7 PR Lessons Komen for the Cure Didn’t Know It Was Giving You
Update at 11:40 am ET: Since this post was published, Komen has restored funding to Planned Parenthood, which you can read via this statement they released today. Special thanks to Jen Zingsheim for noting in the comments that she learned this via Jezebel, which is how I found out.
I’ve been fascinated by the way the Komen drama – over its new grant policies resulting in withdrawing funds for most of the Planned Parenthood programs that were formerly recipients – has been unfolding.
Kind of like watching a train wreck, isn’t it? That’s what it feels like to me, at least.
Before we go any further: I do care about women’s health (I have my own issues that I deal with every day), and have donated to Komen by supporting friends who’ve participated in their walks, but not directly. I have friends who’ve survived breast cancer (among other cancers). I briefly met Nancy Brinker some years ago, when I was a “scrub” on a client event, and the American Institute for Cancer Research is a former client.
Black Swans and Ground Hogs: Communication, Not Prediction
Happy Groundhog Day, WUL readers!
If you are anything like me, you’re a big fan of the once famous Bill Murray movie surrounding one of the littlest celebrated holidays in American culture.
It’s a day when a small number of people in Pennsylvania wait to see whether or not a rodent of the family Sciuriade “thinks”certain meteorological conditions will persist for six weeks or if inhabitants of the northeast US will be able to break out their flip flops a little early.
This annual ritual, if taken seriously, leaves a slew of questions for any hard-nosed reporter who can’t take a joke:
- For starters, how do we know if Punxsutawney Phil is afraid of his shadow or something else?
- Have scientists developed some unusual way of communicating with groundhogs or translating their grunts or gibbering into language as we know it today?
- And who exactly are the top hat-donning handlers, known as the Inner Circle, who take care of Phil?
Toon Time: Twitter Introductions
Erin Feldman is the marketing communications manager at TouchSystems, a touch screen company based in Hutto, Texas. Her background is in marketing and creative writing, and she riffs about writing right at her blog, Write Right (so write right, don’t make her use her red pen). She spends the rest of her time writing poetry, drawing, reading, and running.
