Sticks and Stones

Speaking of the Obama campaign, my colleague Vivian Folkenflik points out that ReputationDefender service has used the candidates' online image management for their own promotion purposes. I've talked about Reputation Defender before here on Virtualpolitik. Since I last checked in on their offerings, they seem to have expanded their "my child" service, where anxious parents can look out for inappropriate expressions on the Internet by errant offspring. Virtualpolitik pal David Folkenflik has reported on NPR in "Obama Campaign Opens Anti-Smear Web Site" about how FightTheSmears.com is designed to contain rumors by controlling critical search engine results.