This is the new campaign site for Australian Labor Party leader Kevin Rudd. When I saw it I thought Howard Dean's children should sue.
Hits all the buttons in mostly the right places (grey images set a depressing tone when you're talking'topics'). Very good, but that, it seems, was the old template - video upfront - parodied as:
Hi, my name is INSERT NAME HERE.
Come watch videos of me on INSERT NAME HERE TV.
Join my team!
Read my blog, even though I never write on it!
I'm one of you! Look! I even have a Facebook page that I have yet to update!
Both Obama's and Hillary's sites (one is spending hugely online over the other, guess which?) are now doing something else - could this be new, more 'mainstream' audience effect?
It's Obama's - and it shows. It's polished 'till it shines.
The Tories campaign site StandUpSpeakUp has also dropped upfront video.
The rapidity and ubiquity of this evolution does place something like StandUpSpeakUp in a new context - yet more online consultation, there's nothing actually special about it and it already looks old to me.
Kevin 07 is ocker (in a good way) but it adds humour - proven virally but sorely lacking elsewhere. It's also broken, design wise. Doesn't really matter - they knicked a brilliant template.
Looking again StandUpSpeakUp fails on some basic marketing levels ('I'm not quite convinced, convince me' > click away) as well as a rather catastrophic usability error in unclickable images — click insanely on the top's calls-to-action.
Larry Magid is pretty upset about the way some states' attorneys general are blaming MySpace for the fact that there are pedophiles and other predators on the site, and proposing legislation that would restrict kids' access to social networking sites. There are predators everywhere. The good news is that MySpace is at least trying to get rid of them.
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Time Magazine ran a scary experiment to see how much personalised information they could easily source about someone.
What makes these sites controversial is that they gather all this information without your permission. The resulting profiles can be embarrassing or simply wrong. And getting those profiles removed or changed can be impossible.
The Author, checking on popular site ZoomInfo, "saw that everything from my telephone number to my full name were flat out wrong".
Browser integration with the Google Maps API AJAX architecture, allowing 2D map views to be embedded in any web-based application, so everyone in an organization benefits from the power of Google Earth Enterprise.
Performance enhancements amounting to as much as a 10x speedup for vector data processing and better than 2x reduction in server computation for responding to imagery requests.
New search framework for integrating geocoding and other search services via Java plug-ins including a Google Search Appliance reference implementation.
Regionator for creating Super-Overlays with Regions based KML and publishing them for viewing in any Google Earth client version (Free, Plus or Pro).
Security improvements and extended Operating System support including Red Hat Enterprise Server 4 and SUSE Linux 9 and 10.
They’ve also streamlined the interface and made a handful of other improvements.
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Steve Coogan is behind online soap - sorry, 'interactive online sit-com' - Where Are The Joneses?
Dawn (Emma Fryer from Ideal), discovers from her dying mother that her father was a sperm donor and that she has 27 sibblings scattered across Europe.
Not loving the ads in your widget, Steve. Plus ya'gotta make sure the server's up to streaming it otherwise people will drop your widget. It's also crap marketing because it leads you to a flickr dead end ...
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Metropolitan Police on Facebook. They have a 600 strong group which the Mail (boo!) infiltrated. Something, anything wrong here? Nah.
A Met spokeswoman said last night it appeared that officers had fallen short of their professional standards.
Those involved could now face a dressing down from their superiors and even disciplinary action if they are deemed to have brought the force into disrepute.
The Central Office of Information (COI) has decided to pull all its government advertising from social networking sites.
They are currently running armed forces ads via YouTube and have used MySpace and Bebo before.
This follows the latest beat-ups on the Web from MSM (MainSteam Media). This time it's the Sunday Times, linking brands to the BNP via Facebook. Vodafone, First Direct, Halifax, Prudential, Virgin Media and the AA have deserted Facebook. eBay have not.
Plus the BBC's increasingly ridiculous primetime ratings-chaser Panorama criticized YouTubefor refusing to police so-called 'happy slapping' videos, and damned Peugeot and Carphone Warehouse. [The Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA) called Panorama 'misleading', I'd call it a very good example of the worst sort of tabloid TV.] And Teachers' Unions want the Internet banned.
A lot of bellowing, confused people all sounding like they want the whole thing stopped and for us all to live in somewhere censored and filtered and quiet - like China? Sites are changing content because of this (as they would).
[Register comment]: I work for a large uk website that is made of user generated content.
Our media provider (who serves the ads) has asked us to pull various bits of content and retire entire sections of the site to please the advertisers.
Thank you Panorama, are you the Taliban-wing of the BBC? I notice that News Online is undermining your argument again (see 'Cyber bullying - don't blame the web'), as they did over WiFi.
We don't want to exclude use of any of the new social media but we do have to have a very clear idea of what the context is going to be like.
When the newspapers will spend lots of energy trying to place you in ANY negative context — see what the Mail did to 'Whitehall blogger' Owen Barder, taking comments out of context for example — this strikes me as plain wrong and naive.
Also reminded of much of what Tom Steinberg wrote in his recent report (for the government, most of which was accepted), The Power of Information.
Appears to have not reached the COI.
Effective government net marketing — hence 'reaching youth audiences through social networks' for example — is never going to happen unless someone gets some backbone and stands up to press/TV luddites. Someone like a politician.
Is it not slightly irresponsible not to go where the kids actually are?
It is just not possible to effectively use social media without something, somewhere which can be taken out of context.
Register: After extensive investigations, The Register can reveal that Vodafone rival Orange's adverts are running on the [Facebook] group "Aryan Satan Worshipers" [sic]. Sick.®
So change the context. It really, really needs it. The 'debate' is ridiculously ill-informed (see Panorama comments).
The commentators on the Guardian about the BNP/Facebook [Racists don't just read online ads] have no information about Web marketing, social networks etc. for which I blame the BBC, in large part.
How is this country's economy going to get anywhere if both politicians taking advantage and tabloid media are dominating the 'debate' and scaring people witless about the Web?
Some would like to change the context to this:
[blog comment]: NEW ad serving engines are appearing from companies like wunderLoop that are based not on the context of a sites content but on the indivdual and their behaviour, so that advertising appears related to their profile.
Do YOU want to be graded, profiled, judged and then your platform support withdrawn because you don't fit advertisers desires?
[blog comment]: I don’t think a filter system would do too well on social networks. Just imagine - if you knew there were certain trigger words or phrases to stop ads from being displayed on your profile, how easy would it be for people who don’t want ads on their profiles to include those so they get a commercial free profile?
It's very interesting that practitioners were also spooked by the gathering tabloid storm and rushed to say 'we will regulate online ad networks'. Although the American reaction to the BNP/Facebook furor has largely been bewilderment. But you can't have user-generated content + ads without some content or 'context' clanging up against something that someone doesn't want to see/hear. That's 'users' (the public) for you.
Nigel Gwilliam, senior communications manager at the IPA: Online ad networks need to address the issue of trust they now face and our view is that independent, random, campaign level audits are the best solution. In the mean time, agencies need to be vigilant when trading with networks, particularly with regard to high volume, low CPM deals.
If advertisers are nervous, they can speak directly to us and we will make sure their advertising does not appear against user-generated content pages, or against any political parties. The best way is to come directly to us.
You either advertise/engage with 'user-generated content pages' or you don't. MySpace just said that.
It's not possible to filter it to meet the likes of the COI's very strict rules and guidelines.
Context is Content: The ability to connect anything to anything else online continues to challenge standards and practices.
So if you jump like this every time some - frankly - lateral link is made in the newspapers or tabloid TV, effective use of social media is just never going to get off the starting blocks.
The ballpark, the gameplan, the inventory, the master plan .. you've got to change the argument, the context to make real use of social media.
COI has adopted more modern techniques in recent years but we think there is scope to go further. We want to make sure that it moves more fully into the YouTube and MySpace era.
The RAF YouTube page is currently running video diary entries from the front line in Kandahar.
[SAC Paul Goodfellow] is careful not to endanger the lives of others or include any breach of intelligence, but will speak openly about his day-to-day experiences as a gunner in the RAF.
Although I think ads can be controlled on their YouTube page, Paul's RAF diary is sharable - I just did this and it's below. Which means - yes - the BNP could use it the same as I am. Does that one possibility damn what is evidentially a good thing for the RAF?
RAF AFGHAN DIARIES: 10th July 2007
I don't think COI chief executive Alan Bishop has thought this one through:
We don't want to exclude use of any of the new social media but we do have to have a very clear idea of what the context is going to be like.
We decided to use the hosted version and wordpress.com because we couldn't be sure that we'd have a reliable electricity supply here at the office. This way, any of the team can update the site from anywhere, including our home computers if the need arises."
The Guardian's website has a new Science section, very useful when mass media (the Beeb, sheesh) and politicians push nonsense like concerns about WiFi.
AJAX is a technology underpining many dynamic web 2.0 apps, so it's good to see this accessify post suggesting that the well-used Screen reader JAWS is including language about support for AJAX in it's next version.
Google doesn’t sell any space. It sells user intentions, i.e. what’s on people’s minds. And that’s a scare resource — there’s a finite number of people thinking about buying a digital camera today.
So what else is a scarce resource online? Locality.
“We’re not moving toward a world of thin computing,” said Steven A. Ballmer, Microsoft’s chief executive, referring to systems in which simple processing takes place on a PC, but more complex processing is moved to a centralized computer through a network connection. “We’re moving toward a world of software plus services.” Nearly every Microsoft software application will be transformed with the addition of a Web-services component within 3 to 10 years, he said.
Even as Microsoft says it's defending its home turf, the company is of course trying to aggressively compete in the world of search and online advertising, which is Google's core franchise. Recent purchases of aQuantive/Atlas (for $6 billion) and AdECN, as well as high profile deals with Facebook and Digg, show how serious Microsoft is about being a major player in both arenas ... my guess is that "3 to 10 years" is too long for Microsoft to wait to web-enable its critical applications; because by then the free, online options will be much better.
The NeoConservative Oliver Kammresponded on his blog and distilled the objectors - to them, Wikipedia represents "an anti-intellectual exercise".
(Gawd knows what's going on with the BBC at the moment. Withdrawn digital services + the complicated sounding iplayer. And have you used their website search lately? Whenever I've used it it consistently fails the same comparison test against Google that DirectGov does)
One of the standard responses from many Aussies about the Aboriginal situation is 'all in the past mate' - all those massacres, stolen children and cultural destruction is assigned to history.
Well this is coming out of your taxes. Mate.
$525,000 - the price of one stolen life
An Aboriginal man taken from his family as a baby has been awarded more than [A]$500,000 compensation [£211,000].
Bruce Trevorrow was 13 months old when a neighbour drove him on Christmas Day in 1957 from his Coorong family home, south-east of Adelaide, to the Children's Hospital with stomach pains.
Hospital notes tendered to the South Australian Supreme Court show staff recorded that the child had no parents and was neglected and malnourished.
Two weeks later, he was given under the authority of the Aborigines Protection Board to a woman, who later became his foster parent, without the permission of his parents. He did not see his family again for 10 years.
His mother wrote in July 1958 "I am writing to ask if you would let me know how baby Bruce is."
The board knew it lacked the legal power to resist a request for Bruce to be returned, so it lied, writing back to say her son was "making good progress" but doctors needed him for longer.
Thereafter they prevented his mother from making contact with him or from finding out where he was or by what process he had been removed.
By the age of two he showed signs of psychiatric disturbance including trichotillomania, a compulsive hairpulling disorder, and a speech defect. As a boy he also chewed his clothing, damaged books and stole.
He spent eight years growing up in the belief he was the child of a white family living in Adelaide. His dark colour was explained by references to relatives overseas who were darker skinned.
When he was returned to his Aboriginal family he was told he would be visiting them but was instead sent home.
In his late teens he took an overdose and slashed his wrists. Under questioning he admitted to never having felt close to anyone, including his wife, whom he treated "roughly" and "badly". He told the court he did not have the skills to be a father to his children and had never hugged or cuddled them.
In 1998, Mr Trevorrow sued the South Australian Government for pain and suffering, alleging he had lost his cultural identity, suffered depression, became an alcoholic and had an erratic employment history after being taken as a child from his family.
Mr Trevorrow left court saying he would pay off his house with the money. "I thought that we would never get there," he said. "But the day's come when I've got the peace of mind to start my life."
A spokesman for the South Australian Attorney-General, Michael Atkinson, said the [Labor] Government would seek legal advice before deciding whether to appeal.
The former Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission chairwoman, Lowitja O'Donoghue, said the judgment was "a great victory".
Two previous stolen generation claims from the Northern Territory were defended by the Australia Government in the High (Supreme) Court and were defeated because they were out of time.
At least 100,000 children were removed from their parents
Nationally we can conclude with confidence that between one in three and one in ten Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families and communities in the period from approximately 1910 until 1970. In certain regions and in certain periods the figure was undoubtedly much greater than one in ten. In that time not one family has escaped the effects of forcible removal (confirmed by representatives of the Queensland and WA Governments in evidence to the Inquiry). Most families have been affected, in one or more generations, by the forcible removal of one or more children Bringing them Home Report of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families
The Electoral Commission, which oversees the democratic process in the UK, is increasingly uncomfortable about a lack of regulation governing election campaigning online.
At the moment there is a legal requirement to include an imprint on all printed political material, stating whom it promotes and who produced it.
Although encouraged as good practice, there is no similar requirement for blogs and websites, muddying the waters of what constitutes political comment and outright party political promotion.
The Commission has passed its concerns up the line to its newly formed parent, the Ministry of Justice.
"It's definitely becoming more of an issue, and it's something we are constantly reviewing," said a spokesperson.
What's changed that they are now 'increasingly uncomfortable'? What are they proposing regarding 'what constitutes political comment and outright party political promotion' on blogs?
Quite an historic event this week, with the CNN/YouTube joint Democratic Presidential candidate debate.
MSM certainly took note. As the Chicago Tribune's Steve Johnson put it, "it was a bad night for news anchors and Washington bureau chiefs, the traditional interrogators of would-be holders of American high office."
Carol Darr, Director of the Institute for Politics, Democracy and the Internet, said that for the first time, “the filter that mainstream establishment media plays in presidential races — ‘we ask the questions, we are the exalted panel’ — that was broken down.”
Jon Stewart introduces and sets the tone ...
"Video size is important to the debate .. only young people can see it."
And more from Jon Oliver — did CNN 'youthenize' the debate? ...
Note the 'Al qaeda' drinking game ..
TechPresident summed up the reactions.
It brought home the hollowness of much of our scripted political speech, since those candidates who could break through the rhetoric and talk with a human voice really stood out
And Huffpost has a good dissection of what actually happened - they followed the questioners.
And — this has got to be a good sign — White House Press Secretary Tony Snow asked 'Did [Bush] watch the debate?' answered 'I don’t think so. I don’t think he’s big on YouTube debates'.
Andrew Keen - he of 'The cult of the amateur', which bangs on about Wikipedia being unreliable - took a hit as many videos from the 'amateurs' were very well produced or showed the sort of cunning approach journalists have by picking a hole they figured producers would need to fill.
This is what young guy John Cantees did in addressing a candidate everyone else would ignore.
Though another way of looking at it is that the process ends up sounding not dissimilar to that employed by Endermol to fill the BigBrother House.
CNN didn't just "pick the questions." They identified contributors and in some cases worked with them to shape the video.
Huffpost:
If the whole point of the exercise was to hear from citizens, it just shows how hard it is to displace the spirit of professionalism with another spirit-- even when one is trying.
And although there was a first - one woman on the stage - only 11 of 39 questions were from women - 70% were from men.
At this early stage, it's hardly surprising that videos like this one about Alzheimer's gets in — only 3000 video questions were submitted.
Noted that the documentation by YouTube is terrible. Here's that question on YouTube — see if you can find the answer here (it's the one below), on YouTube's main recap page. (The question was actually mashed in with others). One thing I've noticed recently as YouTube iterates its design is the navigation getting stripped too far back, so you get too much simplicity and too little complexity.
POSTSCRIPT: Apparently, the Republican candidates think it's silly and that their base don't watch YouTube, so they aren't signing up for their version in September. The WashPost quotes Mitt Romney saying "I think the presidency ought to be held at a higher level than having to answer questions from a snowman." Republican blogger Andrew Sullivansays: "Ducking YouTube after the Dems did so well will look like a party uncomfortable with the culture and uncomfortable with democracy. But then, we kind of knew that already, I guess, didn't we?"
The rapidity and ubiquity of this evolution does place something like StandUpSpeakUp in a new context - yet more online consultation, there's nothing actually special about it and it already looks old to me.
@PubSecBloggers
