Sharpen your knives, BusinessWeek staffers: The NYT says that 20% layoffs at the mag are "being pitched to investors as something of a done deal." Surprise! Look to your left. Look to your right. Then look at two more people. One of you will be laid off, on average. Statistics are fun. Also: Jon Fine reports that Bruce Wasserstein's dropped out of the bidding, so Bloomberg is looking strong, in terms of "Being the one to buy your magazine and then lay you off."


$4.64 per month. That's how much, on average, survey respondents said they would pay for online access to their newspaper's website. Although half the people said they wouldn't pay anything! So the actual average price point would be about $2.25. Good luck, Steven Brill.


Help A Reporter Out, the source-finding PR-journalist connection website founded by voluble flack Peter "Zzzzzt" Shankman, claims to be raking in more than a million bucks in ad revenue per year. Which seems crazy, but according to some quick math by informed people, is plausible! All this from, basically, an oversized, popular Facebook group. Lucky. This concludes our discussion of Peter Shankman, which only encourages him.


The publisher of the Washington Post thought that an upcoming magazine story was icky and gross, as well as depressing, so the mag spiked the story, which is a total coincidence and in no way a bid to please this lady, the one who signs everyone's paychecks.

Weymouth has been telling editors that there have been too many stories similar to the one last November about a 13-year-old dwarf undergoing surgery to lengthen her legs.

That is weird. Isn't that weird? It is.

Adweek takes an in-depth look at the HARO phenomenon, and does a little calculating to figure out that Shankman makes more than $3K every day selling ads on his two daily HARO emails, that go out to more than 30,000 flacks and other wannabe media sources. For an hour and a half of work. Okay, that's kind of slick.

But you know who thinks HARO sucks? The people at Profnet! HARO's deficiencies:

• It's not from a neutral source—Shankman is a PR guy with his own clients, and gives them first crack at the good media requests.
• Other reporters can totally monitor HARO and steal your ideas.
• Profnet is the recognized leader in masturbation advice and smelly genital information.

I used Profnet many times in my former life as a trade mag reporter; when you needed to round up five geographically disparate sources with slightly different takes on the pluses and minuses of PR agency day care plans, there was really no substitute. But I have to admit that the real takeaway from this debate is probably this, from Sheldon Rampton of PR Watch:

"We're living in an environment where reporters are less and less willing to do independent research, so that's created an opportunity for PR people to step in and do the research for them," Rampton says...

"My personal take on ProfNet is it's not all bad, but there's more bad than good in it," says Rampton, who is less familiar with HARO. "It's one of various ways that the news product is getting cheapened."

We laughed at useless rich girl Brill for her dramatic(-ally blogged) declaration that "even my weekend in bedford wasn’t entirely restful because i still felt ‘on duty’ because i knew i’d be writing about it." Ha! But! Consider this from taser-loving, reporter-helping, cult-like-following-inspiring professional PR man Peter Shankman's long new blog post about how much he hates hearing the phrase "Why Don't You Do Some Work?":

Was having a conversation the other day with someone via IM. She asked me where I was, and I told her I was talking from the lobby of the W hotel in Times Square, waiting to have a drink with someone who runs a marketing firm.

“The W Hotel?! What a tough life! Will you please do some work?!” she IM’d back. It was around 3pm. She didn’t know I’d closed two deals, brought three new advertisers to HARO, and gotten one client onto CNN. Not bad for someone who, according to my friend, had to be nagged to “do some work.”

Shit. Do we really want to open this floodgate? Can you already see where Shankman is prepared to go (at incredible length) with this? That's right, into an exposition of the awesomeness of Peter Shankman and his awesome work-play life balance!

I’ve heard virtually identical comments resulting from Facebook or Twitter updates that have included “Driving from LA to SF, stopped to get gas outside some wind farm,” “Sitting in the lounge at Gatwick, munching on a bagel,” “Singapore–>EWR flight delayed, hitting Duty Free, anyone want anything?” “Sitting on the hood of my rental car, watching the sunset from the desert outside of Eloy, Arizona,” and of course, “working from the Ranch, waiting for them to fuel the plane,” which of course, is code for “handling a client issue via conference call, with my skydiving rig on my back, hoping I’ll finish the call before the next load goes up in the air.”

Just in case you didn't catch his Twitter updates: he goes skydiving! Have you ever been? No? Well some people just aren't born adventurers, don't feel bad.

So Let’s translate “why don’t you do some work” into what it really is: “How come your job lets you fly all over the place, and have meetings in really cool places, and why can’t mine? Your job certainly doesn’t seem like work, why does mine?”

My answer to them? Because you don’t want it badly enough. If you really did, you’d have it. You’d take the risk, and play the game. (In actuality, that’s all it ever is - one giant game.) Face it - Having a job where you’re not the boss is, well, safe.

Peter Shankman thinks you're a pussy, no disrespect intended.

Like to read thousands more words about how Shankman can close client deals on his cellphone immediately before parachuting out of a plane and Twittering about it on the way down and, upon landing, running a road race that ends in a TV studio where he is doing an on-air interview? Read all you want!

"An inability to stay quiet is one of the conspicuous failings of mankind."
—Walter Bagehot

"Everybody's talking trash these days, so why not keep quiet?"
—Dennis Rodman

Shankman tells me he heard from a source that ProfNet is so concerned salespeople have been issued talking points against him. With 14,000 "professional communicators" in its roster, ProfNet has a significant cash flow at stake, especially when your competition gives away its product for free.

Shankman says he'll never charge for his service and would never sell his mailing list — the hour and a half per day that he spends on his mailing list results in great publicity for himself — better than he could ever buy. Though, he does make some coin selling ads at "way over $100 CPMs" to advertisers like American Apparel.

Shankman's little service has been building slowly for a long time. By all outward appearances (not counting his service to American Apparel), he's giving away a valuable service for free, out of the goodness of his heart. Which is why I've always been so god damn skeptical of the whole thing.

What's your angle, Shankman? What's your angle? What's your angle? I fully expect this to turn into some sort of cult, or be revealed as a CIA plot to infiltrate the media. Until then, we're withholding judgment.

[The Industry Standard]

Find him and interview? - O.
——- Forwarded message ——-
From: Chaela Volpe
Date: Jan 7, 2008 1:35 PM
Subject: Gary Krakow joins TheStreet.com newsroom as Sr. Tech Correspondent, Reports Live from CES in Las Vegas

After a couple moments of silence, Shankman says, "This is the most surreal moment I've ever been witness to." Then, of course, he writes it up. Thanks, buddy.

By the way, Krakow has this to say about his new job:

Valleywag: Why'd you leave MSNBC?
Krakow: MSNBC wanted to go in a different direction. I needed more artistic freedom.
V: Does TheStreet still exist? Have you been paid yet?
K: Don't worry about my paycheck. The new, redesigned site will be up within a few weeks with a focus on video.

Search engine optimization experts told PR blogger Peter Shankman that if Laermer isn't a violent sex fiend, he either copied his code from a porn site or he doesn't have effective security in place to keep porn "bots" from writing over his HTML to boost their search rankings. (Photo by It'sGreg)

Shankman titles a blog post: "Sunrise: Not just for those who stayed up all night anymore..." Hmm, can this be? He has me baffled. He writes:

Drives most people I know crazy, but I'm all about getting up at 4:30, 4:45am, and getting a jump on the day.

Let alone the early morning exercising thing - that's a given - and I won't preach on that this morning.

What's the first email they're going to see this morning when they walk in and are looking for sources? Yup.

Update: Peter Shankman responds: "I don't know who would win in a fight - me or Ronn. But I'll race him around the Central Park loop anytime he wants." Up for it, Ronn [sic]?

——-Original Message——-
From: peter@geekfactory.com
To: Sent: Mon, 22 Jan 2007 10:24 AM
Subject: Not a pitch. My yearly attempt at Good PR Karma.

Dear XXX,

Consider this an attempt at good karma for a brutally cold Monday morning in New York City. And happily for you, THIS IS NOT A PITCH. So don't delete it right away. It's actually designed to help you.

In a nutshell, I'm inviting you to source my brain. Add me to your email list when you're desperately seeking a quote at 11 minutes to deadline. Call me when something major breaks and you need a comment from an expert. Put me in your rolodex, and feel free to dial. Here's why:

I know a LOT of people. Like, more than you would ever think possible.

I run a PR shop in New York City, as well as a few other companies, and about four years ago, it occurred to me that knowing as many people as I do has GOT to be helpful to the media, right? So I send out this email once a year.

Between the amount of time I travel for business (in excess of 275k miles a year,) the number of boards/advisory boards on which I sit, the amount of clients I have, and the fact that I'm just a talkative but nice, total ADHD 34-year-old entrepreneur, I have a Blackberry bursting at the seams. Add to this my hobbies, (marathon runner, triathlete, amateur boxer, and licensed skydiver) and I float between the most random of worlds, meeting the most random of people.

This isn't about my clients, by the way. In fact, they're the smallest category. Mostly it's people I've become friends/colleagues with in some capacity, who do the most random things. Loss prevention investigators. Adult-entertainment stars who also buy/fix/flip real estate in South America. The guy who manufactures the laces that go in 75% of the world's sneakers. The guy who just beat the rap for trying to BASE jump the Empire State Building. Knitters who only knit with Soy, Bamboo, or Hemp yarn. The Director of Arts Education for the NYC Department of Education - A child psychologist who only works with high risk, suicidal kids A guy with over 5,000 skydives under his belt. A former Navy SEAL who now teaches mortals like me how to stay in shape. The guy who designs solar clothing, that lights up with messages on the back All friends, people I've met on airplanes, or through the randomness that is my life.

I also have some great clients - OpSec Security (the largest anti-counterfeiting company in the world), AirTroductions (a company I started that lets you choose your seat-mate before you get on the airplane - a date in the sky), MomJunction (where moms meet, talk, and get advice on that ball of energy running amok in their home), Helium Report (Consumer Reports for the uber-rich - reviewing private jets and destination clubs instead of chairs and laptops), and a bunch of others. In addition, I throw a good number of events and parties during the year, and am constantly looking for members of the media who would enjoy attending. If that's you, let me know, as well.

Basically, I don't sleep much. (I've been tested for it. My "getting into and getting out of" REM cycles are about 45 to 90 seconds apiece , as opposed to 30 minutes apiece for the normal world.)

Anyhow - source me. That's my offer for this morning. My contact information is below. Add me to whatever rolodex you're currently using, and if I can help in any way, feel free to call.

All the best,

Peter Shankman
CEO
The Geek Factory, Inc.

PS: Don't worry - this isn't a list from which you need to be removed. I won't start sending out weekly updates or anything, I promise. And to answer the second most frequently asked question, I got your name from Media Map, the PR/Journalist tool.

Earlier: If You Watch Only One "Publicist Gets Tased" Clip This Year...