I’ve been worrying about BMW reliability lately. And not about either my M3 or my 530. It’s how BMW’s quality and reliability have worsened in recent years. A little background — I don’t buy new BMWs, I like to buy lightly used ones that have been well maintained by their owners. So no one in […]
Usually in this blog I talk about issues relating to Strategic clients. Since we’re now running campaigns for brands like Microsoft, BT, Monster, EMC and Cisco there is usually something interesting I can share from a client campaign. But today I’m writing about a consumer campaign designed to raise the profile of credit unions in […]
Last week Gabriele and I had dinner at the Carlyle Grand in Shirlington. Sort of the flagship of the American Restaurant chain here in the DC area, it’s always a solid performer. You won’t be blown away, but you’ll rarely be disappointed either. The atmosphere is upbeat and there are always crowds, which is a […]
This weekend I replaced the stereo in my 1999 M3 with a more powerful head unit. In BMW parlance I went from a C43 to a CD43 radio, the stereo unit included in many BMW models from the year 2000 0n. A little background to start. It’s widely known that BMW sound systems are not […]
I’ve been a subscriber to Esquire for a number of years now. Yes I know — Esquire? Articles on what kind of drink to order, car to pine for and suit to buy? And at prices no working man can afford, no less? That is often true, I’ll admit. But there is also some damn […]
As many of you know the big tech news this week in DC was the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference. Microsoft is a Strategic client, so obviously we were there amidst the thousands at the Washington Convention Center. Strategic also launched a new blog, Microsoft Partner News, in conjunction with the conference.We did this to support […]
I hope everyone’s summer is in full swing. Here are suggestions for some good juice at decent prices to enjoy this summer. First off, the search for a good value, good tasting Bordeaux continues. At times I feel a little like Don Quixote on this quest, but recently there was an encouraging find. I enjoyed […]
Hope everyone had a nice Fourth of July. Working closely with clients on very interesting projects is one of the best parts of my job in technology PR. Most of the time, the knowledge I gain is proprietary. But occasionally I get to share it, and today is one of those times. Recently Bitcurrent conducted […]
This weekend I tackled an irritating issue with my BMW 530i. I had a problem with the air conditioning, and the recent heat wave pushed this problem into the urgent quadrant. Summer time in DC, plus my wife complaining about it meant I could no longer use the time-tested technique of ignoring the problem. The […]
One of my jobs as a technology PR consultant is to stay current with industry trends, as I’ve written about previously here. No trend is bigger right now than cloud computing, which Gartner pegs as a $150 billion market by 2014. However, the term “cloud” is rapidly becoming like the term “2.0” — meaning whatever […]
Gabriele and I recently went for dinner at Tallula for the first time in a while. As readers of this blog know, we’re big fans of the restaurants in the Neighborhood Restaurant Group. Unfortunately, things had changed since we last ate at Tallula. I apparently was the last person in the DC area to realize […]
I’ve written previously in this blog about the success of TANDBERG’s Break Down the Walls social media portal. Tuesday night that success was officially recognized as Break Down the Walls took the prize for best corporate blog at the inaugural Northern Virginia Technology Council (NVTC) social media awards. TANDBERG wasn’t the only winning Strategic Communications […]