Posted: 2011 October 05, Wednesday 07:59
By George Merlis
It may be highly ironic -- if not downright hypocritical -- to post a blog about the dangers of blogging, but here goes....
Let me start with this warning: Don’t blog anything you don’t want the whole world to read. While we reach out to the media often, it’s important to remember that the media may be reaching out to us by reading our blog posts. So it’s incumbent on bloggers to understand their narrow-cast audience can go wide if something they post gets thrust into the media mill. These days that mill is always casting about for fresh grist.
Here’s a case in point with several layers of obfuscation added to protect identities of individuals and organizations:
Not too long ago, an individual innocently posted information about a new development at his organization on his personal blog. The blogger in question was authoritative in his field, so among the readers of his posts was at least one journalist. In this case, it only took one.
The journalist read the blog and then wrote a story based on it. The story as blogged -- and then reported on -- was incomplete. The blogger’s organization was preparing a formal release with more information in it. There were two lapses here: the blogger’s release of information not yet ready for public consumption and the journalist’s failure to follow up the blog with confirming phone calls or e-mails.
When the blogger’s organization did issue a press release with the complete story, the media treated it as old news and largely ignored it. The blogger had scooped his own organization.
Today, with so many people blogging, tweeting and posting to Facebook and other social networking sites, there is a constant danger of premature and/or incomplete information reaching the media. That sort of information can distort or misinform and, in some cases, do damage to a company or organization. News casually disseminated via blogging, social media and e-mail often lacks the necessary vetting by public relations, public affairs and executive personnel. And, unhappily, with journalists today under pressure to be more “productive” (i.e., do more stories in less time with fewer resources), there is a danger that news stories based on these cyberspace offerings will get to the public without any fact-checking.
It has never been harder to control information than it is today. Everyone is connected via e-mail and most are active on Twitter, Facebook and other networking sites. Here are some thoughts on blogging, tweeting, social networking and e-mailing:
Blogging
Many people write personal blogs that contain information from their workplace. If you are part of a large organization, check with your public relations representatives before posting new professional information. If you are part of a small organization, confer with colleagues before going public on your blog. You want to avoid disseminating to a small audience (your blog readers) information that might be compelling to a huge audience (the public at large) unless there is an organizational consensus that the information should be released. Since reporters hate being scooped, blogging news automatically scoops media outlets that don’t follow your blog. As was the case in the incident I cited, a blog post can undermine an organization's media campaign by stealing its thunder.
As someone who takes 140 characters to say, “hello,” I’ve always been dubious about sending out any substantive information via tweet. Twitter’s compression factor forces you to leave out necessary details. There’s nothing wrong, however, with calling attention to fully vetted on-line news via Twitter. (It's one of several mechanisms I use to call attention to my new blog posts.) I recommend coordinating with your public relations professionals or colleagues before you take to the keyboard. (And please check your spelling. If you are tweeting on a smart phone, it is very easy to misspell words and sometimes misspellings can change meanings.)
Social Media
As with Twitter, there are limits on how much you can post on Facebook and other social media sites, although their allotment of characters is far greater than Twitter’s. It's best to use social media to direct attention of your friends and followers to a web site where an official news release can be read. The Facebook page Marketing for Scientists affords a good example of how to effectively use social networking for directing attention to valuable online articles.
As virtually everyone knows -- to his or her grief -- it is entirely too easy for an e-mail recipient to forward a message to another couple of people, each of whom forward it to several more and what began as a private communication is now spread virally. E-mailing something marked “confidential,” or “eyes only,” is like standing under a billboard with an arrow sign reading, “Please don’t read the billboard.” When dealing with company or organization news, I like to use e-mail the same way I use social media -- directing attention to the website with the full media release on it. That way if your e-mail goes viral only the official, approved version is available to the media and public.
Bottom line: when you’re dealing with organization or company news, think long and hard before hitting “send,” “post” or “publish.”
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Media Blunders, China Department
China has a growing and well-financed space program. If music is any guide, it owes a lot to the American space program. How so? Well, the Chinese state media released a video of last month's launch of its Tiangong-1 space station enhanced with animation of the spacecraft docking in low earth orbit and tracked it with the stirring strains of -- "America the Beautiful." Clearly someone had exceeded his level of incompetence in a grand way.
While a Chinese space station has nothing to do with amber waves of grain or purple mountains' majesty, maybe the beautiful and spacious skies references were enough for the hapless producer who added the music. More likely, he had no idea of the lyrics and the standing of the song as an unofficial alternate to the difficult-to-sing Star Spangled Banner. (And what was the consequence of this faux pas? Reprimand, dismissal, prison? All three?)
China could have used "Red Star Rising in the East," but did not.
The British newspaper The Guardian, spotted the gaffe (or homage, if that's what it was) and posted the video here.
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