Looking back over a longish career the blog is frequently forced to admit that some decisions seemed like a good idea at the time.

One of the most memorable was in the Cadets’ Mess at the Scheyville Officer Training Unit in late 1967 when the Adjutant asked the blog whether it would like to go into the Army PR unit after graduation. The PR unit had some big advantages – temporary Captain rank; more money; the likelihood the blog would know more about PR than anything else in the Army; and, a possible degree of additional safety. Having watched too many WWII movies with stiff upper lip Brit characters when young the blog had a terrible rush of blood and replied “Sir, I was rather thinking I might go into a combat arm.” Next thing the blog knew it was in the Royal Australian Artillery and then bound for South Vietnam. read more

The blog’s not in the habit of making nice comments about Popes partly, of course, because there have been so few of them that would warrant it. But Pope Francis deserves much credit for achieving a significant shift in US opinion on climate change.

The George Mason University Centre for Climate Change Communication undertakes a number of longitudinal attitudinal studies on the subject and their latest, The Francis Effect: How Pope Francis changed the conversation about global warming, shows that more Americans, and more American Catholics, are worried about global warming than six months ago; and more believe it will have significant impacts on human beings. See http://www.climatechangecommunication.org/ read more

One of the most important distinctions between behavioural psychology (of great importance to communicators) and some economics (of use to communicators) is that the psychological research often demonstrates a much stronger adherence to scientific principles than the economics research.

The blog has written before about Daniel Kahneman’s warning about a ‘train wreck’ in psychology research due to the over-frequent use of samples drawn from US college students and problems of replicability. In response to that call there have been a number of efforts to overcome the problems and an iterative process that has scrutinised the new techniques to ensure they don’t repeat previous methodological problems or create new ones. read more

Horace, at least for those who have a fleeting knowledge of his work, is famous for two lines – Carpe Diem and dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori.

Most people come across the second (It is sweet and fitting to die for one’s country) because of Wilfred Owen’s famous use of it in his poem Dulce et decorum est in the final stanza The Old Lie. Of course, well before that poem – perhaps the most famous of World War I – Owen had written The Ballad of Peace and War which expressed somewhat similar sentiments to Horace’s but war does tend to change one’s mind about things. read more

The Tony Jaques issues management newsletter (see last blog) on the Minerals Council’s inept coal campaign was recently re-published on Mumbrella, and perhaps predictably, prompted a variety of responses.

The blog also got some comments about allegedly disparaging PR (would the blog do that?) by endorsing Tony’s views. The comments directed to the blog were in person because, as regular readers will know, the blog has switched off the comments function after making the mistake of reading a few of the comments on its old crikey column. read more

The recent Minerals Council of Australia coal campaign – ‘the amazing little black rock’ effort – is probably an odds on favourite to be judged the worst PR campaign of 2015.

The reason was summed up in Dr Tony Jaques most recent Managing Outcomes newsletter when he pointed out that “what coal really needs is an effectively targeted issue management strategy, not a ‘PR battle’ they are almost certain to lose.” See read more

Will we all be marching arm in arm in London chanting Je suis Rupert? Unlikely as it seems a Murdoch publication The Times Literary Supplement has recently published two articles about the re-discovered Birmingham Qur’an text which do have the potential to upset some Muslims even if not quite as much as the Charlie Hebdo cartoons did. read more

While media critics focus on the doomsday scenarios for print media it is easy to forget that newspapers face two crises: the business crisis and the journalism crisis.

Ross Gittins has written a sort of autobiography – Gittins: A life among budgets, bulldust and bastardry. It’s a great insight into how a Salvation Army kid became an outstanding economics editor respected by Reserve Bank Governors, Treasury officials and others. But, more importantly, it provides an incisive commentary on the twin problems of what’s wrong with journalism and the newspaper business – subjects which tend to be regarded in isolation rather than as inextricable aspects of one problem. read more

One should never be surprised by what might happen in politics.

After yesterday morning’s post the blog received a bit of feedback about the likelihood or unlikelihood of the ALP putting aside attacks on Malcolm Turnbull for a while and offering to work with him.

While it never occurred to the blog that’s what would happen it is exactly what did. Bill Shorten,  in his parliamentary comments addressed to the new PM, made an offer to work with the government to address national issues. He then subsequently wrote offering to meet to discuss the China-Australia free trade agreement. The latter made it into the media but the former didn’t. read more

The ALP leadership has almost reflexively – but probably more in panic – started to attack the new Prime Minister within minutes of him being elected.

However, even if they make a few dents here and there the odds are he will still be more popular among voters than Bill Shorten and the blog hesitates to think about the Shorten debacle that pre-election TV debates between Malcolm and Bill are likely to be. More importantly, instant attacks overlook the reality of the honeymoon period Turnbull will experience partly as a result of the community relief that Abbott has gone. read more