How Gleneagles Intan Hospital Deal With Spam Mail

I once received a forwarded email about some poison perfume sample which caused the death of seven women upon inhalation and exposure. It was purportedly sent by a person who claimed to be an employee of Gleneagles Hospital Limited, on behalf of the hospital, in order to warn the public as these seven women were supposedly admitted and treated at Gleneagles Hospital.

How does a PR person deal with such hoax and spam? Apparently, the hoax did not end at emails but also in SMS. Apparently, the PR arm of this hospital had been proactive and well-versed on crisis management and proceeded to set up a webpage on its main domain to explain itself and the hoax. Showing its concern, the hospital wrote:

We understand the panic and mystification that this email has caused and the public's need to seek verification and consolation from a reliable medical institution such as ours. Thus, we would like to highlight that we have never admitted or treated such patients and have never been aware of such incidences. We would also like to categorically state that this email did not originate from our Hospital and / or any of our employees, current or otherwise. In addition, we declare that no one was ever at any time commissioned or authorised by the Hospital to deliver and circulate such warnings. Further to this, we would also like to point out that our registered company name is Gleneagles Hospital (Kuala Lumpur) Sdn. Bhd. (Co. No. 198498-T) and we were never at any point known as Gleneagles Hospital Limited as claimed in the email.

If you like to read more, go to Gleneagles website.

Another bigger company than Gleneagles, Petronas, seemed to have adopted a silent stand over the phone scam that has been circulating like Urban Legend. This site, which was alerted by the scam a year ago, decided to post the message of the spam here.



And because of that, many other phone owners - as far as those in Singapore - have written in here to comment and voice their displeasure. Petronas has a Scam Notice on recruitment here but unfortunately the company did not include the phone SMS scam, which I believe is doing more damage to the national oil producer's image.

This is not good for public relations and the faster Petronas's public relations department do something to control the damage the scam is doing to its image (not to mention gullible phone users), the better.

Using Videos To Tell Stories Online

One of the biggest mistakes newspapers going online when it comes to using videos to tell stories is to try to buy and use the best in the market. While budget may permit expensive indulgences, one needs to be reminded that web limitations certainly will not do justice to near-Hollywood productions.

Here are some tips on what to look out for if you decide to use videos to tell your story.

Choosing Equipment:

Size and Price: You don't need monstrous shoulder-mounted videos used by TV news crew to record videos unless you aim to stand out in the sea of media people at press conferences. Smaller palm held ones are just as good these days, cheaper and offers much mobility. They also offer easier playback and can be set up in a jiffy. Bigger doesn't mean better recording and the bigger ones often do no better than the smaller video devices, including cameras and camera-phones like the Nokia N95. Besides, do you need really hi-tech video cameras to record videos for posting onto video sharing sites like YouTube which has a relatively small viewing window?

Audio Playback: While you don't need top-of-the-range video cams, you need a decent audio recorder. Of course, if your video recording equipment offers good playback, that would be the most ideal. But if it doesnt, then you may need to get a good microphone with good pick-up. This will ensure that your natural sounds on your video is crisp clear. These microphones will allow you to record in a variety of situations such as one-to-one interviews or in groups such as press conferences. A note of advice when using microphones is to remember to switch it on when doing video recordings. You will be surprised to find how many videographers forget to switch it on only to find out their folly after returning to the office.

Stabilising Devices: Tripods are a must in a good videographer's bag. They help steady the video when filming sit-down interviews. Used well, they will not make your video appear as if you were filming while on a boat or in an earthquake. Image stabilisers, a recent development in cameras and video recorders, are devices that help prevent blurred images from camera shake. Most mid-range priced video recorders come with image stabilisers. Get recorders that have this feature installed if you can afford it. It will be worth your money spent.

Display Screens: Most video recorders have flip display screen. This is extremely useful if you are a one-man videographing unit. Flip screens allow you to record yourself such as when doing commentaries and recording videos.

Software: There are a number of free and paid softwares for editing videos. Best known among free ones is the Windows Movie Maker which not only allows you to edit but also do enhancements such as transitions, subtitles, credit lines, etc to produce a somewhat 'professionally done' video pieces. But of course, if you wish to have better ones and can afford them, Adobe Premiere Elements, Ulead VideoStudio and Final Cut Pro are good choices - allowing you to do more than just cutting the frame sets on the recording.