06.13.07
sony “gets” blogging, at last.
Earlier this week, SCEA (that’s the US branch of Sony Computer Entertainment) launched a new blogging site which will see Sony staff posting information about what they’re doing, using their real names and job titles.
This is probably the most positive thing I’ve seen Sony doing from a PR perspective in ages. The company right now has a massive, massive image problem, and it only has itself to blame. From the very top of the organisation through to the PR lackeys on the front lines, it has displayed an attitude for years which is nothing short of impenetrable, arrogant and aloof.
That works (or at least, doesn’t hurt quite so badly) when you’re on top of the game. When you’re millions of units behind the competition and need to actively compete for hearts, minds and wallets, it’s a losing strategy.
Blogging is emerging as one of the best ways for companies to open themselves up to the public and remove that kind of arrogant, inhuman face from their organisation. More and more big companies (with Microsoft on the vanguard, it’s worth noting - even if I’ll never quite forgive the company’s wonderful blogging efforts for the sin of imposing the odiously self-important and ignorant Robert Scoble on the world) are turning to transparency as a way to engage with consumers and build a fanbase.
Sony hasn’t been quick to come around to this idea, and I get the impression that it’s probably viewed with outright suspicion in some parts of the company. However, it’s exactly what the firm needs - especially in view of the fact that Microsoft has been so successful with efforts like Major Nelson and the GamerscoreBlog, and in light of the significant rise in importance of games blogs like Kotaku and Joystiq in recent years. Admittedly, on the latter subject, I’m wont to grumble about the death of journalism, declining standards of English and the damaging credulousness of bloggers as compared to proper journalists - but none of that changes the fact that those sites have significant readership. Companies need to adapt to that environment.
Actually, this isn’t Sony’s first courtship with blogging; late last year, the firm’s European arm launched a blog site called ThreeSpeech, which was actually quite an interesting experiment in blogging. SCEE was paying for the whole thing, but they left production to an external company, and didn’t (as far as I could gather) apply any editorial control to what was posted.
I worked on the site for a little while, and they never edited a single word I wrote, or prevented me from asking any questions I wanted to ask. I’ve actually been criticised a few times for working on ThreeSpeech, the implication being that I was essentially being paid to be a Sony shill; it certainly never felt that way to me (not least because I was actually only meant to be paid for one of the articles, and I totally forgot to invoice for it - doh). In fact, in the small number of articles I wrote for them, there was as much bad stuff as good about PS3 revealed; for example, an excerpt from an interview with Phil Harrison where he admitted that the company had over-stretched itself by including Blu-Ray, and an article where I interviewed Insomniac Games boss Ted Price and he revealed that Resistance: Fall of Man wouldn’t use the PS3’s built-in buddy lists. Neither of which is exactly what you’d call Good News; both of which broke exclusively on a Sony-funded site.
So, to my mind, ThreeSpeech was actually quite brave. Badly designed, and a bit scattershot in terms of the content it posted - but brave. Unfortunately, it’s the kind of thing Sony needed to do before it fell out with gamers; doing it afterwards just attracted ire from people who saw it as an attempt to “deceive” people with cloaked PR spin, which is a bit harsh given that the site was honest from the outset about being Sony-backed.
Hence why SCEA’s initiative makes more sense, given the climate. It might be interesting to see if SCEE could now morph ThreeSpeech into some kind of platform where prominent journalists and bloggers talk about the PS3 and its software fairly openly, which I think was the core idea; it could be complementary to the PlayStation Blog in that form. More importantly, though, let’s see some of the UK staff blogging too. Openness and transparency won’t work straight away, but they’re exactly the magic pill Sony needs to rescue them from their own tarnished public image. (Well, that and making Jack Tretton shut up, but let’s aim for the attainable goals first…)
Technorati Tags: journalism, PlayStation, PS3, PlayStation 3, Sony, videogames
Keith Andrew said,
June 13, 2007 at 10:19 pm
I’ve never been that keen on the whole semi-official approach, really. I’m not sure what it’s trying to achieve.
I think I’m more likely to read this new SCEA blog than something like ThreeSpeech because you know the writers will never ever (intentionally) bring you bad news. That’s not a good thing - but at least you know what to expect. These semi-official blogs make a big deal about the fact they’re not controlled by Sony or Microsoft, yet it’s as if they exist in a bubble where only the PS3 or 360 exist.
Of course, I realise that’s why they exist in the first place. It’s not like I expect Gamerscore to start raving about Resistance. But, I guess it’d be like you writing this blog and never making reference to music, film or television. I’m not pointing to any particular piece, by the way. I didn’t even know you’d written for ThreeSpeech, which shows how observant I am.
It’s probably just me, in fact. But still - they make me a bit wary. I’d rather toe the corporate bullshit line and know I’m being lied to, rather than sit in the middle-ground, over-scrutinising all the writing - even the good stuff - because I have the suspicion I’m being lied to.