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Jimmy Leach
Jimmy Leach is editorial director for digital for The Independent.
There's always the Twitter option
There's always the Twitter option
A wee lecture about the history of the brand, that's been paid for by a brand trying to reinvent itself (Black Magic), but it's quite interesting nevertheless. Although it does seem to insist that brands are manufactured, that is, that they are based on physical products. In the world this brand (The Independent) is in, its more about the intangible nature of our brand - less about the physical newspaper, and more about its presence in less tangible, digital arena.
Still worth a watch, the man cares.
Still worth a watch, the man cares.
Clearly I’m not the brightest individual.
Rupert Murdoch announces plans (now delayed) to charge for content. Fair enough – I think he’s wrong, but rich, famous blokes with opinion tend to be listened to more than the likes of me. Although if he ploughs on, he’ll be a little less rich (no need for him to fret, he has a healthy lead on me still in the money stakes).
Then it gets a bit odd. First he announces plans to charge Google for linking to his content. Not quite understanding perhaps that there's no compelling reason for Google to pay.
And now he’s considering blocking Google entirely from linking to their content. And I’m assuming that by ‘Google’ he, in reality, means all search engines.
So, in short, he wants to make it difficult for people to find his content online, then he’s going to charge them for the privilege of reading it (when broadly similar content is widely available for free elsewhere).
Manchester United's Jonny Evans has electric studs in his boots. Applied to Drogba's poppy, they create a curent which makes him wiggle like an occupant of Old Smokey. Nemanja Vidic deserves praise for not bothering to conceal his amusement.
Uni-Q is a new online show - best described as ‘Question Time’ meets ‘TFI Friday’ - providing a forum for 16-25 year olds to pose questions to MPs and other high profile figures. Created by a group of University of Hull politics graduates as a way to engage young people in politics, Uni-Q is the first programme of its kind to tour universities and colleges across the UK. And it's being backed by the Independent, which is nice.
The first edition include former Communities Secretary Hazel Blears in her first media appearance since her rather controversial departure from the government earlier in the year.
More on how to join in with future UniQ programmes here.
The first edition include former Communities Secretary Hazel Blears in her first media appearance since her rather controversial departure from the government earlier in the year.
More on how to join in with future UniQ programmes here.
You wouldn't believe the tension, the bitching, the glee and the misery as I unveil the top ten most read bloggers on the Independent for last month. And you'd be right to, because it wouldn't be true - but our bloggers pay more heed to this than they would admit.
7 - Mixtape
1 - Eagle Eye
2 - Ian Burrell
3 - Sean O'Grady
4 - Guy Adams
5 - John Rentoul
7 - Mixtape
8 - Catherine IB
The usual melange of the serious, the frivolous and the kinky. These are the top ten most read stories on the Independent website last week.
For reasons best know to the organisers, I'm speaking at a conference next month called the Personal Democracy Forum. It's in Barcelona - why would I refuse?
Aside from their schoolboy error in inviting me, there's a stellar cast of the great and good of geekery such as Mick Fealty, Steve Moore,Matthew McGregor, Rishi Saha, Tom Watson, Tom Steinberg and a lot of very clever types from Europe and the States.
It all promises to be jolly edifying (schedule here) and, if you avoid my bit, very educational.
You can register here - and I can do you a deal. Mention me, and you'll get 20% off the registration. Normally my name adds to the bill, but this time you can get a 50 euro discount - use the discount code jleach09 in the promotion code box and carry on. The discount should appear at the checkout.
Can't say fairer than that.
Aside from their schoolboy error in inviting me, there's a stellar cast of the great and good of geekery such as Mick Fealty, Steve Moore,Matthew McGregor, Rishi Saha, Tom Watson, Tom Steinberg and a lot of very clever types from Europe and the States.
It all promises to be jolly edifying (schedule here) and, if you avoid my bit, very educational.
You can register here - and I can do you a deal. Mention me, and you'll get 20% off the registration. Normally my name adds to the bill, but this time you can get a 50 euro discount - use the discount code jleach09 in the promotion code box and carry on. The discount should appear at the checkout.
Can't say fairer than that.
I missed this yesterday, but Media Week have reported a survey which shows that nine out of ten UK consumers won't pay for news stories online.
The study of 2,000 consumers makes grim reading for Rupert Murdoch who is expected to launch his 'value-gates' (chortle) on the Sunday Times in the next few weeks. According to this survey, 91% of UK consumers wouldn't pay for news online and 90% would be unwilling to pay for news analysis. It doesn't bode well for the future either - of those aged 16 to 24, 86% would never pay for news online, while in the 45-54 age sectors, 96% said they would not pay. 5% would pay for content on a piecemeal basis and 4% for a subscription.
And this, don't forget, is a UK audience. The Auguest ABCes showed the Times website at short of 19m unique users. The norm in the market is for a 60-40 split for overseas to UK users. Let's assume that the overseas users have even less interest in paying for news. So you're left with targetting 7.6m. And four per cent of that figure (ie those who would subscribe) is less than 300,000 users.
So you'll have to charge those poor souls quite a lot to (a) make up for the lost in advertising revenues and (b) to cover News International's current losses (reported at £2.1bn).
Good luck with that.
And incidentally, the Media Week report highlighted another issue - the site was bust and gave an error page the first few times I tried. What will any site do for a subscriber when that happens? Issue mass (if tiny) refunds?
The study of 2,000 consumers makes grim reading for Rupert Murdoch who is expected to launch his 'value-gates' (chortle) on the Sunday Times in the next few weeks. According to this survey, 91% of UK consumers wouldn't pay for news online and 90% would be unwilling to pay for news analysis. It doesn't bode well for the future either - of those aged 16 to 24, 86% would never pay for news online, while in the 45-54 age sectors, 96% said they would not pay. 5% would pay for content on a piecemeal basis and 4% for a subscription.
And this, don't forget, is a UK audience. The Auguest ABCes showed the Times website at short of 19m unique users. The norm in the market is for a 60-40 split for overseas to UK users. Let's assume that the overseas users have even less interest in paying for news. So you're left with targetting 7.6m. And four per cent of that figure (ie those who would subscribe) is less than 300,000 users.
So you'll have to charge those poor souls quite a lot to (a) make up for the lost in advertising revenues and (b) to cover News International's current losses (reported at £2.1bn).
Good luck with that.
And incidentally, the Media Week report highlighted another issue - the site was bust and gave an error page the first few times I tried. What will any site do for a subscriber when that happens? Issue mass (if tiny) refunds?
Crime maps seem to have been on the agenda for ages. Not least because both the data and the maps already exist. The one in Chicagohas been held up as the very acme of layering public data on maps. Although that may be because they have lots of crime...
So the Met Police have launched their version today which raises two questions:
What on earth were their expectations? If Lambeth can be said to have an ‘average’ number of crimes, what on earth are they comparing it to? Midsomer? My experience of south London, over a fair number of years is that while it ain’t Baltimore, it’s not exactly a peaceful idyll either.
And the second is – why didn’t they spend a little more on hosting? People have been talking about this for ages. People are interested in their local area. People are worried about crime.
People will use this website, in droves. So when they do, try not to look foolish by having your website crash or, at best, going reeeeaaaaaally slowly.
At the Independent, we’re not necessarily fine ones to talk about perfect hosting solutions, but if you’re launching a biggie, like the Met were, this sort of message is pretty grim:
A scalable web hosting system (which expands and copes with higher demand) might be a more costly option, but those with the budgets are fooling themselves if they think the saving is worth it.
So the Met Police have launched their version today which raises two questions:
What on earth were their expectations? If Lambeth can be said to have an ‘average’ number of crimes, what on earth are they comparing it to? Midsomer? My experience of south London, over a fair number of years is that while it ain’t Baltimore, it’s not exactly a peaceful idyll either.
And the second is – why didn’t they spend a little more on hosting? People have been talking about this for ages. People are interested in their local area. People are worried about crime.
People will use this website, in droves. So when they do, try not to look foolish by having your website crash or, at best, going reeeeaaaaaally slowly.
At the Independent, we’re not necessarily fine ones to talk about perfect hosting solutions, but if you’re launching a biggie, like the Met were, this sort of message is pretty grim:
Due to very high popularity users may experience temporary intermittent issues accessing this site.
The issues are being worked on and will be resolved as soon as possible.
The issues are being worked on and will be resolved as soon as possible.
A scalable web hosting system (which expands and copes with higher demand) might be a more costly option, but those with the budgets are fooling themselves if they think the saving is worth it.
Rafa Benitez may be defiant, but things are a little rum at Anfield at the moment (though to their credit, the beachball remains not guilty). Sam Wallace has it pretty much right when he says that Liverpool appeared on the brink of a breakthrough last season - and have gone backwards since... So will the board get tired of under-achievement and over-reliance on Gerrard and Torres? Or will the fanctions and uncertainty at board level save him. Or perhaps things will improve on the field. That's always a possibility.
Anyhow, place your bets on Rafa's fate:
Anyhow, place your bets on Rafa's fate:
The relationship between newspapers and Google has been a pretty tetchy one at times. If anyone cares, I’m more keen on the traffic that Google can deliver than worried about how they deliver news content in their own environs.
But today, we’ve gone a bit a more Google, as we’ve changed our search function to a Google version. You can now search the site with their famed engine rather than our old (rather less ‘precise’, if we’re being kind) search engine.
Now, it’s not without issues – Google’s off the shelf search isn’t great at changing to date order and other tweaking functionalities like that, but the initial search result is so much better that we thought it worth a change.
We also added the ‘search the Independent text – just as a reminder that it’s a general search engine. It’s so close to the weather info that many of you were searching for weather, not for anything else.
It’s not the final answer to our search issues, but we think its two steps forward (wth maybe half a step or so back for the lost ability to re-order searches).
Let us know.
Stewie Griffin, the overly-erudite baby from the cartoon series Family Guy (the one who wants to murder his mother) has found himself on the banned list in Venezuela. The Venezuelan government has claimed that the clip is an example of how the U.S. government promotes pot smoking and the legalisation of drugs generally. This may have something to do with a U.S. Congress report that said a huge rise in cocaine traffic from Venezuela was helped by local police corruption and the Venezuelans' refusal to work with the U.S. So the big red button has been pressed - and Family Guy is no more in that part of the world. "There's no subliminal messages here," said Justice Minister Tarek El Assaimi of the pro-spliff showtune(well, quite, you'll notice that when you watch), as he warned that the government would fine any TV station that continues to broadcast the show. "It's an animated cartoon where you can observe perfectly how they promote consumption of marijuana."<div style="list-style-type: none; list-style-position: initial; list-style-image: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; "> </div> More on this at the <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com">Huf
Triumph and bitterness; boasting and recrimination. The monthly revelation as to which bloggers are most read is always an emotional day. The odd surprise in the top ten for September means that there will be more rending of garments and ululating than normal.
1 - Guy Adams
2 - John Rentoul
3 - Jane Merrick
4 - Catherine Townsend
5 - Cyclotherapy
6 - Today in Politics
7 - Catherine IB
8 - Sean O'Grady
9 - Ian Burrell
10 - MixTape
1 - Guy Adams
2 - John Rentoul
3 - Jane Merrick
4 - Catherine Townsend
5 - Cyclotherapy
6 - Today in Politics
7 - Catherine IB
8 - Sean O'Grady
9 - Ian Burrell
10 - MixTape
To me they look a little harsh on the eye and the beauty of Chrome has always been its stripped-down nature, but for those who like a bit of colour in their lives (and enjoy the odd migraine perhaps), Google has released the artistic themes with which you can adapt your browser. I'll keep it plain, meself, thanks, but its there for those who like fripperies.
The ever-splendid Tweetminster, and the equally estimable Alberto Nardelli in particular have been looking at the sentiments in the Westminster Twittersphere (ahem ...) on The Sun's endorsement of David Cameron over Gordon Brown.
Their stats show that there were 248 tweets from MPs, Journos, commentators, PPCs (prospective parliamentary candidates, keep up) and news sources on Twitter from those centred around Westminster.
Not surprisingly, journalists and news sources clearly felt the endorsement was relevant - but less so for the endorsement itself, mainly for the fact that the Sun will focus on attacking the government for months, and perhaps for the fact that The Sun felt empowered to make their stance so clear so early.
The sentiment on Twitter more generally was very much polarised: 54% were strongly against the Sun, with 34% happy with the endorsement and 12% of tweets neutral - but this is skewed data as Labour has a larger presence on Twitter (remember Cameron's 'twats').
But most importantly: people on Twitter don't actually seem to care about the story, this is evident in the very small number of tweets (less than 100 in 24 hours since the campaign was launched) containing the #feelingblue hashtag, which is the Twitter campaign that the Sun launched alongside the endorsement.
It may just be that Peter Mandelson is right - people don't care about what the Sun thinks as much as they used to, and the mood is on the internet is perhaps more important. Of course there's no guarantee that the wider verdict will provide any more comfort for Brown either.
But most importantly: people on Twitter don't actually seem to care about the story, this is evident in the very small number of tweets (less than 100 in 24 hours since the campaign was launched) containing the #feelingblue hashtag, which is the Twitter campaign that the Sun launched alongside the endorsement.
It may just be that Peter Mandelson is right - people don't care about what the Sun thinks as much as they used to, and the mood is on the internet is perhaps more important. Of course there's no guarantee that the wider verdict will provide any more comfort for Brown either.
Tomorrow's paper features an extract from the book Delete by Viktor Mayer-Schoenberger, in which, to quote the blurb, je looks at:
the surprising phenomenon of perfect remembering in the digital age, and reveals why we must reintroduce our capacity to forget. Digital technology empowers us as never before, yet it has unforeseen consequences as well. Potentially humiliating content on Facebook is enshrined in cyberspace for future employers to see. Google remembers everything we've searched for and when. The digital realm remembers what is sometimes better forgotten, and this has profound implications for us all.
He traces the importance of forgetting has played throughout human history, from the ability to make sound decisions unencumbered by the past to the possibility of second chances. The written word made it possible for humans to remember across generations and time, yet now digital technology and global networks are overriding our natural ability to forget--the past is ever present, ready to be called up at the click of a mouse.
It's a fascinating theory and one you can test yourself by quizzing the author. Either email websubmissions@independent.co.uk (please put "Viktor" in the subject line) with your questions or twitter users can also send questions by tweeting with the hashtag "#Viktor". We will post a selection of Viktor's answers to readers' questions online next week at independent.co.uk/books.
Interesting reactions to Gordon Brown's speech yesterday on Twitter as monitored by the ever-excellent Tweetminster. And as reported pretty much verbatim here ...
Of the 4894 tweets during the speech, from all MPs, PPCs, Journalists, bloggers and news sources, (bearing in mind that the bias of twitterers in politics is towards Labour) shows a split of positive, negative and neutral terms were as follows:
Very Positive: 53.4%
Neutral to positive: 25.1%
Neutral to negative: 21.5%
The most positive reactions were for the scrapping of ID cards; pledges for electoral reform and the restructuring the House of Lords; comparisons to Conservative policy; Sarah Brown’s presence on stage; social policies; foreign policy pledges and support for the armed services; and amongst Labour supporters, their history, track record and mentions of the NHS drew great support.
Confusion and negative comments were almost entirely focused on the announcement of Family Intervention projects, specifically references to care homes for teenage mothers.
Neutral to positive reactions were largely verbatim reporting of the main points of Brown’s speech.
Interesting video (the latest in a short series) from those clever people running the Media Convergence Forum. It's aimed at those working in the murky worlds of marketing and branding, but is essential viewing for those in, say, the media industry, trying to understand why, for example, the newspaper might not be quite the daily essential it once was.
There's one take on the music industry and its compelling need to charge for content (even if the market won't pay), and there's this one on copyright protection direct from the Labour Party conference, where Feargal Sharkey, who some remember as an Undertone, but is these days the head of UK Music. In this AudioBoo clip from our mates at Tweetminster, Sharkey is rather complimentary about the steps taken by government (Lords Carter and Mandelson mentioned in despatches) in the digital space. Have a listen.
To be fair to them, they may be expecting a rough ride from critics who may not be naturally warm to the man, but publishers of David van Day's autobiography are emailing randomly (it's a long time since I reviewed a book) asking anyone they might reasonably claim to be from, say, The Independent if they would write a quote for the back cover. Once someone has agreed, then they'll send whatever chapters Mr van Day has so far penned. Say its great, and then we'll send you a couple of chapters
We are publishing David Van Day’s autobiography – and wondered if you would write a short comment on the book (to be printed on the cover), something short would be great. If you are willing to do this, please let me know and I will send you over the chapters we have so far…
Suggestions welcome as to how I should reply
