The first Christmas campaigns started in earnest last week, so it must be September. Welcome to this week’s Good and Bad PR.

AstraZeneca’s medical marvel

AI get’s as much grief as it does plaudits and whilst it is mostly favoured by kids looking to get their homework assignments done fast, it is also clearly a force for good.

AstraZeneca spoke publicly for the first time this week about an AI tool it has been developing called Milton. It can analyse all of the data that comes back from the kids of tests that your average GP does and diagnose over 1000 illnesses before the symptoms even manifest themselves.

This is a huge feat in itself and the pharma giant deserves massive praise for the development but even more back slapping is due. The company is making the AI tool available to others in the industry who are working on similar medical advances, paving the way for huge leaps in medical science.

Murdoch makes money moves

Rightmove claimed it is a wrong move for the Murdoch family to buy the housing website this week. Murdoch’s empire owns Australia’s biggest house selling and buying website and it this week made a move for Rightmove.

The UK property website turned down the big money deal but could it all have just been a distraction to make the media look away from the Murdoch family disputes? Many media have reported that this week sees the start of a court case over the succession planning for the family empire.

Launching a massive and aggressive bid for another business is classic crisis comms 101. It moves the media attention away from the secretive family dispute and over to a business deal that is in the public eye.

Rightmove will do well to fend off the Murdoch family. Good, distraction PR for the Murdoch empire.

Asos’s returns silence

Asos customers were raging this week as the company hiked up the minimum value of the clothes they must keep in order to not trigger a return fee. Asos Premier customers previously only had to keep £15 worth of orders they had made in order to secure free returns of items that they ordered but didn’t want.

That value went up to £40 but only a select few were targeted with the increase. It turns out that Asos picked the customers with a track record of returning large amounts to receive notice of the inflated cost.

Muggles were not happy, and a common theme cut across all of the abuse. If Asos could ensure that sizes were consistent across all of its brands then people would not need to buy and return so many clothes. Ouch.

Asos did not respond to the sizing accusations which really surprises me as it would have been a great chance for them to take a stand for consumers.

Campbell’s goldfish crackers, pasta sauces and juices

This week we end with a rebrand gone well. Campbell’s Soup. The brand is over 155 years old and it turns out that they now do far more than just soup.

Despite Andy Warhol making the name famous, the company decided it was time it ditched Soup from its title. They now make pasta sauces, various juices and *checks notes* goldfish crackers.

You would normally expect people to kick off about this kind of change but the brand played it safe. It paid homage to its history whilst also reinforcing the need for change. Maybe the muggles had an off-day but the new name went largely unnoticed. They now need a modern-day Warhol to depict their goldfish crackers in such a high-profile way. Well done Campbell’s.