Our favorite man from Down Under has done it again. No, I’m not referring to the spray cheese incident: I’m talking about starting another revolution! You’ll recall in the past that Forward’s own podcast guru, Paull Young, started such wonderful things as the Young PR Lens on Squidoo as well as…uh, some other really great ideas none of which I can think of right now, but you’ll just have to trust me.

And now, he has paired with Trevor Cook and the two of them have used their powers for good to start the Anti-Astroturfing campaign. For those of you who don’t know, Astroturfing is faking a grassroots movement through sinister, deceptive, and cunning communication tactics. Less-than-honorable PR professionals *gasp* have been known to do it.

I’m not going to belabor the point, because Trevor does an excellent job explaining the reasoning, while Paull does a fine job of going on and on and on about it. From Paull’s post:

We’ve set up an Anti-Astroturfing page at the New PR Wiki to bring together resources about astroturfing, and we’re starting a list there of communicators who oppose the practice.

The Anti-Astroturfing Statement (From the Anti-Astroturfing page)

We oppose the practice of astroturfing, defined above, in any form. The practice should never be a part of a public relations campaign as it is anti-democratic, unethical, immoral and often illegal.

We will attempt to raise awareness of this practice, expose it for what it is, and encourage our fellow communicators to join us in opposition.

We call for all professional communication bodies to strongly, publicly and actively oppose astroturfing; alongside PR agencies, individual practitioners and bloggers.

And if you know me, I don’t jump on a bandwagon until I’m sure it’s a highly favorable and winning wagon - and this one is. So far these are all the mentions I’ve seen and heard in my RSS and podcast regulars.

• Tom Murphy
• For Immediate Release
• Shel Holtz
• Neville Hobson
• Mike Manuel
• Lee Hopkins
• Peter Himler
• Me (right here) and here
• David Weinberger
• Oh heck, here are all of them

So, congratulations to Paull and Trevor for creating such a buzz for such a noble cause. I look forward to joining the crusade myself by putting the verbal beat down on anyone I run across practicing such despicable behavior. You too can help by going to The New PR wiki, grabbing a badge, and swearing allegiance to Forward. Uh, okay, maybe not that last part, but raising awareness of Astroturfing is a good start. Use the link above or the link on the Forward side bar to get to the New PR. And remember don’t feed the Astroturf!

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