Friday, September 26, 2008

Labour plans blogosphere rebuttal unit

From PR Week:

the Labour Party is exploring plans for an online rapid rebuttal unit, designed to kill off damaging stories circulating in the blogosphere.

Former lobbyist Derek Draper will oversee the initiative, having recently been called in by Labour’s general secretary to advise on how the party can communicate its message.

Labour strategists are keen to respond to the growing influence of right-wing blogs. The eventual system could resemble a modern-day version of Labour’s famous Excalibur unit, which was successfully used to kill negative stories by Tory-supporting newspapers in the run-up to the 1997 general election.

Draper will meet sympathetic bloggers and web-savvy political campaigners over the next few months to thrash out the details.

A bit of free advice to Labour strategists: encourage Derek Draper to go back to California.

Meanwhile, the Tories have had rather a good idea for their Birmingham Conference next week:
Head of new media Rishi Saha has worked with regional organisation Screen West Midlands to identify ten influential bloggers in the area, who have been given free VIP passes to the conference.
If they ever meet in Leicestershire, I shall expect to receive accreditation.
Thanks to Guido Fawkes.

4 comments:

Gareth Aubrey said...

Surely you can see them from your hill in Shropshire anyway? (I'd look the other way while they're there, mind...)

Bernard Salmon said...

The Ministry of Truth goes online!

Jennie Rigg said...

Oh, like Labour haven't had astroturfers for ages... It's amusing how much they backfire though

Frank Little said...

Labour strategists are keen to respond to the growing influence of right-wing blogs
Why are they not worried about left-wing blogs?