Guest Post: To embargo or not to embargo

Embargoes are a hot topic. Hot enough to draw some heavy-hitting journalists to a panel event last week in San Francisco to discuss the pros and cons, and importance of relationships between journalists and PR people. In a guest post, Burson-Marsteller’s Bobbie Peyton shares some highlights from the Embargo 2010 event.

————————————————————————————————————————————————-

Embargo 2010: An Industry Discussion on Future Rules of Media Engagement

Thursday Oct. 29

Photo: from left to right the panelists: Mark Glaser, Damon Darlin, Tom Foremski and Dylan Tweney. Photo by Marie Domingo.

Moderator: Sam Whitmore
Host: Waggener Edstrom
Panelists:

Damon Darlin, NYTimes

Dylan Tweney, Wired.com

Mark Glaser, MediaShift (PBS)

Tom Foremski, Silicon Valley Watcher

Last Thursday evening, October 29, I attended a lively panel discussion entitled, Embargo 2010: An Industry Discussion on Future Rules of Media Engagement. In attendance were the who’s who of Bay Area technology writers.

Hosted by Waggener Edstrom at Varnish wine bar just down the street from the San Francisco Burson-Marsteller office, the event had erupted in controversy in Twitter and the blogosphere before it even began: Michael Arrington was a no-show, and female tech journalists were tweeting their disapproval of no females on the panel (hashtag #embargo2010).

Photo: from left to right: Bobbie Peyton, Laura Perez, Nora Upalawanna and Connie Zheng. Photo by E.B. Boyd.

Before the event started, a few of us BMers were awkwardly awaiting a drink at the open bar, and the mood reminded me of a junior high dance, with boys on one side and girls on the other. In this case, it was PR people on one side and journalists on the other. I spotted Sam Whitmore and headed in his direction. As the moderator, he was a neutral zone.

The panel finally got underway and from the start it was clear that almost none of these panelists liked embargoes. Dylan started off with what would be the quote of the evening: “The word embargo derives from a Latin phrase that means ‘f**k you.’”

At first, the discussion was less about embargoes and more about how to break them and still maintain access. Dylan Tweney encouraged reporters to break embargoes if nothing more than to keep that adversarial relationship alive and well between journalists and anyone who tried to control the media.

That is one of two issues that Tweney has with embargoes: controlling the media. The second is its elitism: only an invited few are chosen to relay the message.

Another issue brought up during the panel discussion was how PR reps and companies don’t do their part to prevent leaks or blacklist those writers who break embargoes. This in turn rewards writers with more readers and click-throughs since they’re the first to break the news. Rafe Needleman spoke out about this issue with my other favorite quote of the evening: “Readers don’t reward thoughtfulness, they reward velocity.”

Not all of the journalists had something negative to say about embargoes. Chris Preimesberger likes them and believes they help him do his job better. Inevitably, the conversation turned to relationships, which was the key takeaway. Journalists are more likely to respect embargoes from people they have relationships with and with whom they trust. Even Tweney, who advocated for an adversarial relationship, admitted that the problems with embargoes has less to do with the nature of the beast, and more to do with a lack of trust between PR professionals and journalists.

Other journalists present in the audience included:

• Wendy Tanaka, Forbes.com
• David Needle, internetnews.com
• Bill Snyder, InfoWorld

[Editor's note, 11/5: link to more photos is not available.] [More photos of the event.]

---

Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)

• The Truth About Embargoes
• News embargo broken on Prix Pictet 2009 winner – both parties respond