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That's it, Valleywag needs an awards show. We'll be taking nominees all year for the Flacky Award — Valleywag's prize for the most ridiculous, clueless, or aggressive people in PR. The first list of nominees comes from Valleywag's archives:

  • Ricochet Public Relations, which publicized MAYA's back-to-the-90s "fill a room with balls" stunt
  • Thunder Factory, who made two senior hires in July, lost them by April, and still have the hiring headline on their site.
  • Thomas PR, which issued a release about gaining a client.
  • The unnamed super-connected flack, whose account brings LinkedIn's servers to their knees.
  • S&S PR, who has the client-history memory span of an Ecstasy-ridden goldfish.

And a new contestant enters the ring: BLASTmedia knew that GUI-rich web analytics were right up Valleywag's alley, so they followed up their press release for client VisiStat with a quick "Any interest in learning more about VisiStat?" five days later. To add some passive to my aggressive, the whole press release (oh boy! dynamically captured visitor habits!) is after the jump.

From: Margie Schaffner To: tips@valleywag.com Date: Apr 24, 2006 12:02 PM Subject: FW: New Silicon Valley-based company provides a better way to count clicks

Hi Nick. Any interest in learning more about VisiStat?

From: Margie Schaffner
Sent: Wednesday, April 19, 2006 3:23 PM
To: 'tips@valleywag.com'
Subject: New Silicon Valley-based company provides a better way to count clicks

Hi Nick—

When Stephen Oachs realized the need for GUI-rich Web analytics that could be easily understood by the masses, he set out to revolutionize the Web analytics marketplace. Frustrated by the complicated process of how web analytics was performed, Stephen Oachs developed VisiStat, Inc., a San Jose-based Web analytics firm focused on next generation analytics solutions.

Visistat, Inc. is an easy-to-use and understand Web analytics service. Originally an in-house solution for Pixelmation Internet Technologies, VisiStat is a Real-time Website hit counter that dynamically captures visitor habits, search engine keyword usage, geographical location, click path, and much more. VisiStat uses StatCasting, which provides users with the ability to monitor their Web analytic information in actual "live time," without the need to reload or refresh the browser window for updates. StatCasted™ reports are updated instantaneously as statistical data arrives; enabling entire reports to be completely in motion as updates are made to the users screen in a "better than real time" format.

I'd love to put you in touch with the entrepreneurs behind VisiStat. Any interest in learning more about VisiStat, Inc.?

Best,
Margie Schaffner
BLASTmedia