1. For better or for worse, I’ve now been trained to use the blog to get results. Can’t beat same-day response.

2. It is more than likely that the PR person in question found my blog through Urban Yukon (I didn’t find any traffic in the logs explicitly from yec.yk.ca or yukonenergy.ca so I can’t say for sure). That suggests that the PR job description entails scanning for news, positive or otherwise. And that, in turn, merely raises the effectiveness of point #1.

As for the suggestion that Dave not “bash” Yukon Energy on his blog but rather send private emails and make private phone-calls…well, all I can say is, welcome to the new reality of public relations.

I’m by no means suggesting that everybody publicly criticize Yukon organizations rather than utilize private correspondence – that’s a judgement call you need to make for yourself – but the approach Dave has taken isn’t wrong, simply different. There’s plenty of people who talk negatively about Yukon Energy at the water cooler and behind closed doors, but you don’t hear or can’t be involved in those conversations. Well, in this instance, you can. Isn’t that empowering?

The very fact that someone from Yukon Energy is reading Dave’s blog (and presumably, Urban Yukon) shows that the corporation cares about its image and reputation. More-so, that YEC wants to listen, create a customer bond and is honest, progressive, transparent; y’know the good stuff that gets tossed about in expensive, four-colour, shiny print brochures.

The difference is, here, in this venue, the words are real and raw.

Behold, the power of the people.

As for not advertising our power failures, I think you’ll find that if there’s a major outage, we usually put out a news release, which is posted on our web site. Earlier this year, I supplied reporters with detailed information about how many outages we’d had this year compared to last, and the causes for those outages. This information was reported in both local papers, so our record is no secret.

Your suggestion for a mashup is an interesting one and I will give it some thought. I am a one person shop so the issue for me could be a lack of resources. In the meantime, if you have a beef against Yukon Energy, your time might be better spent talking to us about your concerns instead of bashing us on your blog.