Just when I though Samantha Jones of Sex and the City was the major challenge when it comes to explaining what PR is all about, I heard news on some new PR-centered reality show produced by Kim Kardashian and showcasing two of her male BFFs. Yes, that is male Best Friend Forever.

So after finally getting to a short, sweet and powerful speech explaining how PR is not exactly what Samantha seemed to be doing, after occasionally explaining that Samantha’s translation of “I’m in PR” was just a funny example, not the real deal, I am now facing a new challenge. How will I respond to “So, you’re in PR! You do what those guys on Kim Kardashian’s TV show do?”

Skipping the “who is Kim Kardashian” part, I’m sure Google is helpful there, let’s move on to analyzing who the so-called PR gurus (People.com calls them that! Beware), Jonathan Cheban and Simon Huck are. Fist, their company’s site. Command Public Relations has a site no decent PR company would ever come up with: commandpr.com (yes, I cringe at the thought of linking to it). A one page… thing, music, flash of course, no way to stop said music, annoying as that might be, oh, and yeah, no real information. Client list? About us section? Services? Who cares about that? Just listen to the rad song explaining that the singer has told many lies and needs to be freed from oppression. I wonder if the “I’ve told many lies” line is their mission statement. Or if the song’s senseless speech, repeating the same idea over and over again, in two languages, is their idea of effective communication.

I dug deeper and read about this Twitter account for Jonathan Cheban. Yes, a master communicator who believes in dialogues, that’s why he follows 38 people and 20% of those are the Kardashian clan. Then Everything PR linked to this Washington Post article about Cheban. Which made me realize my impression of him was not wrong: he cashes in on his famous or semi-famous friends, he’s a party boy that also makes a buck while partying, and he should thank God every day that his celeb friends still love him. The day they stop, he’ll be royally screwed!

But to get a clearer picture on Cheban, here’s what other people say about him:

“If he told me that the sun was hot, I’d try to keep in mind that the sun was paying him to say that[..] Is he a self-centered narcissist staring at himself all day in the mirror? Yes. Is he a name-dropper who checks his pager all the time? Sure. But it works for him.” – Timothy McDarrah, US Weekly editor.

“We’ve actually been following Cheban on Twitter for a few weeks, and the publicist’s Tweets are definitely heavy on the “OMG LOL” style of writing, if you catch our drift.” – Joe Ciarllo, PRNewser

Why are his celeb friends in on this? Well, lots of freebies for the start of course. It works out great for everyone.

Yes, people are free to create all the TV reality shows ever! I am sure Kim Kardashian’s fan base will watch it religiously. I am sure there will be plenty of girls to fall in love with Cheban’s tan. And I am sure there will be kids out there, dreaming to work and party with Command PR.

But as they have their freedom of speech, I also have mine. And I would like to tell you that my life in the PR world and that of all the PR and Marketing people I know (yes, I know a lot of them), has nothing to do with what these people do every day!

And if you don’t believe me, see what other PR people have to say about it. Yes, these people could be rightfully referred to as gurus!

Guest post by Iuliana Butuc-Cerchez

Let’s say you are the founder and the general manager of an Internet company. One of the best in your country. Let’s say that a worldwide financial crisis makes you afraid of the future.

Let’s say that you have a dating portal in your management, besides other websites (a job portal and so on). Let’s say that, in the country where the biggest chunk of your market is, one TV show proposes you, the general manager, to participate and to make fun of yourself right there on the screen, in the front of several million TV viewers. The “prize”, if you happen to be the winner of the TV contest, is to get married to a so-called TV star. Not a nice or hot looking one, believe me!

Would you accept the proposal? Would you choose to be the subject of mockery in blog posts and press articles and, also, to “risk” getting married to a woman of doubtful reputation just to advertise your dating portal? Really, how low can you go with your personal brand to get some awareness on the TV for one of your company’s products?

Iuliana Butuc-Cerchez has been the Corporate Affairs Manager of the Gecad Group for over 4 years. She’s an exceptional PR professional and a true mentor for me. Before starting her PR career, she used to be this hard-core IT journalist at one of the best business and financial newspapers in Romania. She’s also a blogger, but as her blog is in Romanian, only part of my readers will be able to enjoy her articles.

A couple of years ago, if you told someone you didn’t own a TV set or, worse, you had one but did not watch, they would look at you in disbelief, wondering if you were plane crazy. What else could you do in the evening and during weekends? Things have now changed. You can see admiration in their eyes – you broke the evil circle, you know longer have to plan everything around commercial breaks! No more stupid news getting you through to the weather broadcast!

I rented apartments were there wasn’t a TV and I was happy. No temptation, more time. Then I moved and was faced with the evil box once more. For about a month and a half, once I got home, I just had to watch it for a short while which turned into hours. And of course we needed to listen to the news in the morning, while drinking our coffee!

I then realized the madness I was allowing myself to be dragged into and stopped. Don’t get me wrong, there are series I still love and watch, but on the computer, not on TV, and here are the reasons why:

• TV is quite addictive. It’s an easy way to let yourself be lazy while thinking you are doing something fun. But what’s fun about detergent commercial, dark and useless news worth to throw at the garbage bin, or about the boring movie you decide to watch until the one that actually interests you starts?
• It is extremely time consuming: a 20 minute episode gets to 45 minutes because of 15 minutes of commercial breaks and because you can’t really skip the intro.
• It can easily get you angry: you see people exposing their twisted way of thinking that makes you wonder if the world around you is still sane. Do they actually expect anyone to believe there’s a ghost haunting the TV crew LIVE?!?
• It alters one’s sense of what’s important – given the dozens of false critical happenings being poured into our brains during the news bulletins, there are increasing numbers of people believing in false fashion gods and in the greatness of self-imposed famous lives. The political scene is a circus and everything really important is lost as such facts get a quick mention.
• It’s old news! Everything they broadcast: movies, music, news, have already been posted online. Especially since there are quite a few frequently updated, domestic online newspapers.

And I can assure you I am in the target of quite a few commercials I decide not to watch. The downside? I never see the funny ones. But I can live with that, everything extremely funny is said to get uploaded on YouTube and are then forwarded through emails.

What do you think of this? Do you watch TV? Why, why not?