Submitted by Bob Burton on
Ahead of a major United Nations conference in New York on climate change, the high-profile pranksters, the Yes Men, distributed 100,000 copies of a "special edition" of Rupert Murdoch's New York Post.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
The U.S.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
"Size matters," notes Columbia Journalism Review, in a post on the September 12 "Tea Party Express" rally in Washington DC (where some protester signs read, "Bury Obama Care with Kennedy").
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
Total media citations of think tanks were down for the fourth year in a row, according to Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR).
Submitted by Bob Burton on
Mark Penn, the CEO of the PR firm Burson-Marsteller, is embroiled in controversy yet again.
I am very pleased to announce that Mary Bottari is joining the Center for Media and Democracy. She is the Director of a new project we are calling the "Real Economy Project." (You know, the "real" economy, as opposed to the faux Wall Street-driven economy?)
For those of you who don’t know Mary, she really is a powerhouse — she’s an exceptional public interest advocate with tremendous communications and campaigning experience. For the last ten years, she has served as a senior analyst for the Washington, D.C.,-based consumer group Public Citizen.
She started in its Global Trade Watch division in the months before the World Trade Organization’s Seattle Ministerial meeting. Mary was deeply involved in planning for Seattle, and she ran the NGO press center to help communicate the disillusionment of labor, farm, and environmental groups with the corporate trade agenda.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
The National Advertising Review Council (NARC), a "coalition of advertising organizations" that recommends standards for industry self-regulation, issued its first rulings dealing with blog promotions. NARC faulted two companies for "posting 'reviews' of dietary supplements, but not disclosing that they actually own the products," or that the reviewers were paid.
Submitted by Bob Burton on
A global study into 60 citizen journalism projects in 33 countries found citizen journalism flourished under governments which could be characterized as "soft authoritarianism" regimes such as in Malaysia and South Korea.
Is there a difference between covert propaganda and secretive campaigns to shape public opinion on controversial issues? The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) apparently thinks that there is.
The GAO recently ruled that the Pentagon pundit program did not break the law against taxpayer-funded domestic propaganda. The program involved some 75 retired military officers who serve as frequent media commentators. From 2002 to 2008, the Pentagon set up meetings between the pundits and high-level Department of Defense (DOD) officials. The Pentagon's PR staff not only gave the pundits talking points, but helped them draft opinion columns and gave them feedback on their media appearances. The Pentagon also paid for the pundits to travel overseas, following carefully-scripted itineraries designed to highlight successes in Iraq and humane measures at the Guantanamo Bay detention center.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
In what may be the first case against online astroturfing, New York's attorney general has reached a settlement with a cosmetic surgery company.
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