Rob’s blog

Taking our ball and going home

Never get into a pissing match with people who buy ink by the barrel, the saying goes. In other words, you can't win an argument with the media because, well, they're the media, and they get to frame the argument. But maybe there's another option: ignoring them -- at...

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The broadcast journalist’s new tool: Skype

CBC Radio is wonderfully, fantastically open to freelancers. But one of the harder aspects of working with them is their understandable reluctance to use phone interview clips. Little wonder: phone conversations sound awful, and nearly always have some irritating...

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Taking blogging to the next level

So you've been reading blogs for a while. You get a lot out of it, but you can't shake the nagging feeling that there has to be more to it than this. Surely you ought to be able to read blogs more easily, filter content more effectively, and maybe even start blogging...

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No comment

Andrew Coyne has shut down the comments section of his blog: I don't like to be in the censorship business, or picking and choosing which comments to allow and which to reject, and I don't have the time to monitor hundreds of comments every day. I hesitated to do...

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Know your audience

Previously, we talked about how speakers (or their staff) need to negotiate a reasonable speaking time with their hosts. It's part of going into every speaking engagement with your own agenda: a clear idea of what you want to accomplish, and the circumstances you need...

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It isn’t an invitation. It’s a bargaining position.

Entertainment mogul David Geffen once gave Lynda Obst a key piece of advice: never go into a meeting without an agenda. He didn't mean a schedule. He meant that, before you walk into a meeting, you should know what you want to achieve It's good advice for anyone...

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Want to change your default WordPress category?

Say you have a bunch of categories, and you'd like the one that's checked by default whenever you launch a new post to be something other than your catch-all category. (For example, if you'd like it to be somethat that doesn't get swamped by posts from a deleted...

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PR 101

Don't do this: Ashley MacIsaac now says he doesn't support Conservative Leader Stephen Harper, which is what he told The Chronicle-Herald on Monday. The Cape Breton fiddler called the paper at the first of the week to say he had decided to throw his political support...

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Why, yes — I’d LOVE to speak at your event

Public speaking and speechwriting: the essential guides

(photo of books with text) Leadership communications: the essential guides

Looking for advice on public speaking, speechwriting and leadership communications? Here are some of my most comprehensive posts, on topics that people ask me about most often.

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