Long Tail Notes to Chill the Traditionalist

As promised, some notes and quotes from Chris Anderson's The Long Tail. This book has been around for a while, but the more I talk about it with athletics colleagues I understand that it has not penetrated our world. I highly recommend getting a copy -- it's been reissued in trade paper this fall.

Three quotes from the final chapter, which is about the radical change in marketing and PR that is upon our profession.

Where does this leave PR? The usual role of sending press releases to traditional media will probably continue as long as there is traditional media.

Blogging is all about authenticity and the individual voice, not paid spin.

Fundamentally social media is a peer-to-peer medium; bloggers would rather hear from someone doing something cool than from the paid professional representative of that person.

These passages are near and dear both to my heart and my experience. Especially the second quote. If you choose to blog, you must find your own voice. In sports, this really isn't that hard to understand. The heart of the sports section was the commentary of the editor's column. It is that value-added insight that separates a game story from an explanation of the game.