Bad pitch blog

Stephen: We have a three strike rule in place where the guilty party stays anonymous until they, or their employer, sends three bad pitches in total.

For the ones sent to me, I also reply to them and tell them why I am not interested and have never gotten a response.

So I encourage you to send them along. The guilty parties might not learn from it, but future PR practitioners surely can.

Thanks.

I must admit the snarky one in me wants to see these bad pitches and revel in the fact that I did not send them. But seriously, it is a learning opportunity-- nothing wrong with instilling a healthy fear of being lambasted for doing something idiotic. Being nosy, I would always love to see who the offending parties are, but I think that information is besides the point. Kevin's policy seems fair.

Also, I saw that the blog is soliciting--and posting-- examples of good pitches as well.

From an unbiased party, I believe this is a great learning opportunity.

I've been reading the blog for a little while now, and all hilarity aside, it provides a great service to others in the industry.

We read how newsrooms are becoming information centers, but it is blogs
like the "Bad Pitch Blog"
from Richard Laermer and Kevin Dugan, that really give real journalists and bloggers a bad name. These are the idiot bloggers who publish first, and apologize later, if at all. Why not have Bad Publications Blogs,Journalists Make Mistakes Blogs, Negative Reporter Blogs, and just plain idiot blogs. The only thing these guys do is criticize campaigns by PR folks, which give bloggers and even journalists like BusinessWeek a bad name for even contributing to their worthless, timeless efforts. If a bunch of people decide they want to jump in a bus and drive off a cliff, you don't have to follow them, join them...hell, just shoot yourself and move on. Monkey see, monkey do?

I write on the media, and idiots like this for a New York publication that has been around for 35 years, but I would even give them the time of day, let along the satisfaction of naming their waste of time blog to give them even exposure to idiots that would read that kind of garbage.