What Lovely Readings! :-D

Week 8

Well first of all I was heaps proud because I FINALLY found the extra readings besides the text book for once. Woohoo go journals! I can actually use them! Personally that article really didn’t do much (To contact…or not?). There were a few points that were interesting, in particular the quotes by the journalists towards PR practitioners: “To be completely honest, [practitioners] put spin on everything they do. They are dishonest and untrustworthy. I can treat PR people like crap, and they have to put up with it”, and “I could not do my job without PR people [who] bring important stories to our attention. Without PR many important news stories would not reach the public”. These quotes immediately gained my attention as I’m included in the debate this week about the power of journalists and PR practitioners and I touch on the fighting relationship between the two. All the different results from the research conducted about PR practitioners and journalists was fairly interesting, as it gave an insight to little things amongst the professions, for example, the tiny factor of how journalists prefer to be contacted by a public relations person. This is only a simple thing, but contributes to the communication and harmonious relationship that exists between the two.

“The Importance of Writing Skills” again just reinforced information that I had already gathered so far of how important the form of writing is in public relations. However, for someone to write a five page article on it was pretty impressing and definitely worth the read. Wise went into particular detail, and the section devoted to “Methods” was seen to be helpful. The emphasis placed on the difference between regular writing (for publications like newspapers or magazines) and writing for the Web helped further my knowledge. He focused on that in careful detail, which I thought was a key point as some people might not realize that different forms of advertising and media require different forms of writing. And as always there was a segment dedicated to “so what separates a good writer from an average writer?” How many times have I seen something like that? I can assure you it’s more than once.

The second article “How To...Ten Steps to Press Release Perfection” linked together with the Writing Skills article as it focused on the key points of how to write a press release. I really liked this article as it showed the basic 10 facts of how to write a press release, explaining what to do and what not to do. This took me back to semester one’s course Introduction to Professional Writing, when we covered the section on media releases. The fact that I had this background knowledge helped in my understanding and this article showed instead the views of writing in the form of the public relations profession, rather than the journalistic profession (which is what Prof Writing mainly focused on).

Overall, this week’s readings helped to brush up on my knowledge that I have gained so far and enforce the importance of key features and facts of PR. Indeed the best and most enjoyable readings so far (I can’t believe I described readings as enjoyable…but you get my drift).