Categories
End User social networking UC

Wrong spellins becasue I type hte words in too quickly

trefor_250Much of my work dconversations happen vi instant messaging. Becasue I tyoe very quickly I often make stanfdard typographical mistake htat arent corrected by  spellschedker. Unless the typeo is totally outrageous I’vre got to teh point o not bother ing to coerect the mistake.

This might not be good practive but ordinarliy I am talkign to some one I know wekk. If it was a business email I’d take more carre but don’t bother for IM.

This is an interesting woindow opn the movement of language. In one sense as long as the person you are talking to can understand whayt you are saying why should it matter. I’m not suggesting I am a fan of this but clearly a am a proponent:)

I suspect that the probelm is made worse using hte Chromebook becasue hte keyboard is slightly smaller than the one I’ve spent years using so I often hit hte worng keys by mistake. It’s probably too late to change me now 🙂

Otehr spelin related posts:

Refridgeration gaffe

Categories
End User fun stuff nuisance calls and messages ofcom online safety Regs social networking

TripAdvisor

I’m not a lawyer. This is something of which I am proud. Nor am I a chartered accountant, this is something of which I am equally proud.

People that are in Regulatory Affairs (telecoms or otherwise) often individually present a real Heinz 57 of backgrounds, abilities and skills. As far as I am aware, no-one leaves school thinking “I want to be in Regulation!”. You sort of fall into it, from a carrier in the faculties of law, economics, accounting or the commercial arena – and have to be able to hold your own, at a high level, in all of them. In all cases, you need a desire and drive to get under the skin of the regulator and former incumbents alike; those that know me know I revel in this sort of protagonism.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, I have an academic background in Finance and Management and a professional background in commercial affairs and compliance, hence my ultimate arrival in Regulatory Affairs. 18 year old Pete Farmer would’ve laughed if anyone suggested this is where I would end up.

So, this isn’t legal advice. It isn’t to be relied upon. It’s to be taken on an “as-is” basis as a way of stimulating debate and discussion around a subject of which I am as passionate about as annoying the Office of Communications; food.

Believe it or not, in my spare time I run a foodie

Categories
End User social networking

The continuing story of why I don’t like Facebook despite the fact that I use it

facebook adsI’ve mentioned this before but I hate Facebook. Their ads really irk me.

Just now I’ve been reminded that my next birthday is my 53rd. I don’t mind that it is my 53rd birthday. I quite like being me. What annoys me is that Facebook have shoved an ad in my face asking “Are you 53 next birthday”. They know damn well how old I am.

They also know that I would have been two years old in 1963 so there is no way I could have been working in a noisy environment since then.

And then there is the American Express ad. It costs a lot of money to get an American Express card. It’s all very well it being usable everywhere in the US of A  (buy Americun stoopid) but there are loads of places in the UK that don’t take it because AMEX demand much higher commission than Visa and Mastercard.

Badly targeted ads from Facebook. They should use Google Ads. At least Google knows I’m thinking of buying a metal shed:).

Gotta go. Picking up a daughter from university. End of Term and she has run out of clean clothes.

Other posts that mention Facebook:

Annoying Facebook ads
Facebook privacy intrusion continues
Where Facebook used to tread – the spare plinth

Categories
End User social networking

A Twitter death

I woke up in the middle of the night, took a spin round my phone and noticed that someone I followed on twitter had died.

I had never met this guy but at one time he had been a fairly frequent tweeter and you got his whole life story. He was out of work with a broken marriage. It looked as if he had been prone to aggression and had an alcohol problem. Then he kicked the habit and seemed to be pulling himself together.

At some point he disappeared off my timeline. I didn’t really notice. I follow 1,772 people at the time of writing. A lot of them come and go and many of them hardly tweet at all. Also it doesn’t take much of a change in your personal habits to not be looking  when they are tweeting. I don’t try to read all the tweets in my timeline.

So last night when I saw someone mention that he had died it came as a surprise. I took a look at his timeline and he seemed to have gone quiet on social media platforms from around the middle of last summer and he died in the autumn. There was a reference somewhere to intensive care.

I have no idea what the story is. I’m not really interested and it is really none of our businesses. What is interesting is the fact that his life was in some small measure played out online. I have over the past few years been researching my family tree (hence the mention of me buying the History of the Welsh Baptists in a previous post). I’m at a point where there isn’t much to go on. It’s all hard slog in records offices in West Wales.

However any descendant of my twitter friend, indeed your descendants and mine, are likely to have a wealth of information about our day to day lives like never before. In some respects we are planting trees that will only be enjoyed by people that come after us. Much of what I post is private and shared only with the family, which could be an issue downstream.  The family is a specific named set of individuals so my details could be closed to 4G grandchildren (for example). This might require some thought re sharing rules but the principle is there and in any case my Twitter timeline is open for anyone to read.

We are also here relying on the continued existence of today’s social media platforms and their data bases far into the future which is by no means a racing certainty.

It doesn’t really matter anyway. I’ve waxed on long enough.

RIP my twitter friend.

Take care now…

Categories
End User social networking

News around the world as it happens on trefor.net #explosion116

Whiling away the time on Twitter end route from Manc to Linc and spotted this tweet:

Liz Kreutz ‏@Liz_Kreutz  14s

RT @madebyjuan: On my way to work and then BOOM! Building explosion collapse on 116th. NYC #explosion116 pic.twitter.com/revfnFA3oV

I clicked on the link to get a better look at the photo and found an interesting insight into how news journalism works these days.

Chris Kitching ‏@chriskitching  2m

@madebyjuan Hello. I’m a journalist with @CP24, a TV station in Toronto. Can we use your photo?

Dorrine Mendoza ‏@AssignmentDesk1  46s

@madebyjuan Juan, are you in a safe place? Can you talk to CNN about what you’re seeing?

Looks like a bit of action going down in New York City and it’s been picked up on twitter by the media. I wonder if they just have a column looking for “newsworthy” keywords such as, in this case, “explosion”.

Interesting how it works innit?

Related posts:

Twitter highlights international nature of #MWC2014
Never, ever change your Twitter handle by @LindseyAnnison
twitter vs phone response times
Categories
Business mobile connectivity phones social networking spam

1951 exhibitors at #MWC2014

sgs5_thumbYesterday when I signed in for Cloud Expo Europe the guy handing out the badges pointed out a “win an iPhone 5s free draw” for visiting the Telehouse (might have been Telecity – I no longer have the card) stand. All I had to do was take a scratchcard along and see if I’d won.

I duly scratched off the silver scratchey off bit and found a number between 1 and 9,999. Looked like a pretty low chance of winning. In exchange for almost certainly not winning an iPad I was probably going to have to let them scan my badge and stick me on a spam list. Considering also I am not an iPhone fanboi I declined the offer and didn’t specifically head for their stand. It’s a problem, getting people interested in looking at your stuff as opposed to someone else’s.

This morning I wondered whether Mobile World Congress had finished. After the flurry of “exciting” product launches (the Samsung Galaxy S5 and the, erm…) things have gone quiet.

Today is the last day, apparently. At MWC2014 there are 1,951 exhibitors. One thousand nine hundred and fifty one!!! How on earth do you stand out amongst that lot? There must be a much easier way of getting seen.

The web is the only answer. These big shows have to be replaced by website interaction. Ok I hear the argument that says the benefit of going to a trade show is the networking. That can easily be done at specific networking events over a glass of lemonade and a canape. Not too many canapes of course – you will want to do your own fair share of talking:)

Trefor Davies, trefor.net, not in Barcelona.

PS I hear that half the SGS5 RAM is taken up by its Android firmware load!

Categories
4g Business mobile connectivity social networking

Report from #MWC2014 – Mark Zuckerberg and the death of the Personal Computer

I see Mark Zuckerberg (founder of Facebook) is in Barca (short for Barcelona – common usage by  the mobile “in” people) for MWC 2014 (Mobile World Congress two thousand and fourteen).

It’s the trendy place to be. You get to be part of the hype, the frenzy. In the run up you casually ask others whether they are going so that they can see that you are going. Affirmative responses result in knowing nods, comparisons of favourite bars and restaurants  and complaints about all the walking that you have to put up with because the show is so large. To those that respond in the negative everything is left unsaid.

I’ve been to Barcelona. Spent a great few days there with my daughter last summer.  We stayed in a nice hotel slap bang in the middle of the city, could walk everywhere and were able to easily retire to the rooftop bar for late afternoon relaxation when we had had enough of the touristy bits.

I years gone by I’ve known one or two of our sales people have to travel in by train from miles kilometres away because accommodation was unavailable in Barcelona itself. Almost as bad as the old days of Telecom Geneva where people would have to commute from Heathrow to Switzerland because hotels were totally sold out for hundreds of miles around (ish) the show.

Mr Zuckerberg is in town because mobile is

Categories
Business online safety Regs social networking

Edward Snowden – Facebook charges its users!

Facebook charges its users!

A dramatic byline….. ostensibly it hasn’t broken its vow that it is “free to use and always will be“, and there isn’t a pay-wall being erected around it. That said, with the hefty price tag it just paid for WhatsApp, it may well have to consider things!.

But Facebook has always charged, as has Twitter, and Google and so on. So it hasn’t had a Direct Debit mandate, but they have taken something you have freely offered in return for perpetual use of the site for free, and have marketed that. Your most valuable information; your preferences, your search history, your favourite band, most checked in pub, your beach snaps, all of this adds up to a data-miner’s paradise.

A quick calculation on Facebook’s market capitalisation just prior to the

Categories
Engineer social networking

Punters rush to sign up to funky new LinkedIn Group – tech stocks rally in out of hours trading

trefor_thumbIn a data centre somewhere on the world wide web Thursday 20th February 2014 AD.

This evening a new group was created on LinkedIn. One person has already rushed to sign up and early indicators suggest a rallying effect on global stock markets in out of hours trading.

Group founder Trefor Davies said “I’m really thrilled to be able to make this announcement”. Word has it that Davies was chatting to Rob who is doing some website development for trefor.net and who asked whether there was a LinkedIn group for the blog.

“Rob was adding social media links to the template. To my total surprise I found that

Categories
Business social networking

What’s up doc? I’ve never used WhatsApp

trefor_thumbIt’s confession time.  I’ve never used WhatsApp. Now they’ve been bought by Facebook I probably never will.

I have occasionally used Skype. Since Skype was bought by Microsoft it’s probably the kiss of death for the service anyway. Probably a long, slow, lingering death1.

Categories
Apps End User social networking

Contact Convergence Confusion – sorry Mark Williams – one of you had to go

trefor_thumbYou will all of course have read the post about transferring the contacts database from my personal gmail account to my trefor.net one.

Well now slight issuettes are starting to come out of the woodwork. Sent Kid 3 a text yesterday. He was on his way to visit Kid 2 in Durham so I just said “have a good time” or words to that effect. I got a reply suggesting I had the wrong number.

I looked at his profile on my phone and there are indeed two people’s details assigned to that contact. What’s more

Categories
End User social networking

Annoying Facebook ads

annoying_facebook_adsFacebook gets more annoying. Today I note the adverts presented for my eager consumption and click through.

I am not interested in finding attractive women for men over fifty, especially when in the photo they look as if they are the same age as my daughter.

Moreover I am happy enough with my teeth and I already have a driving instructor lined up for kid 3 when he turns 17 (same one as successfully did kids 1 & 2).

If anyone is interested in crowdsourcing a spec for an alternative social media platform that can replace Facebook without the privacy concerns of Facebook stay in touch.

Also I reckon for a learner driver to only cost £2 a day extra it would have to be a 100cc car and the learner would have to be in their fifties -which considering the target demographic for the other ads is probably not far off being right.

Categories
End User social networking

Snapchat – get down wiv da kids

Kid 2 introduced me to Snapchat. Must have been two summers ago when she was about to set off for uni. Other than very occasionally looking at her chats I ignored it.

For one thing it doesn’t keep the photos/videos once sent. I like to keep the photos/vids. I’m a nostalgic.

Recently I saw an article somewhere, BBC maybe, that said the yoof were moving away from Facebook to Snapchat. One of the side benefits, if not the prime motive, was that the media wasn’t stored. More private.

Now my wife uses Snapchat to talk to Kid 4. From her iPhone. Believe you me this is massive progress. Anne doesn’t do Facebook. But she does do Snapchat, now. She also sends texts and occasionally calls people.

I used to think the whole short video/pic thing wasn’t going to take off. I’ve changed my mind.

I also wonder whether the fact that no data is kept (or so we are told) is the way ahead – short termism in extremis. Makes sense considering the way our society is evolving elsewhere. The throwaway society taken to its ultimate conclusion.

Now I think about it how often do I look at any of the photos and videos I store – there are hundreds of Gigabytes of them.  Not very often. I’m not going to get rid of them though. It’s a mind set.

snapchatWhen I depart this planet nothing will matter. Photos. Memories. Great deeds. In the meantime I’ve just started using Snapchat. Even though I’ve been “on” the system for 18 months.

One of the surprises having explored what it can’t do is to find that zillions of my contacts are also on Snapchat and there are many chats (snaps?) waiting for me to see. Amazing. Who’d a thought!

Interestingly I was totally ok with allowing Snapchat access to my contacts list whereas I still haven’t upgraded my Facebook App because it was asking for access to my text messages. It’s about trust, innit.

Don’t betray that trust Snapchat, I am about to start using you.

To finish off with an internet technology angle, Snapchat is of course going to be another bandwidth driver. It will use a lot more bandwidth than a Facebook IM or wall post which I imagine is what it replaces.

Onwards and upwards.

PS just sent Anne a Snapchat praising the ham sandwiches in my packup – they were delicious:)

Categories
Engineer social networking Weekend

Immediacy

I’ve done most of my jobs. Stuff taken to tip, wood piled up “neatly” at bottom of garden, Kid 4’s bag emptied after skiing holiday (that one was worth a few brownie points I’ll tell you), roast beef prep done with veg peeled etc, broken light bulbs replaced. I’m sure there was more. It felt like it (cue violins – I’m not proud). I only have the bit of wood to glue back on the towel hooks in the bathroom to do (again – different bit this time) which will wait for me to finish the cup of tea I am about to consume as a reward for getting most of the jobs done.

When I came in from the garden the news about Jenny Jones’ bronze medal was on the radio. Thing is that happened hours ago. I’ve even written a blog post about it. Very topical, me.

I suppose there must still be people who don’t pick things up as they happen,

Categories
End User online safety social networking

eTagged.me – you are a pest & @LinkedIn should know better

eTaggedmeI got an email from LinkedIn saying ‘ “xxxxx” (name withheld)  has requested to provide them with some feedback based on their personality using the short link below’.

Apparently eTagged.me, according to them, is “a new way to identify yourself to the world including ratings & reviews from your peers that shows how awesome you are”.

They look dodgy to me. A link was very handily provided for me to unsubscribe from further emails. This link seemed to be from eTagged me but I had to insert my LinkedIn password to unsubscribe. !!!!!

This is totally outrageous. I never asked them for the email in the first place and they want me to give them my LinkedIn credentials to stop them sending me any more junk.

I’ve reported them to LinkedIn. I also looked at their website. There is an email address but I’m blowed if I’m going to send them an email to complain. There needs to be a way within LinkedIn of blocking this stuff but I can’t immediately see it.

Beware of eTagged.me. We don’t need any new social media platforms thanks a lot. At the very least they need to change the way they work so that people can block them without having to enter secure credentials that are none of their business. I realise that access to the large databases that are LinkedIn et al is an attractive proposition but on this occasion they didn’t get it right.

Rant over. I must be going through an angry phase – just stay away from me for a while – okaaay 🙂

ttfn

Wasn’t so long ago that someone stole 6.5 millions LinkedIn passwords – here.

Categories
Business internet mobile connectivity social networking Weekend

No mobile network coverage but WiFi saves the day again

No mobile connectivity no longer a problem.

Went to a Burns Night dinner last night organised by the “Friends of William Farr School”. A good time was had by all and I got to wear my new Irish tartan kilt (photos withheld due to health and safety reasons).

The bash was at Hemswell Court, a former RAF Officers Mess – there will be quite a few such buildings in Lincolnshire which was known as bomber county during the second world war. It’s a v pleasant venue with memories of men in sheepskin flying jackets and the roar of Lancaster bomber engines echoing around the place.

Being in a rural spot, as most RAF bomber command airfields were, there is sod all mobile coverage at Hemswell Court. Ordinarily in town I’d feel somewhat naked without mobile coverage. In Hemswell I didn’t give it a second thought.

This is a) because

Categories
End User social networking

Never, ever change your Twitter handle by @LindseyAnnison

twitter online profile Here is my experience of handing over my beloved and much-used Twitter handle, plus associated domain names, email addresses and contacts, to a good cause.

To cut a very long story into one (longish) paragraph, Digital Dales started out as a voluntary organisation helping Yorkshire Dales businesses to go online in 1999-ish; watched all our tourist businesses, agriculture and industry nearly be dragged into oblivion by the stinking, greasy smoke of the Foot & Mouth pyres in 2001; morphed into a broadband event organiser, run by a rural broadband obsessive, to try to get everyone online firstly whilst the countryside was shut, and then because it was and is vital to rural survival anyway. In 2013, wanting a change of direction in my own life, I decided to hand over the name to a community group doing Digital in the Dales – Fibregarden, who are installing fibre optics (FTTH) to every home and farm in Garsdale and Dent because BT didn’t feel like doing IT.

I thought it would just be a matter of transferring the domain names, and handing over the Twitter account – change the password, start tweeting, folks. Oh, how naïve!

Categories
End User social networking

Gravatars and where to get em

I’ve been asked how you get an image in the post whenever you leave a comment on this blog. You need to sign up for a Gravatar account over at https://en.gravatar.com/. This integrates with wordpress and will insert your pic whenever you leave a comment on a wordpress blog.

Even lets you provide different pics for sites with different age ratings. So one angelic pic for blogs like this one and a different, probably masked one, or one of your best mate who you want to pull a joke on, for those sites that are x rated. Can’t believe there are any x rated wordpress blogs. Surely not?!

You may have noticed (there again you may not) that I have been consolidating my icons images on a single headshot image – all part of the branding:)

Categories
Business social networking

Profile information on people when adding to Google Contacts

I’ve added a couple of people to my Google Contacts list today based on being given their email addresses and mobile phone numbers. I’m impressed to see what other information on each person Google comes up with when you add them as a contact.

The info added by Google in Contacts must presumably be dependent on the person having made that available on their profile. However it is impressive – at a glance info on Twitter name, Facebook account etc.

Why wouldn’t you want to make this info available? If you manage different social media accounts differently you can do that either by keeping quiet about some or just restricting who can see what information through that platform’s own privacy settings.

Seem to me that this is a long way towards providing the functionality that the likes of Salesforce.com tout as key selling features for their own platforms, but on a free of charge basis.

I will be reviewing my own profiles and settings for my various social media accounts. Very mildly disappointed that the Gmail changes referred to herein still don’t seem to have kicked in yet. Maybe I’m doing something wrong. Oh I don’t know…

Categories
End User social networking Weekend

Mugshot

mugshotNuff said.

Categories
Business social networking

Social media accounts for startups

I’ve started to separate personal social media accounts from the blog. Although trefor.net is named after me I want to depersonalise it so that downstream it wont rely on me. I ultimately envisage a small staff of developers and editorial types running the site whilst I swan off to conferences in exotic places, the golf course etc etc.

So far I have separated the google accounts – [email protected] is now a pure play gmail account (if I can put it like that) and have done some work on Twitter. @trefornet is the “official” business twitter handle though not one of those verified jobs you see with a tick – one can but dream 🙂

There is already a trefor.net Facebook page (like it if you will) though it will need some work doing to it and regular post upates. That will come more easily when I have a developer on board.

I have also enabled a Google+ profile for [email protected]. This will need some thought as to modus operandi. Google likes to recognise people rather than businesses. I suspect that we will end up with every bit of content frm the blog being linked to on the trefor.net page but only my own stuff on my personal one. There is already a trefor.net page on Google+ that hasn’t been updated for years.

LinkedIn will also need some work. I’ve updated my profile but will have to give some thought as how best to use it. LinkedIn, which I used to largely ignore as a vehicle for people to get jobs or sell things, is going to become more useful (now that I’m selling things). Networking is the name of the game really, in more ways than one.

Much of the development of the blog will rely on having a developer on board. So far there hasn’t been a rush of applications so I’m going to have to step up the activity levels there. Working out of a business innovation centre in Lincoln this seems to be a common thread. A business these days needs to work online and needs web development skills.

There is a good Computer Science Dept at the University of Lincoln so it isn’t as if there isn’t a supply of grads out there. Lots of students would like to stay in the town where they went to University if they could. They typically associate the location with having a good time. At least that’s how it was in my day :). Next week I’m going to pop round and have a chat with the prof. He’s just round the corner from the office.

The whole social media thing is important because this site needs to be a living organism, interacting with its readers in many ways. What’s more by “embedding” itself in social networks we will know more about the readers although I’m totally cool with people using anonymised credential when leaving comments. The value of a business lies with its customers and whilst they aren’t paying for anything,the readers are in fact customers.

As Trefor Davies over the years I have built up a reasonable sized network of contacts using social media. Trefor.net the business is tarting from scratch although obviously there is going to be a high degree of cross fertilisation to begin with. It will be interesting to see, for example, how the Twitter follower count for @trefornet, currently  0, grows compared with @tref, currently 2,572. @trefornet will be more informational and a feedback channel as opposed to the drivel that @tref often spouts:)

Anyway that’s enough waxing on. Got social media profiles to write etc and I’m off out to lunch at a posh restaurant in Nottingham today so must go.

tata

Categories
Business engineering google social networking

Google Apps update – trefor.net is now working

trefSince Monday I’ve been trying to set up a Google Apps for Business account for trefor.net. I kept getting rejected with a message saying that “the domain trefor.net was already in use”.

I was using it via my personal gmail account – picking up trefor.net emails pulled from my Timico POP3 mailbox. Deleted any reference to trefor.net in my personal mailbox then when Google continued to reject my efforts to register a new apps account I discovered you have to wait 24 hours for “things to filter through the system”.

Over 24 hours later it still didn’t work and I made a comment to this effect on Twitter. Twitter is a truly powerful networking tool.  @AndyCDoyle offered to help and this lunchtime, having started to raise a ticket with Google, he found that there was already a Google Apps account for trefor.net. Funnily enough it was one I registered meself years ago. I’d totally forgotten about it.

A password reset came through to the recovery email address, my own personal gmail account,  and hey presto I was up and running. Ish. It does take time to learn how to navigate your way around and I can see why a business might want to contract the setup out to an IT consultant.

One thing that flummoxed me was that in all the help guides it says you have to verify that the domain is yours. None of the relevant fields appeared on my screen so either I had already done it (certainly don’t recall that which I’m beginning to find out perhaps shouldn’t be a surprise) or when I signed up for Google Apps you didn’t need to do that step. I suspect the former is true.

Setting up email was easy. I just had to modify the Timico hosted zone files so that the MX records pointed at 5 google servers. Once that was done it worked straight away. Simples. I can now add aliases to my heart’s content and because the account was set up before Google started charging it’s all free. Result!

It would appear that I can have up to ten users in the free account which is going to do me for the forseeable future. Not figured out how much storage I get yet but I have over 100GB in my other account thanks to me buying a Chromebook so that should be fine for a couple of years.

I’ve already set up some aliases including one for use in tradeshow registrations that is automatically filtered and archived 😉

Important to make a bit of progress every day and this is progress.

PS As you may have noticed at the top of this post I’m experimenting with new profile pics. Have managed to change my personal gmail pic but struggling with  one for the new trefor.net account. Keeps telling me the jpg photo is an invalid file. Google Apps is great for many things but it ain’t perfect and seems to have plenty of bugs that need kluges to work around. Not figured out a kluge for the profile pic yet.

PPS big thanks to Andy Coyle. Was surprised to hear he has a broad Mancunian accent. Shouldn’t have been because he lives in Manchester but that’s Twitter for you. Andy there will be a beer waiting for you when I come up for UKNOF27. Also you might want to think about using his services especially if you are in the Manchester area. His website is here.

Ciao all.

Categories
Business social networking

twitter vs phone response times

Back in action proper today after the holidays with lots to sort out.  First day in the new office – Sparkhouse business innovation centre at Lincoln University’s Enterprise@Lincoln building. Day one jobs include opening a bank account and stepping up the staff search activity. Christmas got in the way to a large degree. In fact most of December did:)

Over the Christmas break I had occasion to order a takeaway from The Castlegate Indian Restaurant. You know the one. It’s by Lincoln Castle’s Westgate next to the Victoria pub. It was Boxing Day and our son Tom’s birthday. A curry is traditional on this occasion so I rang them at around 10.30 to check that they were open. Nobody answered! Huh!

I checked their website and saw that they didn’t normally open until 4.30pm. Fair enough I thought. I was six hours too early. As an afterthought I dropped them a line on Twitter @CastlegateLincs. We follow each other. Within five minutes I had a response telling me that yes they were indeed open that day.

This for me is a prime example of how communications are going to change, already changing in fact. I can see the day where @CastlegateLincs will hardly ever use the phone. Why should we bother with a phone? It clearly didn’t do the job for me on that occasion. I realise that calls can be forwarded but that didn’t happen.

The phone is also a medium where mistakes can be made, misunderstandings, not hearing someone correctly when they speak their meal requirements. It’s the reason why businesses automate processes, or they should do. Moreover paying someone to answer the phone adds to the overhead of your business. Automation is going to permeate our lives to the extent that we won’t bother dealing with businesses who don’t make themselves easy to interact with. Check out this oldish post re trying to book a dental appointment. Every business, no matter what type, needs to move online.

This blog is an online entity. We haven’t even got a printer. Will have to see how we get on with that one:) There will always be occasions where you need to speak to someone but that doesn’t have to be done using a telephone.

@CastlegateLincoln is a prime example of the trend. Using the telephone I got no response but Twitter worked in very short order. Now they just need an online booking system.

Categories
Business social networking

@ploughpub fires chef just before xmas

Years ago I worked for Marconi Electronic Devices. The company always struggled and a round of layoffs in the run up to xmas was a regular feature of the calendar. They would get the numbers off their books in time for the new FY in April.

Those were pre social media days. A number of unlucky people would be destined for a miserable xmas but it would not be world news.

These days thanks to Twitter bad news like that spreads like wildfire and you can bet your bottom Euro that the whole world would  know about it before getting up in the morning.

Witness the chef of the Plough pub at Great Haseley in Oxfordshire. He was a bit peeved about being given the push just before xmas and because he controlled their twitter account was able to tell tbe world – see @ploughpub or screenshot in case they have removed the “offending” tweets.

I reckon this could be a bit of a publicity stunt mind you. When I looked their website said they had had 3,009 visits in the last 7 days, 2,829 of which had been in the last 24 hours. Maybe they should take on their old chef in a new marketing role and get him to find a replacement person for the kitchen!

One assumes they have another chef lined up for the busiest time of the year. One can’t imagine the pub would have got rid of their old one without having this covered…

image

image

Categories
Business events social networking

#trefbash2013 update

phoenixbar_headerIn my original announcement for #trefbash2013 I said that I wouldn’t be providing any food but that guests could order from the standard menu and pay for their own.

Well I’m pleased to report that due to the generosity of sponsorship this year I have been able to chuck in some nosh so make sure you don’t eat before you come. The menu is below. Just what you need to line the stomach for all that champagne.

Beef Rogan Josh
Chicken Jalfrezi
Vegetable Dhansak

Coriander infused rice

Naan Bread, Mango Chutney, Mint and Yoghurt Raita, Onion, Tomato and Coriander Raita and Lime Pickle

We are also having what is being termed as a “Tref Special”: a separate vindaloo/phal curry sauce for those who wish to try their luck. If you don’t like curry I’m very sorry – there is a kebab shop down the road.

The evening will also feature a very “cool” item – you will have to wait until you get there to see what it is.

Starts at 17.30. Not sure what time to have the food yet – was thinking 20.00 but happy to take advice. Maybe 19.30. We will have the Jeff Brown Quartet to entertain us plus Colin Dudman filling in the gaps on the piano.

Note this event is sold out.

Categories
End User social networking

How do I manage Android phone based interruptions from social media alerts?

pink roseI’ve just realized that my Android phone is interrupting me now as often as the toast popup (or whatever it is called) on the laptop that tells me when a new email is in.

I’m getting notifications for new Google+ alerts, Twitter mentions, follows and Direct Messages, Facebook replies & messages, LinkedIn endorsements (lots of those for some reason), profile views, replies, messages, likes, invitations to connect and comments, email alerts from multiple accounts and plain old fashioned text messages. There is another symbol that I regularly get but can’t remember what that is at the moment. I rarely get a notification from Pinterest mind you (fwiw).

Whenever one of these alerts comes in my phone whistles or vibrates. I then look at it and often follow up by looking on my laptop/Chromebook to see the same information.

We are talking social media overload here. I can live with looking at my phone under the sheets during the night so that my wife doesn’t see the glow but daytime alerts are getting a bit out of hand.

I need help. Help! 🙂

PS inset photo of a rose is purely because when I was looking for a suitable image for this post I came across it and thought it looked nice:)

Categories
Business events social networking

Announcing #trefbash2013

Bar at London's Phoenix Artist ClubThe trefor.net xmas bash 2013 is on Thursday 12th December. This year we are back at SoHo’s Phoenix Artist Club. When you have a winning recipe why change it. We even have the same musical line up with the Jeff Brown quartet and international jazz pianist Colin Dudman. Last year we drank 53 bottles of champagne. That record has to be beaten in 2013.

As usual we have a terrific line up of sponsors, many of who support the event year after year: Timico,NewNetGenband, IPCortex, SiphonProvuAVM, Daisy, imtechict, XConnect, Magrathea and Yealink. We couldn’t have the bash without the help of these great companies.

Jeff Brown at the Phoenix Artist ClubIt’s a 5.30 start until late. Book a hotel room for the night and take the Friday off. This is one hell of a bash. If you haven’t been to a trefbash before you can check out last year’s video here.

Only book a ticket if you plan on coming – this event will be oversubscribed. Note there is going to be an open bar until the not insubstantial kitty runs out. You will be able to order and pay for your own food which is very reasonably priced.

You can book a ticket below or via the eventbrite page. See ya there?

 

Categories
Business social networking

Lead response time – salesforce.com

Salesforce.com sales team very responsive to new leads.

Sat on the sofa last night I was checking out the Salesforce.com social media integration tools. It was preferable to play marketing videos through headphones plugged into my Chromenbook than to listen to inane chatter on the Great British Bakeoff that Mrs Davies was avidly watching (sorry if you are a fan).

In order to access the videos, or to download an ebook on some subject or other I had to fill in a form telling Salesforce.com  who I was. I have often been known to enter email addresses such as [email protected] on such forms though I do tend to find that that one has already been taken. On this occasion I actually wanted to see the vids/download the ebook so I used my real address.

Blow me down if I haven’t just received a sales call from Salesforce.com. Now that is responsiveness to your online lead gathering tool. Impressive. Businesses should take note. Unfortunately for the guy from Salesforce.com I was “in a meeting”.

Categories
Business social networking

10 thousandth comment on blog

10k commentJust noticed that I have had exactly 10k comments on this blog since starting out on 19th May 2008. In that time I would appear to have written 1,703 posts! First one is here if you are mildly interested.

That’s an average of 5.9 comments per post – not bad. If we take out the world record attempt which in the end had 5,573 comments it still makes an average of 2.6 comments per post which does show a not displeasing level of engagement.

This number doesn’t include spam which amounts to hundreds of thousands of comments but which I rarely have to deal with thanks to good ole Akismet.

The ten thousandth comment is one made by Mike B and fwiw can be enjoyed here.

It’s Sunday. Gotta go. It’s a day of rest and I did all my jobs yesterday before going to watch Lincoln RFC beat St Ives in the Intermediate Cup. Well done lads. Lincoln City also won, beating Hyde 3-0. Also well done lads.

Categories
Business Cloud datacentre social networking

First #bloggade a big success

We held the first #bloggade at the Timico datacentre in Newark yesterday. A bloggade is as you may know the collective noun for a group of bloggers.

This first event was highly successful covering a range of blog related subjects:

1 The type of infrastructure used to host blogs (led by Timico hosting tech guru Michael Green) followrd by a guided tour of the Tiico NOC and datacenre.
2 A lengthy discussion on Search Engine Optimisation for your blog conducted by @phil_kelsey of Spiral Media and @mattdrussell of WebbHostingBuzz.
3 A general discussion about plug ins and which ones worked for people.

There was a great level of audience participation and a definite interest in holding another event, sometime in the run up to Christmas perhaps.

For a bit of fun we decided to have a go and see if we could get #bloggade to trend on twitter. Despite our intensive efforts it didn’t seem to be working. Then one of the bloggers suggested that if we tweeted that members of the currently in the news boy band “One Direction” had turned uo for #bloggade it might go viral. We did this and at the latest count have had a grand total of two retweets from (pre-pubescent?) OD fans. 🙂

Gotta say I’d never heard of em before this week!!!

Big thanks to all who came especially @mattdrussell whose original idea this was together with @phil_kelsey @jangles and @AndrewGrill for their major contributions.

All in all considering we organised this from scratch to execution in 4 weeks I have to say it was a great success.

Catch ya later.

PS this post was typed by thumb on my Galaxy s4 en route to a customer meeting in London.  I’d be amazed if the formatting is spot on – I’ll make any necessary adjustments when I get back to laptop land.