Kent State’s latest PR problem is in the comic pages! What would you recommend?

As PR professionals, we all know the importance of monitoring mainstream and social media for mentions of our clients. But does your monitoring system include the comic pages?

Don’t ask my students that question. They don’t read “dead tree” versions of newspapers, and they surely don’t bother with the funny papers. In fact, most will tell you the comics aren’t the least bit funny.

But when today’s edition of Crankshaft mentioned Kent State, one of my Baby Boomer colleagues fired off an email alerting me to the “PR problem” it could create. “What should be do about it,” she asked?

Rather than post my response, I’m asking the ToughSledding faithful for some feedback. What would you do?

Edelman Academic Summit #3: My take, finally…

No rest for the old professor this summer. None at all.

It started with a week of intense training in digital storytelling, followed a 3-week crash course in Ethics & Issues. I was student in the former, teacher in the latter.

In the last week of Ethics, I skipped class for a few days to attend the  Edelman’s New Media Academic Summit in Washington. I won’t rehash the sessions. It’s all on the conference website, and it’s well worth your time. Some excellent case studies.

Teaching students how to write good*

Read it sometime -- if you have the patience, or if you care.

Fixing online communication one post at a time

Someone should step up and rip the blogosphere a new one. Someone should tell the millions of bloggers, plus the tweeters and Facebookers, that good writing still matters. Those who work in communication-related fields should pay special heed.

But I’ll warn you: It won’t change a thing.

I’ve ranted on the bad writing in this space for nearly 3 years, and I’ve done it in classrooms for more than 2 decades. Posts about writing always draw traffic and comments, but with each post I am preaching to the converted.

Bless all of you who still care about good writing. Your numbers are dwindling.

Saying goodbye to the blogroll — at least for now

I deleted my primary blogroll today. If you were on it, don’t take offense. If you used it as a resource — and I doubt anyone did — sorry about that. It was a decision based on transparency.

A few months back, a Twitter friend asked me why I had so-and-so on the blogroll. I had no answer. Fact is, I had seldom read the blogger in question, who made my list based on some witty Twitter comments.

In fact, I read only about one-third of the writers on my blogroll. There isn’t time for more. But their presence on my personal “A” list implies endorsement. I could leave that one-third in place, but even many of those I don’t read consistently.

Everyone from my former blogroll, and quite a few others, remain on the feeder. I check that feeder about once a week. (Sorry, but I’m busy.) I read blogs daily, and I learn from them. But I find the posts mostly via Twitter or Facebook links, or emails from people I know and whose opinions I trust. Call me lazy, but like I said, I’m busy.

Deleting the blogroll may hurt my readership and may result in my eviction from other blogrolls. But it’s not like I depend on this site for income…though maybe I should.

I was thinking about coining the term “blogrolla.” I wonder how many bloggers would pay me for the traffic I send their way. (Wipe that smirk off your face!) As the home of “blogrolla,” I just might raise a few bucks, you know?

I might also raise a few eyebrows for my lack of ethics, but the way things are going in social media, I doubt it.