TechWire

Twitter for beginners

In tomorrow's newspaper, I've written a two-page special feature on how to set up and run a Twitter account.

It includes lists of people to follow, best practice tips and things to avoid. It also includes tips on the best Twitter applications for your mobile phone and desktop Twitter clients.

But I also said I'd post beginner's tutorial video, showing exactly what setting up an account is like. So here it is. Apologies for the poor audio. Note that this is aimed at complete beginners, so Twitter-users won't find it of interest.

The problem with RTE's news website (for other news sites)

[Forgive the length of this post: it is about the future of newspapers, news websites and the increasing anomaly of RTE's online news service.]

What is the point of RTE's news website?

What is its aim? Why was it created? I ask these questions as it is RTE's commercial spin-offs, more than any other entity, that are behind the demise of newspapers' potential survival. Basically, as long as RTE puts up a news and sport website, it is very, very difficult for private sector rivals to create any kind of business model.

I should qualify this statement with two caveats.
(i) As a punter, I like RTE's website. I use it fairly regularly. I'm delighted that there is a free, well-resourced, authoritative news and sport website up there for me to look at.
(ii) I also do not think that private sector media institutions have any 'right' to exist, any more than another private sector entity. Mostly, the private sector media exists to make money. For all the fine words about ethics and standards, that takes precedence. So I shed no tears for the 'rights' of private sector newspapers, including my own.

That being said, we all need to re-examine what it is we want from a free media. do we want less newspapers, less media organisations, less diversity?

If the answer is yes, I have no problem with that. It is an entirely fair position. Arguably, there are far too many newspapers at present. In Ireland, for example, we have nine national daily titles. Nine! For a population of four million, that's probably too many.

However, we need to get this out in the open. And know this: the fewer newspapers there are, the more powerful the remaining few become. For all the bumbling and crass stories that newspapers -- especially tabloids -- produce, there is a balance struck in the competition between them.

For all the titles he owns, Tony O'Reilly is nowhere near as powerful in Ireland as Rupert Murdoch is in Britain or Silvio Berlusconi is in Italy. That is largely down to the diversity of the press and the number of titles.

But back to RTE.ie. Many people might assume that RTE's website is part of the broadcaster, funded by the licence fee. It is not. It is, in fact, a commercial spin-off of RTE. In essence, it is little difference from a private company that has won a franchise to use RTE's brand.

Why is that significant?

Because it creates a crucial difference between a public service broadcasting ethic, which is the purpose of RTE and the BBC, and just another private company trying to make as much money as it can. RTE's website arguably falls into the latter category.

What's wrong with that, you might ask?

This: the website is constantly promoted on RTE news bulletins, TV and radio shows. If you were to put an advertising value on the plugs that the commercial, non-public service RTE website gets, it would surely run into the tens of millions, annually. What is more, no other media website would be allowed even to pitch their website being plugged on the Nine O'Clock News.

Then there is the issue of the vast resources given -- for free -- to this private sector, commercial spin-off.

The RTE website runs stories, video clips and bulletins created by the licence-fee resourced public service wing of RTE. It takes some €300,000 of your licence-fee money to pay Ryan Tubridy's salary. And millions more for the news staff. This commercial entity -- RTE's website -- gets all of it for free. The vast sums that are required to fund a correspondent going to Haiti (amounts beyond the wildest dreams of any private sector entity) are written off as freebies to RTE's site.

Remember: the website is not part of RTE's public service; it is a commercial spin-off, created to make money. Keep that in mind the whole time.

At this point, you're probably thinking: yeah, yeah, we see your point. But who cares? At least we're getting some decent quality stuff online for free…
I can understand that. And, as a punter, I think it's a big benefit. But surely RTE needs to either:

(a) Subsume the website into its main organisation properly
or
(b) start asking the commercial spin-off website to pay for the astounding advertising and resources it currently gets for free, to the huge competitive disadvantage of other media organisations.

I would be happy with either outcome. However, I do not think that there is a hope hell of either happening.

One of the reasons that options (a) won't happen is that RTE would have to start paying online staff similar rates as the offline radio and television staff. At present, RTE, like some other large media institutions, classifies this work on its website as 'kind of' journalists. Despite the fact that hundreds of thousands of people read and see their work, they 'only' work for the interweb product. Which, as I have pointed out, is not 'really' RTE. It's the commercial spin-off thingy.

If you asked most people, they would probably say that they imagine that the website is "part of RTE". In other words, it is a public service, run for the benefit of the country. If it were a public service, run for the benefit of the country, no private sector could have any complaints. But it is not. Sooner or later, this is going to become an issue.

Here is the CRO News: we're working to rule

The Companies Registration Office puts out a monthly 'ezine' outlining various issues, upgrades and resolutions.

Increasingly, it seems to be more about the things it can't do than the things it can. In particular, it has begun to note all of the disruptions that will occur because of the ongoing unrest in the civil service.

Guess they're showing us private sector muppets how crucial they are to the economy by preventing us setting up new companies (which will ultimately pay their salaries).

Vodafone Ireland readies its national launch of the iPhone

Vodafone Ireland will officially launch the iPhone to its customers within a couple of weeks.

Although the operator has been giving iPhones to select customers for over two months, it has not had the stocks nor the back-end infrastructure in place to make it available nationally. That will change over the next couple of weeks. There's no word yet on pricing.

From Vodafone's perspective, it is now crucial that it finally release an iPhone: O2 has recently improved its iPhone offering (including tethering support) in a bid to hoover up as many iPhone customers as possible before another operator starts to make it available.

Why Irish bloggers and Tweeters swoon when celebrities look their way

Two cases in point: George Hook and Ryan Tubridy.

1. George Hook
George is an ego-centric man who presents radio items as if he himself is part of the story. (Never more so than at Barack Obama's inauguration, where at least half of the show was about how he, himself, was feeling about it all.)
He is also fond of berating the little or the powerless guy (as I have personally witnessed). He rarely takes on powerful figures. In other words, he is a bit of an ass. Twitter-folk can see this. And they used to comment accordingly. Until, that is, George entered Twitter. Then, would-be critics started to fawn at his feet. Imagine! A celebrity! And he's talking to me!

2. Ryan Tubridy
In a fairly brutal profile piece (can't find link) last Sunday, Liam Fay described Ryan Tubridy as a "facsimile" of the talkshow presenters he aspires to imitate. In doing so, Fay concluded, Tubridy was not the new Gay Byrne, but the new Marty Whelan.
Whether this is an accurate description or not, Tubridy is clearly a bright, witty man. He is also hard-working and capable. But he plays to the mob (which is grey-haired, as he sees it) in a cringing way. Part of this act is to be sceptical of technology. Handily, this suits his audience, the majority of which are most likely over 45.
Another part is to protest about celebrities' privacy, in particular his own. He often says that  he cannot understand why anyone would be interested in his private life. The fact that he spends half his shows asking people about their private lives is, presumably, beside the point.
But sometimes, this mask slips and the act falls flat on its face. For example, I will never forget the moment where, upon learning that Amy Huberman's ancestors were Jewish, his first question to her was: "have you been to Auschwitz?" Nor the time when he asked a group of former anorexics why they couldn't have "taken up a hobby" instead of anorexia.
Many on Twitter see this side to Ryan. And they talk about it. But they won't anymore. That's because Ryan has started to tweet himself.
Yes, having spent over a year rubbishing the forum, claiming it was purely for trivia-obsessed narcissists, he has jumped on the bandwagon.
And how Irish Twitter will love it.
Now, there'll be little criticism. Only fluttering eyelashes. And claps on the back.
Bloggers and Twitterati, for all their pretensions, are no different from the rest of the mob. Thrilled when a celebrity spits on them.

10 must-read Twitter rules for Irish politicians

Over the past week, Twitter has emerged as a serious political tool in Ireland.

But, for the most part, Irish politicians using Twitter employ it as a bland diary record. Worse still, they don't actually post themselves, leaving it to an assistant (which becomes completely transparent).

One British Labour MP, Tom Harris, takes a different approach. He uses Twitter (and his blog) properly. And he has come up with 10 rules for politicians who want to use Twitter credibly. They should be nailed to the wall of every political PR office in Ireland. Here they are.

1. Don’t just broadcast – engage. Politicians who use social media to let everyone know what they think but who don’t even respond to others’ views are doing themselves no favours.

2. Do it yourself. I cannot emphasise this strongly enough: if you have a Twitter account, never let anyone else Tweet on your behalf. Without authenticity, your Twittering is valueless (at least, that’s what I told Tom yesterday when I offered to write this for him…).

3. Don’t Tweet and drink. Should be self-evident, but you’d be surprised how many are tempted. If you’re out for a drink, don’t even check your Twitter account for updates, lest ye be tempted to reply, however entertaining the results would be for the rest of us, and for the media (see numbers 9 and 10).

4. Argue by all means, but avoid being offensive. Respond with a pithy or sarcastic comment if you’re provoked, but be more measured than your critics.

5. Avoid giving your diary details – nothing to do with security, it’s just dull. “Just had a very productive meeting with a really worthy organisation” might be of interest to members of that worthy organisation and to both of the constituents who follow your Twitter feed, but not to the rest of us. Also, avoid inane greetings and sign-offs: “Morning Tweeps!” No-one cares. Really, they don’t.

6. Don’t split your message over more than one Tweet. This is simply bad Twitter etiquette. The value of Twitter is in the discipline required to say what you want to say in 140 characters or fewer. If you want to write an essay, use a blog.

7. Tempting though it is to insist on getting the last word in a Twitter exchange, it’s often more gracious to leave that to your critics.

8. Don’t block followers. There are some real morons out there who get off on sending abusive Tweets, particularly to politicians. They wear the “blocked by an MP” badge with pride. Far better to ignore them completely. Believe me, that will annoy them far more than blocking them will.

9. Always assume that whatever you Tweet will be read by the news editor of the Daily Mail. Because that assumption will be correct. Speak your Tweets out loud, preferably to a third party, before you post. If you have any doubts about whether it will be misinterpreted, then err on the side of caution.

10. If you wake to find an army of reporters, photographers and camera crews outside your home, it could be a sign that you need to rethink your new media strategy.

Chat Roulette: don't go there (NSFW)

Many of you may have heard of Chat Roulette.

It's supposed to be a 'mind-expanding exercise' where people of the world can interface and 'exchange cultural viewpoints' over text conversations. A video of you and the stranger you're talking to appear beside each other.

Predictably, it's purely a repository of freaks, drunks and Manxmen.

And to all you lonely blokes out there: the only women online are in gangs, sitting around their computers giggling.

In the interest of science, I went on for about 90 seconds to see what it was like. The experience was typically nuts. WARNING: person number 2 is NOT SAFE FOR WORK.

How to annoy business contacts: hide your email address

Today, I attempted to email someone in the tech industry. Knowing his company website's URL, I assumed that if I simply put his first name in front of it (eg Sean@company.ie), that this would do the trick. Wrong.
"UNDELIVERABLE," tutted my 'system administrator'.
Okay, I thought, let's try firstname.lastname @ his URL. That's a format sometimes used.
"UNDELIVERABLE," shouted the sys admin, getting irritable now.
Cursing lowly under my breath, I went to the company's website to look for the email address.
30 seconds in, I realised my mistake -- this is an Irish website! There is no section on 'Who We Are', let alone individual contact details!
Off to Google, then, to search for his email address. Nothing in the first 20 results, despite plenty of mentions in associations, organisations and other vanity projects.
In the end, I had to do what thousands of Irish people end up doing: I rang the company, spoke to a receptionist and asked for his email address.
"Hold on a minute, I'll just see if I can give that out," said the receptionist. One minute on hold. Two minutes on hold.
Finally: "yes, hello? Yes, his email address is…" And I got it.
(And the combination? It was firstname_underscore_lastname @ URL. Pathetic.)
This person represents himself as an up-and-coming technology industry player. Yet he's not on Twitter. He's not on Facebook (that I can find). And his email address is not on his company's website. And his email address cannot be guessed according to the usual rules.
My advice to him? Put your damn email address on your website.

What Panasonic plans for Ireland

Walk into any big Irish electronics store: chances are it'll be dominated by Samsung, Sony, Canon or LG.

Panasonic doesn't seem to be on the radar with the punters of Power City. Perhaps this is because its stuff is pretty high-end.

Nevertheless, I've had a good root through the stuff Panasonic will be launching on the Irish market this year, thanks to a big tech conference I'm at in Munich. It's impressive.

What's on offer is three things: 3D HD televisions, 3D Blu-Ray players and some new camera equipment.

The 3D tellies aren't especially unique, with Sony, Toshiba, LG and Samsung all doing them too. Its Blu-Ray 3D players are interesting, though. Firstly, because there are 31 3D titles coming out in 2010, most of them blockbusters. Secondly, because Panasonic has gotten the start-up time of its Blu-Ray payers down to seven seconds. (My current Sony model -- which is two years old -- takes about 35 seconds to start up.)

The best of the rest is the HDV cam that will shoot in 3D and a couple of Lumix compact digital cameras.

There's also a range of iPod/iPhone docks, which I didn't know Panasonic was into. Here are two of them that I had a short play with: the SC-HC3 (€200)

and the quite lovely SP100 (€140).

Video review: HTC HD2 (Windows Mobile)

I had this amazing smartphone for a fortnight.

In that time, I loved some things about it (its 4.3 inch screen, its slim design, its speed and its Sense user-interface). I was less enthused about one or two features, mainly that its operating system still lacks the fluency of iPhone and Android. It's available from €50 on an O2 billpay contract.

(Please forgive the modest quality of the videocamera: we await restitution of our proper HDV-cam.)

 

A sexy Windows Mobile phone? Some mistake, surely?

Nope. That'll be HTC's HD2.

This Sunday, I'll have a lengthy, hands-on review of what is undoubtedly the finest Windows Mobile smartphone ever made. And yes, that statement does come with a huge caveat. And yes, that caveat is that Windows Mobile devices have sucked for the past five years.

In a nutshell, here's what's good about the handset:

-- gorgeous touchscreen (4.3 inches, capacitative)

-- superfast, thanks to 1Ghz Snapdragon processor

-- flawless Exchange synchronisation and best-in-class Mobile Office applications

However, it's not all roses, as you'll see in Sunday's review.

O2 Ireland finally allows laptop 'tethering' with iPhones

It's been a long time coming, but O2 has finally moved to allow its iPhone customers use their iPhones as broadband modems for their laptops.

You can simply pair the devices using Bluetooth or an iPhone dock.

Naturally, this doesn't apply to all IPhone plans (no pre-pay customers need apply, for example). And even for O2 contract customers, knowing which plan you can use it with and how much you can use is a muddy process.

O2 has put up an FAQ section on the issue here.

 

The iPad cost breakdown: >100% profit for Apple?

Gizmodo (and numerous others) report on iSuppli's analysis of the iPad's manufacturing cost, based on the breakdown of its physical components. Its conclusion: Apple will make super-profits on the device. Here's the chart as reproduced by Gizmodo.

Unboxed: Nokia's N900

Nokia's much-anticipated N900 just landed on my desk.

Why much-anticipated? Because it's the first high-end Nokia since forever to use a non-Symbian operating system. The 'new' system is a Linux flavour called Maemo. No review here yet, or even first impressions, as I've yet to charge it...

As far as I know, it's not yet supported by any Irish operators (*correction -- Vodafone has it here for €270-€330 on contract -- thanks for correction, Jim!). However, you can buy it online for between €500 and €600, unlocked.

For the record, here are a few of its specs (plenty more here):

-- 3.5 inch touch-screen display
-- Slide-out Qwerty keyboard
-- 32GB internal storage
-- Up to 1GB of application memory
-- 5 Megapixel camera

The world's most generic news report

This has been doing the rounds for the past couple of weeks. But it's really worth looking at for anyone who missed it.

Charlie Brooker's Newswipe is on BBC 4 on Thursday nights.