Frankie Flack: Don’t publish the email address of my CEO

I had a beer not too long ago with the guy who runs our local youth soccer league. It didn’t take long before he was moaning about all the nitpicky crap he had to deal with: opponents that looked too big, tryouts that were too political, fields that were too distant, refs that were too […]

Frankie Flack: I’ll wait for stock market frenzy to subside

This won’t shock you guys, but I have no idea where the stock market is going to go. And I know that you guys don’t know, either. In fact, one of the nice things about a long career on the edge of the business world is that I’m confident that no one has any idea what’s […]

Frankie Flack: In defense of flackery

There is this guy, Dave, who plays on my softball team. He thinks I have the world’s worst job because I have to interact with the media. “Hate those guys,” he tells me. “Useless, all of them. No faith in those guys at all.” Every time he starts railing on the media, I have to […]

Frankie Flack: Enough with the April Fools’ releases

I have a tradition today. I take the day off as a “floating holiday.” I remove the battery from my cell phone. I shut down my wi-fi. And then I settle into my den and watch all three Godfathers, back to back. That’s because I’m in the information business, and for those of us in […]

Frankie Flack: Ignore the llamas and dress colors; stick to hard news

Yesterday was the worst day in the history of news. First, pretty much every newsroom in the United States shut down so that everyone could watch two escaped llama run around Arizona. Then, for those lucky enough to tear themselves away from the llama madness, there was the whole what-color-is-the-dress optical illusion thing. (I hesitate […]

Frankie Flack: Biz journalists, stay out of PR

So 2014 was a down year for journalism. I don’t base this on any stats about circulation or ad revenue. I base it on the number of phone calls I get from reporters who are looking to make the leap to PR. And 2014 — like 2013 and 2012 and … well, you get the […]

Frankie Flack: How I treat naughty biz journalists

This is the time of year that I really feel for Santa Claus. If he wants to reward the kiddies on the “nice” list, he has a wonderful range of options. But for punishing those twerps on the “naughty” list, the toolkit is a lot more sparse: all he can do to send a message […]

Frankie Flack: Ben Bradlee, you ignorant slut

All the reporters in my Twitter feed are linking, during this sad week of Ben Bradlee’s death at the age of 93, to a Washington Post post titled “A classic Ben Bradlee letter to ‘flacks.’” Bradlee has been responsible for a lot of things we can call “classic.” This ain’t one of them. The brief […]

Frankie Flack: Why I don’t want my name in your biz story

Every once in a while, I fire up Factiva, my news-clipping database, and do a quick search for my name. Unlike everyone else who ego-searches the news, I’m not looking for a mention. I’m looking for a blank screen. I’m successful when I’m invisible. It’s not my job to be quoted. I’m an agency flack. […]

Frankie Flack: Hey journalists, you blur the lines too

Man, I feel for the guys to Status Labs, the PR firm that got outed earlier this month for trying to buy their way onto CNBC. Now, I’m not going to defend the practice of buying coverage. That’s not PR, and the news consumer gets screwed over pretty badly when she can’t tell whether her […]