts – again, they’ve put their information up there. However, there’s a limit. Don’t trust it to provide information (unless backed-up) for your stories. It’s a social network, and I think that’s all it should be.

Posted in: facebook, media

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Democratic Debate… Or Branding Genius?

07.07.26

Mitch Joel wrote on his blog this week that the real winner of the recent democratic presidential debate wasn’t a candidate, but was YouTube.

I completely agree.

You’ve got to admit, Monday’s debate was marketing genius. Almost all of the reporting (and blogging) I’ve seen on this has been about the companies, not the candidates. To this extent, regardless of the problems associated with the debate, YouTube has come out on top. Even Jon Stewart, who you can usually rely on to cut through to the real issues, focused on YouTube.

(For the record, I don’t rely on Stewart for my current affairs knowledge – it’s a comedy show. However, his show is probably the best thing out there for cutting through marketing and spin).

I could rant about the state of democratic debate when two huge brand names dominate coverage, but I’d rather marvel at the marketing genius that managed to set this up. The two brands managed such dominance of the event that it became, not “the democratic debate sponsored by YouTube/CNN,” but “the YouTube/CNN debate.”

You’ve got to admit, this was fairly cool. The video question format helped not only to engage the increasingly alienated younger demographic, but also brought some relevance to the predictably-themed questions.

Unfortunately, a lot of people/groups missed their opportunies on Monday night:

  • The candidates, rather than taking a few chances in this new format, stuck with their same, old, standard answers to the questions, and did nothing to distinguish themselves
  • CNN, while it did well out of this too, stirred up controversy (deliberately? you decide) about its choice of questions

YouTube, however, came out on top. Google strikes again.

Posted in: branding, marketing, media, spin, youtube

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