Charles on… anything that comes along

So I’m having a play with the three contenders here - Proteus, Adium and Fire. Because despite being a latecomer to IM, I’m already trying to keep in touch with folk on two different networks, and - well, take two bottles into the shower? I just IM and go!

Anyway it seems to me that despite being not-free (or perhaps because of that), the winner is Proteus. It just seems to do a stack more stuff. I like Adium’s lower-tabbed windows, so you don’t have windows spawning all over the place for different conversations (lost marks, Fire), but Proteus hits back by using the OSX drawer to stack the different conversations.

Is there anything similar for Windows? Only Gaim that I could find. And as it happens, that code (written for Linux) underpins all the apps here - they all use libgaim.

Any more I’ve missed and should try?

These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
• Video podcasting to iTunes; Cocoalicious; Camino hits 1.0a1 (16 September 2005; score: 28.69%)
• The awful Good Pitch blog; Grundig's self-immolation; TabMark, an essential for NetNewsWire users (8 March 2006; score: 27.03%)
• No endoscope required (24 June 2005; score: 26.01%)

Maybe I’m overreacting on this, but when Andrew Orlowski and I (mainly Andrew) labour long and hard to produce this story about how little margin Apple gets from its iTunes sales, it’s nice if people actually link to the article itself. Sure, quote from it, give people a taster, all those sorts of things.

Which makes this feel like intentional disregard, for a number of reasons:

• links to the AppleInsider “article” about our article, which adds nothing new
• doesn’t carry the link to the original article, which is right there in the AppleInsider article, so people have to follow two links to get all the extra goodness in our article, and of course to benefit our site with page view
• AppleInsider, which while being a useful and nice site, gets a stipend of Googlejuice, eyeballs and karma for a story it played absolutely no part in producing
• the names of the journalists who wrote the damn story don’t even get a faint boost, and hey, we’re ego-driven beasts

Seems to me that if you’re going to link, you should either link to the proper source, or .. no, there is no “or”. If the thing you link to points to the original article, and has some analysis, and you add your analysis of their analysis, fine. But this is an example where A says something, B repeats it, and C says B is saying something.

In a court, they’d call it hearsay. Here, it’s just bad manners. Really.

The web, especially the blogweb, works on links, as pretty much all the great thinkers say (and they sure don’t need my miniscule boosting). Just as in journalism, you should go to the source; the web makes it easier, because you just follow the links until you hit an endpoint. And you should do that especially if you are a journalist.

(OK, I’ve had an email saying “no offense was meant” with an apology. Accepted, thank you. Though I think the wider point still applies: there’s too frequently no examination of the original, nor credit for it.)

These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
• I agree with Jeff Jarvis: let bloggers link to AP, and let AP link to journalism (16 June 2008; score: 41.39%)
• Free, or not free; and a blog exposing the 2012 Olympics (11 October 2005; score: 35.96%)
• On the Guardian site today: breakout, the real web game (14 December 2007; score: 34.66%)

One gets those days when you realise that understanding journalists’ thought processes is not among the job requirements for PR people.

Such as when you read an email with an attached press release, where the email begins:
This press release has been covered in detail by various broadsheet science editors eg. Nigel Hawkes at the Times (see article below).

Please contact me on the numbers below for further information insight /interviews with management etc.

As I pointed out in reply, this is like an estate agent saying to some prospective buyers “Come and see the property - I’m sure you’ll absolutely love it, it’s just right for you. In fact it’s so good that I’ve already sold it to the people who saw it before you.”

By the way, is there a self-aware PR blog anywhere? I’d be interested to read it.

These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
• Why A levels really are getting easier (21 August 2004; score: 31.62%)
• Amazon reviews of 1984, by the post-1984 class: what sort of clock "strikes" anyway? (19 January 2007; score: 27.28%)
• PR treats journalists not as resources, but like car companies treat parts suppliers (updated) (5 February 2009; score: 25.71%)

OK, I challenge anyone using OSX and Safari to get any sense out of Powergen’s web site. I’ve just spent five frustrating minutes spoofing user agents, looking at the source of the page, and trying pretty much everything just so I can tell them my electricity meter reading.

First: give up trying to get past the front page. It tests to see if you’re using Internet Explorer > 5.2, Netscape >= 7, Opera >= 7.2 (I think - can’t be bothered to go back to check the last). However much I spoofed my user-agent, though, I couldn’t get the “Existing customers” link to work. (I mean, are they saying I have to register as a “New customer” even though I’m already a customer of the company? How daft.)

If you click the link saying “Contact us” then you magically get to a place where it says that you can give them your meter reading as long as you have your 10-digit account number. Marvellous!

And messed up. Doesn’t work. It’s a hall of mirrors, all leading back to the same place. Can’t ever get to a place to actually enter the meter reading.

So, Powergen, I’ll end up calling your freephone number, and that will mean the money you’ve spent on your servers and web design and back-end systems has been wasted. When, when, WHEN will companies understand this? If you build a web system but don’t include everyone, it’s a waste because you are guaranteeing that you’ll (1) annoy some of your customers, which is always smart in an age when we can switch power supplier with a few clicks on an (operational) web page and (2) saddle yourself with having to support people on the phone.

Update 12.09: so I call the number, and it’s entirely automated. You don’t even press the phone keys - it does voice recognition. (Though it doesn’t read back the numbers you say apart from the meter reading, so you’re not certain it’s got it right.) Rather weak on distinguishing “yes” and “no”. I was almost thinking it was preferable to the web page when it asked “We are always looking to improve the products and services that we offer. Would you be happy for us to contact you if we do? Please answer yes or no.”

Well, what does that mean? Better electricity? Cleaner, smoother, electricity? (We only get leccy from Powergen - no gas in our area.) Or is that for the day when they decide that hiring out gardeners is a core activity? I didn’t reply, and eventually it said “transferring you to an operator….” In Bangalore. Who asked me for my customer reference number. Which I had given to the machine three minutes before.

I hung up. I hate Bangalore support (I’m sorry, but I do), but especially I hate being transferred elsewhere within *the same organisation* and asked to re-give details I just gave. That’s just bad systems design.

These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
• The Spartacus approach to beating comment spam (9 November 2004; score: 23.62%)
• More browser madness: is Google forcing me to use the .co.uk site? (31 May 2005; score: 19.95%)
• Ho hum, more spammer collateral damage: trackbacks are off (1 February 2005; score: 19.3%)