Murphy's Law

The news that Microsoft is formally trying to get it’s arms around blogging both in terms of the implications and the opportunities, has spawned some interesting discussion.

There’s no question that as a communicator, weblogs do raise some issues.  There have been some attempts at putting together guidelines that can clarify a corporate policy for blogs. most notably Ray Ozzie at Grove created these guidelines.

Personally I believe that blog policies should be coupled with internal e-mail guidelines (I am assuming you have e-mail guidelines!) that outline acceptable usage and behavior on e-mail. A common sense approach that incorporates real legal concerns, is probably the best means of managing blogs. 

Jim Horton rightly points out that because some blogs will be written outside work hours they are less subject to legal restrictions. However, a policy should still be in place. Here’s an interesting question for you: Do you know if any of your employees have blogs?

As a first step take a look at Ray Ozzie’s guidelines.  Weblogs do present some great opportunities for building personality and thought leadership for your company, but as with all opportunities there are threats – innocent or otherwise.

Other interesting reading:

• Rebecca Blood’s Weblog Ethics
• Jorgen Thelin’s persona guidelines
• George Dafermos on corporate blog policy
• BtoB Magazine: Corporate blogs make personal connection

Here’s an interesting look at how Microsoft is responding to the growing number of employees who are blogging.

Yesterday I happened upon an article in UK ‘zine netimerative.com written by PR consultant Katy Howell dealing with the issue of buzzword bingo in press releases.

Now, like me, I am sure you have read many articles on how we should try and put some thought into our vocabulary when writing press releases. We even have new web sites like Corporate Babble keeping a vigilant eye on offenders.

Personally I think it’s worthwhile to think about our use of language in written communications.

Then by coincidence yesterday, my moose tickling colleague Darren Barefoot came across

“Bullfighter” a software utility created by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu that sits inside Microsoft Word (Windows 2000 or XP only and it doesn’t work on the Mac) and identifies potential bull words and also analyses your writing for clarity.

It’s PR Opinions recommended!

BusinessWeek has a feature on Google and raises issues around Google’s page ranking and privacy policies amongst other things.  At least the piece is balanced.

Google is the #1 search engine because it does what it’s meant to, quickly and easily. The pay-off for Google is that the company is already making strong profits and continues to grow globally.

Of course being #1 or the most popular, always means the detractors are only around the next bend. I guess we’d call that a rich man’s problem!

The Wall Street Journal has a fantastic profile on an amatuer self publicist with an amazing success rate.

Greg Packer hails from Long Island, he is a highway maintenance worker and has been quoted by the Associated Press, The New York Times, New York Post and the UK Times to name but a few. The topics have varied from St. Patrick’s Day to Joe Millionaire to Hilary Clinton, whatever the subject he’ll give his opinions.

There isn’t much about which he won’t opine but there are some rules. “I’m not going to talk about the Mets in Yankee Stadium,” Mr. Packer says. “That would be a total disrespect.”

It’s a fascinating piece.

 

 PR firm, Hecht & Company have created a new PR weblog called PR Machine.

 Further to last Monday’s story on how Indianapolis had retained a New York firm to build the city’s profile – and the dismay from local practitioners – the Mayor has attempted to pour oil on the choppy waters.

 A new service called PR Leap promises to “increase the search visibility of press releases, making them more accessible to search engines, consumers, analysts, journalists, newswires, and websites” all for $299 per year.  From the press release it seems they are offering Search Engine Optimization for press releases….mmmm interesting.  

 Technology Marketing has an excellent column by George Parker on the subject on badly-targeted advertising.  Very very well written.

If you aren’t already using RSS feeds to simplify monitoring news stories it’s never too late to start. I know I’ve covered RSS before but as my mother once told me you can never say too much about a good thing… well…maybe.

Anyway, for any PR professional, RSS allows you to have all the latest news from the publications (and blogs) that matter to you, delivered into a single e-mail like application where you can read them and follow links.

Of course with RSS, you can avoid many of the ads that accompany the content on a traditional website.  Infoworld is trying to solve this by becoming the first publisher to include ads in their RSS feeds.  Of course the beauty of RSS is you can unsubscribe so they’d want to be careful…

More on RSS feeds.

 Interesting profile in the New York Times on Intel’s chief lobbyist, Peter Pitsch, who was previously chief-of-staff for the chairman of the Federal Communications Commision.

 According to a story in HR Gateway employees don’t think corporate magazines or videos are a reliable source of information according to UK research firm MORI.  The survey found that line managers and team briefings are the most reliable sources.

 I could be wrong here, but I’d say Martha Stewart doesn’t get on with her brother.  He’s quoted in the ever authorative National Enquirer:  “Jail will be good for her, because it will humble her…It will mellow her and instill in her a more sincere, heartfelt experience towards others.” (NY Daily News)

 SG Cowen have been fined $100,000 for deleting e-mail.

 Whether you have heard of cricket or not, the Guardian’s cricket coverage is without question the funniest real-time sports reporting on the web. I was reminded of Scott Murray’s famous report from India vs. New Zealand during the Cricket World Cup earlier this year in a post from Michael O’Connor Clarke yesterday. It’s fantastic! Now I don’t particularly like Cricket but it’s a great illustration of audience participation and funny too!

There’s a mammoth PR struggle currently taking place at the top of the enterprise software tree.

Back on June 2, Peoplesoft announced its intention to buy fellow enterprise software company J.D. Edwards for $1.7 billion.

Then out of the blue, a couple of days later, Oracle launched a hostile $5.1 billion bid to buy Peoplesoft – and stated that the acquistion of J.D. Edwards would be on ice, until it was examined post-merger.

To add some additional spice to the bid, Peoplesoft CEO Craig Conway is a former protegee of Oracle CEO, Larry Ellison.

Now J.D. Edwards is suing Oracle for $1.7 billion for interfering with the original takeover.

And the 800-pound gorilla in the enteprise software applications market, SAP, is looking to take advantage of what’s going on.

Fantastic entertainment from the outside. But can you imagine the stress their PR departments are under? There are some late nights being put in there.

Background reading:

• Peoplesoft’s Press Room 
• J.D. Edwards’ Press Room
• Oracle’s press room
• And our friends over at Corporate Babble have highlighted SAP’s opportune intervention.