The reflective Greyhound emblem shone brightly in the still photos and video of the scene where a bus passenger repeatedly stabbed a young man before cutting off his victim’s head and then leering at other passengers and police.
The media coverage repeatedly referred to the bizarre attack “on a Greyhound bus,” further tying the company’s name to the incident.
I heard a Greyhound rep commenting about the difficulty to providing security for bus services, compared to airline security, but that was almost two days after the gruesome killing.
Garrett Saunders found Greyhound’s crisis response lacking, suggesting the company should have quickly had …read more

A decade ago, the Canadian government made a statement of regret about the country’s long-time policy of forcibly removing aboriginal children from their home communities and subjecting them to cultural cleansing in “residential schools.”
That half measure laid the groundwork for a full-fledged apology to be delivered today in Parliament by prime minister Stephen Harper.
The formal apology will detail the verbal, sexual and physical abuse many children suffered in the government-funded schools that were run by churches.
The government is keenly aware that its words will be closely scrutinized for weasel words that fall short of a complete expression of remorse, …read more

I tend not to criticize enthusiasts and optomists. I think the world needs as much optimism and positive energy as possible.
So it was not without reservations that I cranked out my rant about the paid editorial content that for 10 recent Jaffe Juice episodes have been a sizeable part of Joseph Jaffe’s exploration of “new marketing.”
Jaffe responded. In his latest episode, no. 109, the garrulous Jaffe talks about how personally touched he was at the American citizenship ceremony he and his wife took part in, how touched he was by the gestures of appreciation and friendship he has recently received …read more

There’s a reason politicians spend many hours being trained to juggle issues and spout statements that won’t blow up in their faces.
Apparently, Hillary Clinton’s vow to “obliterate” Iran if it attacked Israel wasn’t a slip of the tongue. Now she’s suggesting (ABC News) a potential assassination of presidential nomination opponent Barack Obama is a good reason to stay in the race when her chances of winning are now less than 5%.
This is a symptom of the always-on news cycle, in which someone who doesn’t have a lot of ad money has to stay newsworthy at least once a day …read more

The story about the messed up yearbook photos gets better.
Lifetouch National School Studios reportedly was trying to fix their mess-up of a batch of photos when they botched the job even further by trying to paste faces onto other bodies.
My criticism of their weasely attempt to duck their responsibility goes double with the revelation that they were trying to cover up a sloppy photo editing job.
Technorati Tags: business,communications,public relations,mistakes,errors,screwups,yearbooks,photos,students,cover up,lifetouch,photography,photoshop,weasels,editing

A yearbook publisher screwed up in a major way when an employee pasted students’ heads on other bodies.
Lifetouch National School Studios apologized and offered to re-do the publication prep and pay for reprinting the high school yearbook.
Then, instead of shutting up, they went on to explain  that the high school involved made an “unusual and definitely very particular” photo editing request.
The “unusual” request? Resize the photos so everyone’s head is the same size and position them vertically so eye level is the same. Maybe not typical, but not too surprising, if you know anything about graphic design.
The problem is, …read more

It’s great having a mentor.
They give you the benefit of their years of experience.
TechCrunch’s Mike Arrington was happy to offer Loic Lemeur and his start-up company Seesmic the following advice, in a posting published to TechCrunch Saturday. (Arrington was furious that a Seesmic plug-in brought down TechCrunch three times when a Steven Speilberg promotion saw traffic on the consumer-generated video site spike.)
TechCrunch, May 17, 2008
“…But never withhold information from your partners and tell them that you have no idea what is causing downtime when you know exactly what the problem is. As exciting as getting Steven Spielberg on your …read more

What a schmozzle.
The recent uproar after the firing of an employee over her decision to give a free bite-sized snack to the young child of a customer lead the Tim Horton’s chain to unfire her.
The optics of firing a single mother for an act of kindness put the fast food chain in a bind.
Is this likely to set off a chain reaction of protests when some high school student has their hours cut to almost none for not agreeing to take on more shifts while studying for their mid-terms? Will others in McJobs lead a lobbying  campaign to raise …read more

There are times when the public is willing to forgive the indiscretions of public figures. This ain’t one of them.
The problem Eliot Spitzer faces is of his own making. The hardball approach to wrongdoers that made his career now prevents him from successfully playing the contrition card.
As Conrad Black has learned (or maybe he hasn’t), arrogance, a bullying persona and the love of the limelight are qualities that make it almost impossible for people to forgive and forget.
Spitzer’s alleged clever methods of avoiding detection are serious enough to land him in jail. If not, they will consume his every …read more

Ouch. A few days before he was set to leave his job at FEMA, Pat Philbin found himself at the centre of the fake news conference controversy.
As he explains to Kami Huyse on her blog (audio on FIR Interviews), he accepted responsibility to a few reporters because he was the one ultimately responsible for the actions of people in his department.
When the media storm began, Philbin told the Washington Post:

"I didn’t orchestrate this, this is not how I do business. I would not condone or authorize it, but at the end of the day, I was the guy in …read more