I haven’t noticed until today that Ekonominyheterna, a co-operation between TV4 and Swedish business weekly Veckans Affärer is linking to a select number of current posts from the blogosphere, at least one of them being SBAB’s corporate blog. We see MSM dipping their toes into the blogosphere more and more often, and it is not long ago that media as a policy almost never linked to sites outside their own site, in order to “keep the visitor” for as long as possible.
Month: January 2007
The longest law-firm name ever
Speaking of naming companies, WJS law blog calls Ziffren, Brittenham, Branca, Fischer, Gilbert-Lurie, Stiffelman, Cook, Johnson, Lande & Wolf the Longest Law-Firm Name Ever. Oh, and they don’t have a web site, which I guess is logical since the maximum length of a domain name is 63 characters (in theory 255, but each “label” can only be 63, for all you nitpickers out there).
Only in Hollywood kids, only in Hollywood.
Bits and bobs about PR and social media
Today I’m throwing you a smorgasbord of things to dig deeper into. Here goes:
Stathydro? Norskoil? Noroil?
In Norway there is a heated debate about the name of the new oil and gas giant that is the result of the mega merger between Norsk Hydro and Statoil. Branding experts claim that it will cost between 2.7 and 3.6 billion kroner to change name and that the brand Statoil is worth between 2.5 and 5 billion kroner.
Tech blogs in, conservative blogs out
Bloggers Blog compare the top 10 blogs at Technorati on Jan 1, 2006 and Jan 1. 2007. Via Kristine Lowe.
Busting myths about social media
PR agency Ketchum and the University of Southern California’s Annenberg Strategic Public Relations Center have produced a report called “Media Myths & Realities, 2006 Media Usage Survey”. Among other things the survey deflates five myths about social media:
-Blogs dominate.
-Social networking sites are just for kids.
-Young adults don’t read the newspaper.
-Word of mouth cannot be managed.
-The company Web site is the best way to communicate.
Big ad, big love
The business man who paid 11,000 kronor (1,600 USD) for a large personal ad in Borås Tidning, has got replies from women from all over Sweden. Question is if any of them want to move to Borås… (More here in English).
Top 100 web 2.0 sites
Web 2.0 Magazine lists the top 100 web 2.0 sites in categories such as Video (#1 is YouTube), Music (last.fm), Chat (Meebo), Images & Photos (Flickr), Blogs (Blogger), Bookmarking (Digg), VOIP (Jajah) and a few others.
New free Swedish daily
Xtra Helsingborg is the name of Helsingborgs Dablad’s free daily. It will become the second freesheet in the city when distribution starts in about a month. Metro is already present. Circulation: Monday-Friday, 20,000 copies. Via Researcher.
Tags: social media, web 2.0, newspapers, Statoil, branding, advertising, reklam, webb 2.0. Ping.
As a last resource, we can always hire an Information Officer
The city of Borås has not been able to find a new Marketing Manager to market the city as an attractive place, reports Göteborgs-Posten today. None of the candidates wanted to move to Borås!
And if you ever wondered which of Marketing Manager and Information Officer has the highest status, the person’s future boss is quoted in the article saying that if they fail to recruit a Marketing Manager, they might consider lowering their requirements and hire an Information Officer instead.
Tags: PR, public relations, PR. Ping.
A web of lies
Running stories based on bloggers’ accusations can backfire for mainstream media. That’s the conclusion from the recent kerfuffle surrounding an alleged purchase of a “men’s magazine”. The whole thing started with a blog post by Åsa Hagelstedt where she states that she can reveal information from “a trusted source” that actor Lasse Berghagen buys porno magazines. But the blog post became more than an innocent remark when Swedish daily Aftonbladet decided to make a big story out of it. So when Berghagen strongly denied that the story was true, in a critical article in Aftonbladet, then Hagelstedt got cold feet. Her blog has now been completely deleted but the content can still be found via Google’s cache for some time (quote can also be found at Sigge’s blog).
Hagelstedt is not only a local politician in Stockholm and live-in partner to Lars Ohly (party leader of the Left Party). She is also Communications Manager at Swedish temperance organisation IOGT-NTO. She is listed as the main press contact at the site but according to an article in Dagens Media she has “gone underground” an not even her boss Sven-Olov Carlsson has been able to reach her. He will not confirm that she will get to keep her job.
But there’s more. Bloggers have commented on the fact that Aftonbladet has deleted the article from Aftonbladet.se. Today Kalle Ljungkvist, Editor in Chief at Aftonbladet New Media, denies that Aftonbladet has deleted the article from its website.
– We haven’t taken down the articles. We never published them online, he says.
While that may be technically true, the longer version of the articles were only in the paper edition, Aftonbladet did publish the story online in form of a telegram. And that telegram has been deleted. Follow this link and check the page title. In the telegram, Berghagen denied the accusations.
Lasse Berghagen nekar till anklagelserna.
– Jag undrar var de tidningarna är. Jag köper historiska tidningar om jag köper något, säger han till Aftonbladet.
I think this incident raises a number of interesting questions for bloggers:
– Do you trust your friends enough to put your career on the line?
– How can you be sure that second hand information is safe to pass on to others?
– If you are a public person, is that reason enough to be especially careful with the things you blog about?
– If you are caught with a serious mistake, wouldn’t it be better to apologize and move on than to delete your blog and hide?
And some for media:
– Is passing on rumours more acceptable if it has been published on a blog first, than if not?
– Is it really a story if A accuses B of something, but B denies it?
– How do you make up for publishing incorrect information? If you publish a story online, should there not also be a mea culpa online, instead of just deleting the original article?
Tags: mea culpa, Aftonbladet, Berghagen. Ping.