THE WEEKLY SPIN, March 29, 2006

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THIS WEEK'S NEWS

== SPIN OF THE DAY ==
1. B-Roll Bypasses Policies Against Fake News
2. As the Worldview Turns
3. Somebody's Watching You
4. The Selling of a Wonder Drug
5. Can You Feel the Love?
6. 'Ad/PR Man' Wants to Buy Newspaper
7. You Say 'Influence,' I Say 'Propaganda'
8. PR Pros To The Rescue

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== SPIN OF THE DAY ==

1. B-ROLL BYPASSES POLICIES AGAINST FAKE NEWS
http://www.prweek.com/uk/login/?fuseaction=required&nNewsID=548717
Former producer of BBC World's World Business Report and a former
editor at CNBC, Jules Heynes, told PR Week UK that corporate
supplied video footage - referred to as B-roll - is commonly
broadcast even when stations have a policy against its use. "We used
B-roll a lot -­ footage often ends up in the library and is used
for stock shots," said Heynes, who is now client development
director with the major B-roll and video news release producer,
Medialink Worldwide. A recent B-roll by Medialink for the mobile
phone company, Orange, was used 494 times on 67 TV channels. "It
carried out a similar exercise for Orange at the opening
of Louis Vuitton's flagship Paris store on the Champs Elysees -­
and its B-roll was used 380 times," PR Week reports.
SOURCE: PR Week, March 23, 2006 (Sub req'd.)
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
http://www.prwatch.org/node/4683

2. AS THE WORLDVIEW TURNS
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2006/03/27/BL2006032700367.html
With public opinion turning against President Bush, the news media
may have also reached a "turning point on Iraq," according to Howard
Kurtz. The White House has responded with a two-tiered approach: (1)
attack the messenger, accusing journalists of failing to report good
news from Iraq (such as the collapse of reconstruction efforts?);
and (2) schmooze reporters in off-the-record briefings, where Bush
asks to "chew the fat" and makes small talk with reporters about
their families.
SOURCE: Washington Post, March 27, 2006
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
http://www.prwatch.org/node/4682

3. SOMEBODY'S WATCHING YOU
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/environment/la-na-fbi27mar27,1,752257.story
"The FBI, while waging a highly publicized war against terrorism,
has spent resources gathering information on antiwar and
environmental protesters and on activists who feed vegetarian meals
to the homeless," reports Nicholas Riccardi. According to
environmental activist Kirsten Atkins, who wound up in an FBI
terrorism file after she attended a protest against the lumber
industry, "They don't know where Osama bin Laden is, but they're
spending money watching people like me."
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, March 27, 2006
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
http://www.prwatch.org/node/4681

4. THE SELLING OF A WONDER DRUG
http://society.guardian.co.uk/health/story/0,,1741858,00.html?gusrc=rss
Four years ago, almost no one had heard of Herceptin. Today, the
drug is a household name, and British women with early-stage breast
cancer are going to court for the right to get it, even though it is
not actually licensed for use in early-stage cancer, and clinical
tests have yet to prove it will ever save lives. Sarah Boseley
reports on the role played by the Ketchum PR firm to help promote
the drug for Roche Pharmaceuticals through support for patient
groups such as CancerBACUP, which gets a significant chunk of its
funding from Roche and other drug companies. According to one
survey, 18 of 24 major patient groups in the UK accept drug-company
money. "It is not just the patient groups that drug companies hope
to get support from," Bosely writes. "They also want 'opinion
leaders' - people with credibility who can be quoted in the papers
and on TV. ... But patient groups are the most rewarding target and
there is an obvious risk that they could be influenced by companies
with turnovers as large as the GDP of small nations."
SOURCE: Guardian (UK), March 29, 2006
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
http://www.prwatch.org/node/4680

5. CAN YOU FEEL THE LOVE?
http://www.slate.com/id/2138082/entry/2137077/
Slate.com's Senior Writer Timothy Noah kicked off their new Hot
Documents feature with a series of emails between disgraced
Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff and Amy Ridenour, Executive
Director of the right-wing National Center for Public Policy
Research. In their gushing exchange, it is clear that Ridenour can't
do enough to make sure that Abramoff's clients are pleased with
their investments. How willing a mouthpiece is she? "Eager enough,
apparently, that Ridenour was willing to grind out an op-ed piece, a
letter to the editor, and a press release extolling the virtues of
Abramoff's clients." Abramoff does nothing to dampen the enthusiasm
of his friend. You can only imagine her blushing with pleasure when
she read that "The execs at PB (Abramoff client Pitney-Bowes) are
delighted, ecstatic, and very pleased all wrapped up in a big happy
feeling" as a result of her authoring and placing an op-ed favorable
to their exhibit on Black History, while taking a swipe at Black
History Month itself.
SOURCE: Slate.com
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
http://www.prwatch.org/node/4679

6. 'AD/PR MAN' WANTS TO BUY NEWSPAPER
http://www.odwyerpr.com/members/0328tierney.htm
There are many bright ideas out there for the future of the 12
Knight-Ridder newspapers on the auction block, ideas that have
generated discussion about the news media's responsibility to the
public and democracy. O'Dwyer's PR Daily, however, reports that one
group of investors wanting to buy the Philadelphia Inquirer and the
Philadelphia Daily News includes "ad/PR man" Brian Tierney, who "had
a high-profile spat with the Inquirer during the late '90s over its
coverage of then-Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua," O'Dwyer's reports.
"Working on behalf of the Philadelphia Roman Catholic Archdiocese,
Tierney successfully convinced the Inquirer editors to spike a story
about Bevilacqua .... Editor & Publisher ran a feature about the
squabble on Feb. 5, '01. It was headlined: 'Stop the Press: The
Inside Philadelphia Story of How a Cardinal and his Publicity Agent
Cowed a Great Newspaper.'"
SOURCE: O'Dwyer's PR Daily (sub req'd), March 28, 2006
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
http://www.prwatch.org/node/4675

7. YOU SAY 'INFLUENCE,' I SAY 'PROPAGANDA'
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/25/AR2006032500983.html
In an interview with the Washington Post, the Lincoln Group's Paige
Craig and Andrew Garfield vaguely discussed the firm's "influence" -
not propaganda - work for the U.S. government, with whom they have
12 contracts totaling more than $130 million. The Post's Lynne Dukes
writes that Craig and Garfield "make much of their assertion that
they traffic in the truth. It's as if they think truth and
propaganda are mutually exclusive. But consider this: 'For a long
time, propagandists have recognized that lying must be avoided,'
wrote Jacques Ellul in his classic 1965 work, Propaganda: The
Formation of Men's Attitudes. For the masses to believe it,
'propaganda must be based on some truth that can be said in a few
words and is able to linger in the collective consciousness.'" Lynne
writes, however, that the truth can also be "inconvenient," pointing
to the fact - hidden from the Iraq public - that the upbeat "news"
stories translated and placed by the Lincoln Group in Iraqi media
were written by U.S. soldiers
SOURCE: Washington Post, March 26, 2006
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
http://www.prwatch.org/node/4673

8. PR PROS TO THE RESCUE
http://www.prweek.com/us/news/article/547196/pr-pros-aid-overworked-journalists/
PR Week's Hamilton Nolan offers a candid, if not glib, analysis of
the Project for Excellence in Journalism's third annual "State of
the News Media" report, which looks at major trends in American news
media. "Not surprisingly, into the maw of overworked journalists and
reticent corporate owners comes the PR industry. The simple fact is
that the less staff a newsroom has, the less time a reporter has to
devote to gathering news, and the more receptive a reporter is
likely to be to a PR pitch," Nolan writes. "Reporters themselves
would undoubtedly chafe at the idea that friendly PR pros are happy
to step up and do their jobs for them. But deadlines are deadlines,
word counts are word counts, and Happy Hour at the bar next door to
the newspaper's office ends at 8pm sharp. The Project for Excellence
in Journalism may have unwittingly signaled the beginning of a new
'Project for Excellence in Media Relations,' which will offer tired
journalists an increasingly tempting crutch."
SOURCE: PR Week, March 20, 2006
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
http://www.prwatch.org/node/4623