By Elliott Brack
Editor and publisher
SEPT. 25, 2018 | Pet Peeve Department: Readers may be astounded to know how many people in the public relations field take a mighty lazy approach to writing a news story.
If we have seen one, we must have seen at least one a week, of the stories that begin this way: “This Company is pleased to announce……..”
Over and over we see stories starting off this way. So “….pleased to announce” gets our goat. Not wanting to bore our readers with this continual use of a sloppy phrase, we change it. We simply have it to read: “This Company announces…..” Simple and to the point.
Besides it being a sloppy and lazy beginning by the writer, let’s face it: the company itself cannot be pleased. (And maybe the company can’t even announce!) Maybe people in the company may be pleased at the announcement, but a company is not a living, breathing person, and we know that the entity doesn’t have the means to give a hoot.
You PR scribes and practitioners: get more creative!
Abbreviation Test: Our former newspaper colleague Bruce Black of Peachtree Corners wonders how many simple abbreviations that are commonly used in the media the average person would know without resorting to Google.
We’ve picked 10 of his submissions for you to work on. We’ll show the answers at the bottom of today’s offering.
So, what does these 10 abbreviations stand for?
- CID
- MSA
- BOGO
- PSA
- ROI
- LTL
- AP
- IB
- Indy
- API (an old one.)
Suckered Again: Every so often, an old story gets new legs. Within the last month, it was been the story about the Georgia town of Toomsboro being for sale. That small town is located in northern Wilkinson County, where I am from, being born in the southern edge of that county.
A person who lives in Toomsboro presently was baffled by the “announcement” that the town was for sale. “The “Toomsboro for Sale” story pops up in the national media every two or three years. Far from being the whole town, many of the vacant downtown buildings have been owned by the same guy from Florida for at least ten years. For sale signs have been up almost that long. I don’t think anybody is stupid enough to pay what he wants for the properties. More importantly, nobody has a good idea of what to do with it once they buy it, short of throwing away a lot of money to maintain the property.”
Abbreviation Answers: Check to see how you did:
- CID: Community Improvement District.
- MSA: Metropolitan Statistical Area.
- BOGO: Buy One, Get One free.
- PSA: Public Service Announcement.
- ROI: Return on Investment.
- LTL: Less than Truckload.
- AP: Advanced Placement.
- IB: International Baccalaureate.
- Indy: Independent retail store.
- API: Alabama Polytechnic Institute (The original name of Auburn University.)
Traveling Sign: Cece Turner of Auburn reports that the sign in Duncan’s Corner pointing the way to parts of the world has been moved….across the street. Seems a developer is working on the land where the sign was originally located, and at least had the good sense to keep the distinctive sign intact across the street. (The mileage to the distant lands won’t change!)
This sign caused Roving CBS Correspondent Charles Kuralt years ago to stop and talk to the late Mr. L.D. Duncan about why he had the sign up. Mr. Duncan said that many travelers got lost in the area, often knocking on his door for directions. So he erected the sign, with direction of the ways to many places, including both London and Hong Kong. But even then, people often wanted directions from him. His idea: “People can’t read.”
- Have a comment? Send to: elliott@brack.net
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