Digital Google Hit-Men; Post St. Valentine's Day Safari Browser Massacre

on Friday, 17 February 2012. Posted in Public Relations Blog

I hadn’t finished all of the Whitman's chocolates I received for Valentine's Day, when I came across this Wall Street Journal article, “Google's iPhone Tracking - Web Giant, Others Bypassed Apple Browser Settings For Guarding Privacy,” written by Julia Anguin and Jennifer Valentino-DeVries, on February 17, 2012. In essence, the story details how Google has been sending digital hit-men to Apple’s Safari Web browser. The article points out how Google is bypassing the privacy settings of Apple’s Safari Web browser on their iPhones and computers. And they're doing this in a very sneaky and underhanded way:

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Set the Way Back Machine – PR News Release History

on Friday, 10 February 2012. Posted in Public Relations Blog

Things have changed in the world of PR over the past 5-7 years. “Set the Way Back Machine controls for 2005 Sherman, we're traveling back to see the evolution of the press release."

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If NFL Cheerleaders Are In The “Cloud,” Are They Angels?

on Thursday, 02 February 2012. Posted in Public Relations Blog

This question may not be as absurd as it actually sounds. Over the past year, NFL teams such as the Baltimore Ravens and the Dallas Cowboys, have been sacking their outmoded method of backing up game plays and yes, cheerleader footage, in favor of offsite IT data backup , cloud backup and data center solutions. And to the CIOs of these NFL teams I say, "Thank you for releasing the necessary budget for backing up the cheerleader footage, so it doesn't end up buried among dirty diapers and discarded watermelon rinds in landfills."

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Google Extends Tracking: DUH!

on Wednesday, 25 January 2012. Posted in Public Relations Blog

Topping some of the controversial news is the realization that Google will track user activities across all of its services including organic searches, Google+, Gmail, YouTube and others. Wait for it… wait for it…DUH! That's the nexus of their business and, in general, I'm okay with it. On January 25, 2012, Julia Angwin did a nice job capturing this in her Wall Street Journal article on Google.

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What's Marketing 2.0? TMC Sits Down With BridgeView To Find Out

on Wednesday, 15 February 2012. Posted in Public Relations Blog

Rich Tehrani, CEO of TMC, sits down with Mike Emerton, founding partner of BridgeView Marketing, to explore this new phenomenon and how it's literally changing the face of PR and marketing as we know it today.

Watch the video to gain insight on how social media, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Web 2.0 news releases and story placements—in the right publications—all create a digital breadcrumb trail that feeds a company’s sales pipeline.

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“oohaY!” Yahoo CEO Reverses Company Direction

on Thursday, 09 February 2012. Posted in Public Relations Blog

Another very insightful article written by Amir Efrati in the Wall Street Journal today, February 9, 2012, caught my attention: Inside Yahoo: Less Show, More Sell.

The article gives a glimpse into the mindset of Yahoo's new Chief Executive, Scott Thompson, and his turnaround plan for the company. The new plan has the aroma of eBay's PayPal unit (the company Thompson was previously president at) and comes upon the heels of Yahoo's board firing their last CEO, Carol Bartz, over the phone several months prior.

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Google Defends Privacy Policy – A "Minority’s” Report

on Wednesday, 01 February 2012. Posted in Public Relations Blog

Last week in our blog, I wrote about how Google was extending its capabilities to track user activities. This week in the Wall Street Journal, I came across an article entitled; Google Defends New Privacy Policy by Amir Efrati, that also bears mentioning.

Amir writes that Google is in front of Congress facing questions about how it uses data collected from millions of individuals and that the policy changes could help its online advertising business which produced approximately $40 billion in revenue last year. I can definitely see this connection. As I stated in my last blog, the one common denominator between all individuals on this planet is that we are all consumers.

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RIM’s Fate – A “Palm” Reading

on Tuesday, 24 January 2012. Posted in Public Relations Blog

Research In Motion (RIM) announced Thorsten Heins as the new CEO and on its analyst call, and he told folks not to expect "systemic changes" while also stating, "I will not in any way split this up or separate this into different businesses." As a PR professional, I can tell you this is not the dramatic trumpets announcing the Calvary's charge people were looking for. In fact, the benign message sent the company's stock price down an additional 8.5% yesterday. Where was the PR counseling before Heins hit the microphone?

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