Sunday 14 November 2010

Transgender model Lea T is on the cover of Lurve Magazine

The first transgender top model top model Lea T has just landed the front cover of Lurve Magzine.
          I love the cover do you?

Wednesday 10 November 2010

Rioting students

Rioting students stormed a building which housed the Tory party headquarters, as a national demonstration against tuition fees turned into violence. Hundreds of people were evacuated from Millbank Tower in central London after yobs smashed windows, fought police and set fire to placecards.

Dozens of students headed to the roof of the building and hurled a fire extenguisher off the side and concrete. I was watching it live on the BBC news and it all got out of hand. On the ground, sticks and other missiles were thrown at police from a crowd of at least 1,000. Eight people were taken to hospital with injuries, and a number of arrests took place.

An estimated 50,000 students and lecturers were taking part in the protest against Government plans to cut university funding and charge students up to £9,000 per year in tuition fees from 2012.
The demonstration, which was organised by the National Union of Students and the University and College Union, started peacefully, with the students marching from Whitehall past Downing Street and Parliament. But around an hour after the protest started, violence started at Millbank Tower.
These are some images of the protest below from the today please share your comments below:
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Do you think all these protesters were students? Do you think that this protest will change anything?

Tuesday 9 November 2010

My Top PR stunts!

Below i have some of my favourite PR stunts:
                                                                                  
Calendar Girls
In 1999 eleven women from the Women’s Institute posed naked to create a calendar to raise money for charity. The original calendar featured the women posing nude covered by cakes and flowers sold over 800,000. In 2000 their efforts inspired a hit movie, starring Julie Walters and Helen Mirren. Since then almost £2m has been raised for leukaemia research.




'Best Job In The World.' I still can't actually believe this one i wish i could have applied! Tourism Queensland advertised to recruit an 'island caretaker' who was willing to spend SIX months exploring the land and waters of Great Barrier Reef for £74,000. This would involve the successful applicant moving to a rent free three bedroom beach side villa with a pool on Hamilton Island (pictured left). Ben Southall from Hampshire, a British charity worker was chosen as the ideal person to carry on this marketing campaign that has generated tens of millions of pounds in free publicity for tourism in the Australian state of Queensland. He won over the judges’ panel with his stunts, which included riding an ostrich and snorkeling in the Thames. He beat 35,000 applicants from all over the world.

Take a look at his blog http://islandreefjob.com.au/

Dove’s Campaign For Real Beauty. Dove became a household name thanks to its great PR 'Campaign for real beauty' which used real women in adverts rather than the normally used stick thin models. The campaign started in 2003 with adverts featuring six REALwomen in their underwear and boosted their sales by 700%. Look at the women they look great!!

The 'Safety Pin' Dress.  At the time model Liz Hurley arrives for her boyfriend Hugh Grant's Four Weddings And A Funeral premiere in a plunging black and gold safety pin Versace dress. Following that day she became famous and every one knew her name! The dress was part of the Harrods Timeless Luxury Promotion Exhibition in 2007 for £10, 690.












PETA. One of my favourite campaigns to date is PETA. The animal rights campaign group are known for their controversial campaigns. From young women dressed in lettuce bikinis to the yearly 'Running around nude' PR stunt which sees PETA activists run naked through Pamplona, Spain in a parody of the bull run tradition. The organisation has used celebrities such as Eva Mendes, Christy Turlington and Naomi Campbell all supporting the slogan “I’d Rather Go Naked than Wear Fur.”



David Blaine In A Box. This is one of those things that i can say i went to and saw the huge crowds of people that came to see David Blaine in a box and hear and see their reactions.  In September 2003 he staged his craziest stunt to date. The American illusionist spent 44 days suspended in a glass box by the River Thames in London without food.
                                            




Madonna kisses Britney. One which I'm sure everyone knows and if they haven't seen it they definitely heard about it. At MTV’s Video Music Awards in 2003 Madonna and Britney kissed, their joint star power as Queen and princess of pop will keep dominating front covers around the world for ever .
                 




Borat At The White House. One of the funniest and most controversial films to date that i have seen is Borat. In September 2006, Secret Service officers denied Borat access to The White House. Sacha Baron Cohen’s creation had hoped to persuade ‘Premier George Walter Bush” to attend a screening of his film. The antics prompted the Kazakh goverment to disown the movie which went on to take more than $248 million worldwide.
                      


Panda’s In Paris. 1600 paper mâché pandas were put on display in the centre of Paris to increase public awareness about the endangered species. The pandas, which were put there by members of the WWF, represent each of the remaining 1,600 pandas left in the wild. Look at this amazing picture i found its surreal!
                           




$5Million Dollar Bra. Top supermodels in November 2008 took to the stage for the Victoria's Secret show in Miami where they unveiled a $5 million ‘Black Diamond Fantasy Miracle Bra’ worn by Victoria's secret Angel Adriana Lima. It's so beautiful i WANT one!!                          

In your opinion what is you favourite PR stunt to date?

Hollister Shop assistant gets poppy ban because 'its not part of the uniform.'

Hollister banned a shop assistant from wearing a poppy at work - because it was 'not part of her uniform'. Harriet Phipps, 18, wore a poppy on her clothes as a mark of respect to the countless servicemen and women who have been killed or injured fighting for their country. But bosses at Hollister, which is part of the Abercrombie & Fitch chain, ordered the teenager to remove the poppy. Harriet works as an ‘in store model’ in West Quay in Southampton, wearing the shop’s latest fashion items to give customers an idea of how the clothes look on. But when she wore a remembrance day poppy, managers told her to remove it.
Miss Phipps said: 'I think it's disgusting, I think it's awful.I feel it's very important, it is only for two weeks so it's not permanent.It is a personal issue and I feel very strongly about it - I have a friend who is serving in Afghanistan and another friend, a girl, who is going out to fight there, as well as my granddad who fought in the war.They said that because it's not uniform or company policy, I am not allowed to wear it.I'm what is known as a model, we have to wear a uniform key look - we get a selection of clothes which we have to buy and wear to work.'
Miss Phipps, was first told to remove the poppy last Thursday and then a second time today when she ignored the ban. A member of the management refused to comment.
This is not the first time that The Abercrombie & Fitch group is infamous for its strict staff dress code.Last year it paid £9,000 in compensation to a student with a prosthetic left arm who claimed she was banished to the stockroom of one of the firm's flagship shops.

When i read this story in the daily mail it came of no surprise. I worked in Hollister in West Quay also as an 'instore model' for a couple of months and there rules were a joke i got a written warning because i was folding a jumper and didn't say 'Was up welcome to the pier' to one customer and i explained to my manager who had no manergerial experience before Hollister and she explained that missing one customer is a very serious matter at Hollister. They also were very un-understanding when i couldn't work because of university and we as the employees would have to find cover from another 'instore model' through a social networkng group page on facebook otherwise we would have to work.

It also came of no surprise that the members of management refused to comment to the Daily Mail, i also called them up to find out more and they claimed that all members of management were busy, although this is very unlikely due to the fact that they have many managers working per shift.


The full story can be read: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1327826/Hollister-shop-assistant-gets-poppy-ban-uniform.html

Monday 8 November 2010

When would YOU kill someone?

Every week in Ethics, Issues and crisis management we have a facilitated discussion and this week the question was: Is it ethical to kill? The four subjects which were discussed were: Police shootings, Euthanasia, Abortion and mercy killings. This facilitated discussion went on for over an hour as it touched on very sensitive subjects and everyone had a lot to say. Now i put this moral dilemma to you:

 

First Situation


You are told that if you kill one healthy person, his organs will be used to save the lives of six others. It is 100% guaranteed that those six will be saved if you kill him, otherwise they will definitely die.

What would you do?


Second situation

A terrorist has taken you hostage. He gives you a gun (you don't have the option to shoot him) and he tells you that if you shoot one person, he will let six go free. If you don't shoot one person, he will kill six, and if you shoot yourself, he will kill everyone.

What would you do?

Third Situation

There is a runaway train that you cannot stop, and you're in charge of the rail way system. Coming up In front of the train the track splits into two, and you have to make a decision to send the train left or right. However, on the left track there is one person tied down on to the tracks and on right track, there are six people tied down. Sending the train down either track will kill either one person or six people tied to the track.

What would you do?