Category Archives: cuttings

Evolving English: Mr. Tickle continued…

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"There's a new addition to the Evolving English web pages: an interactive map onto which anyone may upload a recording of their voice. To join in, you'll need access to an iPhone or Android-based smartphone, or a computer with a microphone and an internet connection. The voice map features two specially selected texts for you to read aloud."

One Man and His Blog: Quora: Over-hyped and flooding my in-box

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"Quora is really hyped right now. Every previous Next Big Thing, from blogging, through Flickr, Twitter, Facebook and more has gone through an extended period of quiet use by a small, but steadily growing pool of users and evangelists, before the real mainstream growth kicks in. I've never seen a major Next Big Thing on the web go from zero to hero in about 10 days."

One Man and His Blog: Quora: Over-hyped and flooding my in-box

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"Quora is really hyped right now. Every previous Next Big Thing, from blogging, through Flickr, Twitter, Facebook and more has gone through an extended period of quiet use by a small, but steadily growing pool of users and evangelists, before the real mainstream growth kicks in. I've never seen a major Next Big Thing on the web go from zero to hero in about 10 days."

Guardian: ‘Laughing stock’ libel laws to be reformed, says Nick Clegg

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"Nick Clegg will [on Friday] set out the most ambitious plans yet to relax Britain's libel laws, saying he will back a raft of reforms including a statutory public interest defence. ... Britain will become the first country to ask parliament to set out its libel laws, and provide greater clarity ... He also wants large corporations to show they have suffered substantial damage before they sue individuals and non-governmental organisations. A new limited privilege will be given to newspapers when reporting the proceedings of foreign parliaments."

Flowing Data: This Tract provides a view of Census data on your block

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"This Tract, by Michal Migurski of Stamen, with some help from Craig Mod, lets you view details of your block by way of Census data. It's still using 2000 data but was built in anticipation of the 2010 release, which should come in a couple of months. So we'll probably see some improvements from now until then. Enter your location or browse the slippy map for information on race, income, gender, education, age, and housing. There are also aggregates for your Census tract, county, state, and country."

BBC Open Secrets: Council objections to publication of spending data

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"Ministers have given local authorities a deadline of the end of January to issue online the details of their expenditure on items over £500. The Communities and Local Government department maintains a timeline to display progress towards this. ... But documents obtained by the BBC under freedom of information show some councils have protested to the department about this demand from central government."

Ordnance Survey Blog: Changes to the OS OpenData licence

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"From today, anyone who visits the OS OpenData site, where they can download a wide range of Ordnance Survey mapping for free, will notice something a little different. That’s because we’ve incorporated the Open Government Licence, the new government wide licence, developed by The National Archives, which enables easy access to public sector information."

Daily Mail: Clegg pledges to expand freedom of information

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"Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg told the Daily Mail ... hundreds more taxpayer-funded and charitable bodies should be subject to the transparency of the Freedom of Information Act, which currently applies only to most public authorities. ... Others expected to be dragged into the FOI net are the Local Government Association, the Advertising Standards Authority, Network Rail and even utility companies. ... [And] the length of time government records are kept secret is to be reduced from 30 years to 20, Nick Clegg will announce tomorrow."

FT.com: Digital downloads fail to counter CD decline

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"Sales of music albums in the UK continued to fall in 2010, as a surge in digital album sales failed to offset the decline in CD sales. The data from the Official Charts Company highlights the continuing transformation of the music market, as consumers migrate from CDs to digital downloads and free music streaming services."

paidContent:UK: What HMV Tells Us About the Death of Physical Media Products

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Mark Mulligan of Forrester Research: "HMV ... has announced that it will close 60 of its UK stores following very disappointing Christmas period sales ... The cold snowy weather has been blamed in part, but that is like blaming a common cold for a plague sufferer’s demise. The rot set in long ago and largely (though not entirely) due to factors outside of HMV’s control. HMV is a victim of the Media Meltdown. Consumers are falling out of love with physical media products and unfortunately are not yet anywhere close to entering into whirlwind romances with premium digital products."

currybetdotnet: RSS dead for newspapers? Not at The Guardian it isn’t

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Martin Belam: "RSS didn't catch on as a consumer proposition for a very simple reason. It doesn't solve a problem that most people have. Sure, the beauty of RSS is that it allows you to quickly browse updates to hundreds of different websites, and I'm a Google Reader addict myself, but that is a niche behaviour that is useful for a certain type of web consumer - journalists, PRs, techies and the like."