Britizens (which is my new portmanteau for British citizens) will know all about Today – the quite frankly rather good radio news programme that airs every weekday morning on BBC Radio 4. It’s a perfect mix of John Humphreys shouting at politicians, John Humphreys shouting at foreigners and John Humphreys shouting at so-called experts on the news topics of the day. There are some other Today presenters, but they all sound like John Humphreys.

Then, every edition, there’s a fluff piece buried somewhere in the mix – usually sandwiched between a debate on Iranian nuclear expansion and a package about the impending, bloody revolution in Greece.

One day this week it was a section about people who eat in restaurants alone. I didn’t actually hear this piece as I am far too busy on Twitter experiencing things second-hand to be bothered with linear media.

It triggered a bloody debate online with the hashtag #solodining .

Respondents on the Twitter fell into three categories. Category one – quite numerous – are the solo dining evangelists:

@FaithWardle I solo dine a lot. Don’t understand what all the fuss is about. I didn’t realise so many people were so insecure…

@Susan_Rae1#solodining don’t knock it – it’s dining with the one you love…

Category two are the reluctant solo diners:

@drumting had to often dine alone when working away as a trainer. Makes you feel like a social leper #solodining

Then there’s category 3. I call them the “OH MY GOD! HOW COULD YOU DO THAT YOU FRICKING WEIRDOS??” crew:

@lookalibi I’m bemused that #SoloDining is being discussed. Is it just a way to try and profit from loneliness?

@sayitstraight what else r husbands 4? #solodining

Full disclosure – I am firmly in category one. I greatly enjoy going to restaurants alone. I like the respite from chatter, the time to think and observe. I can take things at my own pace and my own time and not compromise. I never have conversations like “No, you order the lobster and then I can have a taste of that… then I can have the lamb, but without the jus…” with myself…

But it’s more than dining. There is, embedded in those category 2 and 3 responses, an assumption that we are only alive or real when we are with others. That humans are like the tree that falls in the empty forest – silent and theorietical unless observed.

These people think that being alone is always lonely. That is simply not the case.

And why stop at solo dining? I’ve travelled Europe on my tod. Not for business, but for pleasure. I’ve explored Brussels and Amsterdam, Dublin and Edinburgh, Paris and London, with little more than Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance for company. I’ve broken that other great taboo too – going to the cinema alone. Many, many times. Though, it has to be acknowledged, I got a few funny looks when I went to see Toy Story 3 one afternoon at half-term.

What does it say about us that so many assume that people who dine or travel or go out alone are doing it under duress?

If you can’t abide your own company – then what does that say about you?

I’ll leave the last word to this chap:

@TweetSofa_stoic If a man is uncomfortable in his own company, he has greater things to worry about than where to eat.

Article source: https://plus.google.com/100320175239277283592/posts/UHKsDZybMhc

I have a confession to make. Even though it’s becoming fashionable not to, I still like G+.

I like the flexible Circles metaphor that enables me to organise content and friends. I love that these can be shared. I really like the posting tools. Simply editing and publishing. A bit of markdown built in. Sweet. I think that as social platform for sharing content, Google Plus is oh-so-nearly there.

But not quite. Not quite.

There are features I want – nay – features I need to complete my G+ experience. I’m sure you have your own wish list (that’s what the comments are for).

If I had my way (do I, powers that be? Does the buzz of my voice count in the swarm) I would be working day and night, living on pizza and Mountain Dew™ to roll out these three:

Easier access to Shared Circles

Shared circles are a feature I coveted and prayed for. Then Google gave them to us – hurrah! But… looking for shared circles is… clunky. You can see posts that publish shared circles in your stream.You can search for posts that mention shared circles. You can add keywords to filter through. Fine. Where’s the extra push?

What’s would be so wrong with a Twitter style “Discover” tab, with circles ordered by category? How about a “Shared Circles” link on each user profile, so you can see what your friends recommend. Don’t thank me Google, you can have that for free.

More Markdown

I love the built in markdown features in Google posts. Want more! Especially, the ability to add hyperlinks within posts. The Facebook style treatment of links as attachments sucks. Yeah. You heard. It sucks.

RSS Now

If there’s one feature I want more than any other, it’s RSS. RSS for circles, RSS for my own stream, RSS for my news feed. Want it. Want it now.

And, yes, I know there are several sites I can use to lash my own feed together. I’ve tried them. I use one. But I use it under protest because Google won’t give me anything better. It could – and frequently does – stop working without notice.

Why Google? Why, why, why? Google owns Feed Burner, FFS. Google Reader is my go to RSS app. Why you not give me RSS in Google Plus?

I have my suspicions (I’m sure you do too) about some executive diktat saying “We gotta keep the content here! We must control it! _We need the future ad revenue!_”. Maybe.

In my case, I funnel my posts from Google Plus to my personal blog. I prefer to blog here than in WordPress. I like the simplicity and the social features. But I also want personalisation. So, I have to hack a workflow together and then fix up the glitches manually at the other end.

This is not good.

I want a simple RSS link I can plug into WordPress (or any other platform. Except Blogger, because, Blogger is rubbish). I want a configuration tool that enables me to define how that feed is formatted too. Please?

So – what features do you really, really want? Tell me.

Article source: https://plus.google.com/100320175239277283592/posts/Ct5T1chLXtb

It’s often observed that online journalism and social media are quicker than traditional forms. They report first and fastest, with eyewitness accounts tapped out in situ, visual evidence gathered by a million glass eyes.

But what we don’t often take into account is that online journalism is persistent, connective and accumulative. Social media, not so much. It’s there, it’s gone. It was ever the same with trad news. Today’s news was tomorrow’s fish and chip paper, remember? TV had it’s cut off point too.

News. That’s what it’s called. New. Now.

But online news articles? Once there’s a link, there’s a thread to follow. Old news, that oxymoronic and ubiquitous construct, is periodically dredged up, revitalised and reviralised.

So, why am I thinking about this? Today I’ve clicked on several interesting headlines – cruft from the weekend slowly making its way down the front pages of online news sites. And many of them weren’t real. They were from yesterday, April 1st.

In the context of yesterday, I would have suspected their veracity, treated them with suspicion. But now it’s the afternoon of April the 2nd and I should be safe. I should be able to take things at face value.

But I can’t because, online, the links linger.

Article source: https://plus.google.com/100320175239277283592/posts/XVuNqhAqNLr

Took a look at the CSS and there’s a custom class called “youtube” that positions the embedded video object so that the video window is totally obscured, leaving only the playback transport strip.

First thought was “how clever is that?”

Second thought was “that can’t be legal…” As well as reducing the embedding video player down to an audio player, it also removes YouTube’s branding, channel access, links and adverts.

That must contravene YouTube’s sharing and copyright regs, right? That’s before we even begin to consider the copyright ramifications of using copyrighted content without license (the songs themselves – though that’s more YouTube’s problem, I guess).

And this is no amateur or underground blog here. This is the NME, the UK’s biggest weekly music paper.

Mind you – when did the mainstream press ever really understand online copyright? Or, more pertinently, when will the mainstream press begin to understand online copyright?

Article source: https://plus.google.com/100320175239277283592/posts/KqVxmqC3HYB

Now I find my web use is clustered around a small number of online publications and services. I flit from Facebook to Twitter. I use IMDB and Wikipedia. I find many of the links I follow take me to a few familiar destinations (including The Guardian, The Quietus, Read Write Web, Ars Technica, Wired, Boing Boing).

It makes me wonder – is it just me? If not, is your pattern of web usage? Wandering and wide? Services? Content driven? How are we using it now?

Article source: https://plus.google.com/100320175239277283592/posts/gP727rcZVK7

(or “Shit Clients Say”)

My significant other is a fashion photographer and retoucher. She recently had a conversation with a new client who’s runs a hair salon. It went like this:

Hair Bloke: Hey, I’ve got a lead for you. Do you retouch passport photographs?
My GF: Not usually. It depends what they want.
Hair Bloke: Just retouching. Blemishes removing – that sort of thing. I know three people who want it doing before their holiday.
My GF: OK
Hair Bloke: There’s a place in town that does it for $7. Can you match that?
My GF: No, sorry. My hourly rate is quite a bit higher.

(Pause)

Hair Bloke: So, how much does this Photoshop thing cost then?

Article source: https://plus.google.com/100320175239277283592/posts/Ao3n6FGhJw5

There was a brief moment of euphoria, wasn’t there? iBooks Author was going to be a game changer. In a digital publishing landscape that is either expensive (Adobe Digital Publishing Suite) or clunky (Kindle Direct Publishing), iBooks Author was going to be free and easy.

And then people remembered who they were dealing with. Apple – the company that pulled Adobe’s hair until it was forced to abandon Flash on mobile platforms… And then we started looking at the terms and conditions. That’s why I’m using the past tense.

Let’s back up a bit. iBooks Author is a simple, digital book creation tool that enables authors to pour text, images and interactivity into modular templates. It understands things like chapters and content tables, so you don’t have to kludge them together in Word or InDesign. Best of all, it costs authors nothing at the point of use.

The iBooks Author announcement was the tasty filling in the middle of Apple’s new education initiative/sandwich announcement. Short version: “Textbooks for everyone!” they cried. Everyone with an iPad.

So, yeah, though iBooks Author could be a great tool for any kind of digital book – or even magazines – textbooks for schools and colleges are the intended output.

And that’s where we come to the EULA. +Devindra Hardawar was the first person to pop his hand up and say that maybe iBooks Author wasn’t so cool after all: http://goo.gl/trnMV

+Suw Charman at Forbes developed the theme: http://goo.gl/ed1j0

The EULA says that if you want to make money from the books you create with iBooks Author, you have to submit them to the iBookstore. And, as many App-makers have discovered, your work may not be accepted. That’s a lot of effort for no return. Furthermore, you can export files as PDF from iBooks Author – but the EULA says that if you do that, you can only give that work away for free.

If you really want to know all the nuts and bolts +Matt Gemmell has a super-dooper blow by blow blog post, free of sturm und drang, over here: http://goo.gl/gF9lb

Let’s be positive about this though. iBooks Author is actually pretty nice. As easy to use as Evernote or Bento and satisfyingly free of the real-world textures Apple seem determined to bolt onto every interface post-Lion (GarageBand, Address Book, etc)

If nothing else, iBooks Author is a significant wake-up call for costly pay-at-the-point of publishing services like PugPig, Adobe Digital Publishing Suite and Aquafadas Digital Publishing. Apple’s EULA is, of course, a land grab to make profit from their closed platform. But the cost to publishers is mostly invisible, because it’s taken from profit (like KDP).

iBooks Author = Free + Easy. But you dance with the devil by the pale moonlight.

What’s required, to break this deadlock? Maybe an open, browser based publishing platform. HTML5-powered. Subscription based. +Netflix for books. +Spotify for magazines.

Zinio’s not it. They only deal with established publishers and make sneaky deals out of sight of mere mortals. Issuu (www.issuu.com) is almost there, with an HTML5 powered Android reader and a (rejected) Apple reader app. But Issuu – and many of its ilk – lack front-end creation tools and the browser version is Flash powered.

Who’s going to fill the gap? Publishing industry asplosion in 10,9,8,7…

Article source: https://plus.google.com/100320175239277283592/posts/TYNbnjpRjGs

Paul, welcome to 1992.

Reading futurists getting linear media wrong has been a hobby of mine for a quarter of a decade…

Paul begins by saying that it shouldn’t take much to kill Hollywood, as it’s already dying.

“Hollywood appears to have peaked,” says Graham, “If it were an ordinary industry (film cameras, say, or typewriters), it could look forward to a couple decades of peaceful decline.’

But Hollywood is not dying. It is merely adapting to becoming a category.

Calling for the development of “new forms” of entertainment won’t contain the stranglehold of Hollywood. New forms of entertainment eat into the pie… but the idea that everyone will gladly and gleefully switch to RPG style, immersive movie narratives is specious. It’s predicated on the logical fallacy that – if only they could – people would prefer to author their own content.

If people craved interaction so much, choose your own ending novels would have taken over in Dicken’s time. But they didn’t, because there’s still a market for linear, authored entertainment – and there always will be. As long as people want to be surprised and entertained or moved or manipulated – they will put their trust in the hidden and skilled hand of the director or author who can do it for them. Just as – now – there will always will be a market for games and interactive entertainment, and user generated content.

Different strokes, different folks.

Killing Hollywood is cutting off our noses with Freddy Krueger’s five bladed glove. What Hollywood truly needs to learn is how to do digital distribution. It’s not the content that’s outmoded – it’s Hollywood’s delivery systems. Don’t mix ‘em up.

In the meantime, we have an uneasy truce. They keep making awesome content, we keep stealing it – until they find a better way to get it to us.

Article source: https://plus.google.com/100320175239277283592/posts/bCnQ46Ywd7m

It may be the first “full course” – but it’s not the UK’s first provision. I know because modules I developed for BA Journalism and BSc Photographic Journalism at +Leeds Metropolitan University had workshops on smartphone photography and mobile media a year ago…

Smartphones (Android, iOS) are core tools for journalists and creatives now, offering us the ability to take photographs in situ, record video and audio – even file copy. Your phone’s an Internet connection, a memo pad, a contacts book and – well – a phone. No journalist should be without one. No one who makes any kind of content should be without one.

But it’s nice to see the rest of the world catching up

Article source: https://plus.google.com/100320175239277283592/posts/jW7njHwvTSu

You don’t need a crystal ball or a degree in tea leaf divination to know that brand + price point x Amazon’s attention to detail (and distribution back end) is pretty much destined to equal TEH SPARKLING SHINY AWESOME.

But I have a crystal ball and I will make the following rash and baseless predictions, based on hunches, intuition and being two cabillion years old in Internet years.

* The Kindle Fire won’t kickstart a secondary tablet market. It will be the secondary tablet market. People who didn’t consider a tablet before will consider one now.

* The Fire will burn some of the iPad’s sales – because the price point and Amazon’s distribution chops will slurp up a lot of impulse purchases:

Tablet devices for kids.
Second tablets.
Student tabs.

The choice in this category before was either “yuck-don’t-want that expensive-thing-I’ve-never-heard-of”… or iPad.

* The Kindle Fire will be the Christmas must-have for adult gifting. Just like the Kindle 3 was last year. Also, “gifting” is my favourite word today. Typing it feels chewy and nice.

And, I know, I know – the Kindle Fire isn’t quite an Android tab, like your proper Android tabs. Like the Xoom or Galaxy or Eee Pad. But you know who doesn’t care about that? Your Mom.

And your Mom shops at Amazon.