Patently counter productive

Tim Bray received an email from the Patent Office’s new PR firm touting their Stop Fakes website. It is written in the energetic style of hype PR:

And the email itself? Here’s a sample: “Can bloggers help? Yes! The USPTO is well aware of the impact bloggers have and the important role they play. As an online opinion leader you can help small businesses protect the intellectual property of small businesses in one of several ways: Write about the site in your blog...” ...

So, let’s put this simply. Dear USPTO, you’re lying. If you actually read bloggers you’d know that the few who write about you think you’re part of the problem, not part of the solution

I think the tone of the USPTO pitch is a trifle condescending. When I pitch bloggers I treat them the same way I treat journalists. Even if they are amateurs, it is an error to suppose they are flattered to receive a pitch from a professional flack. Quite the reverse in fact.

Having said that, I think Mr. Bray is a little harsh. This site offers a general introduction to the patent system and its advantages for small business. Even if you think our current system has, er, room for improvement, this site strikes this observer as a good, if incomplete, introduction.

Here is how I might have written it:

Dear _______, Too often small businesses fail to file for patents because they don’t understand how patents can protect their business. The USPTO has developed a website for small businesses to give them an introduction to the patent process and describe its advantages.

I would not make this pitch to tech blogs. Instead I would send it to marketing, legal, venture capital, and small business blogs, who are less likely to take such a harsh view of the Patent Office.

Edit-
v-Fluence Responds to Tim Bray and shows a lot of class.

Aftermath

Katrina Blog

Slidell Hurricane Damage Blog

WLBT Skycopter view of damage at Gulfport, Mississippi

Pictures of Katrina's destruction.

Map of area of destruction

Nobody ever won a war with their customers

DRM doesn’t scale

I recently got the Gotham Gal a new Mac mini for her office. I signed her up for iTunes and configured it to use the same account everyone uses. She bought some music and when she went to play it, she got the message that the account can only serve 5 users. So she bought the music, paid for it, and she can't even play it on her own computer. That's the DRM wreaking havoc on our home music system.

I am old enough to remember 45’s. They were great; you just bought a song if you liked it and could play it on any record player. The only defect was that sometimes you liked songs that were never released as singles. Digital music gets passed all that because you can make any mix that suits your fancy. If the entertainment conglomerates would stop trying to control this and offer the digital version of the 45, fully portable, they could make a fortune. They are controlling their industry to death.

Enterprising law enforcement agencies use new technologies to spur cross-border data sharing

Alan Joch, Federal Computer Week

Although XML was first adopted by commercial businesses in the 1990s, law enforcement IT managers worldwide soon embraced it as a tool for smoothing processes such as the distribution of police arrest reports to prosecutors or officers in other jurisdictions. But for years, "it was missing a vocabulary for law enforcement," Wormeli said.

That missing link came with Global Justice XML (GJXML), an XML adaptation created by the U.S. Justice Department's Office of Justice Programs and the Global Justice Information Sharing Initiative, a consortium of 32 local, state, federal and international justice organizations.

GJXML provides a data model, a data dictionary and schemas tailored to law enforcement. Those tools free agencies from writing custom interfaces for data sharing. "It's being adopted by law enforcement at breakneck speed," Wormeli said.

Who's on first

Washington Technology

Law enforcement IT industry group Integrated Justice Information Systems Institute, Ashburn, Va., expanded its board of directors, adding six new members: Gerry Wethington, vice president for homeland security, justice and law enforcement at Unisys Corp.; Mike Byrne, executive director of homeland security and justice at Microsoft Corp.; Mike Lyons, chief executive officer of VisionAir Inc., Castle Hayne, N.C.; Morgan Wright, global industry solutions manager at Cisco Systems Inc.; Glenn Archer, CEO of ChoicePoint Government Services, part of ChoicePoint Asset Co., Alpharetta, Ga.; and Steve Mednick, a lawyer specializing in technology-related contract negotiation and related issues.

Calendar cards

It is time to select the Presto Vivace, Inc. calendar card. Let me know if you have any opinions.

Earth 2006

Cosmic Globe

Waterfall

Marble Holidays

Press release websites

Someone on the PRSA discussion list was kind enough to send out this list-

http://www.pr-archive.com/submit

http://www.e-xl.com/submit

http://www.goarticles.com/ulogin.html

https://uadm.arrivenet.com/index.php?o=/steps.php&m=nosession

http://www.express-press-release.com/

http://www.cybernewsnetwork.com/

http://ezine.net/modules.php?name=Submit_News

http://www.i-newswire.com/submit_free.php

http://www.press-world.com/add

http://www.free-press-release.com/

http://www.prweb.com/

http://www.indymedia.org/en/index.shtml

http://www.kazor.com/businessPR/newsPR.htm

http://www.mediasyndicate.com/index.php

http://www.usanews.net/

http://www.out2.com/copyroom/home.asp

http://www.click2newsites.com/press.asp

http://www.24-7pressrelease.com/

http://www.pressmethod.com

http://www.prleap.com/

http://www.malebits.com/

http://www.pressbox.co.uk/

http://www.prfree.com/

http://www.theopenpress.com/

http://www.webwire.com/

http://www.fivestarpress.com/

http://press.xtvworld.com/

http://www.clickpress.com/releases/index.shtml

http://www.free-news-release.com/Submit.aspx

http://www.bizeurope.com/pressrelease.htm

http://www.prminds.com/submitpr_free/submitpr_free.php

http://www.dime-co.com/submitpress.html

http://www.businesshighlight.org/

http://www.bigarticles.com/cgi-bin/add.cgi?d=1

http://www.pr9.net/

http://www.addpr.com/addrelease.php

http://www.aall-dreamlands.com/submit1.htm

http://www.transworldnews.com/modules.php?name=Submit_eNews

How banks should correspond with their customers

Preserving the Internet Channel Against Phishers

The four steps:

* No HTML email. HTML email opens all sorts of possibilities for hiding things. Train your users to expect short and simple messages.

* No links in email. Always refer to the bookmark you encourage users to create from their paper statements.

* All your websites must belong to you, and show up under your domain. Do not acclimatize users to treat other URLs as yours. If you get your users used to sites with names like "cb.pharmphr33.supersecure.com," then you shouldn't be surprised that they don't get worried when they are phished there.

* Fire people who violate these rules. Give a substantial finders fee to the first person who reports the violation. Give the money to both employees/whistleblowers and customers.

From Adam Shostack, who is learning how to talk to marketers.

Katrina

Hurricane Katrina regional imagery, 2005.08.27 at 1415Z. Centerpoint Latitude: 24:16:29N Longitude: 84:18:58W.

Federal architects ready glossary of terms

David Perera, Federal Computer Week

The federal Chief Architects Forum has posted working draft definitions of 175 enterprise architecture terms on its public wiki site.

Volunteers from industry and government are working to define the most common architecture terms, from “application” to “Extensible Markup Language schema.” “Having support helps,” said Ira Grossman, chairman of the forum.

Because the wiki is a public site, people can immediately start commenting on the definitions, but a formalized process will be set up in the next two or three months, Grossman added. Further rounds of rewriting, editing and reviewing still need to be completed, he said.

As Americans, we can be very proud that our government has set a new precedent for open discussion for software standards. I trust others will embrace this approach.

Justice tackles standards for computer-aided dispatch systems

Joab Jackson, Government Computer News

Two law enforcement government bodies have assembled a committee to address the problem of making computer-aided dispatch systems interoperable.

The Advisory Committee on Law Enforcement IT Standards, as the new group is known, should have draft standards ready within a year, said Paul Wormeli, executive director of the Integrated Justice Information Systems (IJIS) Institute.

Why this matters.

Identity theft, it gets more serious

National Center for State Courts blog

Identity Theft Alert: Courts Beware

It seems that the latest target for those in the identity theft business is the jury system, as Jur-E was made aware of two separate cases this week in which jury programs were being used as a vehicle for obtaining individuals' personal information.

It could hardly be more serious.

Call for Speakers, AIIM 2006 Conference

Welcome to AIIM's Call for Speakers

This year we are especially interested in receiving submissions from the public sector (local, state, and federal governments.) For 2006, our re-charged, revved up Conference sessions will be divided into five themes:

• Content Management Architecture, Infrastructure, and Applications
• Data, Image, and Content Capture: The On-Ramp to an ECM Solution
• Centralizing Your Assets: Store, Retrieve, and Preserve
• Communicate, Collaborate, and Manage - "Can You Hear Me Now?"
• Making the Invisible Visible: Measure, Monitor, and Analyze

Deadline for submitting your presentation proposal(s) is September 19, 2005.

GJXDM National Virtual Help Desk Open for business

The IJIS Institute

The IJIS Institute has announced the opening of a GJXDM national virtual help desk to serve developers in government and industry who are working on implementing the Global Justice XML Data Model (GJXDM). More than a conventional help desk, the GJXDM Help Desk will contain a significant knowledge base that users can access over the web, and then submit unanswered questions via the web or telephone. The help desk is staffed in three levels of response. Level 1 will be staffed directly by the IJIS Institute to provide the basic responses to questions and build the knowledge base in addition to managing the project. Specific domain expertise will be available as Level 2 support from the National Center for State Courts and SEARCH, the national consortium on integrated justice. Further support from technical expertise of member companies and the Georgia Tech Research Institute will be available for the most difficult technical questions.

The goal of the help desk is to get answers back to developers within 24 hours wherever possible. The operation will keep open hours of 8 am to 8 pm eastern time to ensure service to the west coast during afternoon hours.

This could be the model for many other federal/state/local iniatives.

Is there any reason not to respond to an inquiry?

John Wagner asks a question on his blog:

Question for you PR spokespeople: If a blogger called you today and wanted a comment on an issue involving your company or your client, would you return the call? Would you go on record with a blogger?

How would a non-response ever serve a client’s interest? And since when were flacks too great and grand to talk to anyone? As for going on the record, is there any other way to go?

Innovation at Work: DC Government's Integrated e-Document Management Program

NCC-AIIM Monthly Meeting, Thursday, September 15, 2005

Bill Zybach, DC Office of the CTO

Like other government entities, the District of Columbia (DC) has seen the volume of unstructured content in their business documents and communications grow exponentially. While this content is generated electronically, it is not currently managed in a manner that enables business users and decision-makers to easily access critical embedded information. The DC government decided they had to do something. The objective of the resulting initiative is to develop an Integrated e-Document Management (IeDM) strategy to address strategic, process, organization, performance, and technology issues. The project includes four phases. Phase I - Analysis and Strategy, was completed on July 26th; 2005. Phase II - Policy, Pilots, Architecture and Solutions is planned to be completed in November 2005. Phase III - Initial Deployment within Pilots will follow. A final Phase IV will focus on a phased in DC Government enterprise Deployment.

This presentation will discuss the tangibles (the deliverables to date) which include the Current state assessment, Document and records standards review, Strategic options for implementing an IeDM strategy across the District, Select pilot applications, Cost benefit analysis and a Deployment strategy for effectively implementing the IeDM strategy across the District. Even the intangibles will be discussed and that's no ordinary story.

Rob Pegoraro talks about reviewing consumer technology

During his appearance before CPCUG, Rob Pegoraro spoke generally about his beat, story selection and his views on technology. He is looking for consumer technology that is past the early adopter stage but not quite mass market. He described his bias and being in favor of ease of use; he is not enthusiastic about products which require extensive tinkering. Pegoraro indicated that anytime he spends more than thirty minutes setting up, it is unlikely to be a friendly review. Apparently it is customary for companies’ PR departments to offer a special technical support lines for journalists in a hurry. Friends, if a journalist won’t be able to make deadline with your regular technical support, that is a clue your technical support is inadequate.

Note - Pergoraro spoke disparagingly of the PR department PowerPoint presentations and large media kits that invariably accompany product shipments. I have never heard a reporter say a kind word for media kits, except for the online variety, so why do we keep sending them?

Missing the point

Arianna Huffington has started a series styled the Judy file, consisting of droppings from New York Times’ anonymice. Imagine what it is like to be Bill Keller right now, wondering which reporters are dishing dirt. Imagine what it is like to come under unjust suspicion for leaking. What are the chances that the anonymice have created an atmosphere of distraction and distrust? Now you know what the worker bees in your government have been putting up with for the last thirty years.

It is remarkable to go to a Washington IT event when one of these scandals is breaking. In the same room you have the worker bees for the government agency issuing subpoenas, the worker bees for the agency receiving subpoenas and the marketing representatives from the litigation support software companies. Mostly everyone is oblivious to the passing storm; but tension is not far from the surface. Industry analysts that have spoken to such groups will tell you that Washington, DC audiences are like no other.

Huffington makes it embarrassing clear that she has no idea what this story is about with this unseemly offer:

And for any employees of the Alexandria Detention Center who may have been monitoring the Bolton-Miller visit: feel free to give us a call or drop us an e-mail. The Judy File promises to protect your identity... even if it means taking the cell next to Judy’s.

It was soon followed by this clarification:

that it is the policy at ALEXANDRIA not to give out the names of visitors (in fact, the deputy we spoke with there said that he wasn’t sure they would give it out even with a subpoena).

This story is partly about reporters and editors who thought their stories were more important than the law. The proper operation of our jails is far more important than Huffington’s ridiculous little blog. It is not morally acceptable to openly solicit the employees of correctional institutions to violate procedures. Huffington needs to clean up her act.

Bob Somerby comments.

Global PR Blog Week 2.0 and the image of the PR industry

The public does not like us. They think we are sneaky, manipulative and duplicitous. We are supposed to be in the business of making a good impression on the public; yet the public does not like us. It’s embarrassing. How can we change it?

Some have said we should find a way to drive out the bad apples and end bad practices. I just don’t think that is possible. Bad clients hire bad practitioners.

What I do think is possible is to educate the public about the ordinary business of professional communications. That is part of what Global PR Blog Week 2.0 is all about. For one week, September 19 - 23, fifty-three PR professionals from twelve counties will present seventy-one articles about communications and public relations. It will all be online and free to the public. Anyone will be able to read it and judge for themselves the nature of our work. I think the public will be pleased.

Get ready to pitch

USA Today to Launch Technology Magazine in October

Looks like it is is going to be consumer oriented. With a $4.95 cover price it is difficult to see how it is going to compete with Tom’s Hardware or the gadget blogs. But after years of watching magazines fold it is thrilling to see a new title launch.