Yeah, but he’s a journalist

Much is being said in the PR realm about Om Malik’s Technorati scoop (eg Steve Rubel and Matthew Podboy). At the risk of sparking a journalist vs blogger debate, there’s something worth clarifying here.

The biggest difference between this scenario and any other scoop by a journalist is that Om broke the (great) news on his own blog, rather than a blog or website hosted by his employer (although it doesn’t look like Biz 2 is chasing hard news on its site these days).

To all the PR people wondering how this particular case changes the PR game, let me say this: it doesn’t change much when it comes to dealing with journalists. If a journalist has a scoop, and can break the news in any medium that now includes blogs, they will do it. And things like embargo negotiations should still apply to blogs - although I’d suggest PR’s start checking.

What we are expecting to see change is the rise of bloggers (who don’t have a day job as a journalist) breaking stories before journalists. That scenario is already well documented and that’s what should be worrying the PR establishment. You thought journalists were hard to control…