Culture secretary Matt Hancock expected to make decision on Rupert Murdoch’s Sky takeover this week July 8, 2018 Culture secretary Matt Hancock is this week expected to reveal whether Rupert Murdoch's 21st Century Fox will be given clearance to take over Sky and bat off a rival bid from Comcast. If Hancock gives Murdoch the go-ahead, the media mogul will buy the 61 per cent stake in Sky he does not already own. [...]
Sir Martin Sorrell’s mission: To out-fox former WPP allies, proxy voting pressure and fintech in focus June 1, 2018 It was there in black and white. In his farewell memo to 180,000 WPP staff in mid-April, Sir Martin Sorrell couldn’t have been more explicit: “As a founder, I can say that WPP is not just a mattter of life or death, it was, is and will be more important than that. Good fortune and [...]
#DeleteFacebook: How can the social media giant bounce back? March 23, 2018 THE HASHTAG WAS popularised by Twitter. Now it is being used to criticise the company that owns Twitter, on Twitter. #DeleteFacebook is only the latest proof that the social media giant is in trouble. Fake news, falling stock, glaring data breaches. A 9% drop off Facebook’s shares. Mark Zuckerberg’s world-beating platform is in the [...]
Why we’re right to condemn YouTube star Logan Paul January 2, 2018 On Sunday, YouTuber Logan Paul uploaded a video of an apparent suicide victim in Japan. Paul, who has 15 million subscribers, was with his friends at the base of Mount Fuji, in a forest notorious for suicides. It wasn’t long before the criticism started. One commenter called out Logan Paul for the ‘disrespectful’ way [...]
How to tackle the PR challenge facing Uber’s Travis Kalanick August 27, 2017 Controversial former Uber chief Travis Kalanick has hired Teneo BlueRubicon to "refresh his tarnished image", according to reports. Though I can’t see confirmation on the record from either Kalanick or Teneo in the sources I’ve read, no denial from either party suggests a grain of truth. Real news or fake news, it makes the news [...]
Q&A: Why are brands like Marks and Spencer pulling their advertising from Google? March 20, 2017 A newspaper investigation uncovered examples of several high profile brands being advertised against extremist content such as videos of a preacher banned from Britain and from white extremist David Duke insulting Jewish people. The BBC, Channel 4, The Guardian as well as the Financial Conduct Authority, Transport for London and the Royal Navy, advertising for [...]
Many PRs don’t understand how influencers work. That must change. March 20, 2017 As someone who works in the PR industry and also runs a football culture blog, I have seen “influencer marketing” from both sides. Building on my recent City A.M. post on the growth of microinfluencers, here are my insights on where PRs go wrong and how they can work better with influencers. Most PR [...]
Google’s top European boss Matt Brittin has apologised to its advertising clients over extremist content March 20, 2017 The European boss of under fire tech company Google has apologised to clients over its failure to stop adverts appearing next to extremist content. "I think we can do better," said Matt Brittin on the morning that Marks and Spencer pulled its ads from YouTube. It follows a weekend when several other advertisers put a [...]
Now banks have pulled their Google ad spend as Royal Bank of Scotland, HSBC and Lloyds pile on pressure March 20, 2017 Google is facing growing pressure over claims it's profiting from hate speech as some of Britain's biggest banks are the latest to pull their ads from YouTube. Royal Bank of Scotland, HSBC and Lloyds have suspended their advertising with the tech giant following an investigation which revealed household brand names were appearing next to offensive and extremist [...]
After his appointment as Evening Standard editor, should George Osborne resign as an MP? March 17, 2017 Chris Rumfitt, founder and chief executive of Field Consulting, says Yes. George Osborne’s post-ministerial career had already raised eyebrows when he took a bumper package to advise asset manager Blackrock. But it truly caused jaws to drop when news came through that he was to edit the Evening Standard. While the former chancellor is clearly [...]