Tiger Woods Scandal

By now everyone has heard some version of the Tiger Woods scandal. In class we spoke about how this event was similar to when the Cowboy's had their few member fight in the locker room. In both situations, the parties waited too long to respond to the media, therefore incriminating themselves.

http://gamercrave.com/tiger-woods-scandal-doesnt-sway-ea/1024/

Regardless Tiger Woods will have lots of press. However, in my opinion if this situation had been handled better there would not be as much, or as negative.

Walmart PR Campaign

Recently a blogger attacked Walmart about their employee health insurance. Due to more scrutiny than ever before, Walmart is taking a new approach, looking beyond the normal media and going straight to the source; bloggers.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/07/technology/07blog.html

Walmart is telling them news, suggesting topics and inviting people to their headquarters. They are experiencing problems with bloggers posting information from Walmart, yet they do not put a source. Despite this problem, I think Walmarts PR team had an affective new approach to reach their customers and people that have issues or concerns with Walmart. Instead of letting people post negative things about their company, they went straight to the source, bloggers, and settled their disagreements.

Did Oprah show too much?

Oprah is getting some negative feedback on her decision to show the face of a survivor of a chimp attack. Oprah said she debated whether or not to show the victims face and decided to when she thought about why they would be blurring it in the first place which is so that the viewers "don't have to" see it.

http://www.popeater.com/2009/11/16/oprah-wards-off-attacks-about-revealing-charla-nashs-face/?icid=mainhp-laptopdl2link3http%3A%2F%2Fwww.popeater.com%2F2009%2F11%2F16%2Foprah-wards-off-attacks-about-revealing-charla-nashs-face%2F

I think that Oprah made the right choice because ultimately it is the victims choice whether or not she wants her face to be shown on national TV or not.

Pink Out

Recently all I have heard about is the big upcoming football game against Utah. What I have also heard a lot is about the 'pink out' part of it. Through signs, ads, and word of mouth everyone knows about this event. I think that the group in charge did a very good job with the PR of this event. They have reached out to the community, alums, students and survivors to bring them all together this upcoming Saturday.

http://www.komentarrant.org/

Overall, I wanted to switch up this blog from the others and show the capabilities of successful PR; because all of my previous posts have been about negative.

Ft. Hood

By now many people have heard about the tragedy that happened last week at Ft. Hood. However, what confuses me about the situation is all the different views, and stories coming from it. According to wsj.com, we can minimize it to two big theories that have come out of it: "One is that Major Hasan should be seen as not much different than many other disturbed individuals, while the other is that the Hasan murders raise hard questions about the ability of Muslims to serve at all in the American military."
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704402404574525743684356798.html

I think that the PR person for Ft.Hood as well as an overall spokesperson from the military needs to come out and make a statement about how they feel, as well as the town and military. They need to clear up the two different views, although it will be difficult.

Late Night Show Suprise

Last Thursday David Letterman exposed a huge secret not only involving him, but several of his employees as well. Letterman revealed that someone had approached him about "creepy" behavior he has committed and they threatened to expose it if he did not pay him off. Letterman's response was not expected, however said by many to be a perfect PR stunt.

http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/oct/04/lettermans-tv-admission-called-adept-pr/

Usually news like this would be seen as sinful and disgusting yet when Letterman told his audience along with millions of viewers they applauded and then laughed, as if it were just another one of his jokes. People now know it wasn't a joke. Also, many say David Letterman could not have presented this information in a better way-- being in his own environment, with his own fans, and I have to agree.

Advertising on Facebook

Recently for the first time Facebook made a profit. Previously Facebook did not have advertising, and therefore did not make a profit from it. However, they now do have advertisements that are segmented toward a specific audience.

http://www.facebook.com/advertising/?src=aw05

Although this may be annoying to Facebook users, I think it is a very smart business move for them to make. Especially with today's economy, everyone is struggling to make ends meet. I am not sure if this is the idea of the public relations person(s), or whom, but whoever came up with the idea to have advertisements along with people's internet socializing/business is very smart and still somewhat discrete to users.