Episode #39: WhatsApp's Self-Made -- and Disastrous -- PR Fail

Talking Shop Podcast

WhatsApp has won the title of biggest #PRfail of 2021! The popular chat app, owned by Facebook, created its own crisis when it sent a sloppy notification to two billion people that sparked an exodus from the service. Cam provides some important context and explains what went wrong, with lessons about how poorly-executed communications can lead to actual and material hits to businesses.

Then, with so many people continuing to work from home, people are asking: is an employer obligated to pay for office supplies for employees? Can employees submit receipts for reimbursement? Ewan fills us in.

In Check This Out, we recommend a long read from New York Magazine on the novel coronavirus and the theory that the virus accidentally leaked from a lab in Wuhan, China. Plus, a fascinating series of photographs that depict the relentless passage of time.

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Links and Show Notes

• WhatsApp Delays Privacy Changes Amid User Backlash - New York Times

Check This Out

• The Lab Leak Hypothesis - Intelligencer
• The Photographer Who Set Out To Watch Herself Age - The New Yorker

Hosts

Ewan Christie is an employment lawyer and partner at Duntrune LLP in Toronto, Canada.

Cam MacMurchy is a corporate communications executive with a multinational technology company listed in Hong Kong and curator of the Digital Bits PR and Communications newsletter. He also contributes to Apple news website 9to5Mac and shares his thoughts on PR, media, travel, and technology on his website.