Submitted by Sheldon Rampton on
Consumers Union, the publisher of Consumer Reports magazine, recently had firsthand experience with search engine optimization (SEO) techniques that companies are using to suppress negative stories about themselves on the Internet. A company called "DONE!
Philip Morris (PM) has long been a past master at funding front groups and organizing scientists to deny the obvious. Now it is apparent that someone at PM tried puffing the entry in Wikipedia on the Marlboro cigarette.
Submitted by Sheldon Rampton on
James L. Horton of the Robert Marston & Associates PR firm is worried about Wikileaks, a new website that provides a means for people to share information about unethical behavior by governments and corporations. Wikileaks says it "is developing an uncensorable Wikipedia for untraceable mass document leaking and participatory analysis.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
Thanks to WikiScanner, more PR firms are coming under fire for making anonymous edits to Wikipedia that favored their clients. "Freud Communications' London office was caught making edits" on articles about Pizza Hut and Carphone Warehouse, reports PR Week.
On my way home from conferences in Malaysia, I unexpectedly ended up spending a few days in Seoul, South Korea. Thanks to Dan Gillmor, who described OMN as the best manifestation of "journalism-as-a-conversation" model, I was able to connect with OhmyNews (OMN), and fortunate to meet with Mr. Jean Min, the director of OhmyNews International (OMNI), on August 22, 2007.
Submitted by Conor Kenny on
This bit of PR whitewashing comes very close to a literal definition. From a Japanese press account quoted in the "Telstar Logistics" blog: "China Airlines has painted over its name and logo on the wreckage of a passenger jet that exploded in flames at Naha Airport in Okinawa moments after passengers slid down emergency chutes to escape. The airline painted over the name 'China Airlines' on the left-hand side of the aircraft and the company's logo on the plane's tail fin.
Submitted by Conor Kenny on
Self-described "disruptive technologist" Virgil Griffith lists as his top aim in developing WikiScanner: "To create a fireworks display of public relations disasters in which everyone brings their own fireworks, and enjoys."
Here at the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), we see WikiScanner as a great way to better understand how public relations firms and other "perception managers" are subverting online discussions and social media. And what better website to track this on than Wikipedia, the world's most popular wiki, or collaboratively edited website?
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
The Center for Media and Democracy has previously reported on the PR firm Hill & Knowlton's work for the oppressive regime of the president of the Maldives, Maumoon Gayoom.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
In a review of SourceWatch editor Bob Burton's new book, "Inside Spin: The Dark Underbelly of the PR Industry," New Zealand investigative journalist Nicky Hager writes that "its hair-raising stories help us see what is rea
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