Was it sensible to go so public?
I think it is. This is the first mainstream combat jet to be developed almost entirely in the new social media market, and folks were craving for any information as it was a highly visible program. The program was and is a juicy target as being the most expensive program ever, prone to overruns as just about every program has been, and has some questionable design characterics/compromises (3 distinct missions in one airframe). Folks in the media, blogs and forums such as this were going to talk about it no matter how much or how little the program officials or manufactures released.
Better to be somewhat pro-active, than just reactive. Yes some of it is
PR hype, but it seems to have been done on a slow build. Perhaps deliberate. Perhaps better to temper expectations.
The defence departments seem to be much more savy about getting press releases, video etc out pretty quickly- and even then we punters are not even happy with the shots they provide as they "must be hiding something".
In the USA I think something was learned from the MV-22 program, which seemed much more problematic, and much more reactive, with one bad news story after another. This led to false hype, overpromisses, coverups, faked numbers, and other problems. The F-22 also seemed to have more hype.
It is perhaps noteworthy that there has not been a crash or spectacular casualty that would surely generate headline news. Over 100 built and hours building at an ever increasing rate, with perhaps one write-off (the A with the engine fire). While the overall effectivesness and cost, and even the program its self are bigger stories; perhaps the failure to fly at the UK shows post fire seems to be the largest specific
PR ding to date- perhaps even larger than the fire itself.