As a daily newspaper reporter, I get dozens of press releases a day so I was intrigued by Tom Foremski's post (colourfully entitled "Die! Press Release! Die! Die Die!") on how the traditional press release has to evolve. Tom makes an excellent point when he describes press releases as "nearly useless" given they have "a tremendous amount of top-spin, they contain pat-on-the back phrases and meaningless quotes". I would add that while press releases are, in theory, designed to generate interest in a service, product, person or company, they often fail to tell an interesting story. Having taken a crack at corporate PR during a start-up stint, I recognize that press releases are difficult beasts to create. But - and this is a big but - they can be much, much better. Tom talks about the use of special sections and tags so a time-strapped journalist can easily pick out the useful information when writing a story. I'd also like to see press releases become dynamic by adding live Web links or maybe a mini-podcast featuring a Q&A with the CEO.
  As well, press release writers really need to start thinking like hacks rather than flacks. They need to start thinking about the best way to tell a story so it sparks enough interest to inspire a journalist to do something. Maybe it leads to a story about the client or maybe it leads to a story that includes the client. Or maybe it just causes the journalist to conciously file away the press release for another day. One more thing: it would also help if press releases coming from high-tech companies would be written in English. After 11 years covering the industry, I'm still amazed to read boiler-plate paragraphs about what a company does to make money - and still have no idea what they actually do or make.