This Isn’t Just a New Media Circuit. It’s a PR Collapse.

The media’s changing. The news is chaos. And most of us are repping people who can’t afford to disappear.

The old PR machine didn’t just evolve. It imploded. And some of us are still picking glass out of our inboxes. Everyone’s talking about how the new media circuit is changing celebrity PR. But the part we’re not talking about?

It’s not just for celebrities.

Vulture dropped a piece yesterday about how the “new media circuit” is reshaping Hollywood publicity. It’s sharp. It’s already making the rounds. And just last month, I was featured in Business Insider alongside other publicists unpacking this shift—how late-night shows are being replaced by Hot Ones, Chicken Shop Date, and creator-led content.

The consensus? Traditional PR is getting outpaced.

But what most of these stories don’t name is just how deep the change goes, especially for the rest of us. Because this isn’t just a new celebrity circuit, it’s a collapsing PR ecosystem.

And if you’re working in this space right now—trying to pitch into a broken news cycle, serve clients who are barely breaking even, or stay professionally calm while your Slack lights up with a vague “heads up” and your soul leaves your body before you even open the thread—you already know: This isn’t just a shift. It’s a reckoning. And not the cool kind where you emerge stronger. The kind where you stare at your inbox like it personally betrayed you.

The Glossier Version of PR Is Dead

The Vulture piece paints a picture of transformation—A-listers skipping legacy press, rebranding through YouTube interviews, and building parasocial trust one podcast at a time. That part is true, but it’s also sanitized.

Because if you’ve worked in PR outside of the Hollywood bubble in the last year? You know it’s not just about strategy. It’s about survival.

(And sometimes praying that the one journalist who liked your pitch didn’t just get laid off mid-thread.)

You’re not just trying to go viral, you’re trying to make your clients’ businesses visible enough to stay open while also pretending that “building brand awareness” is a tangible deliverable in this economy.

What Pitching Feels Like in 2025

Here’s what pitching looks like right now:

• You land on the perfect hook. Timely. Relevant. Practically Pulitzer-worthy.

• You triple-check your press list because the last few people you pitched now work in comms, launched a burnout Substack, or quietly left journalism—because who can blame them?

• You personalize the email, cut the fluff, hyperlink everything like it’s a choose-your-own-adventure, attach a drive folder, and pray to the Gmail gods.

• You hit send.

• You spiral.

Because what happens next?

• Nothing.

• No bounceback. No reply. No proof of life.

• You check the email 14 times to make sure it didn’t send in invisible ink.

• You Google the journalist to make sure they’re still alive.

• You wonder if you should “just bump this up” or quit PR and open a queer flower shop.

• You write a follow-up so casual it could be mistaken for a cry for help.

This isn’t pitching. It’s shouting into the algorithmic void while journos dodge layoffs and AI writes listicles about “10 Celebs Who Might Be Ghosts.” Welcome to modern PR. Hope you brought snacks.

Your Client’s Not Zendaya. They’re Drowning.

And while Zendaya can skip a press tour and still trend worldwide, your client can’t.

Your client is:

• A small business founder whose Shopify traffic is down 73%

• A thought leader who “just needs one big hit” before the fiscal year ends

• A brand with no budget, no assets, and no idea why you can’t land them in The Cut

They’re not rebranding on their own terms. They’re trying not to disappear. And you’re doing this work with shrinking budgets, a broken algorithm, and a media cycle that resets every three hours, usually with another indictment, scandal, or tech bro accidentally tweeting himself into oblivion.

This isn’t PR. It’s triage with a Canva subscription.

The Trump Factor Is Warping the Cycle (Again)

Let’s be honest here. Trump’s return to the headlines hasn’t just hijacked the news cycle. It’s corrupted it structurally, emotionally, and strategically.

We’re not just in Groundhog Day. We’re in a nonstop media loop of court dates, conspiracy drops, fascist dog whistles, and open threats against the free press. And the worst part? It’s working.

Political chaos eats airtime. Scandal eats SEO. Disinformation outruns the truth (and reshapes it before anyone can catch up.)

It’s not just about clicks anymore. It’s about control.

The President of the United States of America isn’t just dominating the narrative. He’s actively waging war on journalism itself. Banning reporters. Suing networks. Refusing interviews. Calling for the dismantling of media institutions while framing truth as an attack, coverage as a betrayal, and the press as the enemy.

And for those of us trying to work in or around this system (i.e., publicists, journalists, founders, activists), it forces a near-constant recalibration of what’s even possible to say, share, or pitch.

Because in this ecosystem:

• Editors are overwhelmed.

• Reporters are getting doxxed for doing their jobs.

• Newsrooms are playing defense.

• And thoughtful, non-reactive stories have to fight twice as hard to even be considered.

So when your client asks why their story about mutual aid, community healing, or gender-affirming care isn’t getting picked up, it’s not that those stories don’t matter. They do matter, and they can land. But they’re not playing on a level field because in a cycle dominated by spectacle, rage-clicks, and political chaos, the stories rooted in care often have to fight harder, shout louder, or find the exact right moment just to get a seat at the table.

This doesn’t mean thoughtful stories are off-limits. It means the rules of engagement have changed. It means publicists are no longer just pitching—they’re negotiating with a news cycle that doesn’t want to slow down long enough to care. Timing, platform, tone, format. It all has to be precise and stand out. Not just for impact, but for survival in the feed. Because in a media landscape shaped by chaos, even the soft stories have to be strategic.

So What Do We Do Now?

Here’s the part the trades won’t say: PR is no longer about getting coverage. It’s about building a system that doesn’t fall apart when the media does.

The publicists still standing? They’re not chasing vanity hits, they’re building ecosystems.

That means helping clients:

• Invest in content they can control

• Build actual communities, not just clout

• Share their voice in places that aren’t at the mercy of the algorithm

• Measure success in trust, resonance, and staying power, not just mentions

It’s not sexy. It’s not always scalable. But it’s real. And right now? That’s enough.

The Real Power Shift

Let’s get one thing straight and two things gay—Pride is coming.

This isn’t about giving up on PR. It’s about giving up on the version that was never built to survive this.

The version that tied our worth to press hits. That demanded Olympic-level gymnastics for shrinking results. That asked publicists to do more and more, for less and less, until burnout became baseline.

The people who’ll lead the next chapter of this work aren’t chasing headlines. They’re building platforms, prioritizing trust, choosing strategy over spectacle, and sustainability over performance.

And here’s the honest part…I’m not doing what I used to do anymore. Not because I couldn’t keep up, but because I finally stopped trying to make a broken system work.

I’m still in this industry, but on my own terms now.

Not chasing press for the serotonin hit. Just doing work I believe in, with people I don’t fantasize about blocking, at a pace that doesn’t make me want to fake a Wi-Fi outage.

No proving. No performing. No pretending the hustle is holy.

If that makes me a little unhinged and a lot more honest, good. I’ve earned it. And if you’ve also crawled out of the PR burnout crater? Pull up a chair.