Social media is significant part of the 2017 election

In short, a tumultuous week showed mainstream media doing what it’s supposed to: reporting, reflecting, arguing, stirring. And social media? Many heartfelt exchanges, many echoes of shock and sorrow, but with customary fakery and trolling – instructions for bomb-making mingled with denunciation and perspective damned hard to come by.

So says Peter Preston. No perspective?

Thing is, may be changing. See another blog on Fleet Street in Cyberspace and Europe for recent comment on anti Corbyn bias. But Preston has this covered for the BBC

 There’s been mounting disapproval over its hostile treatment of Jeremy Corbyn, and deference to Theresa, since campaigning began. But nobody who saw Laura Kuenssberg tear into the PM on U-turn morning could maintain that now

However at that time the press were in competition to find the most quotable manner in which to be obvious. Have a look at the IRA questions from @afneil #marr etc. btw I still think Kuenssberg doc on Corbyn and referendum missed out a whole section on Lord Darling, how Lord Darling came to be centre stage, soforth. Someone still knows, only a year ago)

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Andrew Rawnsley

The focus on leadership, the “presidential” strategy that looked such a no-brainer when this election was called, has not had the effect that most anticipated. I think some of this is down to Jeremy Corbyn. Not because he has fought an outstanding election, but because his frailties as a candidate for the premiership were extremely well known before the campaign had started. A hefty majority of his own MPs had previously declared him unfit for leadership, so anything the Tories had to add to that was likely to be superfluous comment. I expect the Tories to launch a monstering of the Labour leader in the final leg of the campaign. This may not have the impact that they are looking for, if I am right to suspect that attitudes towards him were already largely baked in to Labour’s share.

Thing is, I think this is completely wrong. Guardian and BBC as much as any media have been in total Corbyn attack mode since he stood for election as Labour leader. No change there maybe. But public image much changed by talking direct to camera without any spin from press reporters.

Also social media allows direct communication, feedback, response to questions.
Next few weeks could be interesting, followed by more facts and analysis on who reads newspapers and what to think.

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repeating yet again but meant as a positive suggestion

possibly Guardian Media Group in in transformation to something online

when the print version is always knocking social media it is not helping the brand

Guardian Unlimited Talk trashed the work of a mass of people, lost from history as in Guardian writing

but consequence continues

please stop knocking online media @gabyhinsliff

Observer has an article by Gaby Hinsliff considering the possibility that there is media bias against Corbyn.

Just to repeat a few things.

she mentions "rivers of online abuse" aimed at Laura Kuenssberg. My concerns are the show she did about the referendum that implied Corbyn was to blame for Labour performance. The section on the phase when Labour was asked to take over ignored the actual presentations from Brown and Lord Darling. It was just wrong. Also recent interview reveals that Labour policy on EU trade is very different to Conservatives, this is just not what comes over.

Main thing though is the remarks about online. --"propaganda sheets like the Canary"...reporters worry about truth in a hyper partisan world...

As far as I know the BBC reported two heckles during 2016, both against Jeremy Corbyn. On Twitter and other sources it has been suggested that one was connected with Portland Comms and the other with the Lib Dems. Thing is I have never found any contrary reporting so what to think?

"Facebook messages tend to be shared among the likeminded"

Newspapers have a bit of a funding crisis and spend less on news resources. opinion is the thing. so they become tighter on marketing and discipline. online has more variety as far as I can tell.

You are offering an apology for the rest of Fleet Street and the Guardian Corbyn knocking. My guess is that quite a lot of readers will move online to find media they can trust or talk to each other.

Guardian Media Group so hostile to online in print version it is hard to accept the online version as genuinely part of that scene.

alt left may be best label for Corbyn supporters

I notice alt left seems ok in Guardian terms as they try to promote online in USA.

opinion found online.

Their line on Corbyn in UK print still mostly knocking though. I will explore more about this alt left and see what makes sense.

The idea that Corbyn Brexit detail deserves no space in print makes no sense at all.

Are buildings still a good investment for universities?

This is just a note, bit bigger than a tweet.

Not sure where this week will end up on radio. Thursday I hope to talk to the Storyteller about a fiction drama located on Lancaster campus. So this post is a reminder about reality.

The MOOC is better thought of now than a while ago. LEarning happens anyway as part of social media but this still not integrated with academic scene.

Futurelearn seems to be getting closer to income streams. Working with Deakin so model will reach UK sometime. See recent story in EdSurge for more.

If online education is seen as viable, when will there be a question about buildings? So far much investment has been in the campus, some of it iconic. This will continue and to make interesting video we need good sets. But presumably Deakin spend on IBM Watson funds that are not spent on bricks. The OU has closed regional centres and spent more on FutureLearn so far. When will this be seen as sensible, and what follows?

More later.

Polly Toynbee, BBC , Soft Fleet Street

Just catching up on TV, missed it this morning.

Andrew Marr on YouTube already with Jeremy Corbyn interview.

Sunday Politics on BBC catchup.

Polly Toynbee as balance between the Sun and the Spectator. Difference of view on Jeremy Corbyn? Not a lot.

Would Labour use a drone against ISIS? Will the USA request such a thing? It may turn out that the relevant issues during the election are not those supposed by the Fleet Street / BBC news operation.

Andrew Marr claimed that Corbyn and May similar on Brexit as both want a Single Market. Who is sure about this? Who has eaten the cake and or kept it? Surely May will be asked some questions later.

But Guardian columnists mostly just knocking Corbyn one would guess.

notes on mode 1 , mooc etc

Later there will be another post on online courses, starting with business schools.

Probably a longer one ahead of BETT next year. There is not enough reporting on what happens.

I base my guess on the Guardian still. Both what appears and what is hidden or mostly hidden. "special report" on 7 March can't find on official website but is on Pressreader. Seems to have been supported in print by half page ad from University of Derby. They are mentioned, as is Falmouth and Imperial.

MOOC mention in last column, then Futurelearn.

I still think Futurelearn is major news, as was obvious at BETT.

Helena Pozniak is a freelance journalist, this "special report" is not part of the main education pages.

Page 35 Peter Scott complains about commercial pressure but no mention of MOOC or even tech. My guess is still that the innovation will not come from the existing research stars, see previous posts. Still no update on Mode 1 etc.

Adult learning

cuts ( and unis less interested)

Guardian proper report no mention of the MOOC

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2017/feb/21/pop-up-classes-adult-learning-further-education

My guess newspapers so worried about online and social media share of advertising that they are reluctant to report digital disruption potential

needs a bit more to make the post convincing

Notes on Green Screens at Tubers Exeter

I realise I am way behind with edits and reports from BETT and trip to Lancaster. But Exeter situation intervenes. There is now a Tubers Academy, intended for young contributors to YouTube but the space is also available for hire. I have invited JD to join me next Wednesday in the VR space, ( green screens on each wall ) . We will test it out and maybe record some questions or comments.

Could fit with sequence from Lancaster campus or other locations, past or future. My recent topic was the voice interface for computers. But could be the MOOC, university response to the MOOC, or a swich of resources from buildings to online if this was the case. For video there is still an interest in locations so campus architecture is still welcome. But a completely green room raises a question in itself. Still looking into what studio resource is available for different sites.

So suggestions welcome. Do you have an interesting background or an existing talking head on a solid colour?

Topics could include what to make of the Tubers situation. So far I am not sure anyone has made enough from YouTube to cover the fees. But we may meet such people later. Raises a question what skills should be taught in school, uni ? Video edit?

Previously


We will not be messing about so much on Wednesday, actual content sometime soon.

Corbyn PMQs and Guardian sense of fairness

My belief is that the Guardian now starts with opinion and then works out what to do with the reporting. As in the Louise Mensch distinction of belief and reporting. Just my conclusion based on recent observation. BBC News channel interview with John McDonnell could have concentrated on NIC U Turn but diverts to Alastair Campbell comment on Corbyn. Apparently he asked the wrong questions. So I looked on the iPlayer for actual record. Corbyn asked several on topic then switched to social care and education.

Today found a tweet, maybe the BBC source.

Also couple of clips on YouTube



Make your own mind up.

Guardian in print same sort of thing as my tweet remarked on yesterday. Not as full a report as online but similar in intention. Page 4 half way down third column "earlier the issue had dominated PMQs......he then frustrated some of his own backbenchers by switching tack to focus on education". Doubtless the Guardian has a source for this view from "some backbenchers".

I realise this is in the readG blog not the one about the EU and Fleet Street but my belief now is that something similar happened during the referendum. some people are so determined to get rid of Jeremy Corbyn that they undermine the case he is making. Was it really such a good idea for Lord Darling to concentrate on economic issues in support of George Osborne?  My belief is that Corbyn had a much better grasp of the issues that matter to people. The social and educational aspects of the EU could have been much better reported.

Another Guardian editorial suggests that lies are possible online. I now read the Guardian not for news but to be amazed at how they report it. To hear from Parliament I rely on YouTube, RT and the official channel for Jeremy Corbyn,

Time Travel, possible link to Guardian

It may be possible to work with the idea of time travel as a way to communicate with the literary aspect of the Guardian. Recent article in the Review by James Gleick has a couple of quotes worth thinking about. Somehow the world of academic journals seems to assume some long-term value that technology can interfere with. Seems to overlap with forms of print. Sci-fi is associated with a possible positive take on the future.

The more modern sort of person – “the creative, organising, or masterful type” – sees the future as our very reason for being: “Things have been, says the legal mind, and so we are here. The creative mind says we are here because things have yet to be.” Wells, of course, hoped to personify that creative, forward-looking type.

The conclusion has a reasonable take on the current scene around social media-

A river of messages is a “timeline”– you’re in my timeline; I heard it in my timeline – but the sequence is arbitrary. Temporal ordering can scarcely be trusted. The past, the present, the future go round and collide, bumper cars in a chain of distraction. When distance separates the thunder from the lightning, cyberspace puts them back together.
In the wired world, creating the present becomes a communal process. Everyone’s mosaic is crowd-sourced, a photomontage with multiple perspectives. Images of the past, fantasies of the future, live videocams, all shuffled and blended. All time and no time. The path back through history is cluttered, the path forward cloudy.

So this could be a way to look at print and web over time. There are trends but also loops. For example I still think the Guardian may stop the weekday print version but when this happens is unknown. It just seems more likely from time to time. Saturday in long form ok for a while.

So my blogs still include speculation / observation but no precision as to timing.

Draft outline, digital disruption and business schools

This post is to check out for response and get some updates on recent developments. For a while I have been interested in how media organisations transition with digital technology. It sometimes seems to me that academics and business schools comment about this as if they are not part of it. Somehow the buildings and campus will continue as a base even if FM radio for example disappears in the cloud.

Next week Learning Technologies has some involvement from HE so I will try to check things out. This week at BETT there were a couple of events that might make a lead news item.

Futurelearn won the BETT Award for Free Digital Content/Open Educational Resources for Schools. I don't think they are yet much recognised at HE level. The Open University has cut back on regional support centres in the UK though they continue to invest in Futurelearn. I don't know of other examples where this sort of switch has already happened.

The Department for International Trade had a theatre where one presentation was from the Online Business School. I did do a video but the background noise is a problem Here are some stills to show the gist of it. BETT is a solid tech show and I guess there will be more HE over time, including some more examples of digital plans, maybe with some disruption in the background.

Any links or content most welcome. I will try to do an expanded post in the next week or two.

Steven Poole , content marketing, MOOC , Peter Scott

Today Steven Poole in Review on native ads and other aspects of being online. Trouble is he makes no obvious mention of the situation around newspapers. Why is the darkside of the web finding so much space in newsprint nowadays? Meanwhile the Postgrad pullout section is the only place for news about the MOOC. See post on what is not at BETT in another blog.

When will the Guardian write about the MOOC in context of a general article on policy and context? Will it involve Peter Scott? Maybe the Tuesday section no longer sells enough advertising to justify the sort of expense required. So the MOOC will only turn up in the pullout sections with the initiative coming from advertisers.

Also could there be reporting of the MOOC as value compared to the Guardian courses? You know the sort of thing - £49 for three hours on how to be a critic. Why not try a MOOC and decide if you want a certificate towards the end of the course? It may not be much more expensive. Surely there is copy here for someone?

Fake News and loss making newspapers

Things are speeding up. See previous posts for usual comments, here are some notes on recent Guardian.

Paul Mason on Facebook and Google. He likes Soundcloud and Medium but doubts they can survive. I do not think he is fair about the length of clips on YouTube. There is a lot of long clips from lectures and conferences.

10th Jan news that Trinity Mirror is trying to work with the Express. there could be more reporting on the business background for this kind of move.

Today story about "fake news" quickly becomes one about social media

The News Media Association has previously warned ministers that Google and Facebook were unfairly making money out of journalism produced by its members.

I think we should get more about what the plan is and less knocking copy on the web as it is. Any news could be "fake" and needs to be considered with a views on who is writing it. the newspapers need to consider that the web is read / write so involves the audience, people like us, see previous posts etc.

If Jeff Jarvis was still writing on a Monday I would be more positive about weekday print continuing in 2017. As it is I expect more about "fake news" and not much in print about what the news organisation websites are trying to do or how the public can relate to them.

So far neither Google of Facebook have closed a site without warning destroying all content I contributed. Sorry to keep repeating this, probably time to move on.

Guardian hello

This is written as if someone at the Guardian may read it. Just to clarify. I mention this because of a Steven Poole opinion on Saturday.

Generally speaking, just as people say things over the internet that they would never dare say to someone’s face, abusive marginalia is not meant for the author’s eyes. In an age when furious readers fire off torrents of poorly spelled invective directly to the author via email or Twitter, simply writing rude comments in a copy of the book that the author will never see seems the height of good manners.

This post is meant for the Guardian, readers writers edit suite whatever. What time is it? Trends in print sales? Should there be some guidance on web policy? The print version recently is mostly negative on web. So what else is proposed?

In this way, then, the centuries of marginalia in printed books make up a kind of invisible republic of readers and writers having extended conversations through history. By contrast, the fact that you can’t scribble in the margins of electronic books reflects the paradoxical atomisation of an internet age in which everything shouts about how “social” it is. And so here is one more reason to cherish the printed book: you can talk back to it, and to future readers.

Nonsense, surely? Is there some sort of archive on Unlimited Talk?

By the way, thanks for the discount tokens. But I stick to my forecast. either print Guardian Monday to Friday will cease during 2017 or at least the possibility will reach some sort of public conversation.

Citizen Journalism worth another look?

Not sure what citizen journalism is at the moment but I come across signs of problems with newspapers especially. Is it time to look back at this and work out some new variation? I contributed to OhmyNews International. the English language version. Recently I come across OhmyNews video on YouTube but I don't understand Korean.

One of the points made when OhmyNews was launched ws that the business model of existing news was not going to work online. The web is write as well as read. Some sort of collaboration would follow.

It seems though that news organisations are still reluctant to change their approach. I find the Guardian is now going backwards. Unlimited Talk as closed down. In print there is some negative coverage about social media but very little about how the web site is different or what the plan is.

Recent article from Peter Preston inludes much history and some numbers.  I notice that the "users" only appear when prepared to pay money

users, especially young people, were used to paying to use their mobile phones.

although this did not last long on tablets. Thing is, no mention at all of the reader as a source of content in any form.

I have found another article by Jay Rosen that has some possibilities. Part one was about the problems for US media in Trump era. Part two looks at positive ideas-

From journalists is only one way Americans get news now. They get it directly from newsmakers, as with Trump’s Twitter feed. They get it from ideological cadres styled as news sources, like Breitbart. They get it from entertainers like Rush Limbaugh (an opponent of the press) or John Oliver (an ally of accountability journalism). They get it from friends and family members passing along a personalized mix of stuff. They get it from people interested in the same things who collect online and pool information. 

Thing is, why not work with this? The people who collect online pools of information may have a perspective.

In the UK I find it easier to follow Jeremy Corbyn directly on Twitter than rely on the Guardian for fair reporting. Maybe this is just me but I guess more of this direct content will be part of the future. Some journalists also turn up on Twitter with links to comment. Somehow more connections could develop. This is likely to be through social media rather than platforms such as OhmyNews. At least that is my guess. The editing function is still there when links are repeated or comment added.

More on this later in the year. Meanwhile stories around BETT will be partial, derivative and a bit vague. Still they may contribute something. Sort out in Feb may suggest a better pattern for future occasions.

Corbyn Finds Voice ( in the Guardian )

To be fair and balanced as one tries to be in a blog, you have to consider the facts. Recently the Guardian did have an interview  with Jeremy Corbyn and it seems to have been well reported. He compares Teresa May with Henry VIIIth for use of the royal prerogative. So this may bode well for 2017. As the Guardian campaigns around Brexit the official leader of the opposition is a useful part of the mix.

Also the interview clarifies Corbyn views on immigration and the single market. Guardian can refer back if they get puzzled. Sometimes the reporting has been so limited that all sorts of claims are made.

My guess is that Corbyn will find more of a voice on Brexit during this year. He is now working with socialist groups in Europe and making a positive case away from the influence of Cameron and Mandelson. I doubt if it will be much reported in much of mainstream media but social media now finds a larger proportion of UK opinion.

Facebook, what time is it?

A couple of recent items suggest to me that the Guardian really is in trouble, has no idea what to do about online, is wasting time trying to put a dent in Facebook.

Tuesday 13th , front page of G2 apparently Facebook has had a terrible year. Readers should delete their account at once. Various scandals, fake news etc.

Thursday 15th , "Google and Facebook will take more than 70% of all money spent on display advertising online in Britain by 2020" report by OC&C Strategy Consultants.

This is the real issue surely. Guardian in print seems to be full of scare stories, almost as many as when the web started to get attention. Almost nothing on what the Guardian offers online or what the plan is.

They do not seem to have realised why social media works. The web is two way, readers can be writers. I recently visited King's Cross and found the Midlands Shed is now a Waitrose. Not news, happened months ago. So the plan for a campus has been folded. This may have been the high point of the celeb option. Selling courses in lecture format is not an online sort of thing.

I now doubt if they will change. Welcome of comments? not very likely. Open discussion on what happened with Guardian Unlimited Talk? This will probably have to wait till after the next shock.

So I think a 50% chance of the print version closing Monday to Friday during 2017 is sounding quite a reasonable guess.

( continues re Education aka Tuesday on Hello Spiders blog )

immigration blind spots

Guardian seems very determined not to report Corbyn and colleagues. I watched some Sunday TV and notice what gets reported in print on a Monday. Mostly Boris.

Nothing about Corbyn in Europe that I can find.

The columnists, Matthew d'Ancona again on Boris, as a potential champion for positive views on immigration.

But what is lacking in mainstream politics is not opposition to immigration, but a sufficiency of voices willing to make the case for it. In this respect, Sir Oliver Letwin was quite right last week to tell the Times that the main parties have “made a terrible mistake” in failing to argue, with commitment and resolve, that “properly controlled migration enriches the country in every sense”.

No mention here for Dianne Abbott or Jeremy Corbyn. Is it Guardian policy to under mention them? it is getting more strange every day. To use a sports metaphor from Larry Elliott it is like reading a report on a cycle race where one team seems to have vanished.

Notes towards a persuasive counter-narrative

 Matthew d'Ancona writes about a drift to the right, Trump Brexit and Europe, then claims

a persuasive counter-narrative is conspicuously absent from mainstream politics.

This appears to be so as reported by the Guardian. Corbyn and Corbyn supporters only appear as trouble. Since the leadership election the approach seems to be to ignore Corbyn, not just find negative angles.

For example this report this morning puts Emily Thornberry right at the end of a story about the economic damage of leaving the single market. Online there is a video from the Andrew Marr show so the balance is slightly different. My own take was that Thornberry was perfectly clear on the Labour policy, also consistent with other front bench statements.

Chuka Umunna means well but I wonder why the Guardian features him as a Labour rep and often ignores those in the actual Shadow Cabinet? If the Remainers carry on with the economic case they will get support in the City and the House of Lords but Thornberry and others are working with the wider public. Needs a bit of space to report in full. Issues such as worker rights and the environment were largely ignored during the referendum. Needs a wider agenda to make sense outside the City and environs.

My guess is that space will appear online, not in Guardian print. But dialogue could continue.

More later in the week. How will Richmond be reported? Will it play well up north?

Editor Brand Dissonance Update

Possibly the Guardian, more than most of Fleet Street , is moving online to a globalised future. (The Mail is outside scope of this post, their online is a bit of a sideshow at least a bit different, not really trying to continue the same journalism values imho).

Trouble is that reading the print version is doing less and less to communicate what the online offer is about or how the reader is supposed to fit with it. Recently I mostly find writing about fake news on Facebook, dangers of mega companies, threats to educationa and the novel. Maybe it is just me but here are a few examples.

 It’s worrying that our young seem distracted and often depressed, and sad for those of us who have invested so much of our belief and our effort in print technology, that it – and the modes of being associated with it – appear to be in decline.

Will Self  Review Saturday

I’m also worried about how we use social media. The so-called neutral platforms facilitate hate against women, racism and homophobia, and they may have put Trump in the White House as well. It may not be the platform itself, but the way in which it favours those outside the conventional media establishment and its notions of balance. 

Rachel Holmes Monday

On Sunday John McNaughton put aside the ideas around the "netizen" or web "utopia". Things are very worrying.

What I cannot make out is what the Guardian Media Group is doing online. I still come across the website through Twitter links. But the dissonance comes about by comparing the print version. Is there a parallel universe of editorial where the web is more or less ok? Can't find it. What are the numbers on print sales? My guess is that the weekday print will vanish during 2017. 50 % confidence. Well enough confidence that it will be under discussion during the year and / or related events will actually occur.

According to Will Self "the age of bi-directional digital media only properly dates... from the inception of wireless broadband in the early 2000s" . However John McNaughton mentions earlier dates - "In the first decade after the internet we use today was switched on, in January 1983, cyberspace was a brave new world – a glorious sandpit for geeks and computer science researchers. "

More later on various dates. Will Self is closer to the Cluetrain Manifesto and the start of Guardian Unlimited Talk. This was actual social media, closed down by the Guardian without warning and without any option for readers to recover their own content. The facts are now obscure in any story told by Guardian staff. I cannot imagine any social media company doing such a thing. The Guardian editorial group must believe that their own content is the crucial bit. The conversation matters not. My guess is that things have now got worse. Much of the opinion copy is knocking online. How can it fit with other social media? Any numbers on how the audience finds the website? From the print version I guess the readers are just in a rush to unplug, if they find the argument convincing.

HE day as tech disruption, ramble till BETT

Leaving this post as Guardian related as tomorrow should be an Education day in print. Not sure if this continues, not much media today.

I have now booked three nights in London around time of BETT for me and colleagues from @wenotno and Wild Show on Phonic FM. We are mostly interested in radio but this can cross over into learning etc.

Found out about dif - digital innovation festival - through the One Planet MBA, sponsors of Tech Exeter conference. Tomorrow is HE day then on Wed Douglas Rushkoff

We don’t have to accept the rules of a 13th Century, printing press era operating system for our 21st Century economy. Real disruption would mean challenging the underlying OS, not just installing more extractive software on top of it.

From an interview but maybe more fully explained on Wed. Somehow the Guardian seems still with the printing press. They have not done a lot on the MOOC recently. Peter Scott refuses to write about them. They don't seem to have many reporters so rely on such academic sources for copy. Through Twitter I have found a video from 2014.



Time for an update on Futurelearn. And London University. Is there a business model yet? 

The Twitter for dif is @thinkDIF_ 

My question is still about the buildings budget compared to online. Apart from OU / Futurelearn I think UK universities are still investing in iconic buildings. Blended could at least reduce the time on campus. It is even possible that there has been a bubble in student accomodation. More later.

Now watched the YouTube catchup on this morning




remark about campus unis about 27 min in.

@wenotno on @phonicfm between 12 and 2 Exeter time but probably an update on this much later.