2008 will be a very exciting year for me.

Today, and in the days following, I will be sharing three new developments in my life that will immediately be my top professional priorities; and will influence what you will find on this blog.

I will start with the first piece of news today and elaborate on the others over the next couple of weeks, so I invite you to stay tuned.

Director for Digital Strategies Group, Asia | Waggener Edstrom Worldwide
Last week on 2 January, I joined Waggener Edstrom as the Asia Lead for the company’s Digital Strategies Group. Having managed a couple of global multiple-agency PR accounts some years back, I had the chance to work with several Waggener Edstrom teams; and the experiences left me very impressed by the culture of innovation and excellence that runs throughout the agency.

In speaking with the company about taking on this newly-created role, I was just as blown away by the expertise and capabilities of the DSG; and those conversations convinced me that Waggener Edstrom is way ahead of the curve in delivering on the Digital PR promise for PR and online influence. And so with Asia as my mandate, I embark on this journey with my new colleagues with great excitement.

Coming up… Two Theses…
The other two priorities for me this year lay outside the domain of my work at Waggener Edstrom; and is in the form of two theses that I’ve been thinking about over the past few months. I hope to post an executive summary on each of them on new blogs over the next two weekends.

The new blogs will not be as regularly updated as this one; but they will serve as conversation-starters with like-minded individuals. Having them on separate blogs will help me to separate our PR 2.0-related conversations from that of my other interests.

Till the next post…

Some fundamentals seem lost in the Web 2.0 world.

Having a good name is one of many. I’m not referring to a company’s reputation - we already know that to be undeniably crucial. I’m referring to the very names of companies and products.

I was just testing Wikia Search earlier and the one thing that struck me was how easily cynics could headline a negative post.

All because ‘Wikia’. Sounds like. ‘Weaker’.

And the possibilities are endless - Wikia: The Weaker Search Engine. The Weaknesses of Wikia. Jimmy Wales’ Hopes to Beat Google Get Wikia and Wikia…

Of course it could work in favour of the new search engine… For instance - Wikia Weakens Google’s Stranglehold in Search. But against a giant like Google and its kingdom of fans, the downside risk for a name like Wikia seems greater than the upside. And Wikia’s powerful founder doesn’t give it the opportunity to enchant the masses with a David-and-Goliath story.

On the flip side, Apple’s range of operating systems - Panther, Tiger, Leopard etc - makes made it very easy for Apple-loving journalists to headline their articles with “Leopard takes a giant leap ahead of Windows” etc. (A random example I found; and I’m sure there are many more.)

That said, a poor name will not deny a good product from succeeding; and from a digital PR perspective, it would be good to explore Wikia Search a little more. BusinessWeek has a pretty good introduction to Wikia.