After a few seconds on a stadium screen detonated her private life, Kristin Cabot is stepping back into public view, this time on her own terms.
The former Astronomer chief people officer will appear as a keynote at the PR Crisis Comms conference in Washington, an upcoming, high-priced industry event that positions Cabot’s experience as a live case study in modern reputational collapse and recovery.
A single ticket to the two-day conference is priced at A$1,313, with organisers expecting around 200 attendees.
If it sells out, the event could gross more than A$262,500. According to Newsweek, Cabot is not expected to be paid for her appearance.
Her session: Kristin Cabot: Taking back the narrative – will unpack how she and her publicist moved quickly to “take control” of the online conversation that followed her viral moment, and attempt to “rewrite” a story that spiralled far beyond its origins.
“Cabot experienced firsthand the extremity of public shaming that women have long experienced when in the negative spotlight of the media, one their male counterparts often seem to avoid,” the conference synopsis reads.
Cabot will appear alongside her PR representative Dini von Mueffling, described by organisers as an industry veteran, to outline both immediate crisis-response tactics and longer-term reputation repair.
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From meme to moral spectacle
Cabot became a global talking point in July 2025 after briefly appearing on a kiss cam at a Coldplay concert with her then-boss, Andy Byron, CEO of Astronomer.
The clip racked up more than 100 million views in days, eventually snowballing into what conference materials claim were “hundreds of billions” of views across platforms. What looked, from the outside, like a fleeting meme triggered a sustained collapse of Cabot’s privacy, safety and professional standing.
Speaking recently to The New York Times, Cabot said the incident was “not an affair”, but “a lapse in judgment that spiralled far beyond anything I could have imagined”.
“I crossed a professional line, and I own that,” she said. “Walking away from my job was the price I chose to pay. What I didn’t expect was everything that came after.”
When the internet doesn’t move on
According to Cabot, accountability quickly gave way to something else entirely.
She says she was doxxed and stalked, received death threats, and became the subject of relentless commentary about her appearance, character and worth. Paparazzi camped outside her home. Her children, she said, became afraid to be seen with her in public.
“The internet turned a mistake into a moral spectacle,” Cabot said. “I watched my entire career get erased in real time.”
Those experiences now underpin her repositioning as an anti-bullying advocate, with a focus on what she describes as ritualised public shaming – particularly of women – in an algorithm-driven media economy.
A broader industry warning
While Cabot is the headline drawcard, organisers stress the conference is not solely about her story.
The program features 22 speakers examining how brands, companies and individuals can be “turned upside down in seconds” – and what crisis leadership looks like when attention moves faster than facts.
Technology looms large in that conversation. The event website flags AI-fuelled amplification, synthetic media and harassment at scale as new variables crisis professionals must now plan for, often in real time.