Tuesday October 8, 2024

When Things Go Wrong

Boeing understands how difficult it is to turn around when things go wrong.  Now it has a strike to negotiate with 33,000 machinists off the job.  Its reputation as an aerospace company was already in tatters and the strike doesn’t help in any way in getting it back on track.  It’s hard to understand how […]

When Customers Are Wrong

Jeff Bezos has said he is happy to lose customers who criticize Amazon for supporting Black Lives Matter.  He said their position is racist and he doesn’t want his company to have anything to do with them.  This is positive PR for Amazon, which is still suffering from negative comments over how it has handled […]

What Can Go Wrong

This is an old story but it is a reminder of what can go wrong even in publicity stunts.  After six months of planning and anchoring a giant net over a downtown block, the United Way of Cleveland had thousands of volunteers fill 1.5 million balloons with helium and launch them to the underside of […]

The Wrong Horse?

What happens when one places investment, R&D and manufacturing on the wrong technology?   German automakers are about to find out.  They are all-in for diesel engines at a time when the rest of the world is looking into electric.  They have staked their reputations on diesel and come up short.  Now they are facing […]

Getting It Wrong, cont.

Sometimes, though rarely, a reporter will fess up and admit that a story was wrong.  Here is a spectacular case.  It took an impartial investigation to determine that Rolling Stone’s writer was duped and the publication with it.  One should not expect this to happen often.  A reporter will fight tenaciously to vet and protect […]

Getting It Wrong

There isn’t much recourse when a reporter gets a story wrong.  One can protest to the journalist and hope he makes a correction. But, if the reporter insists that he has multiple sources for his article, one is at a disadvantage in arguing.  In a case we’re handling now, we don’t know the facts beyond […]

When Publicity Goes Wrong

Sometimes creative media ideas go wrong.  When they do, you get an incident like this.  The publicist for a computer gaming company went to great time and expense to assemble a package that could pass for a safe — or a bomb.  How was a newsroom to know?  After the building had been evacuated, the […]

When The Media Get It Wrong

Increasingly it looks like Newsweek’s outing of the creator of Bitcoin was wrong.  The fingered person, Dorian Nakamoto, has hired a lawyer to clear his name.  Newsweek has explaining to do.  Nakamoto is upset that the media have invaded his life.  The publication is standing by its story, but it looks shaky as the days progress. […]

Social Media Gone Wrong

JPMorgan Chase & Co dipped its toe into social media and got burned.  As this commentator says, the bank ought to have known better.   What seemed like a good idea was tried when the bank is under attack from regulators and activists for its actions during the economic meltdown.  The communications practitioners at the […]

PR Gone Wrong?

According to a new book, PR staff for Fox news used dummy accounts to counter negative postings about the company.  Was that unethical?  It was not transparent, and it was dishonest.  Should PR be doing this kind of sub rosa defense work?  Some say yes, others no.  My inclination is to say it is out of […]