Category: General

Australia comes in 35th on RSF’s freedom of the press list behind countries including Ghana, Lithuania, Bosnia, Cyprus and even New Zealand. It’s a complete and utter national disgrace, but not surprising really, our Federal Government jails journalists for not revealing their sources, video bloggers will shortly potentially need to be licensed to do video online, and libel laws are headed in the wrong direction in terms of the publics right to know. We should be top of this list! Of course, you won’t read much about it in the MSM either, after all, we all know about the great relationships our media owners have with the Government. It really is a sad day when you realise that your own country isn’t as free as it once was, nor should be.

My post for another week at The Blogging Times was on video (again)…and naturally I had some fun with video editing 🙂

Enjoy:

Jeff Jarvis ways in on Pay Per Post via Jason Calacanis, who brings it up (yet) again. I know Jason has called Pay Per Post a cancer, and whilst I’ve previously disagreed on some levels (essentially I’m not against others using it, but they should force disclosure), if it is indeed cancer, Jarvis and Calacanis writing about it is like continuing to smoke when you’ve got lung cancer, it only makes things worse. Every single time Pay Per Post gets mentioned as a company, it’s free publicity for them: there is no such thing as bad publicity really, sure a few people might decide that they don’t like you or your product, but statistically more people will actually discover the product for the first time….and are more likely to use it, after all, people do tend to be able to make their own decisions of various products, no matter what I, or any one else for that matter has to say about them.

Now here’s throwing something to the wind: even the fake blog/ astroturfing scandal surrounding Eldeman at the moment is actually going to HELP Eldeman write more business. The fact that they did the wrong thing is pretty much a given, but the publicity and name exposure Eldeman has received as a result of it is something that even money would find difficult to buy. How many firms out there looking for PR advice now know the name Eldeman as a result of whats occured? How many potential clients now know that Eldeman can and does delivered strategies that include blogging? Sure, a whole pile of people already did before the scandal, but chances are a lot more do now…and trust me, 99% of the time the net result is positive long term even when the publicity is the result of a scandal, not negative. Indeed the only real negative scandals are those that either result in the company closing down (there can be no positives from ceasing to trade), or it’s directors facing legal threats, including jail.

Tags: Jason Calacanis, Jeff Jarvis, Eldeman, Payperpost

SEOmoz has a brilliant post researching metrics using real log file data and comparing it to available metrics. Their conclusion:

“This survey represents only a tiny sampling of sites in a niche sector, albeit a relatively popular one in the blogosphere and webdev/tech space. Based on the evidence we’ve gathered here, it’s safe to say that no external metric, traffic prediction service or ranking system available on the web today provides any accuracy when compared with real numbers”

Halayuya brother!

Darren posts about our forthcoming trip to Toronto. Darren gets the easier of our trips. Bunbury is roughly 2 1/2 hours South of Perth, and Perth is literally at the arse end of the world…they say it’s the most remote capital city in the world, and they aren’t lying. Unlike Darren’s trip, god must of been on my side when I booked the flights because despite trying to make sure I went the cheapest route, Craptus..sorry, Qantas wasn’t the cheapest option, nor the easiest in terms of flights either, so I’m heading to Toronto via Hong Kong flying Cathay Pacific, which I’m told has won awards for being the best airline in the world or something similar.

For anyone in Toronto who might want to say g’day, I’m in Toronto from 12 November through to 23 November. I’ve also got stop overs in Hong Kong both ways due to the way the flights worked out. Look out shops, here I come. 🙂

Viidoo. This is probably illegal…but the quality is amazing. A full review at Web TV Hub (via Digg). Free US TV channels…Im sitting here watching as clear as day NBC11 from the West Coast of the States…it’s apparently warm there at the moment, not that I’ve got any idea what the temps are in Celcius..worth a look :-)…PS, if you’ve got problems viewing the channels turn Skype off to use it, Skypes a bandwidth hog.

OK, fun with webcams and video, but here’s the preview for my weekly column at The Blogging Times this week which will be online shortly…and yes, interesting light affects when I have the blinds open in my office 🙂

Tags: The Blogging Times

Im the guest on this weeks Blog Herald podcast. Aside from saying Ummm to often, I think I did ok, at least I held relatively held myself back when asked an interesting question towards the end 🙂

Sometimes I find it’s difficult to know what to write for my weekly column at The Blogging Times, and then I just threw out the rule book.

Here’s a side thought though, is there a word to describe this style of writing? Chartreuse does it best, I’m literally a pale imitation, and yet it’s somewhat liberating. It’s fun even when I poke fun at myself..the hidden part is the “functionally illiterate” part, it’s one of she who must be obeyed’s favourite ways of describing me, but hey, I’m not the PR guru she is. For starters I tend to be too honest with people, even when it’s probably to my own detriment. 🙂

Congrats to b5’s Successful Blogger (literally) Liz Strauss on news that’s she’s joined me and the party that is happening at The Blogging Times.

I’ve got nothing to disclose at this point about the site, I don’t own a share in it, but I do get paid a small retainer to write a weekly column at the site…but I digress. As a strategy Minic and Char keep bringing in cool people to add to the site, and as a value ad strategy for me it works. Got to say I’m enjoying Mr Angry’s angry rants, Howard’s posts (when he posts) and Erin continues to improve like a fine wine. I also might be a bit old fashioned when I say this, but I actually like the idea also in terms of it mimicking a MSM publication which has it’s set opinion section..although I’m still not sure Minic what you’re doing with your URL structure set…for example I’m not sure why each post seems to have two actual entries and comment sections therein…but you can’t win them all.

Over at my old stomping ground The Blog Herald Matt’s going really well with the podasting side of it. Touch wood I’ll be, if and when we sort a time out, next weeks guest on the podcast. Different strategy to The Blogging Times, but as a consumer it works for me as well, both blogs have different styles and in many ways have become more complimentary to each other.

And for the record, no. b5media isn’t interested in (ever) reentering the blog reporting space. Personally I don’t want to die of a heart attack at the age of 31. After years of playing that game I just enjoy seeing others do it now.