There have been many blogging reactions to last week’s debate about social media releases and “meatball Sundaes” (see my post Die Social Media Release Controversy, Just Die, and the news radar on this site, which features some of the links).
Some have blogged in support of SMRs, and others continue to question them.
I thought I would throw a few more cents into the mix. While I am warming up to the SMR concept, one thing that concerns me about the format is the focus on reducing news to bullet points, or “just the facts.”
(Indeed the spec on SHIFT’s site says that bullet points are preferable when it comes to the core news facts).
Many have said that this is an improvement over the traditional press release format, and have either implied or come right out and said this is a refreshing change because it cuts the all the “B.S.” out.
I can’t help but think how misguided and cynical this attitude is. Have we resigned ourselves to the fact that putting a few sentences into a paragraph, and weaving the paragraphs into a story automatically turns the copy into hype and spin?
I wonder if it is an inherent weakness in the SMR concept. At a minimum, I think this aspect of SMRs deserves further though and debate.
Isn’t narrative important to PR? Aren’t we, communications professionals, supposed to be able to weave sometimes complex facts into an intelligible story?
I am in the field of technology, and sometimes complex tech needs to be explained and put into proper context – something that is not easy to do when reducing the news to bullet points and “just the facts.”
Call me crazy (or maybe I am missing something), but I believe that it is possible to have a well written press release that explains things, and am not sure why SMRs necessarily require stripping information down to the bare bones.
