A brief primer on social licence

Social licence is a frequently-used, but little-understood term. It is referenced often in the debate around energy projects, especially in Canada.

So, if you’ve heard the term and wondered where it came from (coined in 1997 by mining executive Jim Cooney) and why people on opposite sides seem to be attaching a meaning to it that supports their own perspective, you’ll want to read “How social licence came to dominate the pipeline debate in Canada,” by The Canadian Press. It includes interviews with Jim Cooney, as well as advocates on both sides of the proponent/citizen divide.

Source: How social licence came to dominate the pipeline debate in Canada

Facebook Trending Videos point to deeper issues with Facebook as a media outlet

Early data on the performance of Facebook Instant articles. Periscope makes videos permanent. Donald Trump does something that crosses the ethical line for PR pros. And we look at the deeper issues underpinning the discussion about Facebook’s Trending Topics.

Gini Dietrich, Martin Waxman and Joseph Thornley tackle these topics and more in this week’s Inside PR podcast.

This week’s #InsidePRMustKnows:

  • Publishers are reporting mixed results with Facebook Instant Articles, according to Digiday. They are driving traffic, but it is less engaged. Nevertheless, revenue is flowing to publishers. So, Instant Articles as a publishing platform isn’t going away anytime soon.
  • Periscope is about to make videos permanent with save settings in its app. This is big news. Facebook Live Videos gained a huge advantage over Periscope by making it easy for people to save their videos. By making it easy for users to save their videos beyond the current 24 hour expiry date, Periscope will even up the playing field.
  • And in our “too bizarre not to be true item,” Gini offers her thoughts on Donald Trump posing as a PR rep in a call to media. “It’s not OK!”

Algorithms are not neutral

In our main discussion, we turn our attention to lack of transparency in how Facebook’s Trending Topics are selected. This is a far reaching and important issue. It’s about Facebook’s emergence as a media outlet. It’s about dominance of one player. It’s about the level of transparency necessary so that we can assess bias. And it’s about the additional obligation to transparency and scrutiny that Facebook should now be subject to.

During our discussion, we cite several sources that you should read in order to have the facts to make up your own mind about what is at stake:

This article is cross-posted at the Inside PR podcast blog.

Inside PR podcast turns 10

We’re  belatedly celebrating the tenth anniversary of the Inside PR podcast. Terry Fallis and David Jones posted the first episode of Inside PR on April 3, 2006. Back then the tag line was “Inside PR: Going deep on the state and future of public relations.” After recording 200 episodes, Terry and David decided that they’d said all that they wanted to say. But they didn’t retire the podcast. Instead they passed it along to Martin Waxman, who had been co-hosting with Terry and David. Martin, in turn, brought Gini Dietrich and Joseph Thornley in as new co-hosts. And thanks to Terry and David’s benevolence, the Inside PR podcast now has been running continuously for over ten years. That’s a record of longevity that we’re proud of. And we’re not thinking of stopping anytime soon.

Also this week, we give a shout out to original co-host Terry Fallis, who has just been shortlisted for the Leacock Medal for his novel, Poles Apart. Terry has won the Leacock award twice before, for his first novel, The Best Laid Plans, and for his fourth novel, No Relation.  The award winner will be announced on June 11. So check your Twitter feed on the evening of June 11 and send Terry your best wishes.

This week’s #IPRMustKnows:

Also this week, we talk about the Counselors Academy Conference that Martin attended in Puerto Rico. Martin’s big takeaway from the conference was the continuing trend for PR agencies to integrate design, video, paid media and other disciplines as the traditional silos of creative, advertising, PR and content converge.

While at the Counselors Academy Conference, Martin interviewed one of the keynote speakers, Duncan Wardle, Vice President of Creative Inc., Disney Parks and Resorts’ creative think tank. He offers some great advice for priming creativity in our own organizations.

Marching to Facebook’s Tune

FIR_itunes cover_Inside_PRThis week on the Inside PR podcastGini DietrichMartin Waxman, and Joseph Thornley chat about more changes to Facebook and their impact on our news consumption and publishers. Oh, and we couldn’t let Boaty McBoatface go by without comment.

Martin tells us that Facebook is testing sections in its newsfeed – sports, entertainment, lifestyle, politics, etc. A good idea that will make Facebook a better browser experience for news.

Gini wants us to be sure to note that Buzzfeed has demonstrated that Facebook Live Video can aggregate broadcast-size audiences. Over ten million people watched Buzzfeed staff wrap elastic bands around a watermelon until it exploded. At one time during the forty minute broadcast 800,000 viewers were watching concurrently. Could there be any clearer indicator that if Facebook will build a video platform, we will come?

And dredging up for Joe memories of happy hours spent playing with toy boats in the bathtub, Boaty McBoatface showed that the public may have a better sense of humour than people in authority. If you ask a casual question, be ready for a whimsical answer.

Finally, Martin points out the recent article on Wired, Facebook has seized the media, and that’s bad news for everyone but Facebook. News is important to Facebook. But it’s not what Facebook cares about. Instead, the platform is focusing on packaging content as an experience that will draw us and keep us. The content doesn’t matter to Facebook as much as the packaging and whether it holds attention.

We’d love to know what you think.

Leave a comment on the blog, send us an email or an audio comment to [email protected], join the FIR Google+ Community, join the Inside PR Facebook group, message us @inside_pr on Twitter, or connect with Gini DietrichJoseph Thornley, and Martin Waxman on Twitter.

This post was originally published on the Inside PR Podcast blog.

Wall to Wall Facebook on Inside PR 440

Gini DietrichMartin Waxman, and Joseph Thornley chat about all things Facebook on this week’s Inside PR.

It may be big, but Facebook is like a shark. It just keeps moving. Recently, Facebook opened itself to sponsored content. We talk about recent changes at Facebook, including sponsored content. We talk about the need for adequate disclosure of sponsored content to enable people to recognize it as such.

We also discuss Facebook Messenger’s second email inbox. It seemed to have sent a lot of people into a tizzy. Joe, on the other hand, is quite happy to have Facebook Messenger filter out as many messages as possible.

Facebook uses its huge data store to fine tune its news and advertising algorithms. But kudos to the company for this innovation: Facebook introduced auto captioning to make itself more accessible to people with site impairment. Good on Facebook!

And we couldn’t talk about Facebook without talking about Facebook Live Videos. They are available to all of us and we’ve been using it. Video for the rest of us. Video that persists (unlike Periscope which expires.) Video that we can schedule with an event. Or, as we have done, video available only to members of a group (join the Inside PR Facebook group to see the video Joe made of his end of the recording of this podcast.)

We’d love to know what you think. 

  • Is Facebook going to become the one social network to rule them all?
  • Junk filters? Nuisance or must-have.
  • Have you used Facebook Live Videos yet? How was your experience? Do you have tips for others who are just beginning to use them?

Leave a comment on the blog, send us an email or an audio comment to [email protected], join the FIR Google+ Community, join the Inside PR Facebook group, message us @inside_pr on Twitter, or connect with Gini DietrichJoseph Thornley, and Martin Waxman on Twitter. And we have a favor to ask: If you like this podcast, please rate us on iTunes.