I’m pretty big around here!

When will I, will I be famous - I can’t answer, I can’t answer that. Well actually now you can - you just need to add up all the unique subscribers over all your social media outlets.

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Shut up about the BBC

I’m a vain kind of guy - not vain as in spending hours in front of the mirror - if you’ve seen my hair you’ll know I don’t do that - no vain as in wanting to know what people are saying about me.

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Jersey in the news

As part of my job I often find myself searching for Jersey on Google, Google News or Google Blog Search - I’ll even occasionally look up the island on sites like IMDB, Wikipedia, TV.com and others.

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Is search enough?

I’ve been thinking - and yes it did hurt - is a simple search engine, or even an extremely complicated search engine for that matter - really enough in the modern mass content age?

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Journalism GCSE?

OK there isn’t actually going to be a journalism GCSE, or at least I don’t think there is - but I think Journalism, or at the very least standard journalism techniques should be taught all through school.

One of the key skills you need as a journalist is being able to sift through huge amounts of information to find the story. It’s about being able to take a 300 page report and find the one line that was hidden, the line that will make the top story in the next bulletin or the front page of the paper.

It isn’t an easy skill, it’s certainly a lot harder to perfect than I made it sound above. In journalism being able to interpret and sort large amounts of information is a considerable amount more important than being able to spell - that’s what spell-check, dictionaries and copy editors are for.

I finished school with a few pretty awful GCSEs and a GNVQ – I wasn’t a great student – but have more than made up for it since entering the working world.

Since starting on this path of journalism I’ve been on dozens of courses to improve my journalism instinct, improve writing skills and learning when to spot a duff story (among others).

Key to all of these though is the ability to spot an idea, to find a story and most importantly to cut the chaff.

Google is part of the chaff – but it can also be the wheat. Where on one side Google is a brilliant source of information, a great way to enhance a story with facts and figures – it’s also an evil source of mis-information, a great way to enhance a story with WRONG facts and figures (if your lazy).

Before I go on – I know the information isn’t actually on/in Google itself, I understand it’s a search engine.

When I was at school and was told to write a report on a subject I had no idea how to start. I didn’t know which books to look in or how to assemble the information into something meaningful.

If I was at school now that would be a breeze.

A professor at the University of Brighton has described Google as ‘white bread for the mind’ basically saying that it’s filling enough but it doesn’t really have the nutrients.

Tara Brabazon explained that “We need to teach our students the interpretative skills first before we teach them the technological skills. Students must be trained to be dynamic and critical thinkers rather than drifting to the first site returned through Google.”

This is a basic journalism skill – so if school newspapers were encouraged, if students were trained in journalism skills – if they were encouraged to think critically and objectively – they would be able to make better use of services like Google and Wikipedia and not just take the first site as fact.

It would also encourage more debate, more political interest and hopefully in turn lead to a more fulfilling society.

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Not getting an iPhone

I’ve been on holiday for the past two weeks or so and haven’t fell the desire or pull of the blogosphere, not so much because I’ve had a thrilling time - but more because I went with my wife and two small children and was too stressed to blog.

Fortunately I’m now home again and can get back to my real holiday, the one that lasts for 47 weeks a year - work.

While away in England I saw posters, adverts and signs everywhere proclaiming the iPhone being on the way - it wasn’t as manic as the original iPhone release in Americaland but it was pretty heavy duty.

This annoyed me - mainly because I live in Jersey and the chance of one of the islands operators being allowed to sell the iPhone is pretty slim - but also because of the cost.

I visited the o2 site to find out just how much an iPhone would cost to buy and what the monthly rental would be - thinking maybe I could get one with a contract in the UK - I don’t make many phone calls so am not that bothered about the roaming costs.

I currently pay £25 per month for my mobile contract and that gives me something like 120 free minutes, 120 text messages and a few other bits I never use.

The cheapest o2 iPhone subscription is £35 per month for 200 minutes, 200 SMS and unlimited data (with a fair use policy). It also gives you free access to over 7500 WiFi Hotspots and visual voicemail.

This isn’t bad - it provides about the same level of extras as a mid tarriff for about the same price as most mid tarriffs but those tarriffs would also normally provide you with a free smart phone.

In this case you’d also have to pay £269 for the iPhone - this isn’t an awful price on its own, for a top iPod with phone functionality but with the £35 per month as well - it’s a bit much.

If I could pay £269 for the iPhone and then just use it on a Pay as you go contract it would be fab value - but with a £35 a month contract - it’s a bit steep.

That’s one reason why I’ve decided to get an ordinary phone and buy an iPod Touch instead - but there are other reasons.

£269 doesn’t sound too bad when you first look at it - it’s comparable with other similar products but if you take a look at the cost of the iPhone in the USA our price starts to get a bit on the steep side.

The price for the same iPhone in the USA is $399 dollars - at the current exchange rate that is £191 or £78 less than buying the same product in the UK. Even counting for VAT thats still a LOT more.

So I’m sticking to my current phone, getting an iPod Touch and holding out for the first phone with the Google Stack software.

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Ask Not…

Ask not what you can do for your search engine but what your search engine can do for you. Appologies to any John F Kennedy fans for the bastardisation and reversing of that famous quote.

Here is the full quote in full as an apology:

“And so, my fellow americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.”
~John F. Kennedy, Inaugural address, January 20, 1961

I’m a Google man, I’ve been using Google as my search engine for longer than I can remember, I like the simplicity of Google and I like the fact that it actually provides me with results.

Or at least I used to - until the Blogosphere rolled up, until Flickr, You Tube and Facebook joined the scene - now Google doesn’t really cut the mustard - its results page is limited at best and empty at worst.

Yes it delivers on results but there is nothing ‘value added’, there’s no meal deal, no fries with my veggie burger or shake with my wrap. And I like fries and shakes.

This is why I’m warming to Ask. OK so the results aren’t as good but the interface is pretty and it gives me French Fries on the side.

If I search for Jersey on Google I get a good set of results - I get Jersey Tourism, I get Jersey’s Wikipedia entry, I get the Jersey Government and I get Jersey Airport but thats about it on the first page (apart from a few adverts).

If I search for Jersey on Ask, ok the results aren’t as great but I still get Jersey Tourism, Jersey’s Government and a lot of Tourism related links but I get more as well.

I get links on the left to expand or narrow my search, I get a box at the top giving me the CIA factbook info on Jersey and a combination of photos, dictionary definitions and videos on the right.

OK so it is horribly American centric, even on ask.co.uk, compared to the More brit friendly Google although Google isn’t blameless. If I search Google News for Jersey I get New Jersey or Sports Jersey - little about ACTUAL Jersey.

There are Good and Bad sides to both sites but at the moment Ask is winning. Especially given, with a single click I can restrict the Ask results to UK sites only - thus giving me a BETTER set of results than Google.

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