- No one truly knows why certain things go viral, but this week it was Chris Martin of Coldplay inadvertently outing a couple who apparently were having an affair. Google searches for “Coldplay” increased 600 percent in matter of hours after the incident hit social media.
- Colorado Public Radio will lose about $1.5 million annually – 6% of its budget – after Congress enacted legislation to eliminate funding for public broadcasting. No word on whether layoffs are expected.
- The “Fixer Upper” empire led by Chip and Joanna Gaines featured a same-sex couple on one of its new shows – “Back to the Frontier” – and the religious right who have helped fuel their rise have lost their minds.
- Who knew it would be Jeffrey Epstein that posed the biggest threat to fracturing MAGA Nation.
- Walmart has recalled 850,000 Ozark Trail water bottles because the tops keep exploding and hitting users in the face.
- Colorado Gov. Jared Polis appears to be looking for an exit strategy for his widely panned pedestrian Bridge to Nowhere at the state capitol. After two weeks of overwhelmingly negative media coverage, the governor announced an online vote to determine its fate.
- President Donald Trump abruptly announced that Coca-Cola would switch to cane sugar from high fructose corn syrup for U.S. shipments, but the company, when contacted by media, is refusing to commit to the change.
- Sometimes sound bites work, and sometimes you overshoot the runway. Metro State University of Denver announced a new degree program that it said will make it the “Julliard of mariachi.”
- Jared Leonard, the Denver restaurateur known for the Michelin-recommended AJ’s Pit Bar-B-Q, has been indicted on fraud charges for allegedly receiving more than $1 million in pandemic relief loans under false pretenses and for his personal benefit.
- A bipartisan effort to limit or ban pharmaceutical ads could hammer linear television revenues to the tune of $10 billion annually. Would there even be anyone left to advertise on the national nightly news shows?
- Last month, CBS agreed to a $16 million settlement with President Donald Trump that many described as simply a bribe to ease the way for its parent company Paramount‘s merger with the movie studio Skydance. This week, CBS announced that it would cancel the “Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” which has been among President Trump’s harshest critics.
- Water wars are only going to increase in frequency and intensity, and a South Platte River water dispute between Nebraska and Colorado has now landed in federal court.
- National Football League Players Association Executive Director Lloyd Howell resigned after an investigation caught him double-dealing by consulting with a private equity group seeking an NFL team.
- Felix Baumgartner, the extreme athlete most famous for skydiving back to Earth from space in 2012, died in a paragliding accident. He was 56.
- The last surviving member of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League immortalized in the 1992 movie “A League of Their Own” passed away. Betsy Jochum was 104.
- Andrea Gibson, Colorado‘s poet laureate, passed away at the age of 49.
- PR professionals are experiencing a new wave of phishing attacks from scammers pretending to be journalists.
Who won the week?
- Leslie Oliver has been named VP of External Affairs at the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce. She previously was senior director of External Affairs at Comcast.
- Chalk one up for public awareness campaigns. Deaths on Colorado’s reservoirs and rivers have dropped 50 percent from last year, and state officials point to a digital awareness campaign for helping make a big difference.
- Investors own less real estate in Colorado than the national average, a surprising development for a state with cities such as Aspen, Telluride, Vail, Steamboat, Breckenridge, etc. Real estate investors are thought to drive up the price of real estate and limit real estate options available to individuals.
Denver Public Relations Blog 