Back in 2005, I posted my frustrations with the blog mob spinning the Jeremy Hermanns slash Alaska Flight 536 slash nasty comments story out of control. I’m still frustrated, but having spent a couple of days mulling the problem, I’d like to talk a little bit about how I think this got started and why it’s become such a problem.
First you have the incident itself, a traumatic thing by all accounts. Jeremy Hermanns, blogger and amateur pilot is airborne in an Alaska Airlines MD-80 bound for Burbank when, according to his blog he hears a “loud bang - the cabin air began to swirl and the engine sound became deafening.” Jeremy said that there is no way to describe the feeling of helplessness, “absent any control, you cannot breathe, and everyone around is stunned into fear.”
This is where the first bone of contention comes up. According to Jeremy, he was able to detect, “the smell of acrid AV-gas/JP4 and burning plastic.” But as many commenters have since pointed out, MD-80’s don’t use the aforementioned type of fuel, and there was no burnt plastic associated with the incident. So far as I can see, this is what started the nastiness. Some people with aerospace expertise believed that Jeremy was overplaying the incident for his own monetary gain and were obviously anxious to attack his credibility. But more than likely, Jeremy wasn’t lying or overplaying the incident - his memory was simply flawed, as human memories often are after traumatic experiences.
Then, as the nastiness mounted, Jeremy noticed that some of the most critical comments were coming from IP addresses associated with Alaska Airlines. He does note that:
Like I said - these just originated from an IP address registered to them according to my Wordpress comment logs; I don’t know if they’re from actual Alaska employees, or maybe just hackers using Alaska’s IP address. But according to my server logs and a simple WHOIS lookup, they all came from an IP address registered to Alaska Airline, Inc.
But people clearly paid more attention to the title “Alaska Airlines Comments on My Story” and the last line of his post, “Thanks again, Alaska. You guys are the best,” than to the preceding disclaimer.
Soon, the comments muddled the facts entirely, making it appear as though Alaska corporate itself had sanctioned the remarks which may or may not have been posted by Alaska employees.
The comments ran the gamut from the oversimplified:
Right now, these 5 comments are apparently the ONLY response that Alaska has to Mr. Hermanns experience. Does that make YOU want to fly Alaska anytime soon? To know that if you share your experience, you’ll have to defend yourself against a company rep (rather than be offered apologies galore)?
to the illogical:
Alaska — if you’re listening — do you have anything to say about all of this? Is this how you intend to treat anyone who publicly shares negative experiences they’ve had with your airline?
to the completely off-base:
HAHA! I for SURE won’t be flying Alaska Airlines now — the accident was a big starter, but their poor PR attack is even worse. What simple minded marketing exec thought they could snake by with spinster blog comments, and NOT be had? Good luck with that Alaska, I hope you hire professionals in the future.
to the patently absurd:
And they called “you” a pussy ? What a crock of crap ! If you ask me they’re the sell-out pussies ! Having the balls to have the word Alaska on the side of their planes and business, while corporate is based in Seattle ! Look on their corporate contact info and all phone numbers are (206) and not (907).
They couldn’t hack it in the real AK so they fly in and out of Seattle, pretending to be Alaskans.
I say the next flight with Ralph on it in AK airspace should be escorted promptly back to Seattle by a couple of F-15s launched from Elmendorf - that would make a great live-fire training exercise, wouldn’t it Ralph ? Pussy.
And soon, the assumptions and Alaska bashing were running rampant in the blogosphere. Highly influential bloggers (click here to read about a few of them) ran with the story without bothering to check the facts, behaving more like fourth grade gossips than serious citizen journalists.
It’s these kinds of incidents that simultaneously destroy the credibility of the blogosphere as a whole and frighten companies away from becoming bloggers themselves. How can we expect that any business would want to develop a presence out here when some of the most influential people in the blogosphere are reinforcing existing blogger stereotypes by galavanting around like a pack of raving numbskulls?
This may be a difficult time for Alaska Airlines, but the blogosphere is the real entity suffering from public relations disaster.
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
-b- 01.02.06 at 2:19 pm
See a related article in the NYTimes about how Answering Back to the News Media, Using the Internet
Steve Broback 01.02.06 at 11:51 pm
Let’s talk to a Lawyer. I say there is a good chance that the Alaska employee who made those comments can be considereed “official”. Probable Agency relationship.
Respondeat Superior. The traditional basis for employer liability
for the acts or omissions of its employees is respondeat superior.
The doctrine holds the employer liable for the employee’s acts that
occur within the scope of employment or in furtherance of the
employer’s interests.
The Restatement (Second) of Agency, §228, establishes the test
widely used to determine whether an employee’s conduct fell
within the scope of employment:
(1) Conduct of a servant is within the scope of employment if,
but only if:
(a) it is of the kind he is employed to perform;
(b) it occurs substantially within the authorized time
and space limits;
(c) it is actuated, at least in part, by a purpose to serve
the master; and
(d) if force is intentionally used by the servant against
another, the use of force is not unexpectable by the
master.
(2) Conduct of a servant is not within the scope of employment
if it is different in kind from that authorized, far beyond the
authorized time or space limits, or too little actuated by a
purpose to serve the master.
Kami Huyse 01.03.06 at 9:36 am
This is exactly why companies MUST enter the blogosphere. Right now anyone who want to can blog and an even larger crowd can add their comments. I believe blogs are (in general) more like editorial than citizen journalism sites.
That is why companies cannot afford to stay out of the blogosphere. They need a presence, a go-to person, that can speak up when such incidents occur.
There has also been a pretty good discussion at POP!PR Jots about the idea of a employing a blogging policy for companies.
http://pop-pr.blogspot.com/2005/12/pr-issue-behind-alaska-airlines.html#comments
I am not so sure that a stiff policy would work, but guidelines about using company computers to send out personal ideas is probably a good idea.
More important is to have good, corporate bloggers already established in the marketplace when something like this occurs.
Teresa Valdez Klein 01.03.06 at 10:40 am
I agree that, in retrospect, Alaska would absolutely have benefitted from having a blogging policy in place - whether or not Alaska employees were commenting on Hermanns’ blog. And I agree that companies must figure out this blogging thing and develop a presence out here.
But I think there’s another issue at play in this instance. A lot of bloggers have decided that because blogs are important to businesses, businesses owe them some kind of vigilance and a response when they issue criticisms.
That’s just not realistic - and it’s a little egocentric. I think that a lot of bloggers who are criticizing Alaska for conducting a “bad PR campaign” expected that someone official would eventually respond directly to the blogosphere. They’re as angry about that as they are about the accident in the first place.
Companies need to enter the blogosphere, but it’s not just because the bloggers criticize them. It’s because a blog is going to become an essential feature of their marketing strategy. Yes, responding to critical bloggers is one part of that equation - but the more central focus of a business blog is to keep customers, potential customers, and the community at large abreast of what’s going on with the company.
Bloggers who demand that Alaska start blogging now in response to this “PR crisis” are suffering from an over inflated view of themselves.
Kami Huyse 01.03.06 at 11:10 am
Teresa: First of all, I think it may be too late for Alaska to “respond” by blogging. It seems they would have needed to be a part of the coversation already as a part of their overall communications strategy (versus marketing strategy).
At any rate, as a PR professional, I know that a company must respond (or choose not to respond) to outspoken critics. A company must also effectively communicate with the mainstream media, employees, shareholders (if they have them) and any other stakeholders. If bloggers start affecting business, business will also need to speak “directly to the blogosphere.”
This is not egocentric, it is a new reality that people can say whatever they want in their blog space. If they have a large audience, or their ideas get picked up, and if a business is affected by this “conversation,” they will then have to respond.
Whether all these conditions have yet been met in the Alaska case remains to be seen. A quick check of Google News shows that the current Alaska blog controversy hasn’t bubbled up into the mainstream press.
Still, if Alaska had an online strategy that included monitoring blogs prior to the emergency, they may have been able to answer questions quickly and limit the criticism by offering facts.
Ike 01.03.06 at 11:31 am
Let’s remember to look at this from the other side of the equation.
Jeremy is using a technology that gives him the swagger and power of a budding medium. A newsroom of one. Most who do flip the switch on their blogs don’t consider the other aspects of running a newsroom — like the cranks and the freaks who call the assignment desk.
Legitimate reporters and journalists know how to roll with that, and how to defuse angry feelings without stoking the fires even more. “Citizen journalists” rarely have the training and experience required to live up to those responsibilities.
Those who want to “play journalist” need to understand more about the game before they turn their word-presses into bully pulpits. That is where the credibility suffers.
Teresa Valdez Klein 01.03.06 at 11:35 am
Kami:I think we’re talking about the same thing here. What I’m referring to specifically is the misconception running around in the blogosphere that Alaska was somehow conducting an ill-advised “blog PR campaign” with the comments that may or may not have come from Alaska employees.
I absolutely agree with you that it’s not egocentric for bloggers to expect that companies should respond to them when it becomes clear that their blogging is affecting business. Jeff Jarvis and Dell are excellent examples of a situation where a company absolutely ought to be responding to a blogger.
What’s egocentric is when a blogger somewhere in the echo chamber misrepresents the facts because he or she didn’t bother to research them, and then starts acting as though the company involved owes them and the other bloggers doing the same thing an explanation simply because they have the “power of the blog.” I think Ike says it very well indeed.
Also, not to nitpick - but this has begun to bubble up into the mainstream media.
Teresa Valdez Klein 01.03.06 at 12:28 pm
Ike: I think you’re right on. Part of the issue here is absolutely experience. Bloggers haven’t been to journalism school and they don’t have older, wiser editors around to show them the ropes and keep them in line.
I wonder if it then becomes the responsibility of the blogosphere to police itself.
-b- 01.03.06 at 1:27 pm
We’re working through this now on the book and trying to put in context of what to do when faced with a situation like this. While all the blogger PR pundits can opine about what companies should do and how they make the rules in the blogosphere, it’s way more complex than that and I can see a CEO reading this and saying, “what the? I have to respond to every blogger that calls my blog a piece of crap.” A colleague said to me today that the blogosphere is like kryptonite with no powers in the real world. Outside of the blogosphere does anyone care what the pundits say?
Teresa Valdez Klein 01.03.06 at 5:07 pm
More on the blogosphere policing itself thing:
Steve had a very interesting perspective when we met this afternoon. He thinks that the blogosphere as a whole does real journalism - but individual bloggers do not. It’s the give and take, the push and pull between bloggers that brings the truth to the surface and that no one blog can represent all sides of the story because that’s not in their nature.
Thoughts?
-b- 01.03.06 at 6:23 pm
Yep, see the NYTimes article I cite above, in the first comment and this quote from the article, “But the power of blogs is exponential; blog posts can be linked and replicated instantly across the Web, creating a snowball effect that often breaks through to the mainstream media.”
Teresa Valdez Klein 01.03.06 at 6:29 pm
Byron: I agree, but I think it’s more than that. Blogs balance one another and keep them in check. For example, when I said that the bloggers that assumed Alaska Airlines as a corporate entity had gone off half cocked in the blogosphere ought to be spanked, I was acting as a check on their negligence to the facts in that instance.
We police one another in the service of the truth. Does that make sense?