PR - in the wild or at a crossroads?

Went to an interesting NMK event last night - PR in the Wild - to hear 3 people I respect speak - Sarah Ogden and Will McInness of the Brighton Mafia (Midnight Comms and NixonMcInness respectively), and Drew Benzie whose blog I follow. Topic was the changes that the "NEW" new media is forcing on PR overall. The circus was whipped into shape by Roger Warner of Velocity. I made some notes in what was a spirited discussion, but Renaissance Chambara beat me to it so I'll ste.. - I mean link to - Ged's notes:

Measurement however is the fly in the ointment for PR people as they aren’t there yet. Wadds observed that PR needs to tie measurement back to the P&L or the balance sheet in order for it to be relevant and posed the question of how many people were making good money and margins from online PR at the present time?

This bottom line question alongside ‘will PR agencies be killed by integrated/digital/ ad agencies’; seemed to be the elephant in the room based on the post-forum discussion I had with a number of people.

We see the same elephant - I asked where people thought the money and impact was and where it was going, and at that point I sensed a schism between what is happening now - as Drew pointed out, corporates are paying for old PR poured into new bottles - and where it is going. Will noted that the real impact is the ability to listen, Sarah that it is a "parasite industry" and needs to redefine its role.

I think they are all correct - they are describing an industry in transition (or disintermediation as Drew put it), but in elephant fashion - ie all seeing different bits of it. The money today is going into stuff that is probably less impactful than it was in the old media, but the metrics - or more precisely, their calibration - there are metrics up the wazoo - are not yet fully understood to show where the real impact will lie. PR is a "parasite profession", in that it piggybacks off the old media at present, but as that collapses it has to find new channels (hosts?) for its art - and those are soft arts, largely around listening, influencing and storytelling rather than easy-to-measure advertising.

I personally think that PR is the best placed of the marketing arts to operate in the "new" Social New Media, (see here) but that they will need to integrate with the technology / strategy side of interactive media as it is evolving so fast right now (Drew alluded to this, and Sarah and Will's outfits work together). We also have direct experience of this as increasingly if you are doing the platform and strategy work you get involved in the front end media - like iBall for example.

I also couldn't help ask a Facebook question, and wondered (i) if the panel would have handled the recent FaceAd launch better, and (ii) if everyone in the room advising clients to go on Facebook had ever read the T&C (worryingly few had, and fewer were bothered...). This drew quite a bit of spirited debate (I was later told their UK PR agency was in the room) and I hope a good time was had by all.

Alcohol as ever oils the social intercourse, and we had some very good discussions afterwards as well.....wild, man