Disney Attacks Scarlett Johansson Instead of the Facts
From Tom Weidlich and Eric Rose writing for PR News… Actor Scarlett Johansson’s lawsuit against the Walt Disney Company is turning out to be a blockbuster. Yet, the company’s response is eliciting mostly thumbs-down reviews and providing an example of bad litigation communication. To its credit, Disney responded promptly and publicly. On the down side, […]
Cleveland Hits the Ball Out of the Park on Name Change
From our friends at PRCG/Haggerty… The Cleveland Indians professional baseball team, like similarly branded clubs, has been pressured for years to change its name, which many Native Americans view as racist. Last week, it unveiled a new moniker with a campaign aimed at anticipating blowback. It wasn’t just good PR, but good crisis communications. Baseball […]
The Right (And Wrong) Way To Apologize For Dumb Things You Said Online
By Brittany Wong, writing for HuffPost… The Celebrity Apology™ is having a moment, with famous person after famous person apologizing for stupid things they said online in years past. Just this year we’ve had journalist Alexi McCammond apologize (and resign from a Teen Vogue editor-in-chief position) for anti-Asian and homophobic tweets. We’ve had Chrissy Teigen apologize for cyberbullying and Billie […]
7 Questions to Ask Before Hiring a Crisis Communications Firm
By Bruce Hennes, Hennes Communications This article first appeared in the National Law Journal Crisis communications is a sub-specialty of the public relations profession that is designed to protect and defend an individual, company, or organization facing a public challenge to its reputation. Crisis communications is aimed at raising awareness of a specific type of threat, the magnitude, […]
Critical Race Theory and the Push to Keep it Out of US Public Schools
By Denise-Marie Ordway, writing for The Journalist’s Resource… Two experts offer insights to help journalists – and non-journalists – make sense of the recent controversy around critical race theory, a decades-old legal framework for examining how U.S. laws and systems have perpetuated racism. Republican lawmakers and elected leaders across the U.S. have spoken out in […]
UFOs, Once Consigned to Conspiracy Theories, Have Landed in Mainstream American Journalism
From Amaris Castillo, writing for Poynter… Last Friday, U.S. intelligence agencies released a report that many were eagerly awaiting: a preliminary assessment on unidentified aerial phenomena. In layman’s terms, UFOs. The unclassified report said these phenomena clearly pose a flight safety issue but that there aren’t enough high-quality reports on them to draw any firm conclusions. Sightings […]
7 Questions to Ask Before Hiring a Crisis Communications Firm
By Bruce Hennes, Hennes Communications Crisis communications is a sub-specialty of the public relations profession that is designed to protect and defend an individual, company, or organization facing a public challenge to its reputation. Crisis communications is aimed at raising awareness of a specific type of threat, the magnitude, outcomes, and specific behaviors to adopt to reduce the threat. […]
What Makes a News Story Trustworthy? Americans Point to the Outlet that Publishes It, Sources Cited
By John Gramlich, writing for the Pew Research Center… Americans see a variety of factors as important when it comes to deciding whether a news story is trustworthy or not, but their attitudes vary by party affiliation, demographic characteristics and news consumption habits, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey. Overall, broad majorities of U.S. […]
7 Things You Should Know About Guns
Written by Denise-Marie Ordway for The Journalist’s Resource, published by the respected Harvard Kennedy School-Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, we changed the title from 7 Things Journalists Should Know About Guns to 7 Things You Should Know About Guns. Regardless of your beliefs, we thought it would be helpful to start with […]
Sports Writers Could Ditch the ‘Clown Questions’ and Do Better When it Comes to Press Conferences
Nicole Kraft, professor of sports journalism at The Ohio State University, writing for The Conversation… LeBron James had enough. During the press conference after Game 1 of the 2018 NBA finals, James was questioned repeatedly by ESPN’s Mark Schwartz about the mental state of teammate J.R. Smith, whose final-seconds rebounding blunder contributed to a Cleveland Cavaliers overtime loss. […]