Our Blog ~ Pros and Cons

Pros and cons will discuss the good and bad in marketing, media and politics. It will also feature marketing tips and whatever else we’re in the mood for posting.

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One Space Will Do
May 10, 2013

In a previous post, I bemoaned the missing space.

Having been taught at an early age that a sentence ends with two spaces, I was critical about the lack of respect two spacers get.

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Attention Startups: Don’t Hire A PR Agency
May 9, 2013

Attention entrepreneurs … “nothing could be more dumb (sic) than throwing your hard-earned venture capital money at a public relations firm.”

So says Kevin Leu, a PR specialist himself who worked in-house with PR agencies before founding GirlsOnAMap.com.  In an article in Venturebeat, he concluded that using venture funding to hire an agency is about as smart as allowing your company to be acquired by Groupon in an all-stock transition for five reasons:

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How Much Entertainment Can $3.6 Billion Buy?
May 9, 2013

The National Mortgage Settlement may not be solving the housing crisis, but it’s providing plenty of entertainment.

Under the terms of the settlement, some of the country’s largest mortgage lenders are paying out $3.6 billion to former homeowners whose homes they foreclosed on.

As we previously reported, some of the checks from third-party vendor Rust Consulting have bounced.  So first homeowners were foreclosed on, then they received checks from their banks that bounced.

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Trial of Mass Murderer Goes Uncovered
May 8, 2013

How does a story about the trial of a mass murderer – someone who is alleged to have killed hundreds – not make it into the mainstream press?

The only logical answer is that media bias is alive and well.

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Another Blow to Small Businesses
May 7, 2013

Small businesses today are fighting to survive.  If the U.S. Senate has its way, many won’t.

By an astounding vote of 69-27, the U.S. Senate today passed another tax hike – one that will require even the smallest online businesses to track and charge sales and use taxes based on the country’s 9,600 different taxing authorities.

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What’s An “Activist”?
May 6, 2013

Journalists go wobbly over use of the term “terrorist,” but not so when it comes to the word “activist.”

For many journalists, there is nothing nobler than the activist, who, in their mind, is devoting his or her life to a chosen cause.  It’s not a real job title, but journalists use it anyway.  Activist is code for “good guy.”

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Careercast Survey: Being A Garbage Collector Is Better Than Being A Reporter
May 3, 2013

As a former newspaper reporter, I’m thankful every day that I left print journalism and have been able to run my own business for more than 20 years.

I became even more thankful after reading that careercast.com ranked being a reporter as the worst job in the world.  Well, maybe not the worst.  The survey included only 200 jobs.  I didn’t see honey dipper or bomb squad specialist on the list.

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Can You Define Public Relations in Three Words or Fewer?
May 2, 2013

In a previous blog post (“What the Heck is Public Relations?”), I noted that even though we’re supposed to be communications professionals, we’ve done a miserable job defining what we do.

Here’s a chance to remedy that.  Tell me how you would define public relations.  Leave a comment on my blog or in a discussion group.

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Who Says Rust Never Sleeps?
April 24, 2013

It’s a story rich in irony.  As part of a multi-bank settlement, some of the country’s largest mortgage lenders are paying out $3.6 billion to former homeowners whose homes they foreclosed on.

Except some of the checks are bouncing, thanks to a big oops by third-party vendor Rust Consulting.

Steve Viuker, a writer for The Warren Group who is based in New York City, wrote about the bouncing checks for Total Mortgage Services in his article, “Follow the Bouncing (Mortgage Settlement) Checks.”

He quoted this blogger as follows: “When does tragicomedy become farce?  Foreclosed homeowners who failed to pay what they owe now have big banks failing to pay them what they owe.  Hopefully, the banks whose checks bounced will be adding a bounced-check fee to their payments to the foreclosed homeowners.”

Best of luck to Rust Consulting.  We hope the float was worth it.

 

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Where’s Jimmy Carter Now?
April 24, 2013

Jimmy Carter validated the election of Hugo Chávez when he became president of Venezuela in 1998, playing a part in condemning the country to 15 years of misery under the dictator’s rule.

Now that Chávista standard-bearer Nicolás Maduro has defeated challenger Henrique Capriles by a margin of just 1.6% (about 250,000 votes), the former leader of the free world has been silent about the outcome.  Nothing has been posted on The Carter Center’s Web site.

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