No format has been more maligned than reality TV. Its obituary has been written many times. Commentators pour over declining ratings of the likes of Big Brother and X Factor. In the age of Netflix we gaze into a future where live viewing is obsolete. Yet just when it seems time to switch off the…
The news that MI6 will be launching its first advertising campaign aimed at recruiting more women is significant not just because M’s the word. It marks a new openness for an organisation that for the best part of the last century did their utmost to persuade us they didn’t exist. Diversifying away from the old…
Influence is a tricky one to measure. The word itself derives from the Latin influentia, meaning an influx. Influence flows out, imperceptibly, and its effects are more qualitative than quantitative. Take the Sunday Times’s big splash this week revealing findings from its investigation into Labour’s dominance on twitter during the 2017 election. According to research from Swansea…
Forget the hastags #Bots #CambridgeAnalytica #Russian #trolls #darkforces #Socialmedia #disruption What we see from Rudd’s downfall is that the agenda is still being set by the reporting of traditional media turbo charged by established opinion-formers.
The price of a J D Wetherspoon pint will be the cheapest within a ten minute walk of where you’re stood. Whether or not this adage is entirely true, the pub chain has created a brand of cheap-and-cheerfulness that has have left its competition in the gutter. Could this partly account for why its chairman…
It’s lonely at the top. The modern CEO is expected to have a voice, to articulate values and, most importantly, be available. Yet there is little to prepare even the most media savvy executive for dealing with crisis once the internal support network begins to turn on you, with many boards happy to see leaders…
With all due respect to the excellent investigative journalism that exposed the large-scale data harvesting by Cambridge Analytica – it will not bring down Facebook. Commentators were quick to point to share price volatility and hashtag protests as indicators of doom. The social network has indeed been slow to ventilate the stench surrounding its relationship to…
When Margaret Thatcher launched a task force to retake the Falklands from Argentine forces, her message was simple: she was defending the rights of the islanders to self-determination. In 1982, after years of domestic inertia, economic stagnation and government infighting, the British public endorsed this decisive act- and it won her a landslide reelection a…
It shouldn’t surprise us that brands have attempted to make money from outrage. The opposite of virtue is not Vice. It’s the Daily Mail. This week, Centre Parcs announced that it would be joining an increasing number of brands – Lego, Paperchase, the Southbank Centre – who have chosen to stop advertising in the newspaper….
Are they, aren’t they? Will they, won¹t they separate? Forget the TV soaps. This week has been all about the Cheryl and Liam. Earlier in the week the Sun¹s showbiz guru Dan Wootton broke the story that the showbiz couple were about to split. According to his scoop, the dynamic duo were struggling to keep…