6.07.2007

This is the way the world works.

In terms of how the "media" deal with one another.

1) Company hires a PR firm to do all of their marketing and press relations.
2) PR firm supposedly does that and get paid a lot of money to do that.
3) Firm sends out press releases to the news outlets and never include enough information.
4) News outlets call firms to get the information - firms take all day to find it.
5) News outlets eventually get something out based on the original press release.
6) Advertising people don't appear to do much of anything at all from one side of the newsroom to the other (This was thrown in because I felt I was leaving them out).

Here is how this applied to my life today:
1) A press packet arrives through e-mail, is printed out and handed to me to add to the calendar. This is one of my projects for the day.
2) I go through and add all the information I have to the calendar. This takes an hour.
3) A nitpicky copy editor goes through and finds all of my mistakes and demands more information that was not provided in the first place.
4) I call the PR firm to give me info. Get the answering machine and leave a message.
5) PR firm calls me back, and the woman gives me information on a different event I'm doing.
6) I ask for the calendar information, and she thinks about and says when SHE did the press packets, she ALWAYS included that information.
7) I ask again for the info.
8) She says, "I'll get an intern right on it. It'll be their new project."

I totally know how that intern will feel when they find out about their "project" tomorrow morning, seeing as how it was mine in the first place.

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