September 2009 Archives
September 30, 2009
Google ads battleground between The Sun and Labour
Labour vs The Sun on Google
Google Ads drag the Hillsborough disaster into the recent spat between the party and the newspaper
UX London redux video: Tom Coombs on Jared Spool - part 1
At the recent London IA redux of the UX London conference, Tom Coombs ran a session where he summarised the highlights of workshops by Donna Spencer and Jared Spool. This is the first of three video clips of him talking about Jared. Tom Coombs on Jared Spool In the course of this clip Tom explains a little about Jared's view on using the correct language for the audience, and examines some of the themes in the 'Why good content...
September 29, 2009
The Guardian's 'river of tones'
Meg Pickard tweeted yesterday about finding The Guardian's 'river of news' page quite useful, and it got picked up in a couple of places. I think it neatly illustrates a couple of points about our information architecture and web principles. The URL of the page is http://www.guardian.co.uk/tone/news/latest, and it is the 'tone' bit that is interesting from an information architecture point of view. All content on the site is tagged with a 'tone' that illustrates the type of content, for...
September 28, 2009
The romance of print as a historical memento
I can usually be found on here trumpeting the superiority of all things digital over all things old and analogue, but sometimes there are sentimental things where new media frankly just doesn't cut it. Last week, when my daughter was born, I thought I'd buy a copy of a newspaper to keep for her as a memento of her birthday. Not only might there still be interest in some of the stories that were being reported that day - she'll...
September 25, 2009
UX London redux video: Tom Coombs on Donna Spencer
Back in the August the London IA mini event was a redux session of the UX London conference. As part of the evening's presentations, Tom Coombs was attempting to distill hours of workshops by Donna Spencer and Jared Spool into a 15 minute session. This video clip includes highlights some of what Tom said about Donna. Tom Coombs on Donna Spencer Tom's overview of Donna's workshop explained how she used physiological factors like the way the human eye works,...
Last chance to object to the church plans for Walthamstow's art deco cinema
Today is the final day to object to a planning application seeking permission to turn Walthamstow's listed art deco cinema into a church. As you may know, the cinema has been closed for some time, and the church owners have allowed it to fall into considerable disrepair. Back in the sixties, the EMD used to have concerts on, including The Beatles, Rolling Stones and The Who. It also has lots of cinematic history, being the cinema where Alfred Hitchcock grew...
September 24, 2009
UX London redux video: Chris Petzny on Dan Saffer
In August the London IA mini event was a redux evening featuring cut-down versions of talks and workshops from the UX London conference. Chris Petzny gave the first redux talk of the evening, attempting to distill Dan Saffer's conference presentations into 15 minutes. Chris Petzny on Dan Saffer In this clip, Chris explains how Dan Saffer challenged the UX London audience to design a product for the blind and deaf, and used that as the springboard to explore his...
September 23, 2009
Introducing...
If you'll indulge me with a very personal post today, I'd like to introduce Emma Rose Belam, who was born yesterday at 3:34am. Mum and baby are doing absolutely fine....
September 22, 2009
The Guardian's children's comics: Part 2 - Roy of the Rovers
Last week The Guardian and The Observer published a series of reproduction comics from the 1970s and 1980s, and yesterday I blogged about some of the transformations they illustrated in the relationship between reader and publisher. Today I want to focus on examples from the 19th December 1981 issue of Roy Of The Rovers. The 'team chart' One of the weekly features of Roy Of The Rovers was a chart for you to fill in to track your team's progress....
September 21, 2009
The Guardian's children's comics: Part 1 - 40 years of changing media
Last week The Guardian and The Observer published a series of reproduction comics from the 1970s and 1980s, including facsimiles of Jackie, The Dandy and Roy Of The Rovers. As well as giving me a blast of nostalgia they also gave me a chance to look through to see the contrasts that modern media and telecoms have brought to change the relationship between publisher and reader over the last 40-or-so years. The Dandy (1984) and The Beano (1980) "Reader's Clubs"...
September 19, 2009
September 18, 2009
London Linked Data meet up: Notes and take-away quotes - part 2
This week I've posted quite a bit about the Linked Data London meet-up that I attended in Hammersmith last week. As well as a two part transcript of my contribution to a panel about 'linked data and the future of journalism', yesterday I published the first part of a set of notes and take-away quotes from the event. Here are some more. 'About a third of a newspaper is data' - Andrew Walkingshaw Either he is stalking me, or I...
'Learn to blog smart' training in October
There will be another chance to take part in my "Learn to blog smart: join the conversation" training day in October. The course will run on Friday October 30th at The Frontline Club in London. The day long course is aimed at "new and aspiring bloggers, or companies just beginning to dip their toes into the daunting 'blogosphere'". It is ideal if you are in a position where you need to get a blog up and running, but are a...
September 17, 2009
London Linked Data meet up: Notes and take-away quotes - part 1
Last week I attended the first London Linked Data meet-up. It was organised by Georgi Kobilarov and Silver Oliver, and they kindly invited me to speak on a panel about 'Linked Data and the future of journalism'. Earlier this week I published a two part rough transcript of my contribution to that debate. Today I wanted to publish the first of two posts looking at what I made of the rest of the event, which was, at times, a little...
September 16, 2009
UX London redux video: Frances Eida on sketching
Update: I mentioned Frances Eida as an inspiration for my own sketching in my talk at EuroIA 2010 in Paris. The other sketchers I mentioned as inspiring were Eva-Lotta Lamm and Anna Lena Schiller. I've been publishing a series of videos of the UX London redux evening put on in August by the London IA group. The last clip I posted was of Jane Austin and Chris Neale talking about sketching. This next excerpt features the third person from IG...
UX London redux video: Jane Austin & Chris Neale on sketching
Last week I started publishing some video clips I made at the recent London IA event that presented a redux of the UX London conference. Amongst them I posted several excerpts from James Box's "Wireframes 2.0" session, which covered sketching and building interactive prototypes amongst other things. Today I wanted to continue the sketching theme, with a clip from the evening's final presentation by Jane Austin, Chris Neale and Frances Eida from IG Index. Jane Austin & Chris Neale on...
September 15, 2009
'Linked Data and the future of journalism' - part 2
Yesterday I published the first part of a rough transcript of the things that I said at the London Linked Data meet-up. I was part of a panel chaired by Paul Bradshaw. We were discussing the future of data and journalism with John O'Donovan, Dan Brickley and Leigh Dodds. The views expressed are my own, and not the views of Guardian News & Media where I work. The view from the stage at the London Linked Data meet-up Martin Belam...
September 14, 2009
English Defence League advertises Muslim dating agency on their forum
Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words - one of the best 'When Google Ads go bad' I've seen in a while......
'Linked Data and the future of journalism' - part 1
Linked data and the future of journalism
I recently appeared on a panel debating linked data and journalism. Here is a transcript of what I said.
September 11, 2009
"Breakfast with the Voicebot"
On Tuesday morning I visited Sidekick Studios near London Bridge to have 'Breakfast with the Voicebot'. The robot looked somewhat less human than the illustration on the invite. To be honest, it didn't look like it was capable of wrenching itself free from its base and going on a strangling and mangling rampage, which I always find slightly disappointing when I've been promised a robot. It is the type of machine usually used on car production lines to perform menial...
September 10, 2009
'Too dangerous' for Southern Electric or EDF to fix their own equipment in my house
This is the astonishing story of how, thanks to the disconnected way our utilities have been privatised, a woman expecting a baby in 7 days time has been left in a house with no electricity for two nights. At first neither EDF or Southern Electricity could agree on whose responsibility it was to look at the problem, and then, when one of them did finally take the job on, they decided it was 'too dangerous' to send an engineer to...
UX London redux video: James Box on Wireframes 2.0 - part 5
This is the last video clip from James Box's "Wireframes 2.0" presentation at the UX London redux evening put on by the London IA group during August. James Box on Wireframes 2.0 Following James' presentation there was a Q&A session. These excerpts show his responses to questions about getting clients to "sign-off" on interactive prototypes, and contributions to the debate from Jason Mesut and Andy Budd. UX London redux video: James Box on Wireframes 2.0 - part 5 from Martin...
However much James Murdoch wishes, the World Service made a BBC News website inevitable
James Murdoch's speech in Edinburgh, and a recent survey suggesting that more people favour advertising or subscription as a funding model rather than the Licence Fee, has continued scrutiny of the role of the BBC in the digital media landscape. The ICM poll shows that whilst 43% of people think the Licence Fee is the best way of funding the BBC, 57% do not. Murdoch described the BBC News website as 'dumping free, state-sponsored news on the market', and I...
September 9, 2009
UX London redux video: James Box on Wireframes 2.0 - part 4
During August the London IA Mini event was a redux evening that concentrated on providing a distilled version of the recent UX London conference. I made some video clips of the evening, and over the last couple of days I have been posting excerpts from James Box's "Wireframes 2.0" talk. James Box on Wireframes 2.0 In the last section of this redux presentation from James Box, he examines ways of documenting rich interactions like AJAX interfaces. He illustrates this...
Mail homepage goes indigo - well, 'Indigo Collection' anyway
When I first saw this homepage advertising campaign last week from Marks & Spencers on the Daily Mail website, my initial reaction was to tweet that it had burned my eyes. Aesthetics aside, I did think it merited further mention. It is very interesting to see a British newspaper experimenting with advertising formats like this. For the Daily Mail's online audience it seemed likely to be totally 'on brand', perhaps much more so than the Evening Standard giving pages 2...
"Where can I find the UKs cheapest cars" - hey, we are number #1 for this really long search phrase!
I've written before about the trend towards asking users to search for a specific phrase in marketing material as an easier way to help users navigate on the web rather than remembering URLs. I just saw an example of it taken to an absolute extreme. In Metro this morning, the strapline for a cargiant.co.uk advert was to 'Just Google it', with the proud boast at the foot of the page: "For the search term 'where can I find the UKs...
September 8, 2009
UX London redux video: James Box on Wireframes 2.0 - part 3
I've been posting a series of short video excerpts from the London IA redux event covering the UX London conference. This clip is the third part of the excellent "Wireframes 2.0" presentation by Clearleft's James Box. James Box on Wireframes 2.0 This clip moves Wireframes 2.0 on from sketching with pencil and paper, to making interactive prototypes. James looks at the situations where you may want or need to do this. For UX London, Clearleft made available a set...
UX London redux video: James Box on Wireframes 2.0 - part 2
The UX London conference was the subject of a 'redux' in our most recent London IA Mini series. I've been publishing a series of video clips I made of the evening, including Andy Budd's introduction. Today I'm continuing with excerpts from "Wireframes 2.0" presented by James Box of Clearleft. James Box on Wireframes 2.0 In this part of his UX London redux talk, James looks at sketching, with some real examples from project work at Clearleft. As well as...
September 7, 2009
UX London redux video: James Box on Wireframes 2.0 - part 1
The most recent London IA Mini evening event was a redux of the UX London conference. I've started posting some video clips I made of the evening. One of the most engaging and useful presentations was by James Box, and this is the first of a series of excerpts from his "Wireframes 2.0" redux. James Box on Wireframes 2.0 In this clip, James introduces the Wireframes 2.0 workshop that he presented with colleague Richard Rutter, and discusses how, in writing...
UX London redux video: Andy Budd on UX London
A couple of weeks ago The Team hosted London IA Mini 3 near London Bridge. The night, kindly sponsored by Zebra People, was given over to 'redux' presentations of the recent UX London conference organised by Clearleft. As well as posting a blog-redux-of-the-redux myself, I also filmed the majority of the evening, and over the next few days I'll be posting clips including Chris Petzny, Tom Coombs, Chris Neale, Francis Eida, Jane Austin and James Box. I wanted to start...
September 5, 2009
In praise of Wikpedia's football coverage
When the English language version of Wikipedia recently passed the 3 million article mark with an entry about a Norwegian soap star, Andrew Keen was moved to tweet that he didn't know whether to laugh or cry. But there are some things that Wikipedia does much better than any 'real' news organisation. The European qualifying for next year's FIFA World Cup in South Africa includes some complicated maths about teams finishing second in their group qualifying for a play-off, but...
September 4, 2009
'The future of journalism' and Linked Data panel
Next week I'll be taking part in the first London Linked Data meetup. I'll be on a panel chaired by Paul Bradshaw, looking at what linked data means for 'the future of journalism', alongside John O' Donovan (BBC), Leigh Dodds (Talis) and Dan Brickley. The event is described as: "for people who are interested in learning about Linked Data on the Web, people working on making data available on the web, people building infrastructure and applications for the Web of...
September 3, 2009
London IA Mini Conference III: UX London Redux
It seems an age since it took place, but a couple of weeks ago we held the third London IA Mini Conference. This time the venue was a space near London Bridge donated by The Team, and the theme of the evening was a redux of the UX London conference organised by Clearleft. The event was kindly sponsored by Zebra People. Andy Budd on the future of UX London Andy Budd of Clearleft opened the evening, talking about how UX...
September 2, 2009
'thelondonpaper' website review
I don't know, you take a couple of days off work to move house become homeless, and people start closing newspapers behind your back. My commute home will shortly face one less obstruction when I'm walking down York Way. It was only at the end of May that doomed free newspaper thelondonpaper was advertising their free website for London - thelondonpaper.com - with a big wrap-around spread that reproduced the newly re-designed site in print. Free seems to have very...
September 1, 2009
The BT broadband boxes that have muzzled the Muswell Hill fibre trial
Muswell Hill BT fibre controversy
Pictures of the new BT broadband boxes causing a nuisance on North London streets.