As the rest of the UK, Freelance Unbound is downing tools for a, possibly, well-deserved Christmas break. Normal service will be resumed in the new year, unless the festive media provide an irresistable topic for posting. Until then, my editorial assistant wishes you all a very merry Christmas…
Anyone wanting to take us back to the solid Victorian values of the three “R”s in education should take pause. If you take a turn round the duck pond in Bath’s delightful Victoria Park, you’ll come across this handsome piece of Victorian sculpture – an urn commemorating the anniversary of the opening of the park […]
In case anyone has missed it, here’s an interesting infographic from Tweetsmarter.com comparing the profiles of Facebook users versus Twitter users. A couple of interesting points: Twitter is a publishing platformOnly 27% of Twitter users log in every day – but 52% update their status every day. That means those updates are coming remotely from […]
Tired of the short-term focus of Twitter’s #trending topics? Here’s a great geeky toy to play with over Christmas – Google Books’ Ngram Viewer. The Ngram Viewer allows you to enter search terms and see how frequently they are used over time. This is a kind of historic version of Twitter trends – nothing after […]
In the wake of the shock news (if you’re a web geek) that social bookmarking site Delicious is being earmarked for closure by Yahoo, a grieving Paul Bradshaw calls for suggestions for a service to take its place. He says: Delicious is possibly the most useful tool I use as a journalist, academic and writer. […]
In the current climate, some hard-pressed journalists may be thinking they’d like to get out of underpaid, overworked hackery and into the cozy, cushy world of corporate writing. But freelancers who fancy dipping their toe into the water need to be aware of some cultural differences between corporate communications and journalism that can derail them. […]
Via Bill Bennett: The life of the journalist is poor, nasty, brutish and short. So is his style. Stella Gibbons,Cold Comfort Farm So very, very true.
In a very interesting analysis from tech site GigaOM, Joe Weinman looks at how more tightly metered broadband services will affect web content. As broadband services become more finely tiered – ie you pay for what you use and real “unlimited” broadband becomes a thing of the past – many of the services and content […]
Cathy Relf’s excellent Rantings of a Sub-Editor blog offers a tough challenge to journalists and sub-editors – to turn a piece of drivelling nonsense submitted by a car reviewer into elegant and accurate copy. Here’s the original: The car is fairly pedestrian-friendly as there aren’t any hard surfaces directly beneath the bonnet Her straight-down-the-line edit […]
As online journalism student assessment looms once again, here’s a handy guide for J-students on how not to mess up their web site assignment. This is aimed at students who create in WordPress, but can equally apply to other platforms. Or, probably, almost any similar student assignment. In brief: Start early Do it for real […]