Dreaming of being the world's leading...

TWL has been accused, in the past, of being nothing but a picker of the lowest-hanging fruit. Fair enough, I say. Why make life hard for yourself..? If there's low-hanging fruit to be picked, pick it. I've fallen off a ladder before picking high-hanging fruit and it hurt...I don't want to do it again.

It's also difficult when people make it so very easy for us...when they quite literally dangle their low-hanging plums right in front of our noses (sorry...not "literally"..."metaphorically"). Take this, for instance...there's that much low-hanging fruit here I'm considering opening a greengrocer's.

It's a press release from a company called Pure. Pure is chuffed to bits to have been recognised in some new media industry awards. That's fine - I'm sure Pure is very good at whatever it does - but would you really stick a press release out to announce that you've been highlighted as the country's 11th fastest growing new media company? Surely there are at least 10 other companies more worthy of coverage..?

I do sense that Pure might've been a little uncertain about the newsworthiness of the announcement, so it understandably chose to engage the services of a PR agency to impart some much-needed spin. This it did...the second paragraph started with the following six words:

"Pure reached the coveted top 12..."

Excuse me? Since when has the top 12 of anything been coveted? Unless, of course, you're a chicken attempting to get your best egg into the box. Still, Darren Fell, Pure's founder, was "absolutely thrilled to have reached number 11"...a phrase not heard since Lisa Scott-Lee released her last solo single (and even then it started with "I would have been...").

Pure's PR agency is called flannel. I kid you not. The web address is www.no-flannel.com but it's called flannel. You might as well have called it Spin, Puff, Smoke and Mirrors. It was established by an ex-hack, though, so it's probably spot on. And having a name like flannel does allow for some brilliantly misreadable quotes in its own press releases, such as this one when flannel was appointed by Sponge (yes, really):

"We've got some exciting developments and client campaigns happening over the coming months," said Douglas McDonald, Client Services Director at Sponge. "flannel will help us to effectively reach our target press audience with this news."

Yep, Doug, I'm sure it will.

And this, when flannel won new client Bazaarvoice:

"We're extremely excited about our roll-out into Europe, and flannel is helping us become known to the retail, business and marketing press in the UK," said Bazaarvoice VP of Marketing and Products Sam Decker.

Just don't forget a dash of waffle, Sam, and a sprinkling of bullshit.

Still, it's memorable, I guess..?