Whatever...

Guest blog – “More technobabble with your vol-au-vent, sir?”

As well as being a platform for JKers to rant, ruminate and reflect on the worlds of technology and PR, 'Whatever...' will periodically be running guest blogs from friends who live beyond the (fire)walls of Johnson King Towers.

Here's Phil Muncaster, senior reporter at IT Week, on life in the fast lane of tech journalism…

I used to think that as a technology journalist par excellence, the crème de la crème, number one with a bullet etc etc, I would therefore be invited to the best of the best parties on the London social scene.  Or at the very least rub shoulders with minor TV celebrities, has-beens and never-wills.

But no. Eventually you come to realise the sad fact that, as an IT hack, you are a few hundred places below Tourette's-afflicted Pete and clinically insane Nikki on the list of zeitgeist opinion-formers today.

Usually this isn’t a problem - over the years, one of the skills a successful IT journalist comes to acquire is the art of kidding yourself that free house beer, the roughest plonk and as much mineral water as you can physically stomach - all consumed in the delightful setting of a musty function room above a pub - is where it's at.

But then every so often an event comes along which dangles a cruel and glamorous carrot in front of you, involving a private members' club, bucketloads of champagne and, quite possibly, the close proximity of some celebs.

The other week, it was the launch party for .mobi at a secret location  in London's bustling Soho district, where we were located directly beneath a party for Gordon Ramsay and his missus, who was launching her new book. No doubt they were accompanied by an entourage of celebrity hangers-on, and allegedly Posh-Beckham-Victoria-Spice sans David.  Oh, and Jeremy Clarkson.

So near and yet so far - right venue, wrong floor!

What is most head-smackingly frustrating about this is you get to peek through the looking glass for just a second, before being yanked back unceremoniously, and once again cruelly forced to make small  talk about business cases, technical specifications and deployment strategies.

That said, most of the PR girls were canny enough not to stay put for long.  Up the stairs they quickly trundled without so much as a bye or leave, off to press the flesh and kiss the air with the great and good - and Jeremy Clarkson.

After exchanging risqué banter with Ramsay and nabbing a few copies of the free book, back they came to gloat. And found me trying to listen politely to technobabble while simultaneously catching the barman's eye, eating a miniature Thai green curry, and working out whether I'd make the last bus home.

Rock ‘n’ roll it ain't, baby*.

* Come on, Phil, we’ve seen that picture of you and the Hoff on your blog…

Guest blog – Death by PowerPoint

As well as being a platform for JKers to rant, ruminate and reflect on the worlds of technology and PR, 'Whatever...' will periodically be running guest blogs from friends who live beyond the (fire)walls of Johnson King Towers.

Here's that man Nick Booth again, veteran tech freelancer and PR trainer, on the challenges of keeping it simple, stupid…

There are nearly three million Welsh people living in their homeland. And that’s in an area the size of Wales!

OK, that’s a stupid intro, but it makes two important points about modern presentations. It’s obligatory to pack them out with facts and figures. And everything, from rainforest destruction, through disappearing polar ice caps, to the size of Mike King’s garden, has to be measured in units of ‘Waleses’.

Am I alone in being fed up with all these meaningless statistics?

Or maybe I’m just jaundiced by my own bitter experience of giving presentations.

Once, I was giving media training to a huge IT corporation whose name I’d better not mention. The theme of my training was to be ‘Keep it Simple’, the idea being that people never remember much from a presentation, so just spoon-feed them little nuggets, and leave them wanting more. They said they liked it. Hoorah! But when I sauntered into their offices for a run through, I encountered a sight that would make a bishop kick in a stained glass window.

Ten marketing clones were there to meet me. And it soon transpired they all wanted some input into my work. Keep it simple became “Let’s Keep It Simple”, at the suggestion of a man in chinos. A power suited women then changed it “Let’s Keep Simple-izing” as it sounds more American and dynamic. More changes were made, until the title eventually became “Let’s Keep Simple-izing the Process to maximize competitive advantage”.

But that’s not half as bad as the presentation I did for a large telecoms company. There, they chucked out all the feedback I got from their channel partners telling them how they could improve their service. And instead they insisted on 50 almost identical slides, with stupid charts on them that looked like squashed spiders.

I’m not the world’s greatest public speaker. Indeed, on youtube.com, I’m described as a “funeral warm up man”. But honestly, Bob Monkhouse couldn’t have brought that material to life.

At the end, someone complained about all the charts. The very same person who’d insisted on them in the first place, who by then had realised the need to cover her posterior in front of her boss.

So you see, statistics are very useful. You can use them to protect yourself. And to kill others in a dog eat dog corporate situation. Blimey, I’m really glad I don’t work for a big company…

However, if you do work for a big company, and want some no nonsense media training, do contact me.

No, daddy - you have to press the send button first...

By Tom Kirkham

Sensational news broke earlier this week... according to Carphone Warehouse's Mobile Life Report 2006, mobile phones are apparently very popular with kids.  Wow!  I almost fell off my chair when I read that.  Apparently, 51% of ten year olds now have a mobile, though this isn't exactly a surprise.  Everywhere you look - on the street, in cafes, on public transport, in doctors' waiting rooms (perhaps in the queue for treating tendonitis?) - you'll see kids texting, playing games and annoying the hell of everyone by flicking through libraries of ringtones.

So, it's not big news - however, the survey has sparked debate on issues such as mobiles in schools, children maintaining undesirable relationships, or even depression caused by a lack of texts.  Of course, a lot of this 'debate' is just old issues and the bleedin' obvious re-heated.  How exactly is texting in class different to passing a note to the person in front of you?  Equally, we all know there are individuals that children would do well to avoid, and of course young people are going to be depressed if they have no friends.

Texting, like email, has opened up new ways of forming friendships and staying in touch with people.  In fact, the survey shows that texting is now the preferred method for youngsters to contact each other, rather than phone calls. The real problem seems to be whether parents can keep up.  If kids want to talk in text, then parents risk being cut out of the loop if they don't respond in kind.

The problem is, 42% of parents admitted having to ask children how to use certain functions on their mobile.  In my experience, these 'functions' could easily include "How do I turn it on?".  I remember when my dad finally figured out how to open his SMS inbox, he was shocked to discover several years worth of unread messages saying "Call me now!", "Can you pick me up from the station?" and other miscellaneous requests for his urgent assistance.

It's inevitable that young people will go on using mobile phones, and operators will make sure uptake increases by providing all manner of tailored call/text packages, new designs, features and what-have-you.  The problem is making sure parents stay up to speed with this communications revolution, so that they can still effectively interact with their offspring.

On a lighter note, elsewhere in the survey it is revealed that for people aged 18-24, their mobile phone matters more to them than television, while interestingly, half of young adult phone users have sent or received a sexually explicit text.  I received one a while back, but it was actually meant for someone else - the disadvantage of having such a common first name...

A laptop for 1 euro a day!

By Marjorie Meyer

Going back to college with a bright new laptop sounds exciting, doesn’t it? The French Government wants happy students that work hard and has therefore decided to continue its MIPE (Micro Portable Etudiant) project for a third year.

The MIPE project consists of helping students to buy a Wi-Fi-enabled laptop. Depending on the model you are eyeing up, you will have to pay just 1 euro per day over a 12 to 36 month period!  It's a great opportunity for those who can’t afford to spend a lot of money in one go.

Now I wish I were still a student, as I need to buy a laptop to replace the prehistoric desktop computer I’ve been working on since I was 18. Although it's expensive, I've decided to upgrade because I simply can’t live without a decent computer anymore. Surfing on the web, connecting with friends and family living far away from me, posting on my blog and reading other people's blogs, is now an integral part of my daily life (welcome to France's PC-addicted youth culture!).

In my opinion, the MIPE project is a win-win situation for all involved. It offers students greater freedom with their time and their working methods, and for the numerous partners championing the cause (vendors, retailers, banks…), the opportunity to build and retain customer loyalty. And best of all, it closes the gap between rich and poor students.

As Carol said before, service providers in France are offering very competitive pricing for internet access, and with Wi-Fi spreading all across the country, you can increasingly get internet access for free. This, together with the MIPE project, means that cheap mobile computing and the internet should soon be available to all students.

So when are you going to send your child to one of our fabulous French universities??

Free lunch? It's an all-you-can-eat buffet!

By Richard Scarlett

So, with the high profile (and conveniently synchronised) launches of thelondonpaper and London Lite, the tabloid armies of Rothermere and Murdoch have well and truly thrown down the gauntlet and declared all-out war on the streets of London. Roll on the dirty tricks, cheap stunts and consumer harassment, as both papers try to survive in the already overcrowded freesheet market.

But nowadays, it seems that it’s not just the newspapers that have resorted to dangling the idea of something for nothing under our noses. As I flicked through my giveaway newspaper and read about the flurry of companies launching their own ‘gratis’ services left, right and centre, I realised that 'free' is just the latest strategy to win consumer loyalty and sustain precious advertising revenue.

But in the midst of all this excitement, I have to ask myself - is ad-driven revenue really a sustainable model for the freesheet business or just the latest example of ‘dotcom denial’? Probably the latter.

Ad spend for many companies is extremely sporadic, and one of the first things to be cut whenever corporate savings need to be made. Add to that the crowded and competitive market space that these companies operate in and the whole thing begins to take a different shape. As more companies jump onto the ‘freebie’ wagon with hopes of monopolising their particular market, I’m sure it’s not only me who can hear the faint but worryingly familiar sound of a bubble bursting?

But why worry?  For consumers in the meantime, it looks like the offer of a free lunch has generously been extended to breakfast and dinner too!

Of course, it's not that simple.  A primary goal of the free products and services rush is to force down prices and ruthlessly drive competition into the ground. In true ‘party-pooper’ mode, I believe that while we’re downloading our free music, watching our free films and reading our free papers, it may be worth sparing a thought for the people who are being dealt the losing hand in this cutthroat game.

No, I’m not on about the industry big shots who can afford to give things away in the hope of long-term gain, nor the increasingly agitated and outspoken record companies who can no longer overcharge us with ridiculously marked up CDs.  I’m talking about the workers who could easily find themselves out of a job simply because their company can't compete in this emerging ‘freebie’ culture.

A little dramatic maybe, but just remember that the next time we take up the offer of a free product or service, we may well be helping to destroy another business run by hard working people just like you and I.

So, about that free lunch? No thanks - I’m feeling quite nauseous now.

Shift my paradigm

By Claire Gibson

One of the perks of this job has to be the chance to hear some of the more weird and wonderful business expressions sometimes used on transatlantic conference calls. Americans seem to possess a unique talent for language mangling, though of course Brits are also capable of some quite serious crimes against English.

In fact, none of us are immune to this - anyone spending time in planning meetings and 'brainstorming' sessions will probably have been shocked at how easily some of this language rubs off and creeps into everyday conversation. However, while we may all have been guilty of spouting off a marketing-ism in a worryingly earnest tone while, for instance, ordering a pint of lager, I can honestly say some of the more mind-boggling ones listed below had never even entered my head before working in PR, let alone inadvertently left my lips.

So without further ado, I present Claire’s ‘Top Ten of Business Bunkum, Befuddlement and other words beginning with B’:

10.Time to get the dog & pony show on the road

9.This one is a different animal

8.Down in the weeds

7.Circle back; regroup, touch base or revert

6.We have to put the bug in this guy’s ear

5.Let's go for the low hanging fruit

4.Get your ducks in a row

3.Are we in go live status? (American pronunciation, not as in the Quo)

2.What is your immediate pain, and how can this become your long-term gain?

And at number one, for overwhelming obscurity:

1.Let’s see if the other shoe drops

And of course, this is only the top ten - some other fantastic expressions that would ordinarily have people hitting the mute button on calls had to be left out. However, we’d definitely welcome further contributions - the more obscure the better - via the comments section, and hopefully we’ll be able to build our own ‘Anthology of Business Bunkum’ right here on Whatever... So with that (and I quote) - let’s make it happen, my friends, make it happen…

Oops I did it again….

By Jacqui Depares

It's over a week ago now, but the story of Lucy Gao and her 21^st birthday party at the Ritz still refuses to die.

Lucy Gao’s email gaffe has apparently become a topic of national importance.  We all got the email, we all laughed at the dress code “the more upper class, the better”, we all were astonished how someone could assign friends 15 minute slots to arrive at a party - but most of all we were disappointed that we didn’t get the email soon enough so we could all go along (or was that just me?).

And while it may be old news now, it certainly won’t be the last email of its kind that circulates on corporate email systems around the world.  Indeed, Lucy Gao was merely one example in a long line of email catastrophes.  For instance, there was modern day Romeo Joseph Dobbie, who innocently (ok, stupidly) emailed a woman he’d met on a Saturday night with a declaration of love, who then forwarded it on to her friend, who forwarded it on…and on, until it made it into the Metro as a 'news item'. 

Other stories follow a similar path of self-destruction, though with rather more serious consequences.  Take city lawyer Richard McKenzie, who last year sent his secretary a £4 dry cleaning bill for a ketchup stain on his trousers.  He ended up having to quit his job after the email he sent was splashed all over the UK press.  Then of course there was the splendidly named Bradley Chait, the man whose girlfriend, Claire Swire, emailed him about his sexual prowess, which he then ungallantly forwarded on to his friends, who emailed it on to the world, resulting in a series of suspensions at his place of work (though the jury's still out on whether or not this was actually a hoax).

Now, while these incidents undoubtedly raise a chuckle in the office, there's actually a pretty serious lesson to be learnt here - in each case, the message was originally sent from a corporate email address. 

While you may be prepared to walk the path of shame as an individual, I’m not sure that your company would want its reputation dragged through the mud because of an email that you sent with its name attached to it. In fact, any company which values its brand should be actively making their staff sign up to a communications policy, outlining what constitutes an acceptable use of corporate email and the penalties that will ensue if a member of staff oversteps the line.  It may seem a little extreme, but if you stop and think about it, the justification is pretty clear.

And so, next time you get ready to write an amusing email about what you got up to last night, maybe stop and think about it for a second. Hate to be a killjoy, but do you really want to become the next Lucy Gao?