New venture off to a positive start

It was interesting, and not at all surprising, to see a new venture started by my former colleague John Quinton-Barber win headlines.

John QB has co-founded a new company, Social PR, and already looks to have a great team on board who are well-known in the North West. The new website looks impressive and the offer well polished.

I’m sure it won’t be difficult to follow their progress. I will do so with interest and wish them the best of luck.

Good websites could mean better councils

Anyone who uses local authority websites (as I do) knows the visitor experience varies significantly from one area to the next.

The best are made with the user in mind. They’re easy to understand and make contact with a local authority department simple. Others (and there are a few) leave users confused and frustrated and, ultimately, on the phone to the council to complete the transaction they hoped to do quickly online. If this happens, the costs of dealing with such a transaction increase for the council as frustrated users contact call centres or local drop-ins rather than completing the task on the website. If there’s a case for cash-strapped councils not to invest in making their websites better to deal with this shift in the way its customers’ live and work, I’ve yet to hear it.

Government style guide: how many banned words do you use?

A colleague has shared the latest style guide from the Government Digital Service, which sets out some common sense standards it expects those who write for it to uphold.

This is aimed at people who are responsible for producing content for gov.uk, which is set to replace the websites of various departments and other bodies over the coming year or so.

MEN’s ‘model newsroom’ makes more cuts

I was sorry to read today that the Manchester Evening News is making further cuts to its editorial team, with two of the city’s best known business journalists set to leave the paper.

Prolific North has reported that MEN business editor Kevin Feddy and his deputy Simon Donohue have been made redundant and could leave the paper as early as this month.

How housing helps growth and hits the headlines

A report by the think tank Centre for Cities was published yesterday which generated strong headlines and made a clear link between house-building and economic vitality in major urban areas.

Cities Outlook 2013 calls for more flexibility for local councils in these areas to develop ways of supporting house-building or improvements, which could plug the shortfall in the supply of homes the country needs (currently said to be running at more than 100,000 a year). Its research suggests that meeting this gap could create 150,000 new jobs and add 1% to national economic growth rates, making most of us a winner in the process.

My resolution for 2013: breaking bad email habits

I’ve a habit to confess to, which I’d like to break this year. Emails have had a hold on me for more than 15 years, arriving and requiring responses at all hours. The more I respond, the more traffic arrives to fill the void. I came into work early this morning after a week or so off to clear out the messages that had landed over Christmas before getting on with the rest of the day.

Driving into the office before 7am after a lovely festive break with family and friends, it is easy to be struck by how maddening this is. As new year’s resolutions go, breaking the cycle of email addiction is one of the better ones I’ve made.

Why are house prices sky high? It’s the banks, stupid

I came across the campaign group Positive Money’s website this morning whilst reading  letters readers of The Observer had written in response to its coverage last week of the rise in private rented housing in Britain, aka Generation Rent.

The website puts across a stark argument about the role banks have played in fueling runaway house price inflation by pumping billions of pounds into the property sector during the decade before the economic crash.

The result, it says, is that property values doubled in this time and we are not poorer, not richer, as an ever-increasing share of our incomes is spent on keeping roofs over our heads.

Check out the website, which sets out what the public can do to support the campaign. The two-minute video below sets out the argument about the role banks have played in creating this issue.

Can housing bridge the digital divide?

I got an insight today into the role the affordable housing sector could play in getting more people online, which is one of the aims set out in the Government’s recently launched digital strategy.

I was with comms colleagues who work for providers across the South West, talking about how digital media can be used to build stronger relationships with key stakeholders, make transactions more efficient and cost effective and convey messages to a wider, more significant audience. More than anything, social media can be used to achieve the ’gold standard’ of two-way communications, where organisations listen and respond to what they are hearing in a way that satisfies their audiences, and ultimately supports their business.

Press gets lock in at last chance saloon

For weeks, I’ve listened to arguments about the press ahead of Leveson’s damning report today. It’s depressing, but not surprising, how quick people on all sides of the debate have been to reach judgements about the report, which appears at first glance to be thoughtful, proportionate and measured.

During the hearing, we’ve heard sickening tales of people traduced by media misconduct. It shouldn’t be forgotten how people like the McCanns, the Dowlers and Christopher Jefferies were treated at times when their lives were already under huge strain. Hugh Grant, Steve Coogan and Charlotte Church (who was on Question Time tonight) have sounded at times like they are speaking for the country when calling for independent regulation of the press. It was painful to see experienced tabloid journalists Trevor Kavanagh and Nevile Thurlbeck speak on Channel 4 News tonight about the importance of a free media. Surely noone disagrees with this. But their performance tonight suggested that they don’t get what’s happening around them, or what they need to do to deal with it.

People aren’t grieving when retweeting celebrity comments

I’ve been reading about something called Celebrity Death Twitter Harvest, or the tendency for people to express collective sadness on social media when someone famous dies.

The recent death of Dad’s Army star Clive Dunn led The Guardian to ask today why celebs (or anyone who tweets) mark the passing of someone famous with such a tribute. Well, it contributes to the conversation taking place in the Twittersphere for a start. And it’s easier than buying flowers.

I’ve always thought some of the tweets seem insincere, but it doesn’t stop me from doing it to acknowledge the death of someone who has made an impact on my life. And doesn’t this go with the territory?