Executives Get the Blogging Bug

Although the Internet can be a dangerous place for CEOs with opinions, more top executives are venturing online--mostly with signed blogs, or personal Web pages. Top-level corporate bloggers include J.W. "Bill" Marriott Jr., chairman and CEO of Marriott International, Michael Critelli, executive chairman of Pitney Bowes, and Robert Lutz, a vice chairman of General Motors.

Blogs offer CEOs a way to communicate with investors, employees and customers, and to defend themselves when under fire. Done well, "a blog is an extremely effective way of articulating a vision," says Debbie Weil, a corporate-blogging consultant and author of "The Corporate Blogging Book." But blogs, chat rooms and stock-message boards also pose pitfalls, particularly for executives unaccustomed to unfiltered dialogue.

Some CEOs deliberately stay away from newsy or controversial subjects in their posts, and many companies now review executive writings before they are posted. Forty of the country's biggest 500 companies now publish corporate blogs, according to the Fortune 500 Blogging Wiki, a collaborative tracking site.

Link to WSJ Article (sub req.)

'Lyrics' Hits High Note In Ratings

by Wayne Friedman, Friday, Jul 13, 2007 7:45 AM ET

IN TV PROGRAMMING THEORY, TWO make a trend: Karaoke reality shows are now the way to summer success. A day after NBC's "The Singing Bee" vaulted to a big 5.1 rating among 18-49 viewers, Fox's "Don't Forget the Lyrics" posted a healthy summer-worthy Nielsen preliminary 3.4 rating. All this reveals a major strategy for both networks: Getting first to market usually lets it trump the competition. After announcing that "Singing Bee" would debut sometime in August, Fox said it had a karaoke type show, too--and it would launch in July. Not to be outdone, NBC said it would debut "Bee" one day earlier than "Lyrics." Still, "Lyrics" is now the second-best new show of the summer. It held onto all of its "So You Think You Can Dance?" 3.4 rating lead-in. "The Singing Bee" might be able to put more distance between "Lyrics" the next time around. "Bee" had Major League Baseball's All-Star game to contend with on Tuesday night--sending the game to its lowest TV ratings level ever. Like "Lyrics," "Bee" also had the benefit from a top-rated reality competition show, NBC's "America's Got Talent," which was its lead-in. Other reality shows were lower down on the charts. At 9 p.m., NBC got a 2.6 for "America's Got Talent," ABC managed a 2.0 for "American Inventor." At 8:30 p.m., a repeat of "Bee" took a 1.6 rating. At 10 p.m., NBC led all programs with a 2.9 for "Last Comic Standing." Overall, Fox was first for the night among 18-49s with a 3.1 rating/10 share; NBC was second at a 2.4/7; Univision was third at 2.3/7; CBS fourth at 1.9/6, ABC fifth at 1.7/5; and CW sixth at 0.6/2. Link to MediaPost Article