In the beginning, there was no press release!
And, PR pioneer Ivy Lee said on October 28, 1906: Let there
be a Press Release!
The press release was created following a train wreck on
October 28, 1906, in Atlantic City, N.J., that left more than 50 people dead.
The train was owned by Pennsylvania Railroad, one of Ivy Lee's clients.
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| NY Times |
In fact, that also marked the beginning of formal PR and the
birth of Crisis Communication.
We at Public Relations Council of India, under the aegis of
World Communicators’ Council (WCC), have decided to observe October 28 as the World
Communicators’ Day.
Since we have enough time, let us plan in advance for the
Day and look at conducting some professional activities.
Let us not focus on mere felicitations and awards. We have
several of them. In fact, the awards should be just annual – part of our Global
Conclaves. Frequent awards and felicitation for no rhyme or reason devalues PR
movement. As it is we enjoy a bad reputation of popularising the pink shirt
phenomenon.
Now to the activities for October 28. Since it is a Saturday
and if it creates any issues of not being a working day, let us plan the
celebration a day in advance – and not a week later.
Let Oct 28 be sacrosanct.
What we can do?
Since the day marks the issuance of the world’s first press
release, we can plan a Media Relations workshop for the younger generation.
We can also plan workshops/chat shows under YCC banner.
Why not conduct a tour of young communicators to a media
house?
Or a session on writing press releases?
Or skits on what the youngsters perceive of media?
We can have senor journalists coming and guiding us.
From the headquarters, we plan to do a national essay
competition on few current topics and bring out a Digest. Please get as much participation
as possible.
So, let’s plan in advance and get going.
-BNK24x7











