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Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Two must-reads and a must-listen
I get home tonight from the latest round of travel with no plans for going anywhere in the next week or so, which I hope will leave me with some time to write a blog post or two. Oddly, I find myself pining to get to the keyboard to blog, but time simply hasn’t allowed. I’m in San Diego right now, getting ready to do a presentation on “push-pull” in communications.
However, I’ve been meaning to write about a couple resources that cry out for the attention of communicators for one reason or another. Given the lack of time to give each its due, I figured I’d take a couple minutes and just list them. There aren’t many.
First is the outstanding panel discussion presented by the Canadian Public Relations Society in Toronto, featuring Globe and Mail technology writer Mathew Ingram, b5 Media Operations VP Mark Evans, e-business and marketing consultant Stuart McDonald and food blogger Jasmine. They focused on the theme, “Reaching Out to Bloggers: Do’s and Don’ts,” and the 90-minute discussion is one of the best summaries of blogger outreach practices I’ve ever heard or read. The inimitable David Jones of the Inside PR podcast moderated the event, which also gave him the opportunity to record it and post it as a podcast episode.
This outstanding discussion should be required listening for anyone doing—or considering doing—blogger outreach.
Second, Tom Foremski, the author of the “Silicon Valley Watcher” blog, emailed me a while back about an idea he had. He articulated this idea in a “Watcher” post titled, ”The Right to Respond Should be a Fundamental Right on the Internet.” In this item, Tom points to the chorus of laments he has heard about inaccurate information about companies posted to blogs, wikis, and other sources that are reflected in search results. The usual suggestion of publishing a response is inadequate, since the response would not rank as high in the search listing as the offending link.
I’m proposing that companies and individuals all should have a level playing field and that a fundamental right of the Internet should be the right to respond to anything that is written, said, or viewed about them.
Tom suggests a “Right to Respond” link or widget beside any content that is directed to a RightToRespond.org server. Responses logged by companies would be indicated in the same way a Technorati tag shows readers that other posts have appeared on the same topic. Companies would contribute to the cost of maintaining the service.
The comments Tom received cover the spectrum from the general wisdom of such a service to how it would be funded. Read the full post. Do you think something like this should be built into the web’s DNA?
Finally, a deeply disturbing item from Leesa Barnes that has been picked up by a number of other bloggers. Brilliant blogger Kathy Sierra, who writes the outstanding ”Creating Passionate Users” blog, has received an escalating series of death threats from someone who doesn’t much like what she has to say. The threats include images of Sierra in a noose and muzzled by a thong. Kathy’s original message is here.
The threats have made it difficult for Sierra to leave her home; she has cancelled speaking engagements as a result of the threats, which have been covered by the BBC.
Dan York has aggregated several blog posts about the situation. And these links just begin to scratch the surface. I’ve started reading some, and the diversity of opinion is wide and deep, although nobody believes the death threats themselves should be allowed to stand. Given my lack of time, I will just direct you to the sources in case you weren’t already aware of this and not add any commentary other than to say that threats of assaults and violnce against women are as heinous and vile online as they are in the real world. Disagreement is fine. Resorting to this despicable behavior is far from it. It diminishes us all.