Social media is emotional. It's personal. It functions in real time.

In short, it runs counter to all forms of marketing regulated industries have used for years. The social media guidelines from most regulators (whether FTC, FDA, FINRA, etc.) are still in development. This leads to a lot of:

"The regulators won't let us."

"What if we interpret the guidelines incorrectly?"

"We

Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius said, "Conceal a flaw, and the world will imagine the worst."

The CEOs who have committed public relations blunders so far in 2010 need to bone up on the Roman philosophy.

The list -- like the BP oil spill -- is staggering.

As we near the mid point of the year, here's our list of nominees for the CEO PR Hall of Shame.

Grand Prize: Tony Hayward

He singlehandely has disproved one

The great basketball coach John Wooden passed away Friday at age 99. His successful career hold lessons for anyone charged with motivating others and leading a team. We drafted the following post for an edition of our bimonthly eNewsletter, the Atkinson Advisor, a few years ago, and thought it would be a good time to revisit Wooden's Pyramid of Success.

John Wooden’s accomplishments as a leader are legendary. Wooden coached UCLA

Every day we see another story about newspapers dying or going to the recycle bin. There is even a website on the subject – Newspaper Death Watch.

Several members of our team recently had the opportunity to hear from Tennessean publisher Carol Hudler and two of her marketing colleagues about the health of Nashville’s daily paper. She refuted several typical myths related to the newspaper business. Here’s what we learned