It takes a lifetime to build a reputation and only one tweet to destroy it. That’s what Washington Post reporter Mike Wise is finding out after an ill-fated social experiment using social media. Wise thought he was going to pull a clever little ruse. He’d send out a tweet with falsified news – saying he [...]

The story that won’t seem to die: previously anonymous Miami Dolphins General Manager Jeff Ireland asked former Oklahoma State wide receiver Dez Bryant whether his mother was a prostitute during a meeting with team executives prior to the NFL draft.  I expected this nugget to create a little buzz in the blogosphere and fill a [...]

The Federal Trade Commission raised quite a stink a few months ago when it released its new guides governing endorsements and testimonials, which the commission itself said would “affect testimonial advertisements, bloggers [and] celebrity endorsements.” I’m co-presenting at the next Minnesota Interactive Marketing Association event, a discussion about ethics around social media marketing. As you [...]

Editor’s note: This is John Reinan’s weekly marketing columnfor MinnPost. To view the original, go to http://bit.ly/buGnk8. Can you feel sorry for a jerk? I’m talking about Steven Payne, the theater executive at Evergreen Entertainment who told a customer to go [expletive] herself after she complained of a bad experience at a movie in St. [...]

As long as cameras have been small enough to stuff inside a duffel bag, a suitcase or a pocket, they’ve been used to expose actions people would probably rather have kept private. In most of those cases, there’s a PR team somewhere working hard to earn their paychecks — or perhaps reconsidering their career paths. [...]