Submitted by Sheldon Rampton on
After several months offline, former U.S. Foreign Service officer John Brown has reactivated his "Public Diplomacy Press and Blog Review," which summarizes current news about public relations efforts by the United States and other countries. Brown's latest bulletin includes several items on the State Department's "Democracy Challenge," a YouTube contest asking global citizens to complete the sentence, "Democracy is..." Other recent items discuss the PR damage to Russia's image following its invasion of Georgia; results of a recent survey examining international preferences in the U.S. presidential election race; and links to video archives of old Soviet propaganda cartoons; and an essay by Brown himself about the difference between public diplomacy and propaganda.