Public Relations & Social Media Insight

If this video of a PR disaster at a private party hosted by Shell Oil atop of Seattle's Space Needle last night seems too good to be true, that's because it is.

 

The video is a hoax, but a very good one!

 

The story went that this video was shot by an Occupy Wall street protester named Logan Price who infiltrated a private party called "New Frontiers" thrown by Shell to celebrate the impending expansion of offshore drilling operations into the Arctic. Shell set up a replica of the Kulluk oil rig that will be doing the drilling and invited the widow of the man who designed the rig to symbolically "tap the arctic" and fill her glass with liquor poured from the top of the model rig. But, whoops, the pump malfunctioned and spewed all over her. Now that's symbolism!

 

"if Shell can't even handle a three-foot replica of a rig that pumps booze, how is the company going to fare in the Arctic deep?" laughed Tree hugger. The story was also picked up by the Seattle Post Intelligencer, Gothamist and our geeky cousin Gizmodo.

 

[Badvocates  target Shell in a hoax that keeps on giving. Wonder if it is truly effective? - JD]

A PR firm that helped to support Occupy just won a prestigious award for its work, much to the movement’s chagrin.

 

Occupy Wall Street may be weakened, but the brand seems to be doing fine: The protest movement just won a prestigious PR award.

 

Technically, the award went to Workhouse Publicity, a high-end New York firm that launched a pro-bono Occupy campaign after protestors took over Zuccotti Park last year. On Thursday, Workhouse scored the Public Relations Society of America’s Silver Anvil Award — the Oscar of the industry — for public service with an entry called “The Revolution Will Be Editorialized.”...