UPDATE: Since I originally posted this, I’ve learned that Domino’s is taking steps to fire the two employees in the video.
AUDIO UPDATE: Neville Hobson posted this concise audio about the fiasco:
It was a relatively calm morning, both in my home and in the Twittersphere. And then I saw this message from Adam Cohen:
As a former Domino’s employee, a current Domino’s customer AND a professor of public relations, I felt compelled to see what Adam found. Here it is, all its “glory”:
At about 10:20 this morning, I went to Domino’s website. After a bit of poking around, I found their online contact form. This is what I sent to them:
I teach public relations at Georgia Southern University. Are you aware of this video titled “Disgusting Dominos People” on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFxqC8hZ_xs ? Having worked at a Domino’s in Auburn (AL) in college, I was appalled at what is shown in the video. Is anything being done to address this? There’s a huge discussion going on about the topic on Twitter now, too: http://search.twitter.com/search?q=domino . If possible, I’d like to know what your company is doing to combat this, so I can share it with my PR students.
Thank you,
Barbara Nixon, Ph.D. (ABD) :: Georgia Southern University
I am curious to see what reaction Domino’s has to this video. This might be a good case study in crisis public relations.
UPDATE: April 14, 2009, 11:00 AM
Apparently another blogger has heard back from Tim McIntyre (in Corporate Communications at Domino’s). See “Video: Let the Domino’s Appall” for his response, which says in part:
We just got off the phone with the franchise owner, who was absolutely dumbfounded by this. He has told us that he will be terminating their employment effective immediately.
Will I stop ordering from Domino’s? No, I won’t stop. I would like to know that these two people no longer work for the company. Domino’s is a company I trust. I just hope that they’re paying attention what people are saying about the company now.
Stay tuned.
(PS: Thanks, Adam, for calling this to my attention. I’ve used part of original tweet as the title to this blog post.)
If you’re a faculty member, it means even more. Here are a few of my thoughts as the semester winds down.
Students are stressed because “they are so busy.”
HINT: Yes, I know you feel busy now. And this is great prep for you when you get into the working world. You’ve known all semester that you have these projects due at the same time. In the world of PR, you’ve got to be ready to juggle. And not just juggling scarves or bowling pins; those are too easy. Think juggling knives while walking on a tightrope over flames. (Isn’t that an awesome graphic? It came from mike r baker‘s website. Check out his other stuff!)
Students are coming to me (usually by e-mail, but sometimes in person or Twitter) asking about what their grades are so far.
HINT: I post everything in GeorgiaVIEW, so this is info that you have immediate access to all throughout the semester. Please don’t wait until the end of the semester to check your progress.
Students (not all, but some) are upset about their grades and seem surprised it’s because they left out big parts of their projects/assignments.
HINT: And this one’s a big one. I give detailed assignment guidelines for all major – and most minor – assignments. I even provide a link to the rubrics for most assignments during the semester. What more can I do to ensure that you know how you will what needs to be included and how you will be graded? (That’s a real question, not a rhetorical one.)
Students follow the advice and guidelines they’ve been given and do extremely well on their assignments. These are the kind of students that employers look forward to hiring.
HINT: It does happen every semester. At least a few people in each class “get it,” and make it all worthwhile for me. If you’re one of these people, THANK U!
[NOTE: This post is an updated version from last spring.]
Earlier this semester, you had the opportunity to try out Twitter and then write about your One Week of Twitter on your blogs. Some of you continued to use Twitter even after the assignment was over. Several have used Twitter as a way to connect with me personally (via direct messages).
Now you have the opportunity to jump back into Twitter one more time. Pick a 48-hour period ending no later than April 22 to engage on Twitter again. You should send a minimum of 10 tweets over this timeframe. Use the hashtag #PRCA2330 in your tweets so that others in our class can find them easily. Be sure to send me an @ message to let me know when you’re starting your 48 hours.
Ideas for things to tweet about
Share (shortened) hyperlinks to sites on the topic of public relations.
Respond to public relations professionals.
Ask questions that could be answered by public relations professionals.
Promote a campus organization or event that you’re involved with.
This post is due before midnight on April 22 and is worth up to 50 points. Use the category of “Assignment” so that I can easily find this post. Include all of the following:
A hyperlink to your Twitter username (for example: “You can find me on Twitter @barbaranixon.”)
How was this 48-hour experience different from your first week on Twitter? (Be specific.)
What surprises you about using Twitter?
What do you still want to know about, related to using Twitter?
Recommend at least three public relations professionals (not including any of the ones I originally recommended), with a brief explanation of why you’re recommending other public relations students to follow them. (Hyperlink to their Twitter usernames.)
NOTE: You also need to post a link to your Another 48 Hours post as a comment on this blog post.
Have you ever written or created something, and later realized that it was based on something you had already seen (and was not completely your original work)? It’s probably happened to us all.
Magician and mentalist Derren Brown explains in this short video how subliminal messages may affect us. (I would have embedded the video from YouTube, but embedding for this specific video was disabled.)
When you are writing or editing your post, click the button on the toolbar for bullets (very similar to how you’d insert bullets in Microsoft Word). The bullet button is the fourth from the left.
I have created the various pages and assignments categories, but can’t seem to make the assignments correlate with their correct pages. How can I fix this? Any ideas?
See WordPress.tv’s short video on how to embed video (as well as photos, audio, etc.)
Do you think you could clarify what is to be going in our blogs more often? I feel like no one really knew we were supposed to be doing so much in our blogs because it is never spoken of in class. Thanks.
Please, please ask questions in class or visit me in my office hours.
I simply can’t imagine how I’d stay up to speed in the ever-changing world of public relations without listening to podcasts. My iPod stays filled with a variety of podcasts, and I listen to them on my 100-mile roundtrip commutes to Georgia Southern.
Since we have no class on Wednesday, April 1 (as I will be presenting twice at the Southern States Communication Association in Norfolk), here’s what you’ll do instead: listen and write.
Listen to at least one hour of a public relations or social media podcast. Here are some suggestions; or, you can choose one of your own.
Respond to this blog post with the name of the podcast you’ve chosen to listen to. (All you have to do is tell me the name of the podcast in the comment section of this post. No other information is needed here.) UPDATE: As of April 6, comments are closed.
In your own blog, write a minimum of 250 words about what you got out of the podcast.
In place of class on Monday, you watched a video of Seth Godin discussing his latest book Tribes. Many thanks to Andrew Warner of Mixergy for providing this video.
At the request of many students, I’ve created a blog checklist to help you be sure you are on track with what you need to include. Remember that your PRCA 2330 blog counts as nearly 1/3 of your grade in the course. Devote as much time to the care and nurture of your blog as you would to a term paper that counts that much. I strongly recommend that you keep up with your blog weekly.
Please fill out this checklist before class on Monday. I’d appreciate it if you would fill it out once right away, before making any additions or changes to your blog, and then if your blog isn’t as robust as you know it needs to be, fill it out again after you fix things.
PRCA 2330 Students
