As director of news operations for ProfNet, I come across a dizzying array of blog posts covering everything from public relations and marketing to journalism education and the media industry. Here is a roundup of some of the more interesting PR- and media-related stories I found online last week:

In Hired a PR Agency and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt, Jeff Domansky, aka The PR Coach, shares seven quick tips to help you choose your next PR agency partner.

Cultivating Company Spokespeople: 5 Steps That Will Yield Your Best Spokesperson Group Yet, from Tech Affect, shares five suggestions for growing a thriving spokesperson program to make sure your hard-won media opportunities don’t go to waste.

Top Photo Apps for Getting Instagram Engagement, from Strategic Public Relations, offers five apps you can use for photos on Instagram.

In Social Media Has Created Two Types of Users, guest blogger Tyler Orchard of Zync talks about the two distinct groups of social media users that should inform your social strategies and content.

In Ad Agency Run by High-Schoolers Lands First Paying Client, we read about IAM Advertising, an ad agency run by students from the Innovation and Media High School in Brooklyn, N.Y. The agency was recently hired by PBS to create a social media campaign to promote its documentary series, “DC Met: Life Inside School Reform.”

How to Take Your Career from Social Specialist to Strategist shares tips for those who started their careers as social media specialists and would like to move into the strategist arena but aren’t sure the best way to go about it.

In 12 Bite-Size Takeaways from the Online News Association Conference, Jeff Sonderman shares some of the most important bits of news and ideas from ONA’s annual conference for digital journalism innovators.

It’s the start of the school year, which means students are returning to journalism programs around the country. As the media industry continues to evolve, how well is new talent being trained, and how well are schools preparing them for the real world? In Reboot Journalism School? Take Control of Your Education Instead, Robert Hernandez, journalism professor at USC’s Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism, shares his ideas on how students can make the resources of the j-school, and the Web, better work for them.

Should newspapers be funded by a tax on Internet service providers? In An Internet Tax Won’t Save Journalism – or Newspapers, GigaOm’s Mathew Imgram argues that such a tax is filled with flaws, including the fact that large newspapers are not synonymous with journalism and would do little to save the industry.

Patch.com, AOL’s hyperlocal news experiment, is rolling out a new site that places heavy emphasis on social elements. Patch Unveils a New Site, Focused on Social and Mobile offers more information and a preview of the site.

Do you have a media, PR or communications blog we should be following? Let us know in the comments below.

ProfNet, a service of PR Newswire, has helped journalists and experts connect since 1992. Writers can search the ProfNet Connect database of more than 50,000 profiles; send a ProfNet query by email to thousands of subscribers around the globe; or get timely experts and story ideas by email.

As director of news operations for ProfNet, I come across a dizzying array of blog posts covering everything from public relations and marketing to journalism education and the media industry. Here is a roundup of some of the more interesting PR- and media-related stories I found online last week:

In The 10 Commandments of Online Etiquette, Gini Dietrich shares her list of 10 things online marketers should never do, including adding someone to a newsletter list without their consent; building lists, fans, followers, connections or circles just for the sake of numbers; and posting your news releases as blog posts.

Facebook Likes and Freedom of Speech looks at a legal case in the Eastern District of Virginia in which six employees of the sheriff’s office were dismissed for “liking” the Facebook page of one of the sheriff’s opponents – and what this case could mean for social media and free speech.

Pew Study Looks At Photo, Video Sharing Habits looks at a recent Pew Internet & American Life Project study about how photos and videos are shared socially. The findings shed some interesting light on how many (or few) people are actually using these various networks.

Definitive YouTube TrueView Ads Guide: What Smart Marketers Need To Know guides readers on how to set up YouTube TrueView video ads. Whether you are looking to use the video ads for branding, generating leads, direct response or you just plain want to drive views to your stellar new video, this guide shows you how to set up your campaign from the ground up.

In The 4 C’s of the Conversation Company, looks at the four pillars that can help companies be more customer-oriented: customer experience, conversation management, content marketing and collaboration with clients. By managing these, companies can optimize their conversation potential.

Freelancers: A Happy, Well-Paid Bunch shares some optimistic news from Ed “The Wealthy Freelancer” Gandia’s 2012 Freelance Industry Report. Freelancers say they’re happier than they were before going independent; they say they’re making decent money, and they were relatively unscathed from the recession. There’s also a great infographic that sums up some of the key findings.

Don’t Just Teach Skills, Train Young Journalists to Be Lifelong Learners is the first in a series of posts looking at the job journalism schools are doing and how they can improve. Mindy McAdams, journalism professor at the University of Florida, explains why teaching code isn’t enough -- students must also learn why code is worth struggling with.

5 Things Journalists Should Know About Quartz looks at Atlantic Media’s business news startup, staffed with veterans from top media organizations around the world, including The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, Gawker, Huffington Post, GOOD magazine and France 24. The digital news service is getting a lot of pre-launch attention for its intention to do things differently -- which makes it not only interesting but also a sort of lab experiment whose successes or failures will bear lessons for other news organizations.

Industry Icon Martin Nisenholtz on Digital Journalism, Today & Tomorrow shares the news industry icon’s thoughts on digital journalism. Nisenholtz, a senior vice president at The New York Times Company, is retiring at the end of the year. He helped shape the Times’ Web strategy and was involved in virtually every major digital initiative at The Times, from the creation of the website to multiplatform projects involving mobile phones and tablets.

PR Professionals Need to Act Now to Ensure Christmas Campaigns are a Success shares tips on what marketers should be doing now to help them fulfill journalists’ requests for Christmas gift ideas and holiday-themed features.

ProfNet, a service of PR Newswire, has helped journalists and experts connect since 1992. Writers can search the ProfNet Connect database of more than 50,000 profiles; send a ProfNet query by email to thousands of subscribers around the globe; or get timely experts and story ideas by email.