Master Class #49: Hacks v. Flacks
There's always the tension between reporters (hacks) and PR pros (flacks).
We love to criticize, question and challenge one another.
But as newspapers and other media continue to lay off staff in droves and there is a desperate need to fill the gaping news hole, flacks are needed more than ever. Why? Because we are trained news writers and tend to be pretty smart. And while we are getting paid to promote an idea, product or service, our news copy is usually damn good and worthy of publishing.
The PR-to-media ratios are at frightening levels these days. We guess there is one real, live breathing journalist per 100 flacks. Reporters have less and less time to deal with PR people, but need us for quotable sources and quality copy that you can't get from the green news intern who was working at the Arby's drive-thru just last week.
It’s really hard to be a journalist right now, and we PR pros need media friends more than ever.
So, let's all try to get along in 2024, ok?
Flacks will keep providing news copy. And reporters will keep an open mind, recognizing it is impossible for one ink-stained wretch to write the whole damn paper by himself each and every day.
THE NEW 60
A Jaffe Exclusive
by Andy Landorf & John Colquhoun
