WA miner Fortescue Metals is a strange beast.
On the one hand its owner, Andrew Forrest, is heralded as a “saviour” of Abroigines by creating a scheme to employ them. On the other, the company is taking them to court in oder to access their tribal lands - or in this case, part of Port Hedland Harbour.
Whether the Aborigines or Fortescue is found to be in the right by the Supreme Court, the action has undone all of the goodwill the company built with its employment initiative.
And from the company? Stony silence. The normally media-friendly Andrew Forrest seems to have gone to ground.
The PR Lab: http://www.prlab.com.au
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: aborignes, andrew-forrest, fortesqcue-metals, port-hedland, sacred-site, WA-mining
A reminder that the 11th hour of the 11th of November (the 11th month) is Remembrance Day.
In Flanders Fields
In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
– Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: anzacs, flanders-fields, remembrance-day
Pardon the headline, but it really is the case with Sydney’s iconic Coogee Bay Hotel, which has been accused of allegedly putting faeces in customers’ gelato after they complained about several issues.
The hotel’s novel approach to PR was to offer its customers free ice cream. This, from the Australian Hotels Association’s top pub in 2005 and 2006.
On top of that, management wouldn’t comment because it was “a legal issue” and they said they thought it was sabotage. Heaven forbid they express concern, or that they are taking it seriously.
There’s also some argy-bargy going on, with the hotel saying the customers demanded $1m, and the customers denying they asked for any money.
More PR at the PR Lab - http://www.prlab.com.au
Categories: crisis · pr · public relations
Tagged: contaminated-gelato, coogee-bay-hotel, poor-pr
As if we haven’t had enough information about social media floating around the “blogosphere” these past few years. Yet still, many people don’t get it. Social media is just one method (with several sub methods) of delivering PR.
I received a social media release from some students the other day. They had just attended the national PRIA conference and were, no doubt, fired up by one of the keynote speakers, who turned out to be disappointing.
At 6mb it was a “weighty” document. The main problem is that the Australian media wouldn’t even give this a glance, as they don’t accept attachments in e-mail releases. Apart from that, it didn’t contain the necessary elements people use in these documents (at least I think some people use them).
I commented back to the group, but they never responded (that’s bad PR, people).
As my boss at work said: “haven’t they heard of a phone call?”
More PR at the PR Lab: http://www.prlab.com.au
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: SMR, SNR, social media, student-pr
30 September, 2008 · 2 Comments
A Perth PR company has been named in a Corruption and Crime Commission finding which links it with siphoning money to Stephen Lee, the Mayor of Cockburn, just south of Perth.
The Mayor was censured for misconduct after receiving donations from a property developer, funelled through the PR company.
I don’t know if this company is a member of the PRIA, but clearly this is a breach of the Institute’s code of ethics. I’d hope they’d be hounded out of the place. But, like a lot of business dealings in this State, these things seem to be tolerated.
As one writer to WA Business News said: “This man (Lee) has no shame, no ethics or morals.” And neither does the PR company.
But wait, there’s more. The Council hired another PR firm (at a cost of $20,000) to help distance itself from the scandal.
Makes you wonder why they have a communications person at the council.
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: ccc, cockburn-council, perth-pr
Conformation today that the Chinese central party propaganda department stopped reporting on the poisoned powdered milk (see previous post). The reason? The Olympics were on and they wanted to present a harmonious country. Meantime, children died.
No amount of PR can save the Chinese government over this disgraceful episode. But you can bet they’ll give it a try.
Really, they are PR amateurs, as was highlighted by their release of an interview with their space-walking astronauts a few days ago. Only one problem: the spacecraft hadn’t left.
This could be seen as a joke, but highlights the manipulative, sinister side of the Chinese regime.
As for the Games, they are now but a memory, as the city returns to its former polluted state.
A big thank you, International Olympic Committee for committing the world’s athletes to a sham which was supposed to contribute to change in China but merely reinforced its standing as having one of the world’s most deceitful, cruel and heartless regimes.
PR at the PR Lab ( http://www.prlab.com.au)
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: beijing-olympics, china, Chinese-astronauts, milk-powder
If ever there was a PR crisis, it was last week’s contaminated milk powder scandal in China.
More than 13,000 babies were hospitalised after drinking the powder, which was laced with the industrial chemical melamine. More than 52,000 children, all under two, became ill.
The Chinese company which manufactures the power, Sanlu, is in partnership with NZ dairy giant Fonterra.
From a PR perspective, the Chinese company’s responses (or lack of) were pathetic, and not helped by the Central Propaganda Department issuing a directive to hush-up the bungle.
The problems first surfaced on 14 August. As reported in the Chinsese people’s Daily, Sanlu did not issue an apology until 15 September. Unbelievable.
Fonterra should also be called to account. It says it urged its partner to go public and issue a total recall as soon as it knew of the poisoning. However, why didn’t Fonterra go public when Sanlu delayed its response? Certainly NZ Prime Minister Helen Clark said they should have (see ABC News).
Clearly both companies are equally as responsible when the issue of public safety is involved. More than 430 children have kidney stones as a result. Four died.
More PR at http://www.prlab.com.au
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: china, fonterra, milk-powder, sanlu
11 September, 2008 · 1 Comment
When Mark Day says blogging is over-hyped, you know it is thus.
Day is one of Australia’s most respected journalists. A former editor of the Sydney Daily Mirror, newspaper owner and now media commentator for The Australian, he was editor of the Mirror when I was a copy boy, and he awarded me my cadetship.
Writing in today’s edition of The “Oz”, Day said, among many things: “I was taken by an expression used in an editorial in The Australian a month or so ago that observed that blogging had all the intellectual value of graffiti on a toilet door.”
I’ll leave you to read the rest of his column. However, I fully agree. Well almost.
Blogging does have a place, but only in reaching extremely narrow (niche) segments of the population. In the case of my main use (academic insight) it is extremely useful.
However, Day’s point is that blogging for the masses is a waste of time.
In recent months, since leaving the university environment, I’ve cut myself off from blogging, with no ill effects. I read more newspapers, my eyes and shoulders are less sore. Anyway, most (if not all) of the people I work with (in a government department) do not read blogs, so even if I did, I’d have nothing in common with them.
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: blogging, mark-day
I have a pretty good record when it comes to getting letters published in the Sydney Morning Herald, even though I’m in Perth.
However, I stopped writing in recent days due to the strike by journalists (see post 28 August).
I believe it’s important that standards in journalism are maintained, yet I can not see this occurring if staff keep getting laid off. As night follows day, the quality will decline, as less people do more work.
The days of Fairfax giving a jot about good journalism are gone. With a non-journalist, Kiwi David Kirk, at the helm, it’s no wonder.
To the staff: stay solid. I know how difficult it is to strike.
PR at http://www.prlab.com.au
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: david-kirk, journalism, journalism-cutbacks, smh, smh-strike, sydney-morning-herald
A further round of editorial job cutbacks at John Fairfax will do nothing for journalism and create further opportunities for public relations.
Fairfax announced yesterday it was axing 120 editorial jobs in Australia.
Coincidentally it followed the appearance on Tuesday night on the 7.30 Report of British investigative journalist and author Nick Davies, who argued that journalistic standards are declining the world over as cost-cutting and government pressures take toll on the industry.
Davis also mentioned about the growing influence of PR. This is all to evident.
As newsrooms become leaner, staff are under more pressure to produce material: more often than not, without checking facts too closely. I have had media releases run verbatim (and with a reporter’s byline). You get one happy client, but as a journalist, I still worry about where all this is leading.
Davies’ interview can be read at this page: http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2008/s2348362.htm
More PR at the PR Lab, http://www.prlab.com.au
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: newspapers-demise, pr-opportunity, the-age
