And the winner is...

…Paul the octopus.

Now that the world cup is well and truly over I am pleased to announce that the winner of the PR trophy for the tournament is indeed the world’s first mystic cephalopod, Paul.

Various media have gone to great lengths to keep us informed of Paul’s background – born in the UK, currently living in Germany, favourite food – mussels and his favourite pastime – making children laugh. As I cannot recall knowing such facts about any of the footballers involved in the tournament I can only conclude that in addition to his psychic powers Paul has fantastic control of his media portrayal.

Paul has also remained humble in the wake of his triumph – a quality which many players may do well to emulate. But perhaps most importantly Paul seems keen to retire at the height of his success – until, perhaps, he receives a tempting offer to showcase his new aquarium to his adoring fans and talk about his latest book signing tour!

And all I can say about that is, if there is ever an octopus signing autobiographies then I will definitely be in that queue.

The art of self promotion

PR is often accused of stretching, bending or framing the truth in a self serving way and indeed there is some truth in this.

However, sometimes an example crops up the truly beggars belief.

A gentlemen by the name of Jeffrey Wong Su En has awarded himself a knighthood.
Mr Wong, who is the deputy publicity chief for the Democratic Action Party, a Malaysian opposition party in Sabah, northern Borneo, issued a press release to announce his achievement accompanied by a doctored photograph of him receiving the honour from the Queen.

Unfortunately for Mr Wong his name has never appeared on the Honours List and he made several mistakes regarding his attire and certificate which were noticed by various experts in the field, causing him to become the centre of international attention in not quite the way he was expecting.