flackery

Gawker Operative Barred From Flackery Conclave

Hamilton Nolan · 07/25/08 12:14PM

This morning, Republican political attack hack Roger Stone traveled to the offices of 5WPR-the firm led by legendarily inept attack flack Ronn [sic] Torossian-to give a speech entitled "The World As It Really Is." (Dirty, we presume). One brave Gawker reader, Stephen Kosloff, answered our call and agreed to go cover the event. But when our operative arrived, Ronn asked him who sent him-and he gave an honest answer. That was his downfall! We pick up his tale of woe as he enters the room where the event will take place, and prepares to start his reporting:

Comical PR Man Has No Time For Editing Or Democracy

Hamilton Nolan · 07/24/08 09:08AM

As soon as you see an op-ed which begins, "As the owner of one of the 25th largest public relations agencies in the U.S.," you should immediately guess that it's an opus by none other than language-challenged sock puppeteer and unapologetically incompetent superflack Ronn [sic] Torossian, head of 5WPR. "Let's begin with the basics: Bribery is unacceptable, yet for a democracy or civilized government, it is wholly abhorrent," writes Ronn. Please explain, sir!

Why Does A Flack Want To "Help" A Reporter?

Hamilton Nolan · 07/23/08 01:11PM

A flack named Peter Shankman (who enjoys getting tased) has built up quite a little reporter-helping service! Through a free website, Helpareporter.com, Shankman takes in queries from reporters in search of sources for random stories, and then sends those queries out to the PR world, who-coincidentally-like to be featured sources. Everybody wins! Except for the other reporter-source website called Profnet, which does the same thing, but charges a big fee to flacks to participate:

Consumers Bored With This Whole 'Save The Earth' Thing

Hamilton Nolan · 07/18/08 08:42AM

Well, it's been a year or two since the corporate world started its "green" advertising revolution, and it's worked. The problem is solved! The problem being the fickle consumer's desire to hear companies talk about how "green" they are. "After 18 months, levels of concern on any issue tend to drop off," explains one marketing wizard. Now we can all sit back and feel good about what we've accomplished! The earth is still destined for environmental ruin, but at least we'll be subjected to less marketing bastardization like this:

Sad Flacks Secretly Edit Their Boss's Own Wikipedia Page

Hamilton Nolan · 07/16/08 09:09AM

An IP address affiliated with America's most inept agency, 5WPR, was used to edit the Wikipedia entry about 5W's CEO, incompetent superflack and bad apologizer Ronn [sic] Torossian. This is the same IP address that the agency was using to leave fake blog comments, which it was busted for last week. Hey 5W, you guys think you could stop doing this stuff? It's really depressing to cover you. After the jump, a look at the major edit of Ronn's page, which is now flagged for sounding "like a news release.":

"Children have become fashion accessories"

Hamilton Nolan · 07/15/08 10:42AM

Times columnist Joe Nocera is a busy man, and he doesn't have time for flackery and foolishness. But he recently got one press release "so brazen, so craven, so mind-bogglingly inane" that he had to put it on his blog for the world to revile. And coincidentally it's from a flack who also blogs at Huffington Post! Do you need to make sure all the other moms in the park are insanely jealous of you and your stylish little drooling brood? Let Amanda Christine Miller tell you how to turn your children into mere fashion accessories!

Scheme To Blame Intern For PR Fraud Unravels

Ryan Tate · 07/11/08 03:24AM

It's not entirely surprising that the PR firm that misspelled the online signature of the guy they were trying to impersonate has now been busted for ineptly trying to blame an unidentified "intern" for everything. Bumbling disaster of a publicity shop 5WPR posted, in the name of a rabbi, fake blog comments about a sweatshoppy kosher slaughterhouse. When busted, senior vice president Juda Engelmayer blamed an unpaid 5WPR intern who he refused to name. Now, news service JTA is severely undercutting this explanation by reporting it traced one of the fake comments to Engelmayer's home (in part by matching the internet address of a comment to the internet address of an Engelmayer email). Whoops! Hard to blame interns at the office when the stuff is coming from your own pad. How are you going to explain this one, Juda?

5WPR Scares Holy Man With Sock Puppet, Blames Intern

Hamilton Nolan · 07/10/08 12:01PM

Incompetent flackery factory 5WPR has admitted to the internet sock puppetry we covered yesterday-posting fake comments on a blog on behalf of a client. That client, by the way, is a kosher slaughterhouse called Agriprocessors, which has long been under fire for workplace safety and immigration law violations. 5W CEO and paragon of employee satisfaction Ronn [sic] Torossian told The Forward that an investigation is underway to determine who's responsible for the fake comments. But even though Ronn is a friend to Israel, he already has a Rabbi scared for his own safety. Shame! Incompetent shame:

5WPR Flacks Get So Freaking Busted Impersonating People Online

Hamilton Nolan · 07/09/08 04:11PM

We call 5WPR chief Ronn [sic] Torossian an "incompetent superflack" for a reason, people. He and his firm are not just annoying; they are actually incompetent at the practice of public relations. The latest, and sweetest evidence: 5WPR just got stone-cold busted for impersonating people (including a Rabbi!) in a blog comments section on behalf of a (soon-to-be-former, if they're smart) client. We have an email in to Ronn for comment, but this evidence makes a pretty good case that 5W is a bunch of mindless trolls:

Fox News Plays Nice With Times Reporters It Hasn't Yet Smeared

Hamilton Nolan · 07/09/08 12:40PM

Is the Fox News PR machine trying to get back in the good graces of the New York Times-and slyly drive a wedge between reporters there at the same time? The network's famously vicious media relations operation was ravaged in a David Carr column in the Times on Monday. But now that they've let Bill O'Reilly take his obligatory on-air shot at the paper, the network seems to have decided to play nice with Times reporters-at least, with some of them.

The Case Against "Crazy Irena Briganti," From Those Who Know Her Best

Hamilton Nolan · 07/08/08 11:44AM

"The Irena Briganti that I know is funny, hard-working and always willing to help out a colleague-no matter how busy she is," wrote Fox Television flack Erica Keane yesterday, in response to our "smear" of Briganti, Fox News boss Roger Ailes' PR attack-dog-in-chief. But Keane is in the minority in her assessment of Briganti's charm. Our post on her generated perhaps the biggest outpouring of responses we've had since Bloomberg staffers got the chance to vent about horrid boss Matthew Winkler. There was a wellspring of resentment against the Fox News flack just waiting to come out-and much of it came to us unsolicited. Everyone from journalists to Briganti's fellow News Corp. employees weighed in. "She-devil" is among the more middle-of-the-road descriptions. After the jump, all you'll need to know about Briganti's reputation-and her handful of obligatory defenders:

Roger Ailes' History Of Media Manipulation

Hamilton Nolan · 07/07/08 05:03PM

Fox bossman Roger Ailes is the best teacher any media attack flack could have. He's been screwing with the media for decades. Ailes is the man who perfected the art of hammering the media with charges of bias in order to deflect negative coverage from oneself. Kerwin Swint's new biography of him, Dark Genius, has plenty of examples from throughout his entire career. And you have to hand it to Ailes: his clients-all the way up to the President-got the best media haranguing tactics money can buy:

Fellow Fox Flack Defends Briganti's Honor

Hamilton Nolan · 07/07/08 03:24PM

A Fox colleague has written in to defend Irena Briganti, who we dubbed The Most Vindictive Flack In The Media World in an item earlier today. Erica Keane, VP of media relations for Fox Television Stations, "strongly disagrees" with us, as well as the "cowardly anonymous individuals" who were sources for our "hate filled hit-piece." Her full letter, after the jump:

Irena Briganti, The Most Vindictive Flack In The Media World

Hamilton Nolan · 07/07/08 11:54AM

So, David Carr has gone and pulled the curtain back a bit on Fox PR-the single most vicious PR operation in all the media. Good for him. So let's do our part by zeroing in on the one flack who is the face of Fox's feared, vengeful media relations operation. Her name is Irena Briganti. She's the female alter ego and mouthpiece of Fox boss Roger Ailes (pictured). She's been described as bubbly and charming in person. But she's the one holding the bloody hatchet that Fox regularly brings down right on reporters' heads. Here's everything you need to know about the scariest flack in mediadom:

Madonna's Rep Added To Prestigious List Of Lying Flacks

Hamilton Nolan · 07/01/08 04:16PM

All those rumors about Madonna and Guy Ritchie possibly getting a divorce? Not to worry: Madonna's flack, Liz Rosenberg, says publicly that "There are no divorce plans." But wait—is that the same Liz Rosenberg who assured everyone in 2006 that Madonna was not adopting a baby in Malawi? Yes it is! That would be a confirmed lie, meaning that Rosenberg gets added to our always-open list of lying flacks—we've handily numbered seven of them for you, after the jump:

Is There Still Time To Shamelessly Exploit Tim Russert's Death? Yes!

Hamilton Nolan · 07/01/08 02:26PM

NBC newsman Tim Russert died of a heart attack more than two weeks ago, but that doesn't mean that it's too late for desperate flacks to try piggybacking on the man's death in order to snatch a little media coverage for their most marginal clients. For example, here's a question you've probably been asking yourself since that fateful day: "COULD HOLISTIC MEDICINE HAVE SAVED TIM RUSSERT?" Holistic medicine pioneer and tasteless quack Raphael Kellman, MD says "YES!":

Caustic 5WPR Employee Pimps Own Wedding Out To The Media

Hamilton Nolan · 07/01/08 01:40PM

Back in March, we wrote a long post about incompetent superflack Ronn [sic] Torossian of 5WPR calling his former HR director Melissa Weiss a "stupid cunt," and being generally disreputable. The lone defender of Ronn in that case was one of his employees, Christine Garabedian. She wrote in to say Ronn is a great boss, and called (the victim!) Weiss a "jealous" single girl, ending with, "PS Melissa I just got engaged- Now are you even more jealous of me :)." LOL! At the time, several people urged us to go after Garabedian for her meanness, but we refrained, because she seemed like a peripheral figure. Well, we tried. But now she's out there pitching her own wedding to celebrity magazines as a "great story." Poorly! Oh, this is just pure gold:

How To Write A Press Release That Doesn't Suck

Hamilton Nolan · 06/30/08 11:43AM

Press releases: everybody hates them. Reporters hate them because they are trite, condescending, unreadable, superfluous, or some combination thereof. The flacks who write press releases hate them because they know that their intended recipients have nothing but scorn for their hard work. And the public hates press releases because the lazy media uses them anyways, producing tons of craptastic non-news. Flacks recommend buzzwords to get a press release picked up: "green," "environment," "foreclosure," "toxic," and, in Idaho, "polygamy." Wrong! Buzzwords are why people hate these things in the first place. After the jump, five real live ways to put together a good press release:

Play The Teen Sex Ad Blame Game!

Hamilton Nolan · 06/24/08 10:43AM

The fantastically transgressive teen sex ad yesterday from middlebrow retailer JC Penney turned out not to be sanctioned by the company, predictably. That was just too much to hope for. But the fun part now is watching the fallout-after all, can you fucking imagine how pissed the JC Penney people are right now? They are very pissed. They company sent us a statement disavowing the ad last night, and now the ad agency has just sent its own statement explaining how it had, uh, nothing to do with this salacious underage sex production. Now we're just waiting for the third party-who is likely getting screamed at very loudly right now-to take responsibility. Official statements from the two main players after the jump, and our prediction for the next one to come:

The Fate Toward Which We All Inexorably Drift

Hamilton Nolan · 06/23/08 02:21PM

"Many former journalists...also cited better pay, steadier hours, and a more attractive career path, as reasons to seek PR jobs." Sure, but don't forget about the downside: more Satan. [PRWeek, my former home]