THE GURGLING COD

Holy Crap!

Someone's  mom is starting an online PR firm! That's the only explanation for the final word of this:

For the first time, we would like to share with you the job benefits of being a <redacted> agent. No matter what your results, as long as we think you're worthy, we will pay you a monthly paycheck in the range of $5,000 to $10,000, basically setting you on our payroll to do what you do best, "Interneting".

Come to think of it, it looks like someone's mom has teamed up with one of those cashiered Nigerian generals who is always so eager to send a huge check to an honest, Godfearing person.

Wackademics

Not quite Guiteau Monday territory, I am feeling too good for that, but the good folks at the CIA dropped this in the inbox:

Hyde Park, NY, November 5, 2007 – The winner of this fall's hit reality show on the Food Network will be a graduate of The Culinary Institute of America (CIA) in Hyde Park, NY. With the elimination of Chris Cosentino from The Next Iron Chef, the final two remaining chefs – John Besh of New Orleans and Michael Symon of Cleveland – are both CIA alumni.

Interestingly, when a history prof friend of mine we'll call Jack McKittrick got on Jeopardy!, the history department at his alma mater did not send out an email. That was a few years ago, so perhaps churning out successful game show contestants is the new measure of a school's prestige.

Bring out the best?

I have no idea what the professional journal/conference for PR folks is, but I've thought it might be fun to do an article/panel on how not to pitch a blogger. The Cod is a small enough fish that I'm not exactly inundated with press releases, but I get a bunch, and many of them betray a fundamental misapprehension of how the whole blog enterprise works. But more on that later. In the meantime, the Ethicurean points out what might be a cannier approach on the part of Hellman's Mayo (Best Foods to you Cali types):

Last week I received an email from a professional at a world-renowned advertising agency about a new campaign for his client Hellman’s Mayonnaise. (On the West Coast it’s sold under the Best Foods brand.) He said they wanted to hear my thoughts on real food. If they liked my description, they’d feature the post on the Yahoo Food site they’d set up, where "celebrity chef" Dave Lieberman* is blogging and posting videos about Americans and real food. In case I was worried that they just wanted to help me advertise mayonnaise, oh no.

"Our aim is not to get you to talk about Hellmann’s or mayo, but to get your authentic view on what ‘real food’ means to you so we can share it as part of our site," said the email. "To that end, your post does NOT have to mention our campaign or anything about Hellmann’s."

Now, I'd never heard of the Yahoo food site, or the Yahoo/Hellman's 'Real Food' site, but I imagine it gets a fair amount of traffic. Most bloggers are sluts for exposure, and it's not hard to imagine being tempted by this kind of approach. More concerning, though also not surprising, is the totally brazen effort to claim the mantle of "Real Food." I like Hellman's and it has a place in my kitchen. It is a fundamentally different product from home-made mayo. But to assert that it is "real food"is dangerous. Not so much because of the DL Alpha Tocopherol and whatnot, as that it takes an idea "real food"  that has some value as a way to encourage people to think about what they eat, and replaces it with "Real Food," which seems to mean something like a return to the dark ages of Taste of Home. Hellman's Real Food, if it gets any traction, threatens to occlude real food with Real Food, which seems to mean things like Yukon Gold potatoes tossed with a shit-ton of Hellman's.

*Who?