✅ Monday briefing: Shell suit, ESG and PR pod, TikTok Promote, Twitter reach, missing links, AI misinformation, PR for company directors, risk report, Algorithms for Her, and more...
Book for Waddscon on AI and GPT-3, 1-2pm, Thursday, 23 February
I hope that you'll be able to join us for the next Waddscon (1-2pm, Thursday, 23 February) when we’ll be joined by four practitioners to talk about the potential impact of AI on PR.
We’ll explore the explosion of GPT-3 tools, digital creative, media analysis and measurement, and the potential impact on society and the future of work with Andrew Smith, Mark Rofe, Maya Koleva, and Bruno Amaral.
All income generated from the event will be donated to our local foodbank in Newcastle. Please follow this link to buy tickets.
ESG
⛽ SHELL SUIT: A group of institutional investors is backing an innovative lawsuit against Shell. ClientEarth alleges that Shell's directors have failed to manage risks related to the climate crisis. It follows the company’s announcement of $40 billion profits for 2022. Source Stephen Waddington.
🎙️ ESG AND PR POD: We spoke to Prof. Lee Edwards about whether public relations is a force for good or a means to corrupt the public conversation. ESG has the potential to be misused as a form of corporate greenwashing but can also be applied to drive business change and a means of building a better society. Source Stephen Waddington
Design
®️ NEW LOGO AESTHETIC: Burberry has a new logo inspired by an equestrian knight design that was the winning entry in a public competition in the 1900s. It’s a bold departure from the minimalist design aesthetic of recent times and may signal a shift in design trends. Spotted Andy Barr.
Social media
🖼️ TIKTOK PROMOTE: New TikTok paid tools enable accounts to drive account views and leads. The Promote tools enables accounts to drive visits, messages, promote third party content, and target an audience by location. Spotted Alan Morrison.
📢 TWITTER REACH: Twitter boss Elon Musk fired an engineer who suggested that Musk’s declining reach on the platform was due to his fall in popularity. Musk subsequently said that the issue was due to his account overloading the platform. Source Andrew Bruce Smith and Stephen Waddington.
Artificial intelligence
❌ AI MISINFORMATION: Google’s parent company Alphabet’s shares fell by nine percent after it demonstrated a new search assistant called Bard. A video showed Bard making up facts. We’ve written previously about the need to fact check AI generative tools. Source Antony Mayfield.
🔗 MISSING LINKS: The launch of Bard signalled the potential threat of AI to search engine optimisation (SEO). The demo provided results without any form of third party attribution, notably links to original website sources. Source Andrew Bruce Smith.
Media
🗞️ DC THOMSON CUTS: Staff at Dundee-based publisher DC Thomson are facing redundancies as the company prepares to close titles. It said it plans to focus on communities as a means of building audience engagement. Spotted Alan Morrison.
Management
📊 UK ECONOMIC DATA: The UK avoided recession in 2022. The economy was flat in the final three months of the year. However, it contracted in December by 0.5%, following a growth figure of 0.1% in November and 0.55% in October. Source Stephen Waddington.
✍️ PR FOR COMPANY DIRECTORS: The IoD and CIPR have published a guide to public relations for company directors edited by Wadds Inc. director Sarah Waddington CBE. It includes a study of 100 business leaders that found that almost a fifth of organisations don’t have public relations support. Those that do are likely to have a person with responsibility at board level. Source Sarah Waddington CBE.
⚠️ RISK REPORT: Trust, Risk and Resilience: Where are we Now and Where Next? analyses the five key, global, turn-of-year reports exploring the state of trust and risk. It summarises ten questions to test your planning. Source Rod Cartwright.
Events
📅 ALGORITHMS FOR HER: A two-day conference in Sheffield will examine how algorithms perpetuate inequality through their prioritisation of a particular view of the world. Source Liz Bridgen.