Category: Topical Interest

What does your festival say about you?

21-May-10 16:40

The summer is officially here and the flip flops are out in force at Ascent PR! It is weather like this that instantly turns my attention to the forthcoming festivals with the first official one being this weekend and the last ones usually at the end of August.

The media has obviously been thinking about festivals much earlier than me, with the monthlies talking about the latest festival attire; whether that is hats, wellies or day-glo underwear! I also spotted this amusing story on bbc.co.uk this morning too (what does a music festival say about you?)

"Your choice definitely says something about your identity," says Professor George McKay of the University of Salford, who has written extensively on festival culture, including the book Glastonbury: A Very English Fair. He says that Glastonbury goers are probably interested in ethical issues around the environment or multiculturalism or a global consciousness. You may even have an organic allotment! Reading and Leeds are a teenage rite of passage and all about the music, The Isle of Wight festival is about big heritage acts like Paul McCartney, so attracts a slightly older crowd.

The article also mentions that festivals have a certain degree of snobbery associated with them and that it is not about which bands you are seeing, but who you are seeing them with. Well I don't know if that is true, but I for one am looking forward to getting out in the sun with a few ciders and my friends and listening to great music. I will also be consulting the ‘top festival fashion' features such as Glamour's to really get into the spirit of things!

Louise

Brown's blunder

29-Apr-10 16:53

‘Trouble in Rochdale’ ‘Labour loses one voter’ ‘My Gord’s so sorry’ ‘Demonised: the granny who dared to utter the I-word’

These are just some of today’s headlines following Gordon Brown’s microphone blunder – just one week before election day. Such a thoughtless mistake could cost him his whole campaign. One thing that media training teaches you is that the microphone is always recording – had Mr Brown remembered this he would not be fighting for Gillian Duffy – and the country’s – forgiveness.

It will be interesting to see his attempts at turning the public’s opinion around on this evening’s live debate.

Louise

It's good to talk

27-Apr-10 16:50

As a PR person always keen to maximise opportunities off of the back of a topical event, I smiled to myself this morning when I opened a short e-shot from travel company First Choice which outlined in a few brief sentences how it, as an organisation had dealt with the chaos surrounding the recent disruption to the UK's airports and flight schedules. It had apparently sent a few hundred extra travel reps to specific destinations (by boat presumably), it had spent many thousands of pounds putting people up in hotels and making sure they were comfortable, it had diverted cruise ships to collect hundreds of stranded passengers overseas, and since airports reopened it has laid on extra flights to get people home as quickly as possible etc. Oh, and by the way, now that the excitement and panic has died down, how about booking yourself a holiday with us? (Meaning: safe in the knowledge that you are booking with a reputable business that won't let you down when things go wrong).

There is definitely a PR person behind this one! Now, I'm not saying that First Choice went the ‘extra mile' any more than the next holiday company did, but it seems to be happy to talk about it with some conviction and that certainly won't do the brand any harm - after all, in PR terms it is always good to talk (providing you are consistent and confident about what you are saying). Act of god or not, the way a business communicates with its audience during and after any kind of disaster like this is paramount to its future success (or downfall); take the Perrier Water (benzene contamination) scandal as an example of a company that had a monopoly on the bottled-water market; how it responded to those claims has very much shaped how that market looks today.

Natalie

Would you pay to use Facebook?

22-Apr-10 17:18

This is an interesting question for millions of global users to ponder. I think the prospect of even paying a few pounds per month for a service that people are used to accessing for free would go down like a lead balloon. In fact, if this rumour turns out to be true then many Facebook users, including myself, wouldn't hesitate to simply delete their accounts and look for other ways of communicating with the outside world.

Understandably the social media site is looking for ways of generating additional revenue from its 400 million users worldwide, but it risks upsetting its contacts and losing them from its enviable database. Many of us have shared our personal thoughts, feelings, discussions and photos with friends and family on Facebook for many years and will be really disappointed to have to pay for it. However, maybe it was too good to be true for us to have access to such a collaborative and interactive site for free for so long and possibly it's only a matter of time before there's a cost associated with it, which will be a huge shame.

But, this is definitely a sign of the times as The Sunday Times and Times only announced last month that it too will charge the public to access its online material. More of us are using the internet to access information, read books, order goods and communicate, rather than read hard copy material, and organisations are obviously looking for ways to take advantage of this. Personally I wouldn't be surprised to see more businesses going down the same route in years to come.

Angela

Volcanic panic…

19-Apr-10 15:28

As the UK is thrown into disarray over the recent volcanic eruption in Iceland, it never ceases to amaze me how differently the event is reported (depending on what you read and where). It seems to go from one extreme to the other - The Daily Mail, takes the scaremongering approach today, discussing the implications for the victims (that's us apparently, everyone; not just the poor folk in Iceland surrounded by black skies) if planes remain grounded for the next six months (in short we're all up the proverbial ‘creek' without a paddle); food shortages, price rises, the impact on the economy are just some of the things being predicted or dramatised.

While the BBC has chosen the more informative or less sensational approach - with its ‘volcano cloud as it happens' commentary; although it does highlight financial losses and numbers of travellers affected, rather than speculating on long-term future doom and gloom it has chosen to talk about activity as it happens - which seems to me to be the most logical approach - after all, if what we are told is true, we can't predict what will happen or how long this will last. Everything might be back to normal this time next week, or indeed it might not be. The Met Office has instead taken the scientific approach i.e. looking at what the weather needs to do to clear the skies. Whatever way you look at it, nothing is certain. We all have to sit tight and wait - just hope I make it to Portugal for my family holiday in the next month or so - but who knows!

Natalie