This just in... one of the blogosphere’s top “experts” dodged harsh recrimination late yesterday by employing the renowned “Monkey Butt” communications technique.

Having its roots in anthropology, the “monkey butt” is actually a tribal communications tactic used to display submission. Among certain primate species, there's a curious but consistent behavior employed to ensure peace and harmony within the "monkey troop." A less dominate male will turn his back and offer his bulbous pink haunches to more dominate members of the social hierarchy so as to avoid conflict. (Note: also see "penis fencing" and "rump rubbing" used among Bonobo males to express reconciliation.)

Under intense pressure lately to defend PR's legitimacy as part of the online “conversation,” A-List blogger Shel "of his former self" Holtz offered up his monkey butt. In a blog post yesterday, Holtz responded to a recent Richard Edelman interview in IT World regarding the “Wal-Marting Across America” fraud. The question ultimately was/is whether PR provides any value to the blogosphere.

Edelman said, “There's a group of bloggers who don't like PR people being in the blogosphere. I fundamentally disagree with them. I think we add value.”

Holtz responded, “I don’t believe PR as a whole provides value. We have seen far too many examples of PR run amok in the blogosphere, engaged in the same deceptive practices that occur outside the blogosphere, the same practices that result in the dubious esteem in which many hold the profession.”

DEPENDING ON WHAT YOUR DEFINITION OF "IS" IS

Remember Bill Clinton sweating under the intense lights of the Lewinsky deposition saying that he "did not have sex with that woman," and that it "depends on what your definition of 'is' is”? Similarly, Shel parses good PR and bad PR so as to avoid being righteously schtupped.

As he displays his monkey butt, he makes the distinction that he only does the good kind of PR. He says, “I believe ethical public relations has a place in the blogosphere; and it’s the same place it has anywhere else.”

As an example, he sites an incident that happened in his illustrious career some 15 years ago. Apparently, while working for a medical optics company, a bootleg product appeared in the marketplace. Shel issued a media advisory to area press outlets to alert the public. In Shel’s words, “It’s possible that this message saved some the eyesight of some Waco teens." Today, Shel notes, "that message could spread much faster in the blogosphere than it did in 1991 or 1992 when we relied on local TV and radio stations.”

YEAH BUTT

- But didn't those TV and radio stations also act as society's ombudsmans, so to speak? Wasn't that what gave PR legitimacy in the first place as the message was appropriately filtered?

- How many instances of the "good PR" has Shel had in his 30-year career? How often is a PR person hired completely devoid of corporate “marketing,” “influence” and “strategy”? If not for profits (directly or indirectly), for what is your client contact held accountable?

- But didn’t Shel announce just last week that he is now the VP New Marketing for Crayon, the world's first dedicated New Marketing company? And for “marketing approaches” they offer, don’t they include social media such as “blogs, podcasts, RSS and wikis, experiential marketing, long form content, consumer generated content, open-source marketing, virtual worlds, gaming, mobile, and non-paid media digital solutions.” Hmmmmm.

- And didn’t the release say that in order “to build a strong foundation of new marketing practitioners,” Crayon president Joe Jaffe “reached out to some of new marketing's most influential,” namely “communications veteran Shel Holtz.” Double hmmmmm.

SHEL FYI

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