the(new)mediaslut

…by SmartBrain during the launch of “AMD Phenom X4 and Spider”…

What will they come up with next? And whatever the outcome, I hope our hardworking SmartBrain got her number…;)

The Seacil reef planted by the Singapore Polytechnic was meant to create an artificial coral reef but bloggers are now posting the project is a disaster with evidence of photos and live videos.

The biggest problem highlighted by one blogger, who was also a volunteer for the project, was the way Singapore Polytechnic chose to ignore queries from the bloggers and public which lead to them creating their own conclusions on the reef.

“During the briefing, I asked them why they did not reply to all those -ve remarks and questions?…” wrote Steven Wong of wongsifu.blogspot.com.

“Well,according to the researchers and the emails(a few hundreds) she received, it seems some folks out there just want to pick a fight, find trouble and are just too narrow, too protective in their views…

“SO…..With such one-sided view, I guess the people behind the project just ignore these group of ‘protestors’ and would rather spend more productive time doing their works…… ”

Ignoring email complaints is a very risky thing to do in the field of communications these days.

Ignorance begets ignorance. In this case, ignoring the people who took the time to craft out the email creates a public perception that the people behind the project has something to hide.

Without a proper explanations on questions, these email senders will craft their own conclusion which may be misguided or just based on hearsay.

Replying every single email can be time consuming, but the researchers still have to take time to explain its Seacil reef experiment.

The researchers should create a blog to put a depositary of all questions and answers.

In fact, why not use a wiki that only allow the researchers to post their answers to questions emailed to them.

One always have to remember that activities of Public Relations are often done to ensure the overall company has a strong public image and this also include helping the public to understand the company and its products.

Addressing a blogger’s concern can help the public to further understand what the Seacil reef is all about.

Even if the researchers are wrong, admit it and credit it to the blogger.

In the end of the day, the blogger will feel part of the research, rather an incident bystander fighting a lone war against the powers at hand.

Everybody loves an underdog.

The Singapore government has made a few attempts to stay hip and cool. By shouldn’t they know that by forcing themselves to stay hip and cool just for one activity isn’t hip and cool.

They tried the Hip Hop routine earlier this year. Now, the Media Development Authority (MDA) has come up their MDA Senior Management Rap to show they are hip and cool with new media.

Unfortunately, hip and cool they arn’t wrote some bloggers.

Kevin Lim, for theory.isthereason.com, says the rap is “disturbia bad; the makes-me-ashamed-to-be-Singaporean kind of bad“.

DK, for decayonnet.blogspot.com, wrote the rap “is not suitable for anyone below the age of 21 23. Contains some disturbing scenes”.

The MDA rap also started off on a bad footing. The authorities decided to stream it off their own website at www.mda.gov.sg.

“The video’s so popular, the original site takes ages to load,” wrote Tym of Tym blogs too.

Yeap, the rap has become so popular it has been YouTubed.

Speaking of YouTube, around 54 minutes of the rap, it seemed like the producers of this music video ripped off the entire YouTube layout design and replaced it with the MDA logo. Talked about being HIP.

The most disturbing scene of the entire rap would be that of Man Shu Sam, director of broadcast and film, acting as the Godfather of MDA and pointing a gun to a film maker as if he was trying to say “if you don’t do a film according to my wishes, I will shoot you!”.

In the rap (around two minutes of it), Man raps he knows good directors at the back of his hands with two good directors nodding in agreement to what Man is say. Only Yes-man directors need apply?

The silhouette of Man shaking his bum bum to the tune of the Twist deserves an RA rating for the rap.

The saving grace of the entire rap would be the appearance of Cassandra Tay, director of communications for MDA, at 2mins 30sec of the rap and 1 minute later in the rap. Comm chicks are hot and I wouldn’t be surprised if she appeared on Singapore Daily Chio Bu of the day.

So if you want to torture yourself with the MDA rap, the YouTube version of it is below.

Torture yourself silly:

New ad from Blizzard showing Mr T as a mean night elf warrior with a nasty mohawk!

The americanexpress has always be known for its hasty foreclosures and ruthlessness in rejecting life insurance claims of people with whose bad credit credit cards get piled up with debts. Therefore whether you are going for car loans or any kind of holiday insurance, make sure that your work from home is worth all the effort.

All of a sudden, a BLOG became Malaysia government’s best friend in its case against Singapore on claims to Pedra Branca.

Malaysia argued that a photo on the BLOG, leuchtturm3.blogspot.com, showed how close Pedra Branca is to Johor and it has to be trusted as an independent source.

Yeap, you heard that right, the BLOG is now independent source.

Jeff Ooi couldn’t have said it any better, “Yes! An anonymous blog on Blogspot is an independent source!“

Kenny Tan also argued that “his 80-year-old grandfather could tell the pictures were doctored“.

So you have it. Anonymous blog is independent while named blogs are not independent.

That’s the reason why this blog chooses to remain anonymous.

Independent Thoughts

If you get emirates airlines for your new york flights and a cheap motel as well as an affordable car rental service, your vacation has been well planned. If you instead get on the hawaiian airlines for your orlando flights, despite mentioning your requirements at the reception of the flight centre, that is truly a disastrous plan.

Free Burma group in San Franciscan are preparing to protest against Singapore with regards to her relationship with Burma.

According to the BSAF.org website, the Buddhist Peace Fellowship (www.bpf.org) and Buddhist Community, the Burmese American Democratic Alliance and Burmese Community have called for a peaceful meditation rally in front of the Singapore consulate in San Francisco next Tuesday.

Information about the protest can be found here.

I just wonder what is the solution that these protesters would want from Singapore and what can be done to really help Burma.

Singapore government calls for constructive and economical engagement with the military government in Burma while those on the other side of the fence are calling to stop all engagement as it may not be helping at all.

The Dossier coverage on “The Secret War in Burma” which around the 30mins it states that money earned from tourist are going directly to the military rather than its people.

What is the right solution for Burma and is there one?

Thoughts Aside

Whether you are going for a 642-587 or a 642-873, it is important that you go well-prepared. That means basics like 1Y0-256 as well as 70-526 and 646-362 should be on your finger tips. Only then can you think of another advanced certification like 642-503.

Ariel Tam, the previous journalist responsible for Today’s InfoTech section, is said to be returning to the free daily to take charge of her previous section.

Ariel left Today in April this year.

Sources were unable to provide the exact date which Ariel will start.

Remember the Atos Origin country manager who blew up at Smartbrain and personally kicked him off a trip to China because he found Smartbrain annoying and didn’t want “people like you” associated with his precious Olympic Games?

Well, Atos Origin has recently posted an urgently required job wanted ad on jobsdb for, surprise surprise, a PR manager starting right away.

Anyone who applies, please get in contact with Smartbrain and do tell him what Atos Origin means when referring to “people like you”. If you can spin yourself out of that one, then you are definitely one class act of a PR and will make it to the top of the industry in no time.

Actually, if Smartbrain were the elitist country manager who views “people like us” as not worthy, he would actually include this case as part of the job interview with a question along the lines of, “So I managed to screw up and call this journalist “people like you” on my official company email. How would you say I get out of this mess?”

Rockybru.blogspot.com reported that Sunday was a “police reporting” day for two Malaysian bloggers as there were police report made against the two.

The blogger posted that Malaysian Islamic Consumer Association, Malaysian Indian Muslim Congress and Pertubuhan Seri Silat Ikatan Kalam Malaysia made police report against Jeff Ooi, for www.jeffooi.com, for making statements and comments to a Al Jazeera interview on the Bersih rallies which was deemed as tarnishing the country’s image, seditious and causing racial tension.

In an update, Rocky’s Bru also reported that an Ummo member also made a police report to a post by Raja Petra Kamarudin on comments on the recent Bersih rallies. The alleged post can be found here.

Jeff’s first interview with Al Jazeera can be found below.

Al Jazeera, in all fairness of journalism, interviewed Malaysian Information Minister whose response was described as a “joke” by Malaysian blogger Kenny Sia.

Jeff was again later interviewed by Al Jazzera on the aftermatch of the Bersih rallies which the Malaysia Information Minister was reported to have declined to partake in the interview.

Are the statements by Jeff a representation of the man on the street at the Bersih rallies, or made with intend to tarnish the country’s image, seditious and causing racial tension?

Jeff Ooi has not made any comments on the police reports on his blog as yet.

The Malaysian government was reported to have ordered a blackout of any news and photos in the country’s main stream media of the BERSIH rally held in Kuala Lumpur, the capital city of Malaysia, on Saturday, Nov 10 2007.

The rally was well publicised and with a blackout in old media, where did the curious or concerned go to get information about the protest?

They went to the blogs of Malaysians and protest participants who took photos and wrote their account of the demostration online.

They went on Technorati and searched the keyword “Bersih” and probably visited one of the 493 blogs post tagged with the keyword “Bersih”.

Jeff Ooi reported a spike of visitors to his blog, Jeffooi.com, over the weekend. From an average of 5,000 - 6,000 visitors on sleepy weekends, Jeff reported 24,600 pageviews with 21,000 unique visitors to his blog on that Saturday itself.

There was a time when the medium was only the radio, television and papers. The cost of producing anything for them was expensive and out of the reach for the common man and woman. The cost of distribution was also exorbitant.

Today, the medium is the Internet and the tool they call a blog.

Another can set up a blog and go “live” on the internet within minutes, for free.

The cost of distribution has also gone done with blog search engines such as Technorati or Google.

The cost of creating such content, also now affordable to the masses.

A mobile phone is even touted as the ultimate journalist tool and could be bought at a relative low price depending on the plans provided by the service provider. It takes photos, records audio and video, and can be uploaded to the blog in minutes.

How effective is a government ordered old media blackout today?

Ahirudin Attan, the person behind rockybru.blogspot.com and a former journalist, called the blackout a severe blow to Malaysian journalism as “people had to rely on foreign tv stations, blogs and wire news to know what happened at the rally”.

I agree with Ahirudin. I would like to see new media work hand in hand with old media, but by ordering a classical old media blackout order only pushes old fashion readers like me to the Blogs.

Atos Origin. That is the name of the company who would undoubtedly has won 2007’s junket cancellation excuse of the year award if there was one and this post is a story about why they should so be honoured.

Cancellations happen all the time. Sometime the unavailability of the speaker is genuine, other times they want “Mr Editor” but needed a good reason to get rid of “Mr Reporter”, not that there is anything wrong with that. Only giving a nice, civil reason is preferable to an elitist slur calling the journalist, “people like you”.

A while back, around a month ago, a PR agency in Singapore contacted Smartbrain inviting him to view the Atos Origin operations centre for the Beijing Olympics. Little did any of us expect that it would soon descend into an acrimonious exchange of messages.

On 30 October, Atos Origin asked Smartbrain where to return his passport in a strangely terse email that made no mention of the travel arrangements. Later that day the country manager (who I have been advised not to mess with as his business partner turned father in law is a well known arms dealer) sends an apology to say (nicely) that the trip has been cancelled. Smartbrain asked why, but got no response.

On 31 October, Smartbrain asks again in an admittedly colloquial and short email, “Knock knock, anyone there? Any reason the trip was cancelled?”

Apparently that touched a raw nerve and this was the reply from Atos Origin in full, except with names removed.

Khun [Smartbrain],

I think your attitude towards us is quite a surprise to me. Let me remind you that its an opportunity for the newpaper you work for to attend this, and the cost is being paid by Atos Origin. I certainly do not need to answer to you, and justify why I have personally cancel your trip. I would have no problem in giving you the reason, why I have cancel this trip, but now I can tell you that I do not like your attitude, and do not want to associate something I feel very special for us, with people like you.

[Country Manager].

To which Smartbrain replied immediately after his hands stopped shaking:

Wow.Talk about hitting a raw nerve. Sorry… I usually have my emails quite colloquial and I would like to remind you that it has been more than 24 hours since I got the cancellation and not have had any explanation as to why it was cancelled. Anyway, thanks for letting me know that you personally cancelled my trip because of not wanting to associate the event with “people like me”.

I am still trying to understand what “people like me” actually means, but…

Because of your trip, I had to pass up two other trips overseas for [vendor] and [vendor] so I do consider my time invested a major investment, not just for myself, but for my readers.I think that out of courtesy I at least deserve an explanation, but as you so eloquently put it, you do not need to give me one. Fair enough.

Perhaps the other journalists you work with work only on money and free meals. I plan my work mainly around interesting stories.

Was the cancellation because you managed to get me rejected for a visa? Or was it for some other reason. That is what I wanted to know.

While I appreciate that you are paying, I would also like to point out that I did warn you from day one of the problems that the Chinese embassy have with issuing J2 visas. I did warn [PR Agency Person] from the outset that the rules state you need a “letter from a competent Chinese authority” to back up the visa application. In the case of [a Chinese IT company], they got me a letter from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs acknowledging their event. I did suggest a number of alternatives, such as the Olympic committee even.

In particular, I was appalled at your staff’s attitude to the visa application. [Dumb blonde secretary] said she would apply for a tourist visa, hence my first email warning you of the difficulties you may have. She said that it is easier to get a tourist visa and even went so far as to say that the letter I got from the [publication] (which included the invitation letter from [PR Agency Person]) was not needed as it was not a business trip. When I requested the day flight, the immediate reaction I got was that there was no such flight.

TG614 is the flight I took last time to Beijing and it was a day flight.

If anything, I think I should be the one feeling irked at you for the outright lies (that there is no day flight) and attitude you have in maybe getting me blacklisted from the Chinese embassy in applying for a tourist visa where a journalist visa is required.

..

I’m still wondering what made you hate me so much. My colloquialism? Perhaps. The fact that I wanted you to obey the rules for the visa? Or the request for the day trip. Never mind.

My only regret is that I really, really supported your relative in his fight against the previous regime and it saddens me that such a great man has a relative like yourself.

:)
[Smartbrain]

On a side note, it is interesting that the Country Manager cc’d the Vice-President of Atos Origin on the “people like you” email. That makes one wonder if it was a slip of the mouse, pressing reply-all without thinking, or if the higher echelons of Atos Origin actually agree with that reprehensible point of view. At the very least, they have not apologised for it.

Also, to make the timing clear, the event was cancelled before the “knock-knock” email so his dislike of my attitude must have preceded that email, not stemmed from it.

For the record, Smartbrain has never dealt with Atos Origin before; never written about them; never even seen a press release from them on his desk to ignore; never met with the country manager before either in this job, or in his previous job.

Would Smartbrain accept another Atos Origin invitation to an event or press conference? Probably not for an overseas event in which they painfully remind us that they are paying for it and that we poor “people like you” journalists are beggars who cannot ask any questions of their hosts. But for a press conference, definitely and my first question would be, “What did you mean when you emailed me on 31st October referring to ‘people like you’?”

PR Tip #92385: One PR company that knows what is going on is preferable to three who do not.

Smartbrain recently flew down to the city/state/dot of Singapore for an EMC event and when he got to the venue, was turned away as his name was not on the guest list.

Seems an interesting way to spend PR money. Put journos in planes, fly them over, put them up in posh hotels and then turn them away from the event.

However, it was really a case of too many cooks spoiling the broth.

Smartbrain received an invitation from EMC’s local PR (for simplicity’s sake calling them PR1) about a month ago asking if he was free for the event and would like to join.

PR1 then handed off to PR2, based in Singapore, for the flight arrangements. On 30 October, PR2 send Smartbrain an agenda with the email that left no room for interpretation:

“Also, attached is the invitation card that contains the itinerary for both the 6th and the 7th,” PR2 wrote clearly.

The itinerary for the 6th included a dinner launch / speech at the Equinox.

However, when Smartbrain got to the Equinox, ears popping and all (it is on the top of a rather high building), his name was not on the guest list and was asked to wait. He was later told by PR2 (in person) that Media were not invited to the lauch dinner event.

So Smartbrain, totally fed up with lugging 10kg of camera gear around Singapore, goes and finds some nice, competent PR company to talk to and have them pitch stories at him instead over a nice, friendly, non-messed up dinner of Belgian fries and steak.

Only later, Smartbrain checks his email whilst looking up fruitarianism and finds a third PR company (third PR company working for EMC that is, as the Belgian food dinner PR company who is much nicer and more personable does not deal with EMC) emailing him a new “Welcome to Singapore” email with a new agenda expecting him to be at the Pan Pacific at 7 pm. However, that new agenda was timestamped 12.44 pm.

So, in a nutshell, Smartbrain missed day one of the EMC paid for event entirely as PR1 did not know what was going on even with a phone call, PR2 sent Smartbrain the wrong agenda (one for VIPs, not “people like you” journalists) and PR3 assumed that every journalist is always on email and that an email sent with a new agenda at six hours in advance of an event that could not be acted upon.

Nor did he get a call or SMS from any of the PR companies involved.

Perhaps EMC should think of PR consolidation? Just one company is enough and much less likely to totally mess things up like this? If Ron Goh asks, Smartbrain will be more than happy to introduce him to the PR who took Smartbrain out for a nice Belgian dinner tonight and are much more human, humane and personable than either PR2 or PR3.

On the bright side, it is nice to fly over to the city/state/dot of Singapore and have a nice time without having any work to do or events to cover as he was turned away from the event. Thanks, EMC, for a lovely free air plane ticket and hotel stay with no work on the first day at all to come from it.

I was talking to a corporate PR friend who has been tasked to do a corporate blog and her questions about corporate blogging are one of the most common I heard before.

She highlighted one of her biggest concern was about losing control over what will appear on the corporate blog.

My suggestion to her was to first come up with some corporate blogging guidelines.

“No bitching about colleagues or about the company” came up as the most important.

As the company is also listed, no listing of company figures also came up as number 1.

I told her that most importantly select those who will blog constantly and explained to them the guidelines.

Since the company is a tech vendor, focus on the technology. Use the blog to explain the technology and it will benefit potential clients.

It is easy to cut and paste a press release onto a blog, but, really, who reads it?

Instead get the spokesperson or the blogger to explain the significance of the press release for the company to the public.

There are lot of details that a press release cannot cover because of press releases more than 2 pages long are often a no-no.

The blogs engine out there also allow entries to be first entered as draft and let the corporate comms approve the post. Or, one could just put a password to it, emailed the password the corporate comms and approve it accordingly.

If the entry has to be disapprove, explain to the blogger why it was done so.

How about comments she asked?

My suggestion to her was to set all comments to require approval. If it is a critical comment which still make sense, address it by reply with another comment, or create a new entry altogether based on that comment.

If she needed reason for her company to blog, my suggestion was to relook at the definition of Public Relations itself.

Activities of Public Relations  are often done to ensure the overall company has a strong public image and this also include helping the public to understand the company and its products.

Before blogs, the only way to do so is to do it via mainstream media.

Blogs won’t replace mainstream media but it acts as a complement to it.

So maybe blogs can help bring the public back to Public relations?