Episode 7 of Stilgherrian Live Alpha has been recorded and is now online. Enjoy.
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I’ve previously called Vodafone “brain-dead” because they don’t redirect the misspelt version of their web address and couldn’t respond intelligently when I told them about it. But now… [sigh]
A fortnight ago there was confusion over Vodafone’s plans for the iPhone. Were data charges included in the cap or not? Vodafone’s “explanation” seemed to contradict their published terms a conditions.
Even though all their previous plans allowed data to be included within the cap, billed at $1 per 5 minutes of connection, Vodafone reckons that for the iPhone it’s billed separately. Can anyone give a rational explanation for why the data should be more expensive if the device happens to be an iPhone?
Other than price-gouging, that is.
After all, if your mobile device is a laptop they’ll sell you 5GB/month for $39! Given that Telstra and Optus had already announced their pricing, Vodafone could have scooped them both with a better package, rather than looking like a greedy also-ran.
So with this background, I was… erm… thrilled to receive my phone bill this month.
[This article was first published in Crikey yesterday. I've added some follow-up comments at the end.]
Let’s sing along with Senator Conroy! You’ve got to accentuate the positive / Eliminate the negative / Latch on to the affirmative…
[On Monday] our Minister for Broadband was “encouraged” that lab tests of ISP-level Internet filters showed “significant progress” since 2005, and The Australian had him declaring the trial a success. But if you actually dig into the full report [2.8MB PDF] things aren’t so rosy.
Yes, on average filters might be more accurate than three years ago and have less impact on Internet speeds — well, at least for the six filters actually tested of the 26 put forward. But it’s about them being not quite as crap as before.
[This article was first published in Crikey yesterday. As I write this, the affected MobileMe customers are still without email.]
As the hype surrounding the god-like iPhone slowly, oh so slowly fades, a problem emerges from the shadows…
Apple’s subscription email service .Mac was rebranded MobileMe to coincide with the iPhone 3G launch. Existing customers have been moved to the new platform, but for some (Apple claims 1%) it’s a disaster. They’ve been unable to use email for five days — not from their Macs, not from their iPhones, not via the web. And that’s not the only problem. As .Mac user Ed Dale said, “Not pleasant to log in and see four years of mail gone.”
Crikey‘s First Dog on the Moon, also a MobileMe-er, says “it’s been crap”.
It’s a lame excuse to link to Bill Wyman’s old song, but I am actually very happy to have been translated into French and quoted in Le Monde.
In his column Transnets, Francis Pisani‘s article Blogalaxie/4: “futur des médias” et “rumeurs” quotes my rant about journalism from last week.
Ils ont parlé de la “tension artificielle” blogueurs-journalistes qui, selon Stephen Collins occupe trop de place (voir ce qu’en ont écrit Narvic et Éliane Fiolet sur Transnets).
J’ai bien aimé cette phrase du blogueur australien Stilgherrian: “Ce qui est fatiguant dans cette fausse dichotomie c’est qu’elle compare les idéaux les plus élevés du journalisme et le degré le plus bas du blogging personnel.”
Et ce petit avis aux journalistes traditionnels: “La forme de votre métier et la forme de vos articles était déterminée par la technologie pour les distribuer.” Aujourd’hui “nous avons tous des claviers, nous avons tous des téléphones mobiles avec des caméras ou nous les aurons bientôt. Nous avons tous des outils de publication et de distribution” comme WordPress ou YouTube entre autres.
I sound much more intelligent in French… and I do like the word “blogalaxie” rather than “blogosphere”. Still, I reckon “blogueur” and “blogueuse” sound more like something you’d pump out of an asthmatic duck.
I’m not a big fan of the term “citizen journalism”. As I’ve said, adopting the label “journalist” will inevitably annoy those who think they are the “real journalists”. And we’re all citizens anyway, even curmudgeonly journalists.
But I haven’t though of anything better. Neither has anyone else yet, so we’re stuck with it. We might as well agree on what it means.
As usual, Wikipedia provides some good background. But Jay Rosen recently repeated his Most Useful Definition of Citizen Journalism:
It’s mine, but it should be yours. Can we take the quote marks off now? Can we remove the “so-called” from in front?
When the people formerly known as the audience employ the press tools they have in their possession to inform one another, that’s citizen journalism.
There are other definitions, but they will have to be discussed in the comments.
I used quote-marks in my headline and first paragraph because I believe that’s how you denote the item of language you’re discussing. But from now on, I’ll use the term “citizen journalism” without quotes — except just then, because I was denoting again.
Does this definition work for you? Got a better name for it?
Since I was asked, where are the good Australian political blogs?
During Australia’s federal election in 2007, for me Possum’s Pollytics was invaluable for its analysis of opinion polls, as was Peter Brent’s Mumble. Larvatus Prodeo provided interesting commentary from a centre-left perspective. I didn’t get into any of the right-wing commentators, because once Howard’s End became inevitable they became more shrill, even less rational.
However the election overloaded me. I prefer to read essays and analysis with a longer timeframe, not the daily news focus on political mud-throwing.
What, for you, are the best Australian political blogs, and why?
[Update 10 January 2012: Minor edit to remove the identity of who asked the question.]
Stilgherrian’s links for 17 July 2008 through 18 July 2008, gathered according to the ancient rituals:
- Who is watching YouTube? The US courts want to know | ABC News: Are IP addresses personal information? Peter Black's take on the recent YouTube vs Viacom decision. With a lengthy comment by yours truly.
- stripe – what you want on radio: A new multi-channel "Internet radio" service due to go live on 29 July. Subscription model, based in Australia. Investors include Glenn Wheatley and Alan Jones.
- "Is St Isidore of Seville really the Patron Saint of the Internet?": Short answer: Yes.
My rant Note to “old media” journalists: adapt, or stfu! was merely my observation of one part of the Future of Media Summit 2008. Organiser Ross Dawson has posted a quick review of the social media coverage, plus links to some of the more interesting blog posts. Reading some of those will give you a more balanced view.
ABC The Drum
Crikey
CSO Online
Delicious
Dopplr
Flickr
LinkedIn
newmatilda.com
Patch Monday
Posterous
Qik
Stilgherrian Live (Ustream)
Technology Spectator
Twitter
Viddler
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