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The Headliner

Every week, media experts from Eulogy, an independent and award-winning communications agency, dissect the biggest stories to help brands understand and influence the agenda.
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Now displaying: August, 2017
Aug 25, 2017

A crowd gathered and tears were shed as Big Ben bonged for the final time before being silenced for a four-year, £29 million renovation. Were the MP’s tears real? Will the renovation stick to schedule and budget? Why has this story generated so much coverage?  

Across the pond, the USA experienced its first total solar eclipse in 99 years. Millions of Americans gazed at the sky in what was an awe-inspiring moment as the sun and moon aligned. And in what has to be a contender for PR moment of the year, on a cruise ship in the Atlantic Ocean Bonnie Tylor sang total eclipse of the heart. Despite all the safety warnings Trump couldn’t resist looking directly at the sun. Will the President’s vision be affected?

Oh no, you didn’t Jeremy! Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt and Stephen Hawking got into a public spat over the future of the NHS. With Jeremy accusing Professor Hawking of peddling a 'pernicious falsehood'. Hunt has been widely mocked for claiming the world-renowned scientist is wrong about the scientific evidence. When it comes to interpreting studies and reviewing findings who has the better track record?  

What does a kilo of heroin seized by police in Catford have to do with Notting Hill Festival? That was what rapper Stormzy wanted to know after the Metropolitan police tweeted linking the raid to the upcoming Notting Hill Carnival. Were the Met wrong to link the drug bust to the upcoming Carnival?

Forget apprenticeships, never mind university, young people are looking to Instagram to build their careers. But is it a viable way to make a living? Just how many influencers can the social media platform support? When followers can be bought for as little as £3.99 just how much of their influence is real?

And finally, if you are worried about the new series of GBBO being on Channel 4 why not watch it on catch up and skip the adverts? This was the advice from new Bake Off judge Prue Leith. Yikes. As Channel 4 spent £75 million on the show, this remark may have left a bad taste in their mouths. Was Prue’s comment totally unpalatable or was she trying to ensure the show appealed to everyone’s taste buds? Either way, we can’t wait to watch the new series!

Aug 18, 2017

White nationalists gathered on Saturday for a “Unite the Right” march in Charlottesville, where they were met by counter protesters. Taunting led to shoving, which escalated into brawling. One person died and at least 34 people were wounded in the clashes. Governor Terry McAuliffe declared a state of emergency in Virginia.

President Trump prompted a firestorm by initially refusing to condemn white supremacists, choosing instead to denounce violence “on all sides”. The President did not explicitly single out white supremacists until Monday, declaring in a speech that “racism is evil”. He later doubled-down on his initial statement during an extraordinary press conference at Trump Tower, claiming that there were “very fine people” among the neo-Nazi marchers.

Jaws dropped worldwide. MSNBC host Chuck Todd said he was “shaken” by what he just heard. Fox News’ Kat Timpf told viewers she was “wondering if it was actually real life”. Brands associated with the administration – PayPal, SpaceX, Tesla, Intel and Merck –publicly fled, each declaring that the hate espoused by the President had no place in their businesses.

Newspapers joined together in almost universal condemnation. And news magazines on either side of the Atlantic, The Economist and the New Yorker, released covers depicting Trump as a mouthpiece for the KKK.

Besides Thursday’s tragic terror attack in Barcelona, little else has succeeded in shoving the story off the front pages.

In the business world, there’s another bogeyman spooking the stock market. Snap Inc, the maker of GenZ favourite Snapchat opened for trading on Tuesday this week at $13.05 per share, half what it opened at in March at its high. In the following days, it made the full media journey from disruptive upstart to cautionary tale.

Snap Inc has suffered at the hands of its larger rivals Facebook and Apple which expanded their messaging services to accommodate Snapchat’s unique format. But it was poor timing that led to its rapid devaluation—according to many analysts, its IPO simply came too late.

Its first trick was making selfies disappear, wrote Fortune. “Its latest is sending gargantuan piles of cash into the ether.” Oh dear.

Finally, it was announced this week that the Palace of Westminster’s famous bell, Big Ben, will be silenced for four years to protect the hearing of builders working on a £29million renovation of Elizabeth Tower. And if you thought that was reasonable and responsible to the poor people doing the renovations within the tower, well, you’d be ‘bonkers,’ according to many MPs and more than a sprinkling of news editors.

The Daily Mail is predictably livid with a front-page lead over two consecutive days. Tuesday’s ‘Death knell for common sense’ and Wednesday’s ‘Bong! Now a Big Ben climbdown’ beat Trump, Brexit and Philip Green in a champagne shower for top billing.

The Daily Telegraph has done its usual terribly grown-up thing of reporting on a reaction rather than explicitly reacting (while also subtly agreeing with everything that’s been said).

The Sun, uncharacteristically indifferent in its morning editorial, later picked up on Twitter hysteria—its online team was soon reporting MPs’ wild-eyed statements of misplaced nationalism. Don’t bin Big Ben’s bongs, it cried. ‘Health and safety succeeds where the Luftwaffe failed.’

And lo, we were all talking about Hitler again.

Aug 10, 2017

When the Great British Bake Off packed up its tent and marched over to Channel 4, fans were ambivalent at best; outraged at worst.

Now, with barely a month to go until its premiere, the revamped show – minus three quarters of its treasured team (Mel, Sue and Mary Berry) – is already causing the sort of angst we used to watch it to forget.

GBBO’s latest trailer, which shows 335 different baked goods coming to life and dancing around to Paul McCartney, has been branded ‘terrifying’ by fans on Twitter. Several reported having nightmares about the edible characters, which include a vomiting caterpillar and some malicious looking pastries. We know you’re new at this, C4, but baking show trailers are supposed to make you want to eat the food, not worry that the food is going to eat you.

Elsewhere… gone are the orchids, the salmons, the cherry blossoms. All but forgotten are the hots, the tangos, the carnations. The only pink that matters in 2017 finds its name in its most powerful advocate: the millennial. Fashion houses and designers are fawning over it, journalists are ascribing a cultural significance to it and apparently nobody can agree what shade ‘millennial pink’ actually is. Sorry, but it is August, after all.

And finally, while we’d be forgiven for thinking that Google HQ is a melting pot of young progressives, this week proved that even the company famous for ‘blue-sky thinking’ has its share of reactionary idiots. James Damore, a previously unknown software engineer posted a memo which left female staff “shaking in anger”. The 10-page ‘manifesto’ criticised the company’s diversity initiatives as ‘dangerous’ and suggested that gender inequality is the result of innate biological differences between men and women. Sigh.

Despite fierce criticism from self-styled ‘advocates of free speech,’ Damore was eventually fired by Google, who claimed that the memo breached the company’s code of conduct.

So, is the famously open and inclusive Palo Alto giant really silencing anyone who doesn’t share its political views? Or is it taking a moral stand against woeful ignorance?

 

Aug 4, 2017

‘A great day in the White House’ proclaimed Trump on Twitter. Not such a great day for Anthony Scaramucci, AKA the Mooch, who was fired after just 10 days in his role as communications director. The front stabbing, Long Island financier had a turbulent tenure: swearing and ranting at journalists while making accusations about the FBI. Did he get what he deserved? What’s next in the drama that is the White House?

20 years after her death Channel 4 will air the infamous “Diana tapes” –a collection of tapes recorded by the Princess’ speech coach shortly after the end of her marriage. Is it too soon? Would she have wanted her voice heard? Are they important piece of historical evidence? Tune in on Sunday to find out.

We are constantly told the breast is best, yet the UK has one of the lowest rates for breastfeeding in the world. Experts say that to overcome the stigma around breastfeeding we must teach children that it is natural. Can we shift social attitudes and start a breastfeeding boom?

Misogynistic, anti- Semitic and published in one of the most respected papers in the UK. Kevin Myers’ article in the Irish Sunday Times  “Sorry ladies, equal pay has to be earned” was resoundingly denounced and Kevin was swiftly fired. But how did his article make it into print and online?

No stranger to a twitter spat, JK Rowling was in hot water this week. After falsely claiming that President Trump had ignored a disabled boy who was visiting the White House, Rowling was forced to backtrack and apologise to the boy’s family. But no such apology has yet been sent to Trump. Should she have said sorry to Donald?

We’ve all been making mashed potato wrong according to Food Network chef Tyler Florence. For the ultimate mash, you need to cook your spuds in milk, butter and cream. It sounds scrumptious. In the words  of a famous TV badger: “everyone loves mashed potatoes”!

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