When Will Bill Gates Blog?

Over at the Church of the Customer blog Ben McConnell asks when will Bill Gates blog? Excellent question. He points out that Microsoft already has 400 bloggers. I think it's just a matter of time.

Right now CEO blogging is more on the fringe. It's limited to very outspoken execs like Jupitermedia's Alan Meckler or HDnet's Mark Cuban. However, by the end of the decade every extrovert chief executive who still is not scared of the blogosphere will blog - perhaps on a private Weblog for key customers/stockholders.

My question is, who will write these posts? A corporate speech writer? The Chief Communications Officer? Or maybe the top dog him or herself. I'm not sure, but what I do know is that the blog has to be genuine to be considered credible.

If anyone has experiences or opinions here, please leave comments.

Blogs as the Afterworld for Interesting Articles

It's no secret that PR pros are paid to place positive stories about internal or external clients in the press. Even some journalists, albeit begrudgingly, will admit that they rely on PR pros, even if it’s just as facilitators.

When this system works properly, it’s symbiotic. The journalist shares valuable information with readers/viewers; news perhaps never told before. On the flip side, PR pros get to build client brand awareness through media coverage that often is fair and balanced (no Fox News Channel pun intended here). Once the mating dance is over, the journalist and publicist each go to their respective corners, on to the next great adventure…but maybe that shouldn’t be the case.

The blogosphere is the media afterworld. It’s where good stories go to live, not die. After a story runs online there’s an opportunity for PR pros to extend the shelf life of the story. You can do this by selectively notifying relevant blogs who cover your space that there’s a item they may want to blog. I have done this on a number of occasions and it has breathed new life into what some would say is old news. This needs to be approached carefully, however – a pitch letter doesn’t suffice. It’s just a short heads-up. Setting up topical RSS feeds just for bloggers to use is an alternative.

Interestingly, however, some journalists are also getting into the same game. Media companies, as I have pointed out, have an increasing need to build their brands. As some content companies build walled gardens, others encourage journalists to alert Weblogs about their scoops. Jim Romenesko told PR Week last week (story unavailable online) that he loves to hear from journalists who have broken big stories. And, what’s more, on his site Romensko clearly encourages them to send him tips.

As more and more “thin media” sites populate the blogosphere, there is a lot of potential for both journalists and PR pros to share relevant stories with even larger audiences than ever imagined. The key question on my mind as I write this is – if PR people and journalists are both actively pitching bloggers on the same stories, why can’t they work together to achieve the same goal?

RSS Readers: Tivo for the Web

The Online Journalism Review has a roundup review of all of the different "Newsreader" software apps; how they continue to improve, allowing infowarriors better ways to find and assemble what they are looking for on the Web. OJR says RSS may be to the Web what TiVo was to TV. That's a terrific analogy.

My personal RSS reader picks - Bloglines and Kinja.

rexblog Offers PR Tips

Rex Hammock shares an anecdote on his rexblog that he feels can help PR pros figure out the role of Weblogs in the news dissemination process.

The morale, according to Rex?

1. Stop sending out press releases.

2. Recruit a blogger from senior management who will blog constantly with a personal voice and conviction, but rarely say anything about your company.

3. Wait three years and one day an item from that blog may get picked up by a "real" news source.

Stanford Student Interviews Shayne Bowan

Stanford University communications grad student Daniel Kreiss has posted on his blog thoughts from an interview he conducted with Shayne Bowan, co author of WE Media (which I hope to review on this blog at some point). Bowan is a consultant on Web-design and content for media companies and also the former Chief of Development for Belo Interactive.

Kreiss' interview focuses on participatory media, the future the mainstream press, and how on-line relationships spill over into the off-line world.