August 10th, 2010 by Steve

Kids to work: the verdict

I thought I knew what to expect. The first Speed Take Your Kids to Work Day was a strange experiment intended to allow parents to show their little darlings what where they worked was like, and give colleagues a taste of what we have to put up with on a daily basis.

My expectation was that very little ‘proper’ work would get done. But it has. Largely, most people here seem to have got on with things as normal, pausing to say hello to the kids and pick them up when they are engaged in collision with a pot plant. Personally I thought my productivity would dip well below 50 per cent, but I’ve been able to get a good four or five hours’ work done by 2pm, and still have things to finish this afternoon.

It’s by no means work/life balance, but it hasn’t been the whirlwind of distraction I imagined either.

Read more here about what the kids have been getting up to, what they thought of the experience.

A summary of what my brood have been doing today:

- Saskia, 5: chalkboard drawing, testing toys, cake decorating, web site browsing
- Alfie, 2 (very nearly 3): as above, minus computers, plus getting his fingers stuck in the front door
- Ivan, 1: as above, plus trying to answer phones, trying to break phones, trying to send emails before they’re ready to go

It’s been a really interesting exercise. An annual exercise, hopefully. Providing they do their timesheets.

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July 13th, 2010 by Steve

There are just eight types of Twitter profile picture

Journalists spend a long time choosing or pursuing the very best pictures they can to communicate a story. The pose that an individual is captured in can make a big difference to their reputation and to how readers perceive them.

Given the prominence of Twitter, you’d think that people would think a bit harder about their profile pictures. If you tweet a lot, chances are your mug (or whatever reprehensible object you have chosen to illustrate your persona) will be beaming out onto screens around the world many times each day.

A check on those I’m following and others whose content I have tripped across in the past few weeks leads me to believe that there are actually just eight different kinds of pictures being used, not all of them to wholly positive effect:

1. The beaming grinner. Nothing wrong with this at all. Everyone loves a cheery smile. The only drawback is when conveying extremely serious or tragic information – a bit like a newscaster faux pas when smiling through a report on a motorway pile-up

2. The face of wisdom. It it a bird, is it a plane, is it someone looking like they’re old a really bad album cover? Try too hard to look wise and you may just end up looking like a tosser

3. The body part profiler. I’ve seen elbows, lips, knees. Not big, not clever really

4. The sexy pout. Not always appropriate. Looks a bit like HM The Queen might if she took to advertising bras. Can lead to audience discomfort

5. The inanimate object. ‘I’m too clever and thought-provoking to use a picture of me, so here’s a carrot’. Knobs

6. The shadowy type. Face partially obscured in arty photo attempt. Done crudely in Microsoft Paint. Mine is in this category; it’s time to change it

7. Smug bastard. Fat face too close to the lens, trying desperately to look like a social media overlord. The smug mug that looms forth from one of Twitter’s most prolific contributors, who uses the word trending far too often and is probably very poorly endowed, is slap bang at the epicentre of this category. Naming no names. But you know who I mean

8. The passport shot. Safe but oh-so-very-dull. Smile, it may never happen

Then there are people who change their profile picture so often that they probably fall into all of these categories. Or a separate one altogether, called Skittishly Indecisively Try-Hard.

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January 25th, 2010 by Steve

Journalist-baiting by Twitter: part two

Following my post about editorial baiting by Twitter a few weeks ago, a few more stereotypes have sprung to mind, padding out the list to 20:

11. Twinfluencer. Thinks journalists will listen to them just because they are a self-professed influential person on Twitter. Digital equivalent of being a PR lass with big norks.

12. Twilliterate. Thinks random streams of consciousness will intrigue hacks, yet tweets make absolutely no sense to anyone. Please learn to write good English before using a computer.

13. Twardy. Always late to pick up on information and pass it on, yet thinks journalists will look kindly upon them just for making the effort. “Hey, seen this about an earthquake in Haiti?”.

14. Tweasure. As in ‘a little treasure’. Just tries to be cutesy and tweet about their commute, TV preferences, lunch and hair in the hope that hacks will find that attractive. Basically just does on Twitter what they do in the real world – flirt outrageously.

15. Twainee. Similar to the above, but uses naivity and “I’m new to Twitter” as excuses for writing silly things and blundering clumsily into conversations while batting digital eyelids.

16. Twy-hard. Thinks that retweeting reports and opinions on the influential power of Twitter and social media measurement will make them look like a guru and journalists will be glued to them because they’re oh-so-clever. Avoid.

17. Twagic. Far too eager to share personal information and mundane snippets of their daily lives in the hope of snaring journalists in conversation. Followed only for their amusement potential.

18. Twoddler. As in ‘talks’ nothing but twoddle. Feels compelled to jump into every conversation on Twitter that catches their eye and is not shy about proffering opinion – much of which is both shallow and moronic.

19. Twirate. Angers easily. Sniffs around Twitter for any journalists voicing their distaste of a product, a place or a person, and then backs them up/further fuels their ire. Typically incapable of holding any other form of conversation.

20. Twinfrequent. Rarely tweets, but when they do, hacks should run for cover. Saves up tweets for a short blast every once in a while. Typically when they have a flimsy news ’story’ that they need to ‘engage the media’ over.

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April 30th, 2009 by Steve

In Twitter We Twust: the misinformation pandemic

The spread of swine flu is clearly extremely serious and concerning. Yet so is the extent to which the spread of rumour and innuendo on Twitter seems to send many tweeters into a flap.

Fears of a pandemic are justified, but given some of what I’ve seen going on on Twitter this week, it seems Twitter may be fuelling a level of paranoia unmatched by the mainstream media.

Before the internet was a news and general information source, people would tell each other not to believe everything they read in the papers or hear on the evening news. So why do so many people seem to take every tweet so seriously?

A few clients have talked to me this week about their fears of disinformation spreading quickly on Twitter and how they can help counter false rumours. Given the way the swine flu fears have mushroomed, I can see their point. In time though, I expect people will get a better perspective on the fact that unless later proven by other means, Twitter information can have all the credence (and influence) of a late night conversation in the pub.

It’s time for a dose of reality, and the realisation that with media proliferation comes a need for dependable and trustworthy information sources. Step forward ye destitute publishers bemoaning the shrivelling of the newspaper market and seeking new revenue streams.

Until then, I’ll be twittering and following cautiously.
mask

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