snake oil, bone-shakers and witch-doctors 2.0

This is the first of two pieces on the subject of using the internet to find reliable information regarding things connected with health.

Over the weekend I was searching online for information about which foods are a good source of different kinds of vitamins and minerals. Not for myself, but for one of my kids.

It was, I thought initially, a pretty straightforward thing to look for online.

But what happened next enabled me to see the internet in all its naked glory.

My first encounter with the internet was 20 years ago and these days I am rarely offline, except when I am asleep – much to the occasional chagrin of those around me.

Consequently I consider myself to be pretty savvy when it comes to using the internet. A digital native, if you will. I am well versed in finding what I want online and quickly navigating my way through the many pools of information therein, some deep and some not so.

But the food search episode was quite the revelation. Pretty much all the results returned by Google (which has been my weapon of choice for searching since 1998 and is likely to remain as such for the foreseeable) were from websites that looked at best questionable as sources of information and at worst downright misleading.

How, I asked myself, am I supposed to be able to tell in whom I should place my trust?

I trawled through page after page, site after site, and came to the conclusion that I couldn’t figure that one out. So I ignored them all, preferring to remain in blissful ignorance.

This, I realised, is what it must be like to be unfamiliar with the internet and to trust in the validity of all the search results Google delivers you.

One of the most enduring changes the internet has brought about is the democratisation of publishing. Anyone with an opinion, a computer and an internet connection can publish those opinions and, potentially, gather around them an audience of believing readers.

This is a good thing.  And also a not-so-good thing.

september 2011 word cloud

Last month, I published a word cloud showing the words I'd used in August.

I thought I'd do the same for September.

Simple as that.

new songs from my band the subtitles

I joined The Subtitles as vocalist and rhythm guitarist late last year.  A few months ago we started writing our own material.

We picked two songs that we liked, worked on them and then recorded them a few weeks ago. After some refining and mixing, they are now finished. I hope.  :)

The links below should take you to them.  If not, leave a comment to let me know - or email me, or @-reply me on twitter. 

I would really appreciate some feedback on them.  They are yet to go on the band website but soon will.

Hopefully, we'll get some gigs sorted out soon so we can try these (and others) out on a live audience.

Thanks in advance - I really appreciate you taking the time.

The songs:

Falling - click here

Walk Away - click here


Added on 1 October:

I got some great feedback from people who kindly listened to the songs and shared their thoughts. I am really grateful, as are the other guys in the band.

This is some of what was said.  But I'd love to hear some more opinions.

• Wow
• Sounds great
• Impressed
• Awesome stuff
• Both very good
• instrumental section in Walk Away is too long - loses a bit of momentum, I thought it was the outro
• Both *might* benefit from some vocal harmonies on the choruses
• Seriously am now humming Walk Away
• Your drummer's style is very musical rather than "technical" if that makes sense - suits your material well

telling stories, human nature and social media

Since the very dawn of time itself mankind has told stories.

Ok, maybe not since the dawn of time perhaps "since the evolution of language" would have been more accurate. But that didn't sound very story-like.

Someone once told me that all the stories we are familiar with are in fact based on just a handful of original story ideas that came into being eons ago.

That could be true.

Certainly many cultures have a rich story-telling tradition. Viking sagas, the Aboriginal Dreamtime stories, Greek myths, the Tales of 1,001 Nights - frankly there's loads.

Stories don't just come in that more obvious narrative format either. Cave paintings, totem poles, the adornments on boomerangs - graphical story-telling is a strong part of human history.

We've come a long way from sitting round the fire recounting our ancestors' tales of derring-do or painting on cave walls. But stories are still a fundamental part of who we are as individuals, as nations and also in relation to how brands identify themselves.

The approach taken by advertisers and marketers just a generation or two ago looks naive by our sophisticated 21st century standards. It was, with some exceptions, "here's our product - buy it."

And while that approach still exists - and of course the motivation of generating sales is still hugely valid - consumers tend now to switch off to a lot of that stuff. We're all so accustomed to being marketed to that maybe we've started to become immune.

Whether you call it PR, communications, marcomms, or whatever, those who ply their trade in the same sector as I are in the business of telling stories. Stories that will resonate with our clients' target audiences and give them a sense of affinity with a particular brand.

This can be seen being played out in the digital space even more clearly, where the time between brand execution and customer feedback grows ever shorter.

But much like the crazy preacher-man berating the passing crowds at Oxford Circus I passed this morning, there's a danger we end up trying to tell our stories to people who simply aren't interested.

Again, the online world has made this trap ever more easy to fall into.

The fundamentals of story-telling – much like the fundamentals of human nature, in my opinion – remain:

• Get the story right
• Know who it is that you want to tell your story to
• Be sure you're talking when (and where) they will listen.
• And who knows, maybe even ask them to share their stories with you too

We haven't really come such a long way at all, in this story-teller's opinion.

Although at least we're not still writing on walls.

Ahem..!

Yes Facebook, I'm looking at you.

i don’t want you but i need you

Smokey Robinson said it best when he sang I don’t want you but I need you.

As one of the most gifted song-writers in the popular music genre, this observation of what it’s like to be in love with someone you know is bad for you is beautifully crafted.

It also kinda sums up most people’s relationship status with Facebook.

I can’t think of an example of another organisation with such a vast following of people who are so quick to voice their dislike of the service.

And therein lies Facebook’s problem. Timelines and profile tweaks aside, it needs to do something about the toxic relationship it has with its users, many of whom are only sticking around because their friends are too.

It’s like a massive Mexican stand-off. If the day ever comes when enough people finally walk away from Facebook it could start a craze.

So far there hasn’t been a viable alternative to lure people away. For all the fuss, hype and expectation, GooglePlus won’t do it.  And there simply isn’t anyone else with the size and reach to be a realistic threat to Facebook.

That’s not much of a business model though, is it? Our customers are stuck with us and we are stuck with the fact they don’t like us.

If I was gambling man, I’d be looking at Renren as a possible longer-term Facebook rival. But that’s probably a topic for another day.

In the meantime, Facebook has to do something to stem the tide of discontent and griping.

Will Timeline be enough to do this?

No, of course not. But if it forms part of a coherent strategy to start putting people at the heart of the Facebook experience, giving them something to like – in the real sense of the word, not a silly fake Facebook like – then maybe it could be on to something.

Now, why not treat yourself to Smokey Robinson & The Miracles singing You Really Got a Hold on Me – the video and audio quality isn’t the best, but it’s worth it. Your soul will thank you.

give us your thoughts - dan purvis set to music

A few weeks ago I recorded a phone interview that I did with Dan Purvis (Global Director of PR at Meltwater Group, he's also a former colleague of mine at Octopus Communications and a friend).

I cut up part of the interview and dropped extracts into a dance track I had composed a few weeks prior to that.

It's called "Give Us Your Thoughts" and Dan & I hope you enjoy it..!

august 2011 word cloud

For no reason other than it piqued my curiosity, I pasted all the copy I’ve written and published on my site during August 2011 into Wordle to see what it would look like as a word cloud.

I didn’t include any of the comments readers kindly left, nor my responses to those comments.


I haven't included this piece either. That seemed like a daft idea!

Of the almost 5,000 words published, there are 250 represented below.

I wonder what this says about me or the things I write about.

August 2011 - don't run with scissors word cloud

the time has come to spam journos with video

Am I missing something?

A fully-functioning synapse or two? Or the point, perhaps.

I just read a piece on TheRealPRMoment about research from press release distribution company RealWire, which states "news releases including video content achieve three times more coverage than releases without multimedia content."

It goes on.... "For those releases with editorial or blog coverage, the average number of pieces was 17.1 for the releases with video content. This was almost three times the figure for the sample without video content of 6.2 and four-and-a-half times more than the distribution industry average of 3.8 pieces."

Drawing a comparison with the last such survey, the story tells us "Adam Parker, RealWire’s chief executive, attributed the lack of adoption of video to (among other things) the barriers that existed such as the prohibitive cost of some distribution services."

Bit of a so-far-so-obvious, you may be thinking.

Here's the thing I'm struggling with.

This is the same Adam Parker and the same RealWire behind the (always struck me implausibly-named) "An Inconvenient PR Truth" campaign, which put forward a bill of rights (frankly, I've never known whether to laugh or weep at that, and I still can't make my mind up) regarding the manner in which PR people send information to journalists.

Let me break it down for you.

It's a campaign that proposes 10 so-called rights intended to make PR people treat bloggers and journalists with more respect and, at its heart, stop spamming them with unwanted press releases and other forms of contact.

For the avoidance of any doubt, I dislike the campaign. I wrote about it here.

I've never claimed to be possessed of super-human intelligence, and what I'm now struggling with is that on one hand RealWire/Adam Parker (wearing the Inconvenient Truth hat) have advised me (and the rest of the PR industry) to tread carefully. On the other hand, the one that's promoting distribution services via a news item about a piece of research, I'm now being advised to use video in press releases.

Too many people in PR can recount stories of journalists becoming quite irrationally upset just because there was a jpg or a pdf attached to an email.

Step forward if you're brave enough to start punting video at people.

I'll be the one eating popcorn and watching what happens.

brits behaving badly

I'm about to make a comparison between the riots and looting of early August and the way Brits behave in cafes.

I know, I know... extreme. How long before Godwin's Law is invoked?

This is one of my pet hates, and I'm witnessing it as I write this piece.

I'm in the M&S cafe in Reading. Don't judge me! The only independent coffee house I've tried in Reading was bloody awful.

Plus, my youngest son (sat next to me scoffing an enormous cookie) likes it here.

Back to the pet hate. It was relatively quiet when we arrived. Since then, it's got busier. There's a longish queue and empty tables are fewer in number than they were.

I've watched about six groups of people walk in, bypass the queue, find a table, deposit themselves and their bags at said table, and send one person off to join the queue.

I've also watched several people leave the queue with their trays piled high, often with children in tow, struggle to find somewhere to sit.

"I'm sorry," the table-baggers say. "Someone is sitting here."

What I hear though is, "up yours you loser."

It's a bit of a leap, I admit, from here to looting. But what I'm witnessing is a lack of consideration for others.

Sadly, I think it's endemic.

I don't know what it is about this country, my home, but good manners are becoming as rare as hens' teeth. And it just fosters an attitude of looking after number one, and not giving a toss about anyone else.

It's a shame. A real shame.

We can all call for looters to be locked up for years, that's easy.

But what's much harder, is to look at ourselves and consider how we might lead by example in the little things we do every day.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

the double-dip risk of risk-avoidance

It may have been three years since it hit hard, but the global financial downturn / GFC / credit crunch still casts a long shadow over Western economies.

Talk of a double-dip recession has been less prominent of late, but could it be that any cause for optimism is somewhat premature? Sadly I think it may.

An awful lot of people I know have been adversely affected financially since 2008. Belt-tightening has, for many, become the new normal. This shift in attitude goes hand-in-hand with a more cautious and risk-averse outlook. An outlook mirrored in the global finance markets.

Banks became more hesitant where lending is concerned. This sparked the oft-mentioned credit crunch.

Are we about to see recent history repeat itself?

Here's why I think we are. Or at least why it is a possibility.

The world's major stock markets have been in decline for the last few weeks - a decline which has lately gathered momentum.

As investors look around for alternatives (less risky alternatives) to the volatile stock markets, they turn to some familiar safe harbours. In particular, gold (prices are at record highs) and government bonds from the UK and USA. These too have seen trading prices hit levels not seen for decades.

This performs two functions.

First, as capital flows to governments or is exchanged for gold, there is less of it available generally.

Second, as the price of government bonds rises the yields they offer falls.

That in itself is not bad news for the governments concerned as the cost of servicing their debts levels will fall as a result.

But it is this first point that ought to set alarm bells ringing.

Banks will, simply speaking, have less money available. In fact, typical interbank borrowings have started to fall from six month to three month terms.

Less capital circulating ever faster. Something has to give.

That something is most likely going to be business lending.

Business lending is the lifeblood of all developed economies and it is still on its knees recovering from the winding it received in the post-2008 fallout.

Business confidence too is far from the healthiest it's ever been. The prospect of struggling to lend from the primary markets will cause some to pull in their horns.

Investment in people, premises, R&D, you name it, could all come under threat. As if it wasn't already in many instances.

Will there be a second wave of financial turmoil? I have no idea.

Is it likely? Yes, sadly it is.

This is one of those occasions when I really hope I will be proven wrong.



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad