Fair comment, provided you have specific recipients in mind, you know that a
high proportion of them will be Word users, and you send out your stuff in
an older Word format that most of them will be able to open if they haven't
upgraded.
But I wonder, for instance, how many people on the GEM list can't open docx.
Unlike most PR departments, many local museums run on very restricted
budgets, and while they probably run Word, upgrading it isn't a priority.
What I'm really saying is that we should think about our target audiences
when sending attachments.
I agree heartily on graphics. PDFs and attached images needn't be huge,
though. The main problem is that many people don't understand how to adjust
resolution and compression settings to minimise file size. Often, images
come straight from a digital camera and get attached or embedded at full
size. Dropping them down to something appropriate for screen viewing will
cut the file size drastically, and it's easy enough to put in a "full
resolution images on request" notice.
Best wishes,
Paul Baker
Supreme Commander
Diabolus in Musica
Historical musicians in costume
Replica musical instruments and historical artifacts
Interactives, websites, audio & video work
[log in to unmask]
www.diabolus.org
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jon Pratty" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, February 23, 2009 10:07 PM
Subject: Press release best practice: Was TACTILE: launch
Paul/Gemmers
Sorry to sound contrary, but I'd like to mildly take issue with your
assertion about Word, Open Office and the like.
Key audiences for releases are newspaper and magazine editors, journalists
and listings editors; they use Word and other Microsoft products, and macs
and so on. The name of the game in sending press material out is to meet the
needs of these people exactly. After all, you're competing with lots of
other culture/leisure/heritage/arts venues for page/web space. You need to
grab their attention right from the start.
The vast majority of media editors worldwide would prefer Word if being sent
PR documents. Most press don't bother with OpenOffice; .pdf's are usually ok
but tend to be too large as files.
You might say best practice (ie most easily read by the most journos) would
be to put the whole press release in the body of the email, but it's also
acceptable to have a version as a Word doc (saved in a ubiquitious version
of Word, not the latest) attachment. This is easier to track in a more
managed environment (before being sent out) as the release can be bounced
round, edited and signed off; harder to do with an email encumbered with
headers and footers, format restrictions and so on.
One thing that does create problems with Word docs for everyone in the media
is the recent tendency for logos, pics and so on to be loaded into press
releases, which makes them into large files; best to keep releases free of
big logos and pics if at all possible.
My exposure to this? I spent eight years as Editor of 24 Hour Museum, and
three years before that at the Telegraph and Sunday Times. Pet hates?
Journalists tend to dislike very large press release files; many newspaper
intranets strip out very large attachments accompanying emails. The Guardian
used to be particularly bad at this.
Some colleagues from the sector and I agree there is a continuing need for
media and PR skills training at grass roots level. I'm currently exploring
the possibilities of running some regional seminars about online PR basics
to boost knowledge in this area.
All the best!
Jon
Jon Pratty
Digital publishing consultant, culture sector
Journalism: arts, technology and society
[log in to unmask]
http://machineculture.wordpress.com
Terrestrial: 01273 277396
Mobile: 07739 28739
Twitter: @jon_pratty
-----Original Message-----
From: List for discussion of issues in museum education in the UK.
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Paul Baker
Sent: 23 February 2009 20:59
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: TACTILE: New Contemporary Textile Handling Resource launch
Agreed, but could I respectfully suggest that Word is NOT a good format for
distributing information? It is in no sense a standard. The format changes
significantly with every release. This is at least partly a ploy to lock the
world into proprietary Micorsoft software. If you send documents out in the
new Word docx format, half your audience won't be able to open it, unless
they upgrade to the latest version of Word. Many people don't have Microsoft
Word, and don't want it.
The best options are Adobe's pdf, which can be read by anyone who downloads
the free pdf reader, or if you want a truly open document format, use - er -
open document format, or odf, as output by OpenOffice, which is both free
and open source.
Best wishes,
Paul Baker
Supreme Commander
Diabolus in Musica
Historical musicians in costume
Replica musical instruments and historical artifacts Interactives, websites,
audio & video work [log in to unmask] www.diabolus.org
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jon Pratty" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, February 23, 2009 3:20 PM
Subject: Re: TACTILE: New Contemporary Textile Handling Resource launch
Leanne
Gosh - that was a really big file! Can I suggest it's a good idea to make
press releases a bit smaller if you don't want to fill up people's inboxes?
A release in Word and photos as .jpegs is best. Also your attachment is a
Photoshop (.psd) file, which needs a full version of Photoshop to open it; I
think many people may not have that on their PC.
Jon Pratty
Journalism: arts, heritage, technology and society
Digital publishing consultant to the cultural sector
[log in to unmask] <blocked::blocked::mailto:[log in to unmask]>
http://machineculture.wordpress.com <http://machineculture.wordpress.com/>
Terrestrial: 01273 277396
Mobile: 07739 287392
Twitter: @jon_pratty
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