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	<title>Brett Borders &#187; Astroturfing</title>
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	<description>Brett R. Borders&#039; Personal Tangents &#38; Thoughts</description>
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		<title>Wal-Mart’s Paid Critics Flog Real Critics</title>
		<link>http://brettborders.net/wal-mart-flogs-critics-smack-talkers</link>
		<comments>http://brettborders.net/wal-mart-flogs-critics-smack-talkers#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 11 Nov 2006 16:41:54 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Brett Borders</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Astroturfing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Fake Blogs]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.pseudomarketing.com/wal-mart%e2%80%99s-pseudomarketers-lash-out-at-smack-talkers/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
Better watch what you say.
Edelman’s newest flog, or fake blog, is a brilliant little hit campaign designed to intimidate us into showing reverence for Wal-Mart.
 
They want you to believe that commies like me, who think of Wal-Mart as a cultural and  economical contagion, have financial incentive to do so.
(It’s not because being in [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p></p>
<p>Better watch what you say.</p>
<p><a href="http://paidcritics.com">Edelman’s newest flog</a>, or fake blog, is a brilliant little hit campaign designed to intimidate us into showing reverence for Wal-Mart.</p>
<p><img src="../wp-content/paid.jpg" /> </p>
<p>They want you to believe that commies like me, who think of Wal-Mart as a cultural and  economical contagion, have financial incentive to do so.</p>
<p>(It’s <strong>not </strong>because being in the place for more than five minutes makes our skin crawl.)</p>
<p>Folks who just recently picked up a <a href="http://staff.jccc.net/lcline/nature/butterflynetcd.jpg">9000 FREE Hours of AOL CD</a> with their beloved 72-pack of <a href="http://colawp.nnip.org/database/image.php?cola_id=27"> Sam’s Choice Cola</a> will probably read the <a href=http://paidcritics.com> flog </a> and believe it.</p>
<p>Wal-Mart’s mercenary hit squad did some very convincing pseudomarketing. The writing is clever, the criticism and doubt-casting is masterful (as one would expect from top PR professionals),  and the graphic design is brilliant. The spin doctors&#8217; prescription suggests that Wal-Mart is a benevolent corporate “Robin Hood” that provides jobs, charity, and generous discounts to the working classes. The only problem is that is getting bullied by an malevolent conspiracy of paid critics.</p>
<p>Who exactly are these “paid critics?”</p>
<p>Apparently any politicians who receive donations from local businesses (on the brink of getting shut down by Wal-Mart) are the evil kingpins. They are the top of the massive payola conspiracy of <em>Professional Wal-Mart Critics&reg;</em>.</p>
<p>If criticizing Wal-Mart paid anything close to what a high-end journalist writing a flog on the Wal-Mart corporate PR account must earn – I would love to be a salaried, <em>Professional Wal-Mart Critic&reg;</em>!<br />
<strong><br />
It  would be the easiest job in the world!</strong> you would never run out of material for inspiration. You could make it a comedy or a tragedy. You could make it like “Hee Haw,”  “Clerks,” or a Michael Moore anti-corporate documentary. The wealth of possibilities for critical satire is even richer than Sam Walton.</p>
<p>Sign me up!</p>
<p>And send me my first check for this piece.</p>
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