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January 2003

December 2002

Friday, January 10, 2003

Program As Advertisement: Somebody Has to Pay for TV: "A leading television producer and two major advertisers have joined forces to present a live variety show with no commercial interruptions. Instead, the advertising messages will be incorporated into the show. The advertisers, which so far include Pepsi and Nokia phones, are buying six hours of air time to create what the program's producer, Michael Davies, called 'a contemporary, hip Ed Sullivan show' for the youth-oriented WB Network, part of AOL Time Warner. ... Although the network commercial is far from extinct - advertising spending increased for television in the last year - many executives are concerned that a decline in the effectiveness of the 30-second commercial could rock the economic foundation of broadcast television, which depends on advertising as its main source of revenue. ... Donny Deutsch, the chairman of Deutsch Advertising, said: 'The 30-second commercial is not doomed, certainly not in our lifetimes. Somebody is going to pay for TV. But advertisers have to be more and more creative, whether with product placement or something like they're doing with this show.' " Source: New York Times, January 10, 2003
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Thursday, January 9, 2003

Learning from the PR Industry: PR Watch editor Sheldon Rampton participated in December in the World Information Conference in Amsterdam, which explored both positive and negative aspects of new information technologies. An interviewer captured his thoughts on some things that grassroots movements can learn from the PR industry: "There is an interesting seepage that's always going on as they try to control the thinking of others but they are forced to adopt a lot of the language and the symbolism of the people they are opposing. That has always been a very interesting aspect of PR. In a real way, at the very moment that they are trying to control others they themselves are losing control."
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Bhopal Bloopers: "Dow Chemical and Dow's PR firm, Burson-Marsteller, tried to shut down some parody sites and ended up bringing themselves a heap of negative publicity," writes Joyce Slaton. It all began when the Yes Men, impersonating Dow, created a site detailing Dow's responsibility in the Bhopal disaster. When Dow and B-M responded with legal threats, the story "was covered by tickled journalists from the London Times, The New York Times and many other sources and organizations, including Greenpeace. ... The upshot is that thousands upon thousands more people heard about Bhopal and the shameful conduct of both Dow and Burson-Marsteller than would have had the stung corporations not chosen to respond with threats." Source: San Francisco Chronicle, January 9, 2003
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Will 'Dolphin-Safe' Tuna Really Mean 'Dolphin-Dead' ?: "Two former government scientists who spent years investigating stress in dolphin populations charged this week that superiors at their federally financed laboratory shut down their research because it clashed with policy goals of the Clinton and Bush administrations. The scientists ... said their research indicated that the practice of chasing and encircling dolphins to catch tuna exposed the dolphins to dangerous amounts of stress. The accusations, by Dr. Albert Myrick, a wildlife biologist, and Dr. Sarka Southern, a research associate, came days after the Bush administration relaxed the criteria for declaring tuna netted by Mexican and other foreign fishing boats to be 'dolphin safe.' In making that declaration last week, Commerce Secretary Donald L. Evans said that chasing and corralling dolphins and the tuna that often accompany them into purse nets had 'no significant adverse impact' on the dolphins. The ruling cleared the way for Mexican and other Latin American tuna producers to place a dolphin-safe label on cans for American shelves." Source: New York Times, January 9, 2003
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Wednesday, January 8, 2003

Beware the Fat Man: Theater student Natalie Alvarez takes a close look at Jonathan Ressler's "guerrilla advertising" company, Big Fat, Inc. In order to bypass consumer skepticism about advertising, Ressler hires "real people" to talk up his clients' products in bars, parks and other public places. "We plant a group of people in a bar or other public setting and instruct them to use a brand, perform a ritual, repeat a sound bite, and involve others in the activity," Ressler explains. As these "secret agents of capitalism" invade our daily routines, Alvarez ponders the blurred boundaries between illusion and reality, theater and life. "It's The Truman Show," says an advertising executive. "Did your wife marry you because she loves you, or because she wants you to buy a certain brand of soap?"
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BAT Kills Millions, But in a Socially Responsible Manner: Bob Burton and Andy Rowell deconstruct the "social responsibility report" of British American Tobacco, the world's second largest tobacco company, in the latest PR Watch. Among their findings, "BAT's social report disclosed that three of its employees had been killed and 37 involved in serious accidents during 2001, but omitted any estimate of the number of people who had been killed or seriously affected by consuming its products. ... If BAT had complied with this component of the GRI guidelines, its social responsibility report would have included the approximate one million people expected to die prematurely each year for the next three decades from using its products--a figure that Action on Smoking and Health derives from World Health Organization estimates." (Our subscribing members received this issue already last month. Please consider becoming a subscriber. Donations from people like you are what make our work possible.)
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Anti-Environmentalist Lomborg a 'Junk Scientist': As we detail in our book Trust Us, We're Experts , 'junk science' is a PR pejorative used by corporations to smear environmentalists and public interest scientists. Danish professor and author Bjorn Lomborg has been a darling of corporate lobbyists and front groups, as PR Watch has reported most recently in our article on a 2002 meeting of the International Chamber of Commerce. Yesterday the Washington Post reported that Lomborg and his book 'The Skeptical Environmentalist' have been "denounced by a panel of his country's top scientists for engaging in 'scientific dishonesty.' " The Post also noted that " The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Economist and other publications praised the Danish professor, who dismissed many environmental concerns as 'phantom problems created and perpetuated by a self-serving environmental movement.' A Washington Post book reviewer concluded that the book was 'a magnificent achievement.' " Source: Washington Post, New York Times
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Just Say No to S.U.V.s: "This is George," a girl's voice says. "This is the gas that George bought for his S.U.V." The screen then shows a map of the Middle East. "These are the countries where the executives bought the oil that made the gas that George bought for his S.U.V." The picture switches to a scene of armed terrorists in a desert. "And these are the terrorists who get money from those countries every time George fills up his S.U.V." The ads, modeled after the Drug Council's TV commercials alleging that drug users support terrorism, are the brainchild of author and columnist Arianna Huffington. But some TV stations are refusing to run them. Source: New York Times, January 8, 2003
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War Is Sell: Officially, President Bush is claiming that he sees war with Iraq as an option of last resort, and many members of the American public seem to have taken him at his word. In reality, say journalists and others who have closely observed the key players in decision-making positions at the White House, they have already decided on war. In the Fourth Quarter 2002 issue of PR Watch, released on the web this week, Laura Miller examines the PR and marketing campaign currently underway to convince the public that war is necessary and inevitable. (Our subscribing members received this issue already last month. Please consider becoming a subscriber. Donations from people like you are what make our work possible.)
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Tuesday, January 7, 2003

Favors for Enron: Enron Corp. ran a formidable lobbying machine in Washington and state capitals that gained favorable treatment from state and national governments on no fewer than 49 occasions from the late 1980s to the company's scandal-ridden bankruptcy last year. A new report from the Center for Public Integrity lists the favors Enron obtained, the former government officials who worked for Enron, and 28 separate coalitions that aided Enron's lobbying activities. The list of Enron-affiliated front groups and fundees includes the Alliance for Lower Electric Rates Today, Americans for Affordable Electricity, Americans for Fair Taxation, Citizens for a Sound Economy, International Climate Change Partnership, National Wetlands Coalition, and the Pew Center on Global Climate Change.
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Monday, January 6, 2003

The Corporate World's Top 10 Bottom Feeders: PR industry analyst Paul Holmes notes that the corporate scandals of last year created a "chronic crisis, as constituents - shareholders, employees, regulators, the public at large - began to question whether the entire American corporate system was hopelessly corrupt." (As an indicator of how bad things got, Holmes was forced to combine Enron, Worldcom and Tyco into a single item in his "top 10" list of the year's worst PR disasters.) "Ordinarily," Holmes writes, "such an epidemic of ill-considered corporate behavior would have elevated the role of the senior corporate communications executive to a permanent place in the CEO's inner circle, and provided a bonanza of new business for public relations firms. But in 2002, those gains conspicuously failed to materialize." Maybe that's because the scandals run so deep that PR can't fix them. "There was no way to spin the kind of outrageous personal and institutional behavior that gave rise to these crises," Holmes writes. Source: Holmes Report, January 6, 2003
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Tasteful PR in Time of War: The PR industry needs to mull "a shift in strategy if US goes to war," writes Sherri Deatherage Green. During the first few days of fighting, she says, PR pros should hold off on product promotions. "Few activities could be more futile than pitching stories when war reports fill every second of network time," she writes. "But if military action continues over time, companies should find tasteful and appropriate ways to revive their marketing." Also, "Understatement might be the best messaging approach during wartime. Even companies producing items for the military shouldn't brag about fatter profits." Source: PR Week, January 6, 2003
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Managing those Pesky Activists: PR Week continues the industry's preoccupation with managing activism with a variety of articles examining the strategies activists use to advance their causes, "the proactive approach to averting protests," and an article on corporate social responsibility titled "CSR: Beyond Lip Service." Source: PR Week, January 6, 2003
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Thank You For Fessing Up: The industry trade publication PR Week has a few kind words to say about Nick Naylor, the fictional PR man who figures as the protagonist in Christopher Buckley's hilarious book, Thank You for Smoking. "He can stun a Clean Lungs conference into silence with a few words about the First Amendment rights of the poor, embattled tobacco companies. He can win over an Oprah audience by turning the tables on those evil health professionals who only care about their (gasp!) budgets." PR Week gushes that PR pros "will recognize and laugh at themselves in this brilliant, morally complex portrayal of a good guy in a rough business. As one of the more savage political strategists once told PR Week, 'This is the most accurate portrayal I've ever seen of what I do all day.'" Source: PR Week, January 6, 2003
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Lobbyism 101 - How to Get Rich in Politics: When voters elect a Representative they also are frequently launching the education and career of a future corporate lobbyist. Don't pity the retired or (rarely) defeated incumbent because their truly lucrative political career just begins when they join the ranks of millionaire lobbyists. "Dick Armey, the departing House majority leader, summarized the situation in his usual succinct style when he was asked on Friday how much money he would be making in his new job starting this week at Piper Rudnick, a law firm with a large lobbying operation. 'I don't anticipate going hungry,' Mr. Armey replied. ... 'You go from the grovelee to the groveler, [former Representative Robert L. Livingston] said. "It takes a psychological adjustment, but there are compensations.' ... Why do companies like ChevronTexaco , Oracle and Northrop Grumman pay Mr. Livingston fees that are typically $10,000 to $30,000 a month? ... 'When he calls up, people don't say, `Bob who?' ' said Ken Johnson, the spokesman for the energy committee, of Mr. Livingston. 'He's known and respected by a lot of people. He opens a lot of doors.' " Source: New York Times, January 6, 2002
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Saturday, January 4, 2003

Are You Horny, Baby? Or Are You Sick?: Hoping to create another cash cow like Viagra, the pharmaceutical industry has invented a new disease "female sexual dysfunction." According to journalist Ray Moynihan, industry-funded doctors are circulating a bogus statistic claiming that 43% of women suffer from this condition so they can prescribe drugs to treat it - even though "inhibition of sexual desire is in many situations a healthy and functional response for women faced with stress, tiredness, or threatening patterns of behaviour from their partners." And just to make sure the guys can keep up, one of the doctors is also urging men to take Viagra on a daily basis to "prevent impotence." Source: British Medical Journal, January 4, 2003
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Friday, January 3, 2003

HBO's Belated & Weak Retraction: Baby Killing a PR Hoax: HBO Films has finally gotten around to admitting what PR Watch readers knew all along: "allegations of Iraqi soldiers taking babies from incubators (in 1990) ... were never substantiated." This fabrication by the Hill & Knowlton PR firm resurfaced in HBO's December docudrama, "Live from Baghdad" and was subsequently repeated as fact in the Washington Post.
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A Lesson in U.S. Propaganda: Last week U.N. weapons inspectors swooped in to inspect the Iraqi manufacturing plant that U.S. planes bombed in 1991. Iraq said the plant made infant milk formula; the U.S. said it made biological weapons. Mark Crispin Miller examines the evidence and concludes that Iraq's version was correct. Nevertheless, "Iraq, in trying to publicize the targeting of its civilian infrastructure, had engaged in clumsy propaganda (which backfired in the West), while the US counter-propaganda was apparently disinformation (which succeeded). As we sit and wait for another war against Iraq, we should remember this triumphant bit of spin - and all the other winning lies of Operation Desert Storm." Source: Alternet, January 3, 2003
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Learning to Resist Propaganda: Propaganda. What does it mean? How does it work? How can we resist it, and live more decently with one another? Randal Marlin, a professor in the department of philosophy at Carleton University, has attempted to answer those questions in a new book that reviewer Martha Sully calls "a fascinating historical study." Source: Peace and Environment News, December - January 3, 2003
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Thursday, January 2, 2003

Announcing the P.U.-litzer Prizes: Norman Solomon has issued his annual "P.U.-litzer Prizes" for "America's stinkiest media performances." Winners this year include: journalists who falsely reported that Iraq kicked out U.N. weapons inspectors four years ago; Vivendi Universal executive Barry Diller, for his claim that media consolidation is "a natural law"; and right-wing mouth Ann Coulter, for publicly wishing that Timothy McVeigh had bombed the New York Times. Source: FAIR Media Beat, January 2, 2003
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Wednesday, January 1, 2003

The Secret President: "The Bush administration has put a much tighter lid than recent presidents on government proceedings and the public release of information, exhibiting a penchant for secrecy that has been striking to historians, legal experts and lawmakers of both parties," writes Adam Clymer in a detailed report on the administration's new and wide-ranging secrecy policies. Source: New York Times, January 1, 2003
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Corporations Claim the "Right to Lie": After Nike conducted a huge and expensive PR blitz to tell people that it had cleaned up its subcontractors' sweatshop labor practices, California activist Marc Kasky sued them under a California law that forbids corporations from intentionally deceiving people in their commercial statements. "Instead of refuting Kasky's charge by proving in court that they didn't lie, however, Nike instead chose to argue that corporations should enjoy the same 'free speech' right to deceive that individual human citizens have in their personal lives," writes Thom Hartmann. It's true that free speech is an important right for people, but Hartmann points out that "Nike isn't a person - it's a corporation." He analyzes the history of the legal fiction that gives corporations the same rights as people, and suggests that the Kasky case might "begin the process of dismantling the flawed and unconstitutional doctrine of corporate personhood." Source: Common Dreams, January 1, 2003
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