Well, thanks to fellow-Sparklist client Andy Sernovitz, who must have a press roladex (tm) that paid flacks would give their eyeteeth for, I've been interviewed by the four biggies in the past 48 hours (WSJ.com, The New York Times, DMNews and CNET) about the fact that our email lists were stolen. (Our original article http://www.MarketingSherpa.com/sample.cfm?contentID=2139)

The Times sent over a photographer to take action shots of me being an email publishing exec in my office today. About the only action that happened over the 45-minute session was their own reporter calling with more questions, and me peering intently at incoming email. The final story was slightly inaccurate. I'm not remotely a consultant and we publish 8 newsletters, not five. But the spin, anti-spammers' lists being stolen, was interesting.

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/12/technology/12MAIL.htm


DMNews was probably the most fun interview because my pal and sometime-competitor Ken Magill was lead guy for this one, so he got all the critical parts of the story without any explanations on my part about why email list security matters anyway. I think Ken's story on this whole situation turned out the best of the lot. Plus we wasted valuable company time with frivolous gossip, which is always a plus.

http://www.dmnews.com (search under my last name "Holland")

WSJ.com was neat because, hey it's always a thrill to feel a little self-important because you've got the Wall Street Journal calling with questions. Their email reporter Stacy Forster is also obviously dedicated to her beat. She had good questions, and even sent a polite "thank you" email follow-up. (Heck even we don't do that with sources.) However, there doesn't seem to have been an actual story published yet.

Last but not least CNET won the award for swiftest coverage. (Thanks to Bob Rankin for sending the link to my attention.) The CNET article definitely quoted me accurately. It was also a good reminder to me that press reporting is a "free" form of marketing for a good reason, you don't control the message. This guy spun the story (as was his right) to make it sound a bit like I was alone in the woods crying "problem" when there was not such a big problem.

http://news.com.com/2100-1023-957567.html