Crisis Management

Flacks Get a Chill Up the Spine

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.

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Literal "Whitewashing": The Taiwanese Show How PR is Done After Plane Catches Fire

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.

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We Know What You Did Online Last Summer

WikipediaSelf-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?

Fake Green Certification Backfires

Sustainable forest fibreThe Australian supermarket company Woolworths has withdrawn a range of tissue products after being outed by an anonymous blogger for using a "Sustainable Forest Fibre" logo on products sourced from a notorious Indonesian forestry company.

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