Online Public Relations Thoughts

Elizabeth Holmes, founder of the fraudulent Theranos blood-testing company, is now in prison for 11 years.  It has been a long fall for her and a lesson to Silicon Valley entrepreneurs to avoid faking it until you make it.  It is a reminder to communicators everywhere to stick to facts and to avoid puffery, especially in public companies.  Theranos was a company built on a lie that its technology worked.  It didn't and never did.  When investigative reporters discovered the fraud, it was swiftly over for the company and the beginning of extensive legal troubles for Holmes.  Her fall from grace was inevitable.  Those who once supported her have turned their backs.  She will be bunking with three other inmates in a minimum-security federal prison in Texas.  Will she ever be able to live it down?