Thursday, May 23, 2013 Microsoft gets aggressive in its latest viral vids...

And it's hilarious.


Ripping into Siri...


And then mocking the Apple vs. Android fight.

Brilliant.

Wednesday, May 22, 2013 Why journalism matters: Tablets and coffee tables

The Face - 1995 courtesy of Oli Pyle

A few months ago I wrote that digital magazines like Bobbie Johnson's Matter - recently sold (and where's my Kickstarter backer's dividend, Bobbie?!) - were reshaping journalism through nailing the delivery mechanism.

But these characters look at the issue in a slightly different way in their piece in Campaign, where they describe the traditional magazine experience like this:

"Someone (was) willing to walk into their local newsagent every week, browse and leaf through the wonders on offer until they found their perfect partner and parted with their hard-earned cash in order to acquire it and take it home. And, once read, it would be carefully put on display with its predecessors, thus allowing the reader to exhibit to the world a sense of their character and good taste."

... compared to the world of modern mobile magazines which is like this:

"We get what we want, when we want it. We don’t expect to wait. We don’t expect to pay. We have the attention span of a small child and we like our content in bite-sized chunks. We simply don’t respect old media any more."

Something that has been annoying me for a while is how desperate I am to use my iPads and Kindles to consume content. I've tried it a lot, downloading countless magazines, books and news aggregators but always reverting back to more 'traditional' means after a while.

The only 'reading' services that I ever really stick with are Flipboard (because it suits fast tablet-based browsing and sharing) and the Cheezburger app (because I love pranks, fails, and picture of cats). Every other app is social media, video, gaming, or messaging of some description.

The problem, I've just realised, is my coffee table. The coffee table has always been the plinth where we humans display our intellectual diversity and prowess, idly (but carefully) leaving copies of The Face and Wallpaper alongside selected works from the political history section of our bookcase for people to notice when they come over.

But not any more. Nowadays, the symbol of success (and the thing that seems to affirm our own success to others) is our technology. The coffee table features a phone, tablet (or two) and laptop. Unfortunately, everyone has an iPad and they all look the same. You can't even see what's on it unless you're using it (which might be why 50 Shades of Grey did so well).

And this is why the experience of tablet magazines is so important. We don't cherish magazines. We don't bring them home and show them off any more. We want to use our iPads and iPhones and Kindles to consume content. When it's good, we shout about it by telling our friends and sharing bits of content via our social channels. When it's bad, we delete the app and never go back.

Magazines are not like they used to be. Nowadays, the delivery format has overtaken the content. The secret to success - which was my point about Matter - is making the delivery format so slick that it dissolves into the background.

Once the delivery becomes a joyous experience I'm far more likely to chat over coffee about the magazines I'm reading, rather than just bore you about my latest coffee table gadget.

Monday, May 20, 2013 Can Yahoo afford to fall down on Tumblr?

Yahoo's a fascinating one to watch, isn't it? It has managed to build a reputation for itself as a ginormous web dinosaur, gobbling up companies, digesting them, and leaving a trail of huge dinosaur droppings behind.

But in reality, it hasn't really done that badly. Yes, Flickr was a reasonable photo sharing website, but it was already under threat from Facebook and Google due to its paid-for model and limited functionality. GeoCities was already a relic, so I'm not counting that as a failure. Maven was an acquisition of talent, rather than tech. It lost a bit of money on Kelkoo when it sold it, but you win some, you lose some, eh?

But the acquisition of Tumblr for a billion dollars is a whole other story. Aside from being new boss Marissa Mayer's first big purchase, Yahoo is not buying technology or people with Tumblr. It's buying content. Lots and lots and lots of content that it allegedly hopes to monetise through advertising.

Photo: I’m delighted to announce that we’ve reached an agreement to acquire Tumblr!  We promise not to screw... tmblr.co/Z4v08slQ0n8V
— marissamayer (@marissamayer) May 20, 2013

Content, however, comes with something else: Emotion. The people that created that content feel extremely passionate about the content they create. People love their Tumblr blogs, while others love to read them.

Mayer promised not to 'screw up' Tumblr today (appropriately, via her own Tumblr blog). But it shouldn't be Tumblr she's worried about - if should be the people who own the 100 million or so blogs on the Tumblr platform that she needs to look after.

If this goes well, and Yahoo doesn't upset the community, the deal could be the making of Yahoo. It might own one of the web's hottest properties, and rake in cash from the associated advertising.

If this goes badly, the most well-known internet dinosaur might have 100 million people trying to hunt it down and kill it.

Friday, May 17, 2013 Is this another brilliant idea ruined by fake people?

Are these actors or am I just being paranoid? What about this recent classic...



Seems fake to me. All their actions look choreographed.

And why are they all so pretty?!

Wednesday, May 15, 2013 Are you a good friend or an awful friend?

I just finished speaking at the latest empty13 event, organised by Bite but attended by lots of brands, agencies and generally excellent people.

This time we were arguing for and against the hypothesis that, despite brands being able to contact people in very personal ways via social media, "customers do not want to be their friend".

ITV's Fru Hazlitt argued that they do, but you can't avoid the haters. Philippa Snare from Microsoft said they don't, and that brands should be bold, be clear, and be gone. John Bartleson from Telefonica explained that consumer habits change faster than even the most agile organisation. Spotify's Chris Maples told us not to try and fake it.

My brief was to talk 'around' the motion, so compared real friendship with brand friendship, with the suggestion that if you're a good friend then you'll be a good social marketer. And nobody wants an awful friend.

My tips were - for real friendship or brand friendship:

Keep secrets. (Brand translation: Don't sell my data.)
Don’t boast. (Stop bugging me all the time.)
Give people respect. (Don't post to my wall without permission.)
Be a good listener. (Listen to my feedback.)
Be generous. (Don't try to fleece me for cash.)

I then asked people in the audience to tweet something nice to a friend, just to see how it felt. And it worked well - people were reaching out to friends they hadn't seen in ages, just to say how fun it would be to see each other, or that they liked their shoes. The conference's Twitter wall was aglow with good vibes.

And so, as my service to you, I'm asking you to do the same. Tweet something now to a friend or colleague, and say something nice. Use the #empty13 hashtag if you like, just so we can see it. Or don't - it doesn't matter.

Let's make the internet a friendlier place today.

Thursday, May 09, 2013 I want to live like a celebrity. Who's with me?

I'm a huge advocate of celebrities using their status to raise awareness of charitable causes. I'm also a fan of gimmicky social experiments, so the Live Below the Line campaign, where you try to live on £1 a day for a week, really appeals to me. I'll definitely be taking part before June 30th (and you can thank Ben Affleck for bringing it to my attention).

But did anyone see E! presenter Alicia Quarles' attempt at living below the line? To quote her, she "took it to the next level" by aiming to spend nothing! But she didn't do it for a week, oh no. She did it for a day!

Yes. A day... That's some next-level-taking-things-to right there!

If you can't be bothered to read her report, let me summarise her day for you:

1. Someone drove her to a morning meeting.
2. Someone gave her breakfast at the meeting.
3. Someone drove her to lunch.
4. Someone gave her lunch.
5. Someone drove her to an evening meeting.
6. Her evening meeting was a 'red carpet event', where someone gave her food and drink.
7. At some point during the day, she bought a banana. Oops! Fail! LOL!

I'm starting to lose faith in the effectiveness of her endorsement.

To make myself feel less queasy, I'm going to watch this video of Beyonce taking the subway ten times in a row ("I felt amazing, just like everybody else").



OK, I feel better now. So... Who wants to join me and support Unicef by *actually* living below the line for a week?

Friday, March 22, 2013 Shin pads out the Galaxy

This is a guest post by Slice of Barnes.

Courtesy retronaut.com

Well hello! Isn't this lovely?

A quick intro: I’m Slice and I like baking but I’ve always suspected I might have a gift for this technology jive. There’s less washing up for starters. This is my guest post for PR Geek.

First off, let me reassure you regular readers of this fine blog: don’t worry about a thing.  Sit back, relax and enjoy the journey we’re about to embark on. I don’t know how much you know already, so we’ll take it gently and you can scream if you want to go faster.

Let’s buckle our seatbelts, stick on some suitable music, slide into first gear… and we’re off.

I thought we’d have a look at the new Galaxy S4 phone - I’ve got a Galaxy phone (an Ace 2, I believe) so it’s a subject I feel qualified to comment on.

I find it quite swirly and swipey, whereas my previous phone (a Blackberry) was just tappy. Jon Silk may scoff at my inability to answer the iPhone, but I couldn’t answer my Galaxy for a while either. Why? Well, someone calls, there’s a red and green button on the display right? Now wouldn’t you think you’d tap the green one to answer? No. Turns out you have to swipe it. Melon- twister.

Also, when you have a new message, it can’t flash a light to let you know.  It even has what looks like a blinky thing on it but it doesn’t blink. It doesn’t do anything far as I can see.

As for typing stuff… well that’s all swirly. You swirl over the keyboard and it guesses what you want to write. Now, if you do a lot of baking, you really don’t want it replacing chocolate with cocksure. The cake club would have had a collective seizure if I hadn’t had my readers on.

According to Samsung’s Mobile Chief, Mr Shin, this new Galaxy S4 phone is meant to be, and I quote, a ‘life companion’.  It gets funnier.  Mr Shin says that this phone can help you achieve a “richer, simpler, more full life”.  Jon Silk always says you shouldn’t swear on Twitter and blogs and that. I won’t lie to you, this is testing me.

Oh hang on though. I’m reading a bit more (and I may have to strap my ribs up soon) but get this. One of the reasons this phone is going to enhance your life is that you can work it with your eyes. Well for one, they’re missing out on a huge untapped pirate market. Secondly, you’re on the tube and your eyes are going mental scanning the Evening Standard. Now what happens with a normal paper? The person behind you reads it over your shoulder. So how will this life companion deal with two pairs of mince pies?

Courtesy retronaut.com

Let’s have a run through the main features of this life changing piece of kit:

S Voice is just like that Siri jive Silk is always banging on about. It’s witchcraft and no good will come of it.

This new Galaxy lets you take a photo and put yourself in it. Now not one of my mates would buy into this. I look mildly deranged in photos so I am always the designated picture taker. This is not a good feature. The camera is a 13 megapixel one apparently and it seems this is a good thing *shrugs*.

The BBC says this about the video thing: "But on the video side, for a live chat where it's compositing you and your image to show both you and what you're seeing - that's not a gimmick." I’d agree. It’s not a gimmick. It’s dangerous. You’d be so disorientated, you could fall over.

It can translate stuff. You just point it at something, say a menu all in French and it magics it into English. Sorcery.

You can hook a few of them together into a surround sound system by synching the music. I’m having that. Unless it’s Mumford and Sons.

And finally, you get a 5in full HD super AMOLED screen and a Jelly Bean operating system. I have to admit here, I'm none the wiser.

All them bells and whistles and no mention of a blinky message thing, mind.

By the by, it appears that Samsung are the numero uno honcho when it comes to smart phones, and the likes of HTC and Nokia are gagging for a bigger slice of the action, so this caught my eye. Apparently, at Mr Shin’s spangly launch, the queuing media were treated to this:

“ Women dressed in HTC garb handed out bottles of water and cans of Pringles with labels promoting the HTC One phone”

While I like their brass neck for attempting a hijack, if I was HTC, I’d chuck a bit of money at it.  I mean, a can of Pringles? Pickled Onion Monster Munch and some Mullers Fruit Corners at the very least would be my advice. Up your game HTC.

Any road up, you’re all busy people so I’ll sum up in a cakey way: Samsung have come up with a fancy looking cupcake, when what they should have done is knock up a belting Victoria Sponge.

Had I the influence, I would pen this:

Memo to Mr Shin: Despite your splendid Bond villain name, I am not convinced. Please just make me a more tappy phone that can spell chocolate and flash a small light when there’s a new message. 

If you insist on getting all fancy pants, well make my phone tell me if there’s milk in the fridge at home when I’m in the supermarket. 

If you really want to give me a richer, simpler, more full life, please make me a jet pack. 

Furthermore, bonsai animals would be preferable as possible lifetime companions, or – and you could seriously clean up with this one – clone David Beckham and supply him with a range of holographic pants.

And there ends our journey into the new Samsung phone. I like to think we’re all a bit further on.

It only remains for me to thank you for reading and to my esteemed host, Jon Silk, for accepting this challenge. Sadly, I doubt this will EVER be allowed to happen again but I’ve had a top time.

We will now de-blog so please make sure you take all your belongings with you.

All change please.

Thursday, March 14, 2013 OK, Slice of Barnes. I give in.

I love a blog challenge. Remember that time I started a blog about Reggae Reggae Sauce and got an email from Peter Jones telling me my blog was "great"? Or the time I spent living in 1998 because Orange couldn't provide mobile data in Central London?

But recently, someone sent me a new challenge. And it really takes the cake.

In summary, a friend and cake blogger called Slice of Barnes has publicly asked, as a gift to her, that we swap blogs just for one post. I have to bake a cake (and get it rated by a group of independent witnesses, like she does every week) and, in return, she will write a post on technology for this blog.

Now, let me tell you about Slice and how she is with technology. I'll do this through a recent anecdote of hers...

A few weeks ago, she found an iPhone in the street. Someone had clearly lost it, so she did the decent thing and picked it up. Then it rang. And rang. And rang. Slice couldn't work out how to answer it. Apparently, having seen me use Siri in the past, she even shouted "ANSWER!" at it. Nothing worked.

So what did she do? She phoned me to ask how to answer an iPhone.

She saw my iPad once, and announced that it was "witchcraft". Lord knows what would happen if she ever got hold of my Pebble watch. This, dear reader, is the person who is about to guest post on this blog.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

So, Slice of Barnes, in answer to your post (and tweets, and texts, and phone calls, and visits to my home), I hereby accept your challenge.

This weekend, I will bake a cake that is worthy of being featured on your wonderful cake blog.

And next week, we will be waiting to see what you have to say.

How about Google Reading Glasses? Pretty please?

So Google is retiring Google Reader. This is a blow for a lot of people (including me) who rely on it for keeping up with selected websites, and then sharing the news with one click.

Google has been slowly strangling it for a while - it removed some of the features, meaning we had to find ways around its sharing features to make sure our IFTTT pipes don't get blocked.

But now, as of July 1, it's gone. In my view, this means one of two things...

A. Google is so focused on the future that it thinks ridiculous glasses that Google stuff when you look at it is more important than the internet.

B. RSS has had its day, and anyone still using Google Reader deserves to join it in the scrap heap alongside CompuServe, Netscape and WAP sites.

I'm not sure which one it is.

Tuesday, February 19, 2013 Seen in a bar in Canada: Bacon-infused cocktail

That is all.