This past week has been one heck of a week on the work front. Total immersion in a PR project which has produced positive results on a global scale that exceeded even my most fanciful expectations. I don’t usually discuss client work in this blog, but maybe I’ll talk more about it at another time.

So how’s the online world been doing while my attention was elsewhere?

Well, to start with, I’ve missed some conversation developments here in the blog. I’ll try to catch up with everyone soon.

Among the work frenzy, I did manage to record last Thursday’s edition of the FIR podcast, show #168. Shel was away traveling so it was a solo effort including all the stuff Shel usually does with file uploading, RSS feeds, etc. The show went up pretty late, after midnight in fact.

My original plan was to present the show with guest co-presenter CC Chapman. CC does the Accident Hash music podcast and Managing The Gray, an excellent marketing podcast. We were lined up to go and then I couldn’t do it. But it was tremendous to include CC’s music recommendation. Great song (and intro), CC!

One of the discussion topics in FIR #168 was Second Life and the disturbing activities in the virtual world by the Second Life Liberation Army. I see that Chris Clarke has “officially had it” with the continuing FIR talk about SL, saying he thinks that the topic should have been addressed in a humorous manner. And Owen Lystrup has a comment on the podcast blog expressing some incredulity at our commentary.

I’ll be talking about Second Life again in this Monday’s show. Some listeners (D-Ring PR, for instance) have their own views about SL on which they want to hear commentary in FIR from the business and communication perspectives. Happy to oblige!

I started out this morning catching up with my RSS feeds. All I’ve really paid attention to in the RSS area this past week has been the various watchlists I’ve had running re the PR project I mentioned. Such an excellent tool to keep tabs on who’s saying what, in such an effortless way.

First up – a thoughtful commentary by Doc Searls about the Cluetrain Manifesto.

If you’ve read Cluetrain, you’ll know that Doc was one of the co-authors of this work first published in 2000 that provokes strong opinions about marketing and customer relationships.

I’ve read Cluetrain and, while I don’t agree with everything it says, the basic notion that “markets are conversations” is such common sense that I don’t see how anyone, even cynical marketers, can disagree.

Add this view from Doc to your thinking:

[…] The social network that should matter most is the one that grows between the people who create the product and the people who buy and use it. Nothing could be more important here than either expanding customer relationship management to include these conversations and relationships, or junking CRM entirely, because – as Ian Kallen (one of the engineers on the supply side of Technorati’s offerings) put it to me in a conversation yesterday – “CRM is for stalking customers”.

The primary job of marketing is to facilitate those conversations, and to reduce interference in the most highly leveraged relationships a creative company can possibly have.

Next, a bit of a kerfuffle about whether Paul Abrahams, the UK head of Waggener Edstrom, Microsoft’s primary PR agency, “gets it” about blogging. According to Tom Foremski, he doesn’t. Chief WagEd Microsoft man Frank Shaw posts a gentle but robust defence of his firm’s overall abilities in this area.

The best comment on all this comes from Ellie Seymour:

[…] Abrahams isn’t unique, it’s just his position with Microsoft should make him more blog savvy.

Elsewhere, Philip Young has started the Mediations Wiki:

[…] which aims to be a way of collecting useful articles and posts under a series of themes in a structured and accessible way. It is primarily aimed at students studying my courses in media ethics and the impact of social softwares on PR practice but I hope there will be material here to interest a wider audience.

Another useful resource for PR professionals, students or otherwise. Complementary to The New PR Wiki.

So, just a few things on my radar screen today.

Next week, I’ll be Stockholm, Sweden, participating in The Web of Tomorrow, a two-day conference organized by IBC Euroforum. The event is in Swedish although the keynote I’ll be delivering on Tuesday is in English.

I was due to run a half-day podcasting workshop at this event on Monday but it was cancelled due to lack of interest. Maybe Swedish business isn’t ready for podcasting yet.

I’ll be meeting up with Fredrik Wacka while I’m in Stockholm. Fredrik’s the lead speaker at the conference. If you’re in Stockholm on Monday night and would like to meet up with us, let me know.

Finally, as I think about dealing with unanswered emails and uninvolved blog conversations over the past week, plus a load of other things that I need to find time to do something about this weekend, here’s some relevant wry humour from bLaugh: