More Schwarznegger Shock Revelations!
It’s impossible to escape the stories spilling out everywhere about Arnold Schwarzenegger’s love child – but did you know about the Sperminator’s long-lost half brother? Neither did I, but then I saw the clip below – a clip from Russian TV featuring a terrible mime from a man who looked vaguely familiar. I did a […]
Trial by Twitter
Continuing the debate on the challenges that the PR industries face in the digital age, the Dominique Strauss-Kahn affair underlines some of the issues that I opened for discussion last week. It’s a hot topic, particularly as the story has broken at a time when many companies are becoming less and less tolerant of any […]
Careful what you wish for in the new communications age
According to Private Eye, Times media correspondent Patrick Foster was sacked after being earwigged by the BBC’s head of Press during a call in which he made a rather inappropriate comment to Caroline Thomson, the BBC’s chief operating officer. Paul Mylrea, head of press at the Beeb, swiftly raced off a letter of complaint to […]
Remembering the Legends of Journalism
My favourite website of the moment remembers a long forgotten media age and celebrates the memory of a breed of journalism that seems to have vanished. The website is thegentlemenranters.com and it features splendid stories and reminiscences about such legends as the late Peter Batt and Leo Clancy, both of whom died recently.
Super-Injunctions and Changing the Way We Think
This is the modern age, the age of the super-injunction, the age when celebrities want to keep their dirty laundry in bomb- and journalist-proof cages so that not even the slightest whiff of scandal can escape. Of course, it’s just not as easy as that, as the furore over someone posting information on Twitter about […]
The Ghosts of Business Nightmares Past
I’ll be appearing on BBC2 next week, as one of the interviewees in three part series Business Nightmares, with Evan Davis. I’ll be appearing in all three episodes, which cover product design and manufacture, marketing and PR and strategy and deals, discussing stories such as Sunny Delight, Hoover free flights, Ratner, Mini, New Coke and […]
Changing Narratives and the Death of Osama Bin Laden
The ever-changing narratives surrounding the ritualistic slaying of Osama Bin Laden has spewed up a slew of conundrums. It should also teach publicists valuable lessons about the pitfalls of a contemporary story engine, brand messaging turned cariacature and the conditions of the modern news mill. Instinctively, a good publicist understands how to engineer a simple […]
The Royal Wedding: Rebranding the House of Windsor?
The marriage of Princess Diana’s son struck a new beginning -the British Monarchy. Prince William is the great white hope, a fresh face with his mother’s heart and compassion. He will, in time, lead the Firm into a new age. The question is when?
The relaunch of the brand involved an extraordinary, experiential three ring circus full of pomp and pageantry. Tinged with a bourgeois romance and a certain playfulness, the wedding was sealed with a snog that adorned the front pages from Stockport to Shanghai.
Spin, Weddings, Money and the House of Windsor
Piers Morgan dismisses the idea that the British Secret services ever murdered anyone. In a new movie documentary feature, Unlawful Killing, Piers suggests, if MI5 don’t kill the baddies, what’s the point of them? I feel that the new Royal couple may have a similar problem. I might have got hold of the wrong end […]
The Art of Change
Is there any excuse for a deferral, hidden behind the familiar “no comment”? For the first time in my career, I find myself pondering this Churchillian aphorism. “No comment” is a splendid expression which I am using again and again. My old cohorts launched a new offering via PR Week last week, which naturally pasted […]
The Cowell Question
The Observer is asking the big question – is Svengali in chief Simon Cowell essential to the X Factor? Two journalists debate the pros and cons, intersecting the public conversation surrounding Cowell’s migration to America. But neither address Cowell’s principal ingredient, his enormous power to influence the hype and guide the off-screen narrative. After watching […]
The Generation of Now
Of course PR folk and their clients need to address the challenges that face them in a world where social networks are revolutionizing the planet. We know we need to engage a whole new generation of consumers whose values are being reshaped almost daily by their new social dialogue. It’s now harder then ever to […]
Struggling with Reality
It’s an absolute fact that once you’re in the public eye everything changes. Politicians in particular struggle to get used to being public property. Perhaps it should be called the Camcleg law of diminishing contact with everyday realities, at least for the duration of this Parliament. ‘Call-me-Dave’ Cameron and his wife Sam’s latest PR stunt […]
The Hard Sell and the Hard Truth
“Can PR be honest?” people outside the industry have been known to ask. Can it, as an industry, stand up and tell hard truths occasionally? There seems to be a suspicion that the industry takes in the less scholarly in the same way the clergy used to in centuries past. People prone to toe the […]
The Evil That Men Do
In the wake of coming home from Poland and reconnecting, with an astonishing amount of clarity and detail, with my roots, I am finding it hard to adjust to the idea of April Fool’s Day when there seems to be so much capacity for evil in the world. Is humanity essentially evil? Are we really […]
A Borkowski March in Links
I’ve been in and out of the papers this month, commenting on a number of subjects, from the perils of PR spin on behalf of dictators to Sarah Ferguson’s latest misadventures by way of the redemption of Chris Brown and, since I’ve been in Poland, as mentioned in my previous blog, I hope you’ll pardon […]
What's In A Name?
What’s in a name? That’s the question I have been asking myself this week. Back in the day, I thought that trading under my name was a great idea. Some have challenged the conceit, but it was the need to create a family business that was my biggest inspiration. I was proud of my father […]
Remembering Jay Landesman
I went to the wake for Jay Landesman yesterday evening and it was wonderful to see a collective spirit present and some great people gathered to pay tribute to the great man. Perry Benson was there; John Cooper Clarke paid tribute in his inimitable style; it was also great to see the amazing Jim Haynes, […]
Because we all need a laugh sometimes…
Because it’s been an unrelenting year so far, and because we all need a good laugh, and because Victor Lewis Smith is a funny man, and because we always need reminding how awful Little Chef is, here’s Victor’s wonderful review of Little Chef from the Guardian six years ago. And here’s the link to the […]
Elizabeth Taylor: A Star Blinks Out
One of the last goddesses from the pantheon of great Hollywood stars has died. Let’s give thanks for the life of true movie icon Elizabeth Taylor. As a fledgling publicist I met her retinue at a film shoot at a long forgotten theatre, axed by funding cuts in another age. The encounter left an indelible […]