Getting Ink

Movie project: March update

So, some of you will know already that I'm on a mission this year to watch 100 new movies. (I was going to get fit, but really, how common is that?)

Since my last update, I've been really busy with some work stuff and some life stuff, so movie watching has taken a bit of a dip, but this month I've managed to see Man on Wire (the first film in a long time that made me shout HOLY MOSES out loud. Seriously, it's jaw-dropping), Etre et Avoir, Spellbound (those two are both cheats because I've seen them before and they are much loved old favourites).

Next, I watched Persepolis (stunning, really much better than I expected) and half of A Complete History of My Sexual Failures, which was really interesting but actually became so completely excruciating about two thirds of the way through that I had to turn it off, and haven't been able to make myself watch the end yet, not even through my fingers. I know, I'm a complete wuss.

I'm really keen for some British film recommendations - my viewing so far has been pretty skewed towards French and American cinema.

So, any ideas?

Moving from BT to Virgin Media: not as easy as you might imagine

PLEASE NOTE: ANYONE WHO THINKS USING BLOGS AS A PLATFORM TO RANT ABOUT POOR PERSONAL SERVICE, PLEASE LOOK AWAY NOW.

THOSE OF YOU STILL WITH ME: DON'T SAY YOU WEREN'T WARNED.

So, a few months back, I thought I would look at ways to reduce my fixed costs - it's a recession, I'm a business, makes sense, right?

One of my major costs is comms - I am paying around about £120 a month to BT for phone and Internet service. Virgin Media's website claimed I could get the same service with unlimited, free phone calls for just £9.99 a month. Annual saving £1200. Result.

I call Virgin Media and ask them for phone and ADSL service. I get a MAC code from BT, and it all seems to go smoothly until suddenly, Virgin takes £188 from my bank account, claiming the order was cancelled.

I call back, discuss it with a very nice lady, who advises me to just place another order – I’m also told to reclaim the £188 from my bank (top tip: you can reclaim any direct debit if the company shouldn’t have taken it) The nice lady tells me the new order will be up and running ASAP.

I don’t hear anything until this week when – guess what – Virgin takes another £188 from my bank. Weird. So I call, thinking maybe the second order has been cancelled or something and a chap called Robert (“We’re not authorised to disclose our last names”) asks me for my password.

This is where it all starts to go a bit wrong.

“Well, I don’t have a password, actually. As I explained, I’m with BT, and seem to still be with BT, but Virgin has taken £188 from my account today, and I’m confused as to why.”

Robert asks for my password. When I tell him again that I don't have one, he seems a bit stumped. “Okay, can I just have the date of your last bill and the amount?”

“My BT bill?”

“No, your Virgin bill.”

“I’ve never had a bill. I don’t have a Virgin account. I've never had anything - no router, no password, no user name, nothing. That's the point - I think my order must have been cancelled."

“We don't send out bills,” says Robert, slowly, guessing quite correctly that I am educationally sub-normal and incapable of rational thought.  "It's in the e-service area."

"The what?" (See?  Clearly, I am a moron)

Robert repeats himself, although he knows by now he's on to a loser. I am far too stupid to understand what the e-service area is, and he's had enough. "I'm sorry," he says. "I can't discuss it any more."

"What??”

“You failed data protection.” 

Turns out Robert can’t discuss the matter, can’t pass me on to anyone who can discuss the matter or even discuss why he can’t discuss the matter – until I pass data protection. And, as Robert told me, I failed. I am a data protection failure. That hurts.

To pass data protection, you need a password. I, friends, do not have a password.

So, how do I get a password? “I can get one in the post to you, and you should have it within five working days,” says Robert, quite rightly bored to the verge of coma by this point.

So, now I'm waiting a week for a password to an account I don't have, to call a company that doesn't provide me with any services to try and find out why they took £188 of my hard-earned for cancelling a service that I never had in the first place.

I can’t wait.

[UPDATE: I have to add that someone at Virgin Media was in touch within minutes of my referring to the company as 'incompetent fuckwits' on Twitter, and a nice chap called Alex has promised to look into it for me. If nothing else, it shows they're responsive - fingers crossed it works!]

So, you want to be a journalist?

I'm kind of fascinated to learn that tech PR Alexandra Pullin (author of the Wages of Spin blog) has left PR to try her hand at journalism. She says that since she likes writing and editing copy more than anything else, journalism seems like a logical next step. I wish her lots of luck, and I'm confident she'll make a great success of her new career.

It made me think about a conversation I had recently with a friend. Her daughter is about to head off to University, and would like to become a journalist. She asked my advice on what her daughter should do to increase her chances of getting into the media. And it made me wonder - hand on heart, would I recommend anyone embark on a career in journalism today?

Of course, I'm basically not qualified to do anything apart from journalism, and also - I sort of hate most jobs - so journalism and me are pretty much stuck with each other. But what about people who have other options? This is a time when journalists are being laid off left, right and centre; newspapers are apparently on their last legs and freelance rates are dropping off a cliff. Indeed, one magazine editor said someone looking to break into journalism should expect to work for free for two years. Yes, you read that right - TWO YEARS. Jesus.

I told my friend's daughter that journalism wasn't a career for people who love writing - because your precious words will get chopped and butchered by subs and editors, ripped apart by an editor, mangled by some ad sales guy, and will eventually be scorned by thousands of readers. And that's on a good day.

If you want to be a journalist, my advice is: understand it's a business not an artistic enterprise (seriously, outside of Vanity Fair, nobody gives a toss if you can write beautifully) and prepare for a future that isn't on paper.

Top 100 British Parent Blogs and Bloggers

I've been doing some PR (seriously, in the loosest possible meaning of the word) for a company called Talking Tots lately, which provides pre-school activity classes. One of the things I've been trying to do is identify the key parent blogs and bloggers in the UK.

Of course I found there are thousands of blogs and no easy way to know which are most popular influential, so I started to think about how to rate the blogs I found. At this point, I must confess Brendan Cooper provided stacks of advice and support in helping me to create a top 100 British parenting blogs index. Basically, if I hadn't already promised my firstborn to the Amish, Brendan would be a shoo-in. Thanks, Mr C.

On the basis lots of other people probably come up against the same problem I did, I thought I'd share our data here. Enjoy.

The Tots100 Top British Parent Blogs and Bloggers:

Rank	Blog	Score
1	Petite Anglaise	741
2	Wife in the North	718
3	Jo Beaufoix	701
4	Alpha Mummy	696
5	My Boyfriend is a Twat	687
6	Crystal Jigsaw	681
7	Babyccino	670
8	A Modern Mother	640
9	Single Parent Dad	629
10	Notes from Inside my Head	610
11	The Potty Diaries	608
12	Bambino Goodies	597
13	The Bedside Crow	591
14	Man About the House	568
15	Woman of Experience	562
16	Bringing up Charlie	559
17	Millennium Housewife	522
18	Sticky Fingers	520
19	Noble Savage	517
20	Dulwich Mum	508
21	Little Mummy	507
22	Flower Fairies and Fairy Cakes	507
23	A Midwife's Muse	504
24	3 Kids, No Job	500
25	Mother at Large	499
26	Cotton Pickin' Days	498
27	Family Affairs	483
28	Menopausal Old Bag	475
29	Diary of a Desperate Exmoor Woman	472
30	Musings of a Juggling Mother	467
31	Home Office Mum	465
32	Breastfeeding Mums' Blog	461
33	Working Mum on Verge	449
34	Thames Valley Mums	446
35	Nappy Valley	445
36	More Than Just a Mother	442
37	Violet Posy	441
38	Nunhead Ramblings	432
39	You've Got Your Hands Full	428
40	Are We Nearly There Yet, Mummy?	405
41	Dulwich Divorcee	395
42	The Bush Babies	390
43	Family of Five	383
44	WAHM-BAM	382
45	Don't Panic - RTFM	379
46	I Promise That I Will Do My Best	378
47	My Life Now	367
48	A Confused Take That Fan	366
49	Single and Surviving	363
50	The Brinkster	362
51	Mom or Mum Wars	359
52	Most/Least	355
53	Good Enough Mum	323
54	Not Supermum	318
55	Suffolk Writings	313
=56	Posh Mum	311
=56	The Smell of Little Pong	311
58	Family Friendly Working	300
59	Keir Royale	286
60	39 and Counting	283
61	Motherhood: the final frontier	279
62	Tales from the Naughty Step	277
63	Married with Four	260
64	Mrs Trefusis	259
65	Mothers on the Verge	258
66	The Baby Juggler	255
67	Being Lucy Diamond	254
68	Miss Meep's Guide to Living	253
69	Teen Coach Blog	244
70	Lemon Drizzle	241
71	Arabella Miller	235
72	Family Relationships	229
73	Positive Parenting	222
74	Chunky Monkey	202
=75	Is that me? How did that happen?	198
=75	More to Life than Laundry	198
77	View from Nappy Mountain	189
78	Mothers Who Work	186
79	Little Sheep Learning	184
80	Totsy's Place	183
81	Diary of a Surprise Mum	179
82	Rosie Scribble	177
83	Pink Fairy Cake	172
84	Don't Tear Your Hair Out	171
=85	Motherworld	166
=85	Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em	166
87	Family Treehouse	149
88	Adventures of a Sleepless Toddler	133
89	Mummo Mia	128
90	Music Bugs	125
91	It's a Mum's Life	123
92	Milky Moo	119
93	Jessica's Trust	118
94	Sleepy Tots Blog	91
95	Perfectly Happy Mum	74
=96	Amanda's Adventures in Chocolate	63
=96	Pixie Minx	63
98	Mum's the Business	61
99	Tots 2 Travel	54
100	Time Management Mum	43

What Do The Scores Mean?

250 blogs were originally included in the index. Of these, 130 didn't meet the qualifying criteria, often because they weren't updated, or because they were not British. 120 did meet the criteria, and were analysed as follows: each blog was assigned a score from 1 (bottom ranked) to 120 (top ranked) in seven categories:

1. Technorati Authority: number of blogs linking to this blog in the last six months
2. Technorati Inlinks: number of inbound links, excluding self-referring hits
3. Yahoo Inlinks: number of inbound links in last six months (excl self-referring hits) 
4. Google Blogsearch Hits: number of posts/links/weblinks in Google
5. Google Blogsearch Hits Recent: number of links from the last 30 days
6. Readers: number of subscribers based on Google Reader
7. HowSociable: the blogger's visibility outside the blog, measuring activity on sites such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

Each metric was evenly weighted, and the totals added to create an overall score. This meant a blog scoring the highest score in each of these categories would achieve a maximum score of 840 points. The lowest possible score was 7.

These aren't perfect metrics but I figure that combining measurements from Google, Technorati and Yahoo ensures an accurate reflection of a blog's influence, while the inclusion of HowSociable clearly showed how the top bloggers use social media to boost their blog's profile.

I would welcome suggestions of how to improve the Index, as well as suggestions of blogs to include in the updated index. The criteria for inclusion are simple: the blog must be by/about parents, be written by a British parent or a parent in the UK, and just needs to score higher than someone already in the index. Just leave a link to your blog in the comments, and we'll add it to the mix next time.

Trouble with the maths, lads?

Read the headline. Then the standfirst. Do those numbers add up? Of course, your average Daily Mail reader might have no problem believing that 70% of kids don't speak English...

Oh, so *that's* where my sparky edge got to.

It has been said lately, by the likes of Wadds and Katie Moffat, that I seem to have mislaid my sparky edge. Apparently, I've been quite calm and reasonable and - whisper it - even nice to PRs using social media.

I couldn't quite put my finger on what might have happened to rob me of my sparky edge. I still have the same combination of lovely versus basically psychotic clients, I still have far too much work and not enough life ... what's new?

Then I figured it out. I haven't used Response Source* in a while.

Oh yes, friends. Response Source, from what I can tell from recent experience, is where The Stupid People go to die. Some of the world's most stupid people can be found on Response Source. They like to hang out there and send spectacularly stupid, annoying emails to people like me, who don't even have the time to fully enjoy the slack-jawed, empty-headedness on display. 

I was working on a feature Friday - short deadline - and I needed examples of youth projects where technology had been used to engage young people in sport, exercise and healthy living. So I put out a quick response on RS, asking for people who knew about such projects to drop me a line. Having used RS in the past, I even put TECHNOLOGY in capital letters to make it, you know, stand out a bit. Cos it's sort of important to the feature topic.

So, why, why, why, do I get email responses like this?

PR: Further to your request for info on projects that engage young children in health and exercise, I can put you in touch with headteacher  XXXX, at XXX, Tel: XXX XXX XXXX, who will be able to help.

I reply: Can you tell me a bit more about this before I call?

PR: Hi Sally, I've just been chatting to the head and I'm afraid they don't do anything that ties in with your feature. Kind regards, XXXX

Some responses remembered the TECHNOLOGY but not the health and fitness bit. As in:

Hi Sally, I have seen your response source for schools and community groups that have used TECHNOLOGY to improve engagement. [seriously, I love that the PR person capped it up, to help me out]. Our client, XXX, recently supplied a UK school with 150 XXXX, which are used in the school's creative suite for graphic design and cartooning. I thought I'd drop you a line to see if this was the kind of thing you're looking for..."

Well, in so far as it has naff all to do with health OR fitness, no, it's not really what I'm looking for. Should've capped that bit up too, obviously.

Seriously, while none of this is the end of the world, sending this sort of stuff really does make me roll my eyes and think, "Wow, [insert sender's name here] really isn't that bright." And that's not what you want to be top of my mind the day you send a completely brilliant pitch that I delete because, guess what, I think you're a muppet.

* Disclaimer: Other media request services exist, idiots may be found using any one of these services.

Customer service even applies in journalism, you know?

Sometimes when you're a journo, it's tempting to imagine we don't need to sully ourselves with commercial concerns like quoting for business, providing good customer service and managing our suppliers.

But when times are lean, it's all about providing good customer service to the clients you have. After all, I've written enough articles to know it costs a lot more to find a new customer than it costs to keep an old customer happy.  Happily, in journalism, good customer service is easy:

• Don't call your editor an idiot. Even if they are. (I once did refer to an editor as an idiot in an email to a sub-editor. She forwarded the email to the editor. I lost the gig. Lesson learned: Don't call the editor an idiot, especially if it's true. Also: never trust a sub.
• Don't blow the deadline. And if you're going to bust the deadline, let the editor know as soon as you possibly can. As an editor (a hat I wear briefly rarely) I'd always prefer to have 24 hours to plug a gap than 20 minutes.
• Be flexible on prices. Not everyone can afford to keep paying the rates they paid 2 years ago. Smaller companies and charities don't have the same resources as multinationals. If your client's supplier cuts rates, your client will cut rates. Deal with it.

So basically, you know, be a reasonable person, do the job, try to provide good value. I'd have thought this was a no-brainer, until I saw Nick's post about a freelancer who responded to a job opportunity with a one-line email saying "What are the rates?" Not smart. Read the full post here.

PR and journalism: almost exactly the same. Only different.

So Wadds told me via Twitter yesterday that too much social media is making me lose my "sparky edge" (though can I just say how much I adore the idea that I used to have one) when I could only muster mild irritation at the PR who sent me a 7MB attachment to accompany a press release titled "Official Opening of New Church Shop", so I thought it was time for a good old "PRs, aren't they rubbish, eh?" blog post.

Luckily, there's never a shortage of material for that kind of post.

Jed Hallam reckons that PR and journalism are pretty much the same job. I can see where he's coming from: both hacks and flacks are about communicating, about building stories and making them interesting to the intended audience. However, scratch a little deeper and you'll find actually, PR and journalism have five fundamental differences:

1. PRs have to be nice to people. It's in the job description. This is why my career ambitions have never included "public relations". I like being a journalist and reserving the right to tell particularly annoying people that I hope Dante comes up with another circle of Hell with their name on it.
2. When you're a PR, your job is ultimately to further your client's business goals - usually to sell stuff. If you're a journalist, your job is generally to provide information that is useful to the reader. Sometimes those two goals align, sometimes not. But, within certain constraints, my job is to serve the reader. Your job is to serve The Man.
3. As a PR person you always have the option to play the 'no comment' card. Strikes aside, journalists have to come up with something to write about for any story. Although I have to say, when it's writing a hard-hitting expose of the flawed introduction of the Euro symbol on printers, it's a challenge.
4. We can sneak out of press conferences and nobody minds. Try doing THAT if you're a PR attending your client's boring product announcement.
5. Being good at PR needs interpersonal skills. Success in journalism is (to the best of my knowledge) not a problem for those with borderline personality disorders. I remember once sitting in an interview where my editor actually questioned whether the chap we'd just met might be a serial killer. Seriously - it was a definite possibility. But that was NO reason whatsoever not to hire him to work on a major weekly magazine.

Friends don't let friends Tweet when cross.

One of the best lessons I ever learned is that the crosser you are, the more vital it is you should step away from the computer. Or any other Internet-enabled device. To be fair, I learned the lesson the hard way by sending a profane, insulting email referring to someone's personal life to a random PR person (it was meant for someone else, but the Outlook address auto-complete thing didn't know that), but it's a good lesson to learn before completely humiliating yourself like I did.

So learn from this experience - a National Post reporter completely losing it on Twitter with an interviewee complete with three uses of 'f*ck u' and a couple of other random insults. The reporter in question, David George-Cosh, deleted the exchange, but as Twitter users know, deleted posts are archived by Google, and also available using the Twitter search tool.

The important thing to remember about Twitter is you never know who's reading - for starters, someone doesn't have to be on your follower list to see your posts. Even if they are, who remembers all their followers? Once I got past 50 or so, I couldn't have told you who most of my followers are, except the 20 or so I regularly get into conversations with online. (incidentally, I'm on Twitter here)

Thanks to Ed Lee for pointing out the story.

Let's do away with Monday morning blues

Over recent weeks, I've been playing around and looks at various online music services including last.fm, Spotify and Pandora. I must admit, I love Spotify so much I've virtually stopped using iTunes in the office.

One neat feature of Spotify is the ability to create and share playlists. So on Friday afternoon Katie Moffat was looking for recommendations of new songs, and I was able to share my playlist over Twitter. In return, Adam at RealWire shared his excellent playlist with us.

Seeing Adam's recommendations reminded me of some old favourite tracks I hadn't listened to for ages, as well as some new ideas. So here's my thought: what's your ideal Friday playlist? Here's mine, and I'd love recommendations for next Friday and I'm tagging Louise, Jed, Chris and Anne if they're up for the challenge? 25 tracks for a Friday afternoon.

For those of you without Spotify, my playlist looks like this:

1. Sex on Fire, Kings of Leon
2. Supermassive Black Hole, Muse,
3. Under the Bridge , Red Hot Chili Peppers
4. Lithium, Nirvana
5. Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) , Green Day
6. Here Comes Your Man, Pixies
7. It's the End of the World as we Know it , REM
8. Lullaby, the Cure
9. Blasphemous Rumours, Depeche Mode 
10. Enola Gay, OMD
11. Pretty in Pink, Psychedelic Furs
12. You and Me Song, the Wannadies
13. Days Like These, Van Morrison
14. Catch the Wind, Donovan
15. Stop This Train, John Mayer
16. Big Yellow Taxi, Joni Mitchell
17. Alive, Pearl Jam
18. Creep, Radiohead
19. Love Breaks Down, Prefab Sprout
20. Forgetful, Frazier Chorus
21. Free Fallin', John Mayer
22. Cross Your Fingers, Laura Marling
23. Baby, You're My Light, Richard Hawley
24. Hallelujah, Jeff Buckley
25. Will's Lullaby, Joshua Radin