Archive for 2003

(From 2002 until 2005, this mailing list was called the ECCR mailing list)
[Previous message][Next message][Back to index]

[eccr] Fwd: The Weekly Spin, Wednesday, February 5, 2003

Wed Feb 05 08:22:56 GMT 2003


>THE WEEKLY SPIN, Wednesday, February 5, 2003
>---------------------------------------------------------------------
>sponsored by PR WATCH (www.prwatch.org)
>---------------------------------------------------------------------
>The Weekly Spin features selected news summaries with links to
>further information about current public relations campaigns.
>It is emailed free each Wednesday to subscribers.
>
>SHARE US WITH A FRIEND (OR FIFTY FRIENDS)
>Who do you know who might want to receive Spin of the Week?
>Help us grow our subscriber list!  Just forward this message to
>people you know, encouraging them to sign up at this link:
>
>http://www.prwatch.org/cmd/subscribe_sotd.html
>
>---------------------------------------------------------------------
>THIS WEEK'S NEWS
>
>1. Chilean Baritone Sings the Praises of British-American Tobacco
>2. MoveOn Organizing "Grassroots PR for Peace"
>3. Food for Activists
>4. Behind the Homefront
>5. Cops Spy on Journalists
>6. State Department Requests Funding For Middle East TV Network
>7. Shuttle Explodes But Media Still Ignores Nukes in Space
>8. Press Freedom Slipping Away
>9. "Canned PR Material" Not Welcome
>10. The Shared Values of TV Ads
>11. Republicans Seek a Few Good African Americans
>12. 'Americans for Tax Reform' Part of a Pro-War Movement
>13. Liquid Truth
>14. H&K Nukes Australia
>15. Real Girls Have Hamburger Buns
>16. Imagining the Worst
>17. Trust Us, We're Corporations
>18. Nice Work if You Can Get It
>19. Copyrighting Freedom of Expression"
>20. Cable News Wars
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>1. CHILEAN BARITONE SINGS THE PRAISES OF BRITISH-AMERICAN TOBACCO
>http://www.prwatch.org/forum/showthread.php?postid=2682
>   Not everyone enjoyed "British-American Tobacco's Socially
>   Responsible Smoke Screen," our article from the last issue of PR
>   Watch that examined BAT's social reporting process. Eugenio
>   Rengifo, a baritone with a Chilean band, emailed us a stinging
>   letter, calling the article a "joke. Do you really believe in what
>   you wrote about this?" But Eugenio the baritone didn't bother to
>   inform us that he was also a PR executive with BAT's Chilean
>   subsidiary.
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/February_2003.html#1044423860
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044423860
>
>2. MOVEON ORGANIZING "GRASSROOTS PR FOR PEACE"
>http://www.moveon.org/
>   The media-savvy internet-based peace group MoveOn has rapidly built
>   an impressive on-line membership of more than 600,000 citizens. Two
>   weeks ago it garnered major national publicity with its "TV Daisy
>   Advertisement" opposing a US attack on Iraq. Now MoveOn hopes to
>   recruit many thousands of volunteers to "consider pledging a day
>   over the next two weeks" in a "massive, coordinated, grassroots PR
>   campaign -- one that can reach millions of people and ... make it
>   impossible to ignore the anti-war sentiment in this country --
>   you'll see signs in windows, bumper stickers on cars, flyers on
>   your doorstep, billboards along the streets, and ads and letters in
>   the newspaper. ... The Bush Administration has the bully pulpit of
>   the presidency for its public relations work. We have the power of
>   coordinated grassroots action."
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/February_2003.html#1044409403
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044409403
>
>3. FOOD FOR ACTIVISTS
>http://www.crosswalk.com/news/1183938.html?view=print
>   PR crisis manager Nick Nichols, who advises companies to use
>   attack-dog strategies against pesky activists, delivered another
>   fiery speech this weekend at the Conservative Political Action
>   Conference, branding environmentalists as terrorists and comparing
>   them to Hitler. "A lot of [my] clients look like food to the more
>   extreme environmental groups," he said. "Government and industry
>   have to start fighting these folks." Similar sentiments came from
>   other speakers at the conference, which included a long list of
>   corporate-friendly names such as Bob Barr, L. Brent Bozell III, Pat
>   Buchanan, Mona Charen, Tom DeWeese, Lucianne Goldberg, David
>   Horowitz, Alan Keyes, Steve Milloy, Grover Norquist, Oliver North,
>   Daniel Pipes, Phyllis Schlafly, Craig Shirley and Ken Starr. U.S.
>   Vice President Dick Cheney delivered the keynote speech, while
>   vendors at exhibition booths sold anti-Muslim hate paraphernalia.
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/February_2003.html#1044385804
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044385804
>
>4. BEHIND THE HOMEFRONT
>http://www.rcfp.org/behindthehomefront/
>   The Reporters' Committee for Freedom of the Press has established a
>   weblog to cover freedom of information and other issues related to
>   the new Department of Homeland Security, which came into existence
>   officially on Jan. 24. "Behind the Homefront" is a "daily chronicle
>   of news in homeland security and military operations affecting
>   newsgathering, access to information and the public's right to
>   know."
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044372188
>
>5. COPS SPY ON JOURNALISTS
>http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_1720177,00.html
>   Denver police intelligence bureau officers may have conducted
>   background checks for private companies and spied on journalists,
>   according to a federal lawsuit. Police also kept files on groups
>   and individuals they labeled "criminal extremists" including the
>   American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), an 85-year old pacifist
>   Quaker group that won the Nobel Peace Prize for its advocacy of
>   non-violent social change, and the Chiapas Coalition, which
>   supports the struggle of indigenous persons in the Mexican state of
>   Chiapas. Individuals whose names appeared in police files include
>   Sister Antonio Anthony, a 73-year old Franciscan nun.
>SOURCE: Rocky Mountain News, February 4, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/February_2003.html#1044334800
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044334800
>
>6. STATE DEPARTMENT REQUESTS FUNDING FOR MIDDLE EAST TV NETWORK
>http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20030203-054915-3619r
>   "The budget request for the State Department for 2004 reflects the
>   changing foreign policy priorities of an administration set on
>   winning the global war on terrorism and the hearts and minds of the
>   countries where terrorists recruit," UPI's Eli J. Lake writes. "It
>   includes $30 million to launch the Middle East Television Network,
>   an Arabic language satellite station. Also, the budget will double
>   funding for the Voice of America's Indonesia channel. ... Big
>   losers in the budget include both big and small programs. The
>   request for military assistance for international peace-keeping
>   operations is just under $95 million -- less than a third of the
>   $375 million allocated in 2002. But estimates for peace-keeping,
>   because it is so controversial on Capitol Hill, are often
>   underestimated in budget requests."
>SOURCE: UPI, February 3, 2003
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044248404
>
>7. SHUTTLE EXPLODES BUT MEDIA STILL IGNORES NUKES IN SPACE
>http://www.globenet.free-online.co.uk/index.htm
>   For years the US media has failed to report adequately on NASA's
>   growing practice of launching radioactive materials into space. The
>   explosive breakup of the shuttle Columbia is getting massive
>   coverage, but the media is not drawing attention to two upcoming
>   launches that will contain nuclear materials. The radio program
>   Democracy Now! has been an exception to the blackout on nukes in
>   space, reporting today that "the crash comes at time when the space
>   agency is quickly pushing forward its controversial plans to
>   increase the use of nuclear power in space flights. Experts warn
>   that had the Columbia been powered by nuclear rockets, much of East
>   Texas and the region would have to be evacuated due to radioactive
>   contamination. Two weeks ago the Los Angeles Times reported that
>   NASA is seeking 'significant resources and funding' to design a
>   nuclear-powered propulsion system." Of course putting nukes in
>   space has its lobbyists and cheerleaders such as Space.Com and
>   Tech Central Station "where free markets meet technology," funded
>   by corporations including ExxonMobil, AT&T, Nasdaq, Microsoft, and
>   General Motors.
>SOURCE: Democracy Now!, February 3, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/February_2003.html#1044248403
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044248403
>
>8. PRESS FREEDOM SLIPPING AWAY
>http://www.sltrib.com/2003/Feb/02032003/commenta/25802.asp
>   "The Federal Communications Commission, led by Michael ('my
>   religion is the market') Powell, is fixing to remove the last
>   remaining barriers against concentration of media," writes Molly
>   Ivins. "This means one company can own all the radio stations,
>   television stations, newspapers and cable systems in any given
>   area. Presently, 10 companies own over 90 percent of the media
>   outlets. Bill Kovach of the Committee of Concerned Journalists and
>   Tom Rosenstiel of the Project for Excellence in Journalism say
>   these are the most sweeping changes in the rules that govern
>   ownership of American media since the 1940s. The ownership rules
>   were put in place after we had seen how totalitarian governments
>   use domination of the media to goad their countries into war. We
>   already know what happens when the free market zealots remove
>   restrictions on ownership. In 1996, the FCC eliminated its rules on
>   radio ownership. Conglomerates now own hundreds of stations around
>   the country. One company, Clear Channel, owns more than 1,200
>   stations, and there are 30 percent fewer station owners than there
>   were before 1996. The result is less local news and local
>   programming, since the formats are programmed at headquarters."
>SOURCE: Salt Lake Tribune, February 3, 2003
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044248402
>
>9. "CANNED PR MATERIAL" NOT WELCOME
>http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/034/oped/Whose_comments_are_they_+.shtml
>   "Readers have a right to assume that what they read on the letters
>   page is not canned public relations material," Boston Globe
>   Editorial Page Editor Renee Loth said. Responding to unknowingly
>   running GOP "astroturf" form letters, the Globe is instituting a
>   new policy to "confirm original authorship on any letter that could
>   be part of an organized campaign." Globe Ombudsman Christine
>   Chinlund writes that while readers may find the fake grassroots
>   letters-to-the-editor offensive, in political campaigning circles,
>   there is bipartisan support. She writes that former Clinton press
>   secretary and current Grassroots Enterprise CEO Michael McCurry's
>   response to critics is: "Grow up and join the Internet Age." On his
>   own site, McCurry writes, "I believe that the power of the Internet
>   in this capacity has only begun to be tapped by public affairs
>   pros. And that power is extraordinary."
>SOURCE: Boston Globe, February 3, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/February_2003.html#1044248401
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044248401
>
>10. THE SHARED VALUES OF TV ADS
>http://www.prweek.com/news/news_story.cfm?ID=169635&site=3
>   "The State Department's public affairs division has gone on the
>   offensive to combat last month's reports that its Shared Values
>   initiative was faltering after the disappearance of its
>   centerpiece, a $15 million advertising campaign," PR Week's Douglas
>   Quenqua writes. The State Department said its TV ads that featured
>   Muslim Americans "talking about their positive experiences living
>   in the US" were no longer being broadcast because the spots were
>   meant only to be aired during the month of Ramadan. The State
>   Department's "street-level diplomacy" campaign Shared Values also
>   includes speaking tours, town-hall meetings, print publications,
>   radio broadcasts, and Arab outreach programs. The "driving force"
>   behind Shared Values is former Madison Avenue advertising executive
>   and current Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy Charlotte Beers. PR
>   Week reports Beers said that the TV ads' real impact will come
>   later when Muslim Americans starring in the ads visit the regions
>   in which the ads aired. "They're going to be available for
>   questions and answers, and even those countries that didn't have it
>   on their national channel will get these speakers. They'll be
>   covered by the local press; they've become stars because they have
>   such high coverage and awareness," Beers said.
>SOURCE: PR Week, February 3, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/February_2003.html#1044248400
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044248400
>
>11. REPUBLICANS SEEK A FEW GOOD AFRICAN AMERICANS
>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58238-2003Jan29.html
>   Washington Post columnist Gene Weingarten feels "sorry for African
>   American Republicans. They've never had it real good ... So I was
>   heartened when I happened on a Web site last month run by a group
>   called the African American Republican Leadership Council. ... The
>   honorary chairman of the panel is listed as former U.S. senator
>   Edward W. Brooke III, a Republican from Massachusetts. So I called
>   up Brooke, who confirmed the important fact that he is black. Alas,
>   he is not in any way associated with the group. He said he'd never
>   heard of it and had no idea why his name was on the site. However,
>   he was only 'honorary.' Beneath his name were the names of the
>   group's official 15-person Advisory Panel. It includes noted
>   conservatives Paul Weyrich, Sean Hannity, Grover Norquist and Gary
>   Bauer, all of whom are as white as a mashed potato and marshmallow
>   sandwich on Wonder Bread. In fact, all but two of the 15 members of
>   the Advisory Panel of the African American Republican Leadership
>   Council are white." The mission and purpose of the AARLC, says its
>   website, "is to break the liberal Democrat stranglehold over Black
>   America."
>SOURCE: Washington Post, February 2, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/February_2003.html#1044162000
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044162000
>
>12. 'AMERICANS FOR TAX REFORM' PART OF A PRO-WAR MOVEMENT
>http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/01/politics/01PEAC.html?ex=1045136269&ei=1&en=f7706b72d4e51e34
>   The New York Times notes that "spurred by local antiwar sentiment,
>   dozens of cities and counties around the country have passed
>   resolutions imploring President Bush to slow down his confrontation
>   with Iraq. ... City and county councils in 20 states have passed
>   such measures, from small towns like Woodstock, N.Y., to cities as
>   large as Chicago, Philadelphia and Detroit." Well-funded right wing
>   supporters of the march to war "stand ready to try to mobilize a
>   countermovement. Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax
>   Reform, said his organization had sent every state legislature a
>   proposed measure for adoption the day fighting starts that supports
>   Mr. Bush's actions." (Ironically, Norquist has also been working to
>   broker a "strange alliance" between the Republican Party and
>   radical Islam.)
>SOURCE: New York Times, February 1, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/February_2003.html#1044075604
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1044075604
>
>13. LIQUID TRUTH
>http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/31/opinion/31PELL.html?pagewanted=print&position=top
>   The accusation that Iraq has used chemical weapons against its own
>   citizens - Iraqi Kurds at the town of Halabja - is a familiar part
>   of the debate over whether to go to war. According to Stephen C.
>   Pelletiere, however, the facts surrounding that claim have been
>   selectively presented and distorted. "I am in a position to know,"
>   he writes, "because, as the Central Intelligence Agency's senior
>   political analyst on Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war, and as a
>   professor at the Army War College from 1988 to 2000, I was privy to
>   much of the classified material that flowed through Washington
>   having to do with the Persian Gulf. In addition, I headed a 1991
>   Army investigation into how the Iraqis would fight a war against
>   the United States; the classified version of the report went into
>   great detail on the Halabja affair." Pelletiere also suggests that
>   water, rather than oil, may be the main resource at stake in the
>   upcoming war. "We are constantly reminded that Iraq has perhaps the
>   world's largest reserves of oil. But in a regional and perhaps even
>   geopolitical sense, it may be more important that Iraq has the most
>   extensive river system in the Middle East. ... In the 1990s there
>   was much discussion over the construction of a so-called Peace
>   Pipeline that would bring the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates
>   south to the parched Gulf states and, by extension, Israel. No
>   progress has been made on this, largely because of Iraqi
>   intransigence. With Iraq in American hands, of course, all that
>   could change. Thus America could alter the destiny of the Middle
>   East in a way that probably could not be challenged for decades -
>   not solely by controlling Iraq's oil, but by controlling its
>   water."
>SOURCE: New York Times, January 31, 2003
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1043989201
>
>14. H&K NUKES AUSTRALIA
>http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,5914216%255E2682,00.html
>   The Federal Government of Australia has given the Hill & Knowlton
>   PR firm a $300,000 contract to to promote a controversial national
>   nuclear waste dump planned near Woomera in South Australia.
>   Meanwhile, a green coalition has pledged 1 per cent of that figure
>   from its comparatively small funds to launch a "counter-offensive."
>   Federal Science Minister Peter McGauran supports the plan, even
>   though only "a handful" of citizens have submitted comments in
>   support of it. This isn't H&K's first nuclear client. They also
>   handled some of the PR for Metropolitan Edison during its
>   near-meltdown crisis at Three Mile Island.
>SOURCE: The Advertiser (Australia), January 31, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/January_2003.html#1043989200
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1043989200
>
>15. REAL GIRLS HAVE HAMBURGER BUNS
>http://www.time.com/time/health/printout/0,8816,412343,00.html
>   Responding to reports of rising vegetarianism among teenagers, the
>   National Cattlemen's Beef Association "responded to the looming
>   vegetarian crisis by launching a website, Cool 2B Real, in an
>   attempt to link meat consumption with some degree of hipness. The
>   site, which looks like a cross between a Barbie fan page and a Taco
>   Bell ad (beef-filled tacos and gigantic hamburgers dot the screen),
>   extols teenage girls to 'Keep it Real' - 'real' as in a person who
>   eats beef, preferably three or four times a day. Visitors are also
>   invited to send e-cards to their 'real friends' and to tell the
>   world why they are 'real girls' (because they eat beef burritos, of
>   course!)" But Time couldn't resist adding its own pro-beef spin to
>   the story, stating that "New findings from the University of
>   Minnesota link teen vegetarians to a less health-conscious
>   lifestyle than that of their carnivorous peers." Actually, the
>   latest U of M research shows exactly the opposite.
>SOURCE: Time, January 30, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/January_2003.html#1043902800
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1043902800
>
>16. IMAGINING THE WORST
>http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/politics/5052710.htm
>   In his State of the Union address, President Bush asked Americans
>   to imagine what would have happened if the Sept. 11 hijackers had
>   been armed with poison gas or germs. "However, U.S. officials and
>   private analysts said Bush's suggestion that Iraqi leader Saddam
>   Hussein might give such weapons to terrorists - and the implication
>   that the risk of American retaliation can no longer deter him -
>   stretches the analysis of U.S. intelligence agencies to, and
>   perhaps beyond, the limit," reports Warren P. Strobel.
>SOURCE: Associated Press, January 28, 2003
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1043730001
>
>17. TRUST US, WE'RE CORPORATIONS
>http://www.iht.com/articles/84839.html
>   Integrity and good behavior based on "principles" are more
>   important than rules of corporate governance, according to Peter
>   Brabeck-Letmathe, the chief executive of Swiss-based foods giant
>   Nestle (which recently demonstrated its commitment to "principles"
>   by attempting to sue the famine-stricken nation of Ethiopia).
>   Speaking at the same panel in Davos, Switzerland, Margery Kraus of
>   the APCO PR firm offered similar sentiments: "I agree one can never
>   legislate a culture of integrity and trust - it has to start on the
>   inside of companies and build out." (For links to APCO's sordid
>   history and Kraus's work setting up tobacco front groups, see the
>   item below titled "Nice Work if You Can Get It." )
>SOURCE: International Herald Tribune, January 28, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/January_2003.html#1043730000
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1043730000
>
>18. NICE WORK IF YOU CAN GET IT
>http://www.holmesreport.com/holmestemp/story.cfm?edit_id=3000&typeid=1
>   The Holmes Report, a PR industry trade newsletter, has published
>   the results of its survey on the "best PR firms to work for."
>   Winners included:
>        * Fleishman Hillard, whose employees covertly infiltrated and
>   tape-recorded a group that works to stop teenage tobacco addiction
>        * Ketchum Communications, which drafted a Clorox crisis plan
>   that called for labeling environmentalists as terrorists, and also
>   helped fuel the diet drug craze of the 1990s
>        * APCO Associates, whose sleazy work for big tobacco, WorldCom
>   and Russian robber baron Mikhail Khodorkovsky has been detailed
>   here previously.  (Note: APCO is listed in the print edition of the
>   Holmes Report but inexplicably doesn't appear in the online version
>   of this story.)
>SOURCE: Holmes Report, January 27, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/January_2003.html#1043643602
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1043643602
>
>19. COPYRIGHTING FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION"
>http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15026
>   The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998 has given
>   corporations increased power to censor speech that they don't like.
>   It severely curtails the "fair use doctrine which allows artists,
>   writers and scholars to use fragments of copyrighted works without
>   permission for the purposes of education, criticism and parody.
>   Kembrew McLeod notes that trademark law has been used to spike a
>   web site that parodied Dow Chemical, and Vivendi Universal studios
>   used it to kill VivendiUniversalSucks.com on grounds that "certain
>   members of the public ... would be likely to understand 'sucks' as
>   a banal and obscure addition to the reasonably well-known mark
>   Vivendi Universal." Just to prove the absurdity of the law, McLeod
>   has taken out a trademark on the phrase "freedom of expression"
>   itself. "Apparently, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office did not
>   find the idea of someone controlling this phrase morally, socially
>   and politically unsettling, and it granted me ownership of the mark
>   in 1998," he writes.
>SOURCE: AlterNet, January 27, 2003
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/January_2003.html#1043643601
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1043643601
>
>20. CABLE NEWS WARS
>http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=14997
>   The Columbia Journalism Review's Neil Hickey ponders the impact
>   that cable TV is having on news coverage. "The big story in cable
>   news is the effect that supercharged competition is having on the
>   quality of the prime time cable news schedule. All three networks
>   are battling with the same weapons: talk, opinion, punditry, debate
>   - not to mention the psychedelic, color-saturated graphics, a
>   rataplan of computer-generated sound and screens so crowded with
>   info-bits, including a traveling zipper of text across the bottom,
>   that they look like pinball machines in a penny arcade. ... An
>   evening of cable news watching can leave one overstimulated and
>   underinformed n endless garbaging of opinion with little hard
>   information except for scraps of news at the top of the hour."
>SOURCE: AlterNet, January 22, 2003
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1043211601
>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>The Weekly Spin is compiled by staff and volunteers at PR Watch.
>To subscribe or unsubcribe, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/cmd/subscribe_sotd.html
>
>Daily updates and news from past weeks can be found at the
>Spin of the Day" section of the PR Watch website:
>http://www.prwatch.org/spin/index.html
>
>Archives of our quarterly publication, PR Watch, are at:
>http://www.prwatch.org/prwissues
>
>PR Watch, Spin of the Day and the Weekly Spin are projects
>of the Center for Media & Democracy, a nonprofit organization
>that offers investigative reporting on the public relations
>industry. We help the public recognize manipulative and
>misleading PR practices by exposing the activities of
>secretive, little-known propaganda-for-hire firms that
>work to control political debates and public opinion.
>Please send any questions or suggestions about our
>publications to:
>(editor /at/ prwatch.org)
>
>Contributions to the Center for Media & Democracy
>are tax-deductible. Send checks to:
>    CMD
>    520 University Ave. #310
>    Madison, WI 53703
>
>To donate now online, visit:
>https://www.egrants.org/donate/index.cfm?ID=2344-0|1118-0
>_______________________________________________
>Weekly-Spin mailing list
>(Weekly-Spin /at/ prwatch.org)
>http://two.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/weekly-spin

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Carpentier Nico (Phd)
Vrije Universiteit Brussel - Free University Brussels
Studies on Media, Information & Telecommunication (SMIT)
Centre for Media Sociology (CeMeSO)
Office: C0.04
Pleinlaan 2 - B-1050 Brussels - Belgium
T: ++ 32 (0)2-629.18.30
F: ++ 32 (0)2-629.28.61
E-mail: (Nico.Carpentier /at/ vub.ac.be)
W1: http://www.vub.ac.be/SCOM/smit
W2: http://homepages.vub.ac.be/~ncarpent/
W3: http://homepages.vub.ac.be/~jteurlin/Koccc.html
----------------------------------------------------------------------- 


----------------
ECCR-Mailing list
---
To unsubscribe, send an email message to (majordomo /at/ listserv.vub.ac.be)
with in the body of the message (NOT in the subject): unsubscribe eccr
---
ECCR - European Consortium for Communications Research
Secretariat: P.O. Box 106, B-1210 Brussels 21, Belgium
Tel.: +32-2-412 42 78/47
Fax.: +32-2-412 42 00
Email: (freenet002 /at/ pi.be) or (Rico.Lie /at/ pi.be)
URL: http://www.eccr.info
----------------


[Previous message][Next message][Back to index]