Archive for August 2009
Ed's Pledge: when Ministers go it alone
One of the few international set-pieces between now and the next general election is the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen in mid-December. And the UK's Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change is trying to drum up support among the population for - er, well, let's not dwell on details. 'A deal' of [...] read on »
WordPress plugin: Robots.txt Reminder
I'm sure we've all done it. You're creating a new WordPress installation, and for a bit of privacy whilst you build the thing, you choose not to 'allow my blog to appear in search engines like Google and Technorati'. But in the rush to get the site out the door, you forget to switch the [...] read on »
Fair prices, fair penalties
I've found it really hard to articulate my thoughts on this week's hot topic, filesharing. There's no getting away from the fact that freely distributing copyrighted work is wrong; and wrongdoing must attract sanctions at some point. And in the chaotic, decentralised world of the internet, the only party who could reasonably be asked to [...] read on »
Cabinet Office seeks digital chief
A job advert of potential interest to readers of this blog: the Cabinet Office is looking for a 'Deputy Director - Digital Communication' - a full-time, permanent Grade 5 position, based in Whitehall, paying 'c£75k'. It's an interesting-sounding role, reportedly the 'most snr dept webby in Whitehall', with the successful candidate being asked to 'lead [...] read on »
Should Labour share the NHS love?
I've been a fan of Graham Linehan since he was a writer on Irish music (etc) magazine Hot Press. On Wednesday, he stuck a message up on Twitter reacting angrily against 'rightwing wackjobs in the US lying about the NHS'. He starts using the hashtag #welovethenhs and asks celebrity chums to help spread the word. [...] read on »
Birmingham council: not all bad
Last week, I shared the general sense of shock around the blogs at news about Birmingham council's new website: 3.5 years late, and costing £2.8 million. But last night, to my great surprise, I came across BirminghamNewsroom.com - a WordPress-powered website for the council's press office, launched a couple of months back. It's based on [...] read on »
MPs who use WordPress
I had a bit of a brainwave earlier, which led me to wondering how many MPs run websites on WordPress. Taking as my starting point the Total Politics directory of Parliamentarians' blogs, I soon received a number of extra suggestions from Twitter folks... leading me to the following list of MPs whose blogs (or non-blog websites) [...] read on »
Building DFID's new consultation platform
A few months back, I helped the Department For International Development set up an online consultation site for their white paper on Eliminating World Poverty. We used WordPress (obviously), plus Steph Gray's Commentariat theme (with a few tweaks). The site was well received, and had close to 500 reader comments, many of them lengthy. So [...] read on »
Birmingham's new website: how late? how much?
I don't usually cover local government issues here - I leave that to other people. But I'll make an exception for the news that Birmingham City Council is poised to launch a new website. It was originally scheduled to launch in March 2006, at a cost of £580,000. It is now set to launch in [...] read on »
Defra use Commentariat for food consultation
Just to note that Defra is using WordPress to power its new consultation on Food 2030: a fairly straightforward use of Steph's Commentariat theme, with a bit of Defra branding added. So nothing too clever, but as I've said before, I think it's a very good thing if we're clearly seen to be reusing the [...] read on »