Post-publication, I had an additional thought about the SEC's recent "Netflix Patch" with regard to fair disclosure of material information on social media. It's easy for folks to look at this announcement as the death of the wire services. But here's one thing those services offer that, say, an IR blog or a corporate Facebook account does not: data integrity. You transmit that earnings announcement on a wire service and, short of an additional transmission, you can't really modify what you've said--that toothpaste has left the tube. You put up a Tweet, it can be deleted. A Facebook post can be modified. It takes more sophistication than the average investor has to determine what occurred to the original post. There isn't a lot of confidence, then, that what you saw was the same thing that someone else did. This highly important point is relegated to the second-to-the-last paragraph in an... Continue reading

I have a post up at Edelman.Com about the news of the NYPD's social media policy. From the piece, called "The Thin Blue (Digital) Line": A balance must be achieved here. One could argue that we have a very strong incentive to know as much as we possibly can about those we pay to protect us. So, we should want members of law enforcement to be online as much as is practical, so long as it doesn’t interfere with their duties or compromise loved ones. A policy, if too-broadly drawn, may have a chilling effect at precisely the time when citizens desire more transparency from their government. Continue reading

Had the great fortune of working with Jeff Zilka and Rich Myers from Edelman's Financial Communications and Investor Relations team on this analysis of the SEC's recent decision about social media and material disclosure. From the article: On April 2, 2013 (a date perhaps chosen to avoid a misunderstanding), the SEC issued clarification about social media’s role in disclosure. This was in response to a controversial Facebook post by Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, who posted the achievement of a business milestone on Facebook. This sparked renewed debate about the topic of what constitutes “disclosure” on the social Web. The intersection of online citizenship, corporate communications, and regulatory pressures represents the most exciting area of our industry today. Continue reading

I'm featured in a virtual roundtable this week in The New York Times' "Room for Debate". The topic is a favorite of mine: employee online behavior. From my contribution: Business in the information age is, in large part, governed by Industrial Age rules intended to restrain J.D. Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan and so on — bit-and-byte realities wrestling with concrete and steel legacies. It will prove interesting to see these laws and policies applied to corporate social media governance. I'm also joined by my good friend Daliah Saper, who writes: Even if a company did not create a “don’t act stupid” policy, it could easily fire or discipline its employees for posting inappropriate photos to Facebook or disclosing proprietary information on Twitter. Employees, in turn, should know that their conduct in public – including social media accounts visible to outsiders – can expose them to career repercussions. Continue reading

Given the attention around BP and Wikipedia, I struck up a correspondence with Brian Merchant at Vice. The result is this interview, which covers a wide range of topics relevant to Wikipedia, corporate communications, online reputation and, of course, CREWE. The following quote pretty much encapsulates where my head has been at for the past several months: I think the PR industry in general needs to attain a visceral understanding of hacker and open-source culture if it is going to continue to be meaningful in an always-on, hierarchy-averse, release-early-release-often world. Look for more thinking from me in this vein. Continue reading

In the wake of Google's shuttering of its beloved Reader service for RSS aggregation, I'm reading some posts rehashing the idea that simply following the right people or sources on Twitter is a better way to go. I disagree. Let's put aside the fact that we're not talking about a mutually exclusive choice and there's room for both in one's information-consumption workflow. I'm not saying that Twitter is useless as an information source or that a well-managed Tweetdeck won't provide great value. Many of the sources that I rely on to stay out front actually do not use Twitter. The reason why I'm at all successful in what I do is that I try to ignore the majority of the social media punditocracy as much as professional responsibility will allow. Nevertheless, I must follow that group in any case, owing to said responsibilities. So, in that small but important slice... Continue reading

A sad day, but... Wow... What a rich, full, incredible, inspiring life. I remember the first meeting I had with Dan in 2006, talking about WWII, California wines, Vincent Price, etc. He briefly lamented he had to give up handball sometime in his 70s, which I found both funny and, even in my 30s, enviable. I wanted to record the discussion for earSHOT, which was the Edelman podcast that I briefly hosted. "Phil... You think we can just talk?", he asked. I scribbled notes like a madman. Fascinating discussion. I will never forget it. I shot this photo during the celebration of the firm's 60th Anniversary. Captured a moment for me that I couldn't quite describe at the time. Thoughts and prayers are with the Edelman family. Continue reading

The folks at ComplianceX appear to agree with me: The post on Facebook was available immediately to over 200,000 subscribers to Hastings’ Facebook account. It is also not clear how many of these subscribers are Netflix investors or equity analysts. It is clear however that posting on Facebook removes any advantage for the equity analysts and professional traders who monitor the press releases closely. If the SEC goes forward with this action against Netflix, it will signal that they are trying to restrict, not expand the sources that investors have for obtaining information about companies. This is exactly the opposite of what they should be doing. See my previous post on this topic for context. Photo Credit: ebayink Continue reading

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings posted the following on the company's Facebook page in July and it recently earned him the ire of the Securities & Exchange Commision: Netflix monthly viewing exceeded 1 billion hours for the first time ever in June. I'm no expert in securities law, but it seems to me that the case for materiality here is fairly weak. An analyst mentions in the related Reuters piece that this post caused the stock to go up from $70 to $80 that day, so of course it was "material". I see at least three things wrong with this argument. First, if the market's reactions were, alone, the test for materiality, then no one would say anything, anywhere, ever, about their business aside from turgid press releases and regulatory filings. Second, I suppose any analysts who are crying foul are doing so because A) they were caught not paying attention,... Continue reading

Dan Primack's must-read "Term Sheet" newsletter today pointed me to Bessemer Ventures' "Anti-Portfolio" page--a list of venture opportunities with spectacular exits that the firm, for whatever reason, decided to pass on. It's chock-full of names you know, going back decades. Whatever the reason, we would like to honor these companies--our "anti-portfolio"--whose phenomenal success inspires us in our ongoing endeavors to build growing businesses. Or, to put it another way: if we had invested in any of these companies, we might not still be working. Photo Credit: San Diego Air & Space Museum Continue reading

Wisdom from Fred Wilson, who sees a fundamental communications disconnect in the current mania about promoting ionospheric startup valuations: Here's my point. We, the tech/startup/VC world, are not doing ourselves any favors by bragging about the big valuations we are raising money at. We are in fact doing ourselves great harm. Because it makes us look like spoiled brats who are being fed with a silver spoon. Those inside these companies (Spotify, Airbnb, Square, Twitter, etc, etc) know that is not what is really going on. We know how hard it is to build something really new and different. It is a struggle and nothing comes easy. But it is important to realize how the broader world sees it. And they just see billions. And then you get the attacks that I mentioned above. via www.avc.com Continue reading

I've been interviewed by Jake Ocaasi about Wikipedia, CREWE, PR and other related matters over at Wikipedia's Signpost newsletter. We cover the topics of ethics, conflicts of interest, and PR's role in online communities among other topics. Photo Credit: Josh Hallett Continue reading

Dear 95% of email newsletter publishers, I'm not one of those obnoxious "X Technology is Dead" types. In truth, there's some information I get from social sharing environments, some from my hundreds of RSS feeds, some from print sources, and (yes) some from good ol' email newsletters. As to the newsletters, though, it's clear that some of you aren't even trying. It's a shame. They say that an infinite number of monkeys with an infinite amount of time and typewriters could produce the work of Shakespeare. You: Two monkeys sharing a broken IBM Selectric for six minutes. Tops. This is why I unsubscribed from your newsletter: I didn't subscribe to it in the first place. Yes, anti-spam laws be damned, you felt that I so needed to be exposed to your peri-professional crowdsourced rantings that you inserted my name into your database. (One of you managed to find almost all... Continue reading

From Politico: Lawmakers are tiptoeing around issues that could tick off tech heavyweights such as Google or Amazon. They don’t want a legislative misstep to trigger the same kind of online revolt that killed the Stop Online Piracy Act in the House and the Protect IP Act in the Senate in January. Good. Given the choice between a powerful government and a powerful technology community engaged in free enterprise, I'll take the latter. Reminded of the Thomas Jefferson quote: "When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty." Continue reading

My latest contribution to EdelmanDigital.Com is up. Perhaps the most under-utilized Web resources in the communications world are the Web sites offered by international governing bodies. Therein lies a wealth of information that often goes overlooked. Go to the site to read more. Continue reading

Was honored to join Richard Edelman, Robert Holdheim, Mark Hass and Steve Rubel as co-contributors in the "Social Media In Action" chapter of The Handbook of Strategic Public Relations & Integrated Marketing (2nd Ed.), edited by Northwestern's PR professor par excellence, Clarke Caywood. I recently gave a video interview regarding the themes in my contributions to that chapter. Here it is below. Continue reading

Introducing CREWE: Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Engagement Continue reading

There is great tension between companies and Wikipedia and I’m not sure how the public is properly served by this state of affairs. Contrary to popular imagination, most corporate communications practitioners want to do the right thing. This post is intended as a basis for discussion. Continue reading

The PRSA has managed to make quite a bit of noise around its crowdsourcing effort aimed at coming up with a new definition of "public relations." As with any such effort, there's always the risk that individuals or groups with zero, limited or even slanted knowledge of public relations will chime in. There will also likely be a number of agenda-driven folks aimed at unfairly smearing PR. Here are a few possibilities: Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI): "PR makes you really fat." Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA): "PR requires a helmet, handrails, and skid-proof surfaces at all times." Food & Drug Administration (FDA): "This letter concerns PRSA's marketing of the "Public Relations...Defined" communications and marketing initiative. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reviewed the label and labeling, including statements made on your website at the Internet addresses www.prsa.org and prsay.prsa.org. Based on claims made by PRSA... Continue reading

As some of you know, I'm pursuing my MBA degree by way of the executive program at Purdue University's Calumet campus. This after more than 15 years in public relations. A few folks have asked me "Why?" Here's my way around an answer. (And, no, writing about my MBA plans during this whole Occupy Wall Street distraction isn't meant to be intentionally provocative.) First, and to be perfectly frank, I miss school. I seem to do pretty well at keeping myself occupied and curious when it comes to learning new things, but it's often been a solitary or, when not, fleeting experience. This program is neither: Even at an accelerated pace, I will be committed nearly every Saturday between now and February 2013, to say nothing of the homework—about 8-15 hours/week worth. Fortunately, the class (about two-dozen folks) are all from varied backgrounds and bring different experiences. Within that, I've... Continue reading

I recently gave a speech to PRSA's Central Ohio chapter. The topic was how an organization can ease themselves into becoming a social business by looking at the communications tasks that it currently performs and evaluating how social technologies and philosophies can accelerate and improve those tasks in the service of a broad communications strategy. They managed to capture my post-talk thoughts on the way out the door to the airport. Continue reading

Three years ago this month, I started a blog called "Cachaçagora." Long story short, my wife is from Rio de Janeiro and her mom and stepdad are evangelists for well-made cachaça (pronounced "ka-SHAH-suh"). Distilled from sugarcane juice, cachaça is the national alcoholic beverage of Brazil and the third most-distilled spirit in the world. Of the 1.3 billion liters or so that the country produces among its more than 5,000 distillers of widely varying quality, only a fraction of a percent makes it to the northern hemisphere. (The balance that stays in Brazil amounts to about six or seven liters for every man, woman and child in the country, which perhaps helps explain Carnaval to some of you.) One day while in Rio, generally relaxing with my laptop and waiting for folks to get ready, something occured to me while I was going through some feeds. It seems that the sole... Continue reading

From my contribution this week to Edelman Digital's Friday Five newsletter: I’m often called in to help write or evaluate social media policies for clients across our global network. In addition, I have a folder on my laptop bursting with policies that I’ve found from other companies. I spend a lot of time with these documents in my role, 10 percent of which involves being like the firm’s “Emily Post” of the Web. Over time, I’ve noticed that there are a number of elements that social media policies tend to miss. Here are five of them. More over at EdelmanDigital.Com. Photo Credit: William Couch under Creative Commons. Continue reading

Had the great pleasure of participating in Episode #101 of This Week in Law, hosted by Denise Howell and Evan Brown. My fellow guest was IT professional Jason Watkins. Talked about social media policies, sportscasting, Quora, ICE, Wikileaks, fake Steve Jobs, fake Rahm Emanuel, sexting, and Charlie Sheen. Plugged The Pirate's Dilemma (still my favorite marketing book) and UIC's Flourish Conference (April 1 - 3, where my wife and I volunteer). Here are Denise's complete show notes. Continue reading