The Original Sims

The BBC’s IPTV project - Canvas - is now the subject of a BBC Trust consultation:

The BBC Executive has asked the BBC Trust for permission to develop a joint venture to promote a standards based open environment for internet connected television devices, otherwise known as ‘Project Canvas’. For consumers this would enable subscription-free access to on-demand television services and other internet-based content, through a broadband connected digital device.

There are lots of short hand ways of describing Canvas, but most are misleading. Best to take a look at what is proposed and respond. I will.

Here’s the link.

At the Northern Ireland Media Literacy Network  event one of the Books Paul Moore mentioned was Creative Industries by John Huntley. Paul  passed around a few pages for the book which are worth highlighting here.

Now we’ve all seen “10 Rules on … ”  anything you want and they are usually pop-psychology or pop-journalism.  But I liked these – they are much more perceptive than your standard blog fodder.
Here is a shortened version.

1 – Invent Yourself – Create a unique cluster of unique talents – Own your Image – break the rules – be clear about your own assets and talents. They are unique, They are all you have.
2 – Put the Priority on Ideas not data. Create and grow your own creative imagination. Build a personal balance sheet of intellectual capital.
3 – Be Nomadic – chose your own path and means of travel. You don’t have to be alone; most nomads travel in groups especially at night.
4 – Define yourself by your own (thinking) activities not by (job) title. If you are working for Company X doing job Y say you are doing job Y for company X. People who are brave call themselves Thinkers. Play Charles Hampden-Turner’s   “Infinite Game” in which everybody seeks mutually positive outcomes.
5 – Learn Endlessly.
6 – Exploit Fame and Celebrity. Being known – even slightly known – in the digital community of the 21st century is as important as typing skills were in the 20th century clerical economy. Be famous for being creative.
7 – Treat real as virtual and virtual as real At all times use the RIDER process: review, incubation, dreams, excitement and reality checks.
8 – Be kind.
9 - Admire success openly. Win but if you lose learn from that.
10 – Be very ambitious
11 – Have fun

Paul Moore spoke at the first event to be held by the Northern Ireland Media Literacy Network last Thursday.

The Network was established following the Ofcom/University of Ulster conference Media Literacy for the 21st Century held last month. Unfortunately that event I missed, but last Thursday’s event was seriously interesting.

On the horizon is the UK Government’s Digital Britain report.  Paul outlined where the thinking for the report developed;

• The Byron Review tackling the (unlikely) idea of regulating the Internet.
• Will Hutton’s Staying Ahead for the Work Foundation
• The DCMS Creative Britain

It is thought that the Creative Industries in Northern Ireland are worth £214 million per year.  Now, I’m no economist, but I’m pretty sure that there has never been a full detailed audited piece of research into the value of Creative Industries in Northern Ireland.  I suspect that £214 million is a guess. There is a strategy  which defines the sectors and subsectors:

• Design related industries o Architecture, Craft, Design, Fashion, Antiques
• Expressive industries: Music, Performing Arts, Visual Arts,
• Media and information industries: Advertising, Film, Multimedia & Games Publishing, Software, Television & Radio.

Only £214 million?  Surely not.

Still – the initial meeting was inspiring. And I have a whole bunch off books to add to my reading list.
Digital Shock – Herve Fischer
Groundswell – Li and Bernoff
Creative Industries – John Huntley
But there was one particular piece that Paul talked about – but that’s for the next post.

Twittering about Twitter and Blogging about Twitter might appear to be the sign of an empty life. But it is a real and real-time social phenomenon which deserves observation and comment in more than 140 characters.

Late night on The Now Show – “probably” (spoken in very deep voice to get “in joke” effect) the best comedy show on UK radio – Mitch Benn sang a song about Twitter. He was saying partly tongue in cheek, that famous Twitters compare their popularity. Mitch Benn had at 6.30 last night just under 1400 followers. Stephen Fry (at time of writing) has 325,000 followers. Mitch Benn’s thinking was this; there are million and a half listeners to The Now Show – if all the listeners followed him on Twitter, he’d have more than Stephen Fry.

I was in for that – I followed Mitch Benn only to discover that while he had just under 1400 followers, he only follows 42. Stephen Fry follows 55,000.

And there Mitch Benn is the nub of the problem. Twitter is not about following you or being followed, it’s about showing an interest in other people.
@pennydist posted on Twitter about 5 hours ago from sxsw: “People who say twitter is pure vanity have never had their lives enriched by it….”

Within a few hours Mitch Benn had 500 new followers, but he was still only following 42 people.  The programme is repeated today.  How many followers will he have by this evening?  If he’s only following 42, well, he’s missed the point of Twitter.  Here’s the primer; it’s about being social, not about being followed.  You have already got 1.5 million listeners for that.

If you can use BBC iPlayer, go there now and watch or download ATL at the Hall - let me make it easier for you - use this link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00jcx8x/ATLLive_at_The_Hall/. When The Bottom Line started, it wasn’t tough to find talented bands to record for sessions, but it was difficult to get the budget to record bands.  When I eventually moved on to other projects, Mike Edgar took over and steered The Bottom Line to become Across The Line and the whole ATL brand.

Now talent like Paul McClean and Rigsy pushing the idea of a platform for young bands has gone further than Mike or I could ever have imagined.  ATL at the Ulster Hall is everything we could have wanted with an access all areas back stage pass, a white label vinyll and a good shot of whiskey bolted on.

Congratulations guys - you did it and I was happy to be in the audience.

Good morning from The Origional Sims and a happy St Patrick’s Day to one and all. (Creative way to say "Test, Test, 1, 2, 3)

Planning my involvement at The Next Big Thing at the Science Park on Wednesday 4th which I’m hosting. The event will be streamed live from here:

http://www.switchnewmedia.com/clients/nisp/index.html

Fantastic line up from business and technology: Blaine Cook was added to the line up at the end of last week. Already confirmed are:

• Greg Horowitt, Executive Director of Global CONNECT & Managing Director of California based T2 Venture Capital fund
• Damien McDonnell, Chairman of Matrix, the Northern Ireland Science Industry Panel
• Peter Donnelly, Exec Director of BioBusiness Northern Ireland’s Biotech trade association
• Ian Graham, CEO of Momentum, Northern Ireland’s ICT Federation

It’s often fought in London, New York, LA. But has it been argued in Belfast?

The Blogger and the Journalist, MSM and New Media.

My view is simple – Lou Reed is a Journalist, Dr Johnson was a Journalist, anyone who records and interprets the world around them in words (whether set in music, paper, web or stone) is a Journalist. At times that will extend to painting, sculpture, dance, any form of communication. Picasso was a Journalist when he painted Guernica.

I’ve been in journalism in one form or another for a long time. I don’t see it as the preserve of one group of people. But who cares what I think? Most of the time I don’t.

But there are skills that someone who has been trained in News, Reporting, Newspaper, Radio and TV has learned, developed, been taught. I do not for one second underestimate those skills and have often envied the best:

• The ability to clearly and perceptively tell a story
• The knowledge to distinguish between fact and opinion
• The detailed knowledge of McNae’s Essential Law for Journalists or a similar work.

To say nothing of turning a story around on the hoof, meeting a deadline, being first, fair and accurate. And when required, impartial.

Is a Blogger a Journalist? I think so. Can a Blogger really screw up simply because they didn’t check the facts? Oooooh yes. If an experienced Journalist can, so can a Blogger. I will never forget the day when the lawyer’s brown envelope arrived, recorded delivery, because I had been quoted (as it happened misquoted) in a national magazine about chlorofluorocarbons in a polystyrene coffee cup.

So is it worth a discussion at BarCamp? Not a discussion on MSM v Bloggers, I’m so tired of that. A discssion on what each can learn from the other. Along those lines, anyway.

Finding Bloggers will be easy – will Journos participate? I can only ask. What do you think? What’s the shape, form, agenda for such a discussion?