Puffbox

Sky have just launched their new online quiz application, with a couple of interesting twists. It’s a fairly rudimentary Flash-based application, inviting you to type your answer into a text input box, rather than choosing from several predefined options. Of course, that means you’d better be exact in your spelling – and make sure you’re exactly in sync with the expected answer. Trying it this morning, I was marked wrong for a question where the answer I gave was entirely accurate, but presumably didn’t match the pre-defined response. (An improvement might be the ability to store multiple ‘correct’ answers against the same question, to cover for scenarios like this.)

It’s interesting because it’s only open from 9am to 4pm daily, with a leaderboard published at 4.15 – guaranteeing an extra site visit later in the day, I suppose. And because each question has a ‘clue’ link to the relevant story on the site. So guess what: if you don’t know the answer immediately, you need only to click the ‘clue’ and start reading. Meanwhile, of course, Sky tots up another page impression.

I’m in two minds about this. The time restriction is a smart move, and doesn’t offend me. But I’ve got  a bit of a problem with the sneaky boosting of page impression numbers by directing people to clue articles. The quiz is against the clock: so by definition, people aren’t actually reading the clue articles… and they certainly aren’t staying around long enough to click on any ads.

We know that people like to take the BBC as a role model. But it’s still quite startling to see the extent to which the new Iranian government-backed English-language TV news network, Press TV has shamelessly copied it. Same basic layout. Same font. Same dotted lines in the left-hand menu. Same ticker at the top. Remarkably similar iconography. On the bright side, I suppose, it stretches a bit to fill a 1024×768 screen, where the Beeb is still sticking to its 800×600 optimisation. More on the channel in this Guardian article. Sadly it doesn’t yet come up in the Sky EPG.

A lot of speculation this evening about the fate of Britain’s most web-friendly Cabinet minister, David Miliband, in tomorrow morning’s reshuffle. Miliband’s profile is certainly ‘on the up’ – but then again, environment is certainly the hot topic (pardon the pun) at the moment. A stronger Defra, perhaps with energy policy moved over from DTI, might be an effective promotion without the hassle of moving offices. But a couple of hacks, including the FT and Newsnight, have chucked in the possibility of a move to the Foreign Office. Again, given the international element in Miliband’s existing remit, it could be a logical and natural step up. (‘Energy security and climate change‘ is one of the explicit objectives of the FCO.)

Why would readers of this here blog be bovvered? Well, it’s my understanding that the first instruction Miliband issued when he walked through the door at Defra was to move his blog over from his former department (ODPM). Which Whitehall web team, if any, is going to have an even busier morning than expected?

Tory MP Quentin Davies defects to Labour. The guys at theyworkforyou.com update their listings almost immediately. And without me actually doing anything, my RSS-plus-Google-Map mashup now shows: Grantham & Stamford, MP: Quentin Davies, Party: Labour. Thanks to all concerned. 🙂

Regular readers will be all too aware of the NewsMap mashup application produced by my consultancy operation, Puffbox. The concept was to produce a tool to let journalists create interactive maps in a matter of minutes (ish), to tell stories where geography was a key element. Such as the current flooding story.

So I’m delighted to say that our first client, Sky News has used it to put together an interactive map of Yorkshire, dotted with photos and video clips. And I have to say, they’ve done a fantastic job of it. There’s even a coloured polygon!

Ah… I love it when a plan comes together. 🙂

I’ve only just come across a remarkable website, Electoral Calculus which ‘predicts the next British General Election result using scientific analysis of opinion polls and electoral geography’. The mathematical detail of it all only serves to remind me how much of my Maths A-Levels I’ve now forgotten.

But the most striking thing on the site, and one I’m quite inspired by, is their constituency map. Each constituency is drawn to be the same surface area, as they are all roughly the same population (70,000 ish). And startlingly, it’s all done as an HTML table with background colours on the cells.

The overall effect is something very close to Tetris. But it still looks appreciably like a map of Great Britain, and it would make a great basis for some election-night online maps. It may not be too early to start thinking of this.

I enjoyed ITV’s new News Knight a lot more than I expected. It’s clearly trying to be a British answer to Jon Stewart’s Daily Show, with a bit of Have I Got News For You thrown in. And whilst a lot of the humour is derived from hearing the familiar voice of authority, Sir Trevor McDonald reading out some truly ludicrous lines, some of it genuinely made me laugh. I wonder how long that can last, though?

I’m very impressed to see the new Sky News sidebar gadget for Windows Vista. A very easy install process gives a little Sky-branded box on the edge of your screen, with the latest headlines from five different feeds. Click on a headline, and you’ll see a summary of the item in question, with a link to the full story. If that sounds like an RSS feed, guess what. But the addition of photos takes it a step beyond the normal, dry RSS experience.

It’s not without its problems: they’ve only given themselves 20 characters (ish) per line, and just two lines. If a longer headline stretches into a third line, it’s going to get unceremoniously cropped – and flicking through the headlines displayed as I type this, roughly half get trimmed. One or two, you could probably forgive. And I can’t see any way to tweak the refresh rate.

But hey, full credit to them for delivering this. Increasing the potential points of access for the service is exactly the right thing to be doing, especially when it’s little more than an RSS feed (and, one assumes, entirely automated). And it doesn’t do any harm to do this before the competition: I can only find unofficial gadgets for the BBC site.

This list of the BBC’s fifteen web principles, posted by Tom Loosemore, will be invaluable in my client work. It’s amazing how easy it is to make people accept something, if you say ‘well, that’s how the BBC does it.’ Of particular interest:

• Do not attempt to do everything yourselves.
• Make sure all your content can be linked to, forever.
• Accessibility is not an optional extra.
• Link to discussions on the web, don’t host them.

A bit on the evangelical side, maybe, but absolutely sound advice for anyone in this business.

Instinctively, a UK-localised YouTube (at youtube.co.uk) doesn’t sound too exciting. But I’ve spent maybe 30 seconds looking at it, and already I’ve seen two things I’d call ‘significant’ which I’d never have spotted in a US-centric site. Firstly, Chris Moyles and his abortive video-blogging, which didn’t get beyond episode three. Secondly, The Sun’s channel, launched only a few days ago by the look of it… featuring the shock return of a legend of British TV. This is not necessarily a good thing.

Also from Team Murdoch, there’s also a sudden burst of YouTube activity from Sky (including Sky News), despite the close ties between the two via their Skycast clone platform. The behind-the-scenes stuff is quite nice… although it’s clearly been filmed a good while back.