Social media is great. Seriously, isn't social media great? It lets you connect with people you might not otherwise have interacted with, it gives you access to new and sometimes fascinating pieces of information, it provides a bit of light relief, and, yes, it can be a great tool for marketing and PR.
It's that last point I have the problem with.
Or, actually, that's not quite right. I don't have a problem with sites like Facebook and Twitter being used as a PR/marketing took per se. I can see how those sites could be useful to people in those occupations, and actually, I don't really mind people using them to pitch me the occasional story idea. Well, I don't mind too much, anyway. Personally, I tend to use Facebook and Twitter for the third reason listed above - a little bit of light relief during the working day - but I know not everyone uses them that way, so it's not a huge deal if PRs want to use those channels to contact me about something.
What I do have a problem with, however, is a certain breed of PR I've come to think of as the Social Media Stalker. I encountered one today, as a matter of fact. In the course of just a couple of hours, this person:
