tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-83996832011-04-21T15:15:55.749-04:00The Christian Science Monitor calls me a "veteran public relations expert" and a "PR guru," so it must be true. I specialize in issues-oriented PR, and I'll post my observations here.Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.comBlogger211100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1117716745217942692005-06-02T08:52:00.000-04:002005-06-02T08:52:25.273-04:00

How do you get rid of unflattering stuff that turns up about you in a Google search? Well, you can't, says Stephanie Rosenbloom in an entertaining New York Times article on the subject. But what you can do is create a better online image for yourself with new content.

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1116335971039039952005-05-17T09:19:00.000-04:002005-05-17T09:25:56.083-04:00

An article in the Interviewing e-magazine talks about blogs getting more respect from the print and broadcast media and mentions that NBC is considering instituting blogs for its anchors and top news personalities. That's a natural. The blogs will humanize the "stars" and extend their reach to those of us who spend much more time in front of a computer screen than in front of a TV.

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1113138275673036362005-04-10T09:02:00.000-04:002005-04-11T09:25:21.526-04:00

So it seems that disgraced Enron Chairman Ken Lay is spending about $25 a day in pay-per-click advertising to tell his side of the story to people who search on Google for "Enron" or the names of reporters who have written negative stories about him. When you search on one of those terms, you get a listing to the right or at the top of the page that takes you to kenlayinfo.com, and Lay has to pay

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1112967283442603882005-04-08T09:34:00.000-04:002005-04-08T09:34:43.443-04:00

Just what we needed - creative uses for pay per click (PPC) as political advertising! In seems that the Eliot Spitzer campaign organization bought the keyword "AIG" in Google Adwords and briefly ran political ads for Spitzer, the New York State Attorney General who is running for governor and who is also investigating the AIG insurance group, according to an article in Online Media Daily. It

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1112018933043379762005-03-28T09:08:00.000-05:002005-03-28T09:08:53.043-05:00

"With the whole world writing gossip, where is the place for the professional gossip?" asks columnist Liz Smith in a New York Times article. It's a good question, another observation about how blogging has changed the way we communicate. I was the Chief Copy Editor of the New York Daily News in 1976 when Smith launched her column there. She says now that she had her doubts about taking the job

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1110385313592154672005-03-09T11:21:00.000-05:002005-03-09T11:21:53.593-05:00

McDonald's Chief Executive Officer Jim Skinner yesterday unveiled a major company initiative centered on what it called a multi-faceted education campaign to help consumers better understand the keys to living balanced, active lives – “It's what I eat and what I do … I'm lovin' it.” The theme, which, according to the news release, underscores the important interplay between eating right and

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1110245965916393142005-03-07T20:39:00.000-05:002005-03-07T20:39:25.916-05:00

Where did people turn to last year for political news? An increasing number say they got most of their political news from the internet -- 18 percent, compared with 17 percent who said they got most of their political news from radio. The numbers come from a Reuters article on a study by the Pel Internet and American Life Project. The study found that 29 percent of U.S. adults got at least some

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1110204303644402172005-03-07T09:05:00.000-05:002005-03-07T09:05:03.646-05:00

A news analysis in today's New York Times revolves around a suit Apple Computer filed in California over what it calls its trade secrets being disclosed on several blogs. California has a shield law that protects journalists from having to disclose their sources, and the question here is whether that law extends to bloggers. The Times quotes a law professor who points out that blogs have more "

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1109430928404636822005-02-26T10:15:00.000-05:002005-02-26T10:15:28.406-05:00

What have we come to when The New York Times publishes a 1,000-word-plus article on a grainy video of a 19-year-old guy from Saddle River, New Jersey, lip-syncing a Romanian pop tune and doing a sort of chair-bound dance to it? The point of the article is how embarrassed the guy, Gary Brolsma, became after he put his video online and it became the rage of the internet. A web site that features

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1108389153663398132005-02-14T08:52:00.000-05:002005-02-14T08:52:33.663-05:00

Boy do I have mixed emotions about this one. A New York Times article this morning highlights the growing power of bloggers to shake news careers. The most recent case in point was the resignation of Eason Jordan, the top news executive at CNN. He had been attacked by bloggers because he reportedly said that U.S. troops had aimed at and killed journalists. And the most notable previous example

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1108045979626549192005-02-10T09:32:00.000-05:002005-02-10T09:32:59.626-05:00

New York, NY – February 9, 2005 – CooperKatz & Company, Inc., a mid-sized New York City public relations firm, today launched a service to help corporations monitor, analyze, plan for and respond to issues that might bubble up from blogs and other emerging online channels. The service is the first in a series of planned introductions under a new agency practice called Micro Persuasion that will

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1107349370070840652005-02-02T08:02:00.000-05:002005-02-02T08:02:50.070-05:00

Congratulations to CNN for going against the grain and accepting an advocacy advertisement. According to The New York Times, the four major networks - ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox - all refused to run an advertisement by a group called USAction opposing Bush's plans to restrirct medical malpractice suits. The group wanted to run the advocacy ads just before tonight's State of the Union speech, but the

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1101993582305165742004-12-02T08:19:00.000-05:002004-12-02T08:19:42.306-05:00

CBS and NBC have done it again. They have rejected a church's 30-second spot because it deals with an issue deemed controversial. The spot, from the United Church of Christ (UCC), depicts the front of a church as though it's a nightclub with a bouncer admitting people who fit the mainstream mold and rejecting gays and others who differ from the mold. The tagline: "Jesus didn't turn people away.

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1101908314053410862004-12-01T08:38:00.000-05:002004-12-01T08:38:34.053-05:00

A pornographer from California (where else?) is suing Google, Inc., because apparently people can use Google to find bootlegged versions of its photos and passwords to get onto its sites. Aside from a lack of sympathy for the pornographer, the issue here goes to the heart of the internet. The internet is a place where information flows. Search engines facilitate that flow of information. It

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1099499145188094142004-11-03T11:21:00.000-05:002004-11-03T11:25:45.186-05:00

Lots will be written about John Kerry’s loss in yesterday’s election, but I’d like to offer the perspective of a public relations practitioner from the private sector. Kerry could have won, in my opinion, if he had: 1) Arranged a full-hour interview with someone like Larry King early in the Swift Boat Veterans controversy. If he were my client, I would have advised him to ask the interviewer to

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1098102368685585472004-10-18T08:22:00.000-04:002004-10-18T08:26:08.686-04:00

It has long been my contention that the public sector has a lot to learn about public relations from the private sector, and the mistake John Kerry made in the last presidential debate is a prime example. I’m talking about his mention of Dick Cheney’s lesbian daughter in answering a question about whether he believes homosexuality is a choice. He made a mistake in mentioning her and in failing to

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1097199521551805672004-10-07T21:30:00.000-04:002004-10-07T21:38:41.550-04:00

My research among web surfers shows an unfulfilled desire for information about public relations’ impact on society. I suspect what's really being asked is What are the spin doctors doing to public discourse? Good PR strives always to find an authentic story to tell – to find your client’s strength and promote it to the world. Or at least that’s what good corporate PR is about. In politics, the

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1095945578554220132004-09-23T09:17:00.000-04:002004-09-23T09:19:38.553-04:00

Every blogger and his brother are writing about Rathergate, and I’m going there again, too. I spent the years from 1966 to 1976 as a newsman in Philadelphia and New York City, and I respect the role of the news media. I usually argue that they’re not perfect, but cut them some slack, please. They’ve got an impossible job to do. But I’m seeing much too much bad journalism now from previously

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1095772799793473932004-09-21T09:14:00.000-04:002004-09-21T09:19:59.793-04:00

“Anti-Ad Group Tries Advertising” is the headline of an article in today’s New York Times. The story got me thinking about the sad case of Nike v Kasky, a subject I wrote about in my pre-blog AdvocacyNews newsletter. The story is that this group called the Adbusters Media Foundation, which opposes advertising, is marketing its own line of sneakers, called “Blackspot.” The sneakers “are made of

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1095688609149205532004-09-20T09:51:00.000-04:002004-09-20T09:56:49.150-04:00

CBS News is on the verge of concluding that it was misled about the authenticity of the memos purportedly written in the early 1970s about George Bush’s National Guard service, according to an article today in The New York Times. Here’s how the article closes: “One person close to the situation said the critical question would be, ‘Where was everybody's judgment on that last day?’” The “last

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8399683.post-1095688228263016262004-09-20T09:48:00.000-04:002004-09-20T10:46:54.333-04:00

The Christian Science Monitor today calls me a "veteran public relations expert" and a "PR guru." I’m flattered, but I would have preferred if the reporter used the interesting things I said instead of the dull ones. The subject was how I might advise the pharmaceuticals industry. My idea was to use spokespeople from within the industry who are passionate about finding cures for “orphan” diseases

Mel Harkrader Pine ABChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12800009158983341771noreply@blogger.com0