Andy Barr is in the hot seat today, writing this week’s good and bad PR column through the tears because of Rich Leigh’s leaving. Onwards and upwards though, good and bad PR is dead (not really, don’t want an HR situation) long live good and bad PR!

Let this week’s PR love and loathing commence …

Good PR of the week

All hail Jose!

First up in the realms of Good PR, the one man media machine that returned to the UK this week; Jose Mourinho.

Jose is a one-man public relations machine. Some good, some bad, but mainly good; with amazing soundbites (special one), worldie winding-up skills (Arsene Wenger, Rafa Benitez) and a pout that would put a fashion blogger to shame.

He landed in London, signed his contract, toddled down to his first press conference and dominated the back pages for three days afterwards. Jose, I salute you and on behalf of every PR and media outlet, we welcome you back with open arms.

Hillary tweets

Next up for the love-in is an unlikely source, Hillary Clinton, offa US politics and Bill Clinton fame.

I know the type of PR hipsters that read PRmoment, so I know you are all over Texts from Hilary Clinton. A great meme that reached iconic status this week when Mrs Clinton joined The Twitter, and her first tweet was in reference to the Tumblr blog.

This shows us that a) she has a great sense of humour and b) her advisers have both a great sense of humour and the ability to convince her it was an idea she should run with.

Go Hillary.

Bad PR of the week

On to the world of the not-so-good PR.

Microsoft’s bad joke

Microsoft’s Xbox launch squad got itself into a (largely Daily Mail induced) pickle this week when, at the launch of its new console, one of the Xbox team apparently made a light-hearted jape around the topic of rape.

Rape does not even feature in the PR 101 “things not to refer to in a product launch”, as it is kinda a no-go area.

Microsoft issued an apology; “there is nothing else to see here and by the way, the new Xbox is more expensive than the new PS4.” Or something like that.

Minaj’s fashion faux pas

Nicki Minaj, pop-princess and wearer of neon boob tubes and very little else, announced a new fashion line this week; in conjunction with Kmart over in the US.

It was met with a wall of bile from critics. Minaj wants girls to “wear it and feel confident” but as the HuffPo pointed out “it's going to take an extraordinary amount of confidence to rock a skin-tight mini dress, a puffy vest and bedazzled captain hat”.

I think it is fair to say that the range is bonkers (I am an old man don’t forget) and a combination of it being launched in the equivalent of a chav-store, and the fact most of the items look highly flammable, means the media were right to give her a prod.