Posts by neville:

How to deal with too many choices

Whenever I travel to the US, I get apprehensive. Not about the travel or why I’m visiting the States. No, it’s all to do with breakfast choices. Here’s the scenario. It’s breakfast time in my hotel. I sit and the ever-so-friendly waitress asks me for my order. Apprehension starts if I request eggs. Before I […]

The Hobson and Holtz Report – Podcast #101: January 9, 2006

Content summary: Wal-Mart and a blog crisis; relaunching The Observer and the role of the companion blog; banned words for 2006; is Google Pack for the enterprise?; ZenCast’s new definition of podcast; Lee Hopkins report; listeners’ comments discussions (competitive PR advantage, congrats on 100 and 101 shows, RSS and podcasts in job hunting, call to […]

The anatomy of HIV

Daily Telegraph: This is the first detailed glimpse of one of the most deadly organisms on the planet, one that has killed about 25 million people and now infects another 40 million people, of which about three million will die this year alone. Despite having known for more than two decades that human immunodeficiency virus […]

Clueless BrandWeek magazine

Are blogs a waste of your time and that of your business or clients? Indeed they are, according to BrandWeek magazine in the US: Blogs provide almost no new information. They’re frequently inaccurate. They contribute to the hysterical polarization of our nation’s political discourse. And they’re often written by people who can’t, you know, write. […]

Keep cool with egoSurf

Via Steve Rubel, news of egoSurf, a tool that searches Google and other engines against your name and blog or website, and calculates your ego ranking. Naturally, I gave it a go. it says my ego ranking is 11,845. Is that good? Can I exchange those points for a free flight to New York? That […]

FIR Interview – Gerald R. Baron, author, “Now is Too Late” – January 11, 2006

In this edition of For Immediate Release podcast interviews, Shel enjoyed a 55-minute conversation with Gerald Baron, author of the crisis communications book, "Now is Too Late: Survival in the Era of Instant News." Download the conversation here (MP3, 21MB), or sign up for the Interviews RSS feed to get it and our future interviews […]

The Hobson and Holtz Report – Podcast #102: January 12, 2006

Content summary: Annoying anonymous comments now illegal in the US; political podcasts in the UK by Prime Minister Tony Blair and Conservative leader David Cameron; US army hires Haas MS&L to pitch editorial content to bloggers; Dan York’s report; listeners’ comments discussion; the music. Show notes for January 12, 2006 Welcome to For Immediate Release: […]

Biz-Tech-News: Headlines 13-Jan-06

A JotSpot For Excel Apple’s New (Corporate) Tune Body scanner unveiled at station Disruption in mainstream media but where is the disruption in the mainstream PR industry? Europe’s ‘Google killer’ goes into hiding Google offers personal home page for mobile phones How Brands Evolve, Visually Invasion of the privacy snatchers New PR blogs (a bunch […]

Stupendous Il Divo

I’m not an opera fan by any means (note: lower-case ‘o’ – I’m not talking about the browser), but after listening to Il Divo, I could easily be converted. At least, to this type of opera. On Saturday, my wife bought the DVD of Il Divo: Encore and to say I was blown away watching […]

The Quaero oxymoron

If you’ve been following the story of the Franco-German Quaero project – a planned European multimedia search engine, the answer to Google and brainchild of the French government – you’ll know that European politics have contributed to the mire it’s been in for some months. The Quaero website used to be online and provided useful […]

The Hobson and Holtz Report – Podcast #103: January 16, 2006

Content summary: Podcast print magazine to launch; Dutch publisher to publish newspaper with blog content; Power PR makes accountability "guarantee"; gaining first impressions about websites in the blink of an eye; Wikipedia reveals plagiarism by journalist; Lee Hopkins’ report; the pros and cons of offline blog editors; listeners’ comments discussion (the rescue of advertising; meeting […]

Intelliseek acquired, forms part of new VNU-backed company as VNU looks to be acquired

Two of the leading companies in tracking and analysing what consumers are talking about online have joined forces to create, in the words of the formal press release, the new global standard for measuring and understanding word-of-mouth behavior and influence. Market intelligence firm Intelliseek has been acquired by word-of-mouth research and planning company Buzzmetrics. The […]