View From Planet Jamie

Taking a break from housework yesterday I flicked through a few channels and found an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation being shown.  The episode shown was “The Drumhead”, a story about a Starfleet admiral who sees everyone as consipirators and spread mistrust and paranoia anywhere and everywhere she goes.  Because of her high rank very few people have the influence or authority to challenge her obsessions while many others fall under her spell.  The witch hunt is only stopped once it became clear to a superior that she was zealously pursuing the investigation, in the absence of evidence, for personal reasons.

It struck me that there are a few similarities between the issue covered by this episode and the current political climate in the UK and how the Houses of Parliament are dealing with the Digital Economy Bill (link to Twitter search on the topic, some very relevant responses).

It’s already widely known that Sith Lord Mandelson now believes that internet users are all criminal scum who download pirated music, games, films, terrorist device plans and spread evil gossip and misinformation about this control freak government.  He believes that the bedrock of British Law, the concept of innocent until proven guilty, should not apply to internet users such as you and me.  Merely a whisper of an allegation should be enough to get sanctions taken against people.  No trial, so no due legal process before a judge.  That is what New Labour stands for.

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With rumours abounding of when a General Election might be called it seems a good time to present a few salient facts about this “government”.  Regular readers will already know the kind of things I’m going to say.

The current “government” is unacceptable.  A Prime Minister the people did not vote for, seemingly given the position on the basis of some Hansie Cronje-like match fixing agreement.  Utterly distasteful and disrespectful.  It has its fair share of ministers and MPs who completely lack Clue.  Stephen Pound, Jack Straw, Ed Balls, Andy Burnham and Hazel Blears being examples of this stupidity.  Jacqui Smith’s replacement, Alan Johnson, isn’t much better either. Trying to spin the party line he ducks the facts about Gordongrad, formerly known as Broken Britain.

Then there’s Mandelson.  It’s quite ironic that Mandelson is an Anglicisation of the Mendelssohn family name (a large number of whom fled the totalitarian state of Nazi Germany) when he is helping to impose a totalitarian state in this country.  Not only did the “government” refuse to enforce the law over BT’s use of Phorm’s illegal surveillance technology, Mandelson is now driving the Digital Economy Bill through the Commons which will allow sanctions against people purely on the basis of allegations rather than evidence.  That is the act of a totalitarian state.  Quite why any internet user would vote Labour after its complicity in the Phorm case I don’t know.

The expansion of CCTV and the Interception Modernisation Programme have done little to prove me and the many others protesting against what I have called the surveillance state of Gordongrad wrong.  The Big Brother state is expanding.  Some of us have noticed and speak out about it.  Quite why others have not is something of a mystery to me.

This is a “government” which despises the expression of free speech and the rightful challenge of ill-considered laws.  Take the continued harrassment of photographers as a prime example.  Public servants should be accountable to the public they serve, not treating them like terrorists.  Anyone who questions or challenges the performance and failures of this “government” is seen as a menace, a public enemy.  Baseless slurs and smear campaigns are one modus operandi of this “government” in its campaign to silence its critics. Government through fear is a typical tactic from power crazed “governments”.  Trying to get people to report their neighbours as terrorists just because they carry a backpack, use two mobile phones or have used bottles of hair dye in their garbage is really quite pathetic.

I’m sure that once the election date is announced we can expect New Labour, its quangos and cronies to try and paint a fantasy picture of life in Britain today.  I know a teacher who, just a couple of hours ago was threatened with physical violence yet again.  Will that chavscum be removed, suspended or expelled?  When I was at school the answer would be yes to the last option.  In Gordongrad the answer is no to all of them.  Gordongrad has created an entire generation who have no concept of responsibility and work.  A sense of entitlement is all they have, which descends to violence when they are told “no”.

New in the blogroll is A Future Fair For All, a blog which documents the many other failures of this “government” using its campaign slogan.  And be sure there are a lot more than those I mention here.  I do not believe New Labour can truly deliver “A Future Fair For All” because they do not have the desire to do so.  New Labour stands for control freakery of the worst kind.  New Labour is the enemy of a free, open society.

A vote for Labour is a vote for the expansion of Gordongrad.  A state where you have no right to privacy and no right to protect yourself or property.  Where every journey you make, every website you visit and every communication you make is recorded and stored for evidence.  Where you MUST register for and carry at all times an ID card.  Where you are not allowed to question authority or law enforcement.  Where government decides and approves everything that is taught in schools so that it can produce an assembly line of happily programmed little drones.

Some time back I saw a badge saying “New Is To Labour As National Is To Socialism”.  Strong stuff it may be but it sure was prescient.  Remembering it inspired me to write an entry with the same title.  While we’re here, if you’re a new reader here please take a moment to read my brief review of 2009.

In just a few weeks you will have the opportunity to vote in a crucial General Election.  It will be crucial because it will determine where Britain goes: down the plughole or towards recovery.  You can vote for the expansion of Gordongrad and the loss of your freedoms or you can vote for change.  I’m voting for change.

It is time to reject the interfering bloatedness of New Labour.  The New Labour project is a failure.  It should be terminated.

Reports Chris Williams at The Register.

This is good news and something I have been saying for a long time now:there needs to be a full legal reckoning with the BT and Phorm executives responsible for these breaches of the law held to account.  In court.

Chris’ report has a very brief summary of the Phorm case for anyone who is new to the story.  My own entries go back as far as March 2008 and highlight the various illegalities, lack of ethics, lack of open discussion by Phorm, BT & Virgin Media (who I fired), rejections of Phorm by high profile organisations and more besides.

One interesting point here is that Ian Livingston (now BT Group CEO) was the senior executive directly responsible for the illegal and secret Phorm trials.  This is the same Ian Livingston whose name appears after a piece of spin entitled “The Way We Work”.  I cannot equate the illegal use of Phorm’s technology with behaving openly, ethically and in line with the law. UK and EU law has been broken here.  How is that ethical?

It isn’t.

I would love to see the BT management responsible for these breaches of UK and EU law in court for a full trial.  I contend that Mr Livingston’s talk about ethics and integrity are meritless spin and deserve to be exposed as such in court.

Paperchase have finally come clean.

And not before time.  I’ve already said that this was an issue which they could and should have handled much better.  CEO Timothy Melgund’s apology falls short of what I believe is in order, namely a full apology for and retraction of his comments to the newspapers about Twitter and its user community, but it is at least an acceptance that Paperchase did not handle the situation at all well.

Hidden Eloise writes some Final Advice To Paperchase which includes the following:

“Here is what I propose instead to Paperchase.

1. Make a clean and public apology for the bad research that led you to the conclusion that no copying was ever done.
2. Acknowledge publicly that the plagiarism was real and my allegations correct.
3. Retract publicly the damaging comments you made regarding me and all the Twitter users.
4. Put the infringing items back on sale and give all profits from this range of products to a charity of my choice, supporting something that we both hold dearly: independent artists.”

Regular readers will know that Paperchase isn’t the first company to feel a backlash from social media users.  Livejournal, Phorm, the Daily Mail, Trafigura and others have all recently felt the impact of bad news spreading like wildfire.  Matthew DeBord thinks that Toyota should also be included on this ever growing list:

“None of this, though, can contend with the breakneck, crowdsourced, unmediated reputation-wrecker that is the 140 characters of a tweet. As the recall story exploded last week and I pondered the collapse of the vaunted Toyota Way, I checked the #Toyota Twitter tag frequently. The tweet-rate was blistering: Dozens of new tweets every 30 seconds. Give it half an hour and you had a thousand more. Even the most hardened PR warrior would have looked at that and wet his pants.”

Think about that first sentence.  Its implications are massive.  Through the connections of social networking an issue which a company tries to hide or ignore can become a horrendously large reputation destroyer.  It’s not quite chaos theory but one person’s tweet or blog entry can theoretically snowball and grow into something huge.  Hidden Eloise is a perfect illustration of this.  One blog post written after being ignored by Paperchase was picked up and became a story the mainstream media couldn’t ignore because social networking spread the news.

This is perhaps something that isn’t as expected in the UK as America because the British are generally seen as very poor complainers and tolerant of poor service.  That is starting to change, albeit slowly.  One example is when Southeastern railways were rightly criticised by passengers for their performance in the recent snowy weather in the South East; many of them complained to MPs and the London Assembly and today a LA report berated them in official language.  Southeastern’s customer service has been pathetic.  There is little goodwill towards them from passengers.  The only way to improve that is to significantly improve customer service.  Already there is the start of a move to get Southeastern’s franchise removed.  Social networking will play an important role in any such move, or more specifically, collecting evidence for that campaign.

Customers are becoming more aware of attempts to delay responses, spin answers and obstruct responses to simple questions about service failures.  To provide a decent service in the social media age organisations need to truly place customer service at the heart of everything they do.  Make it easy for customers and potential customers to engage with them; deal with customers and complaints honestly, sensibly, without protecting vested interests and in a timely fashion; acknowledge when something has gone wrong, apologise sincerely; act to right the wrong caused and prevent it from happening again; learn from mistakes.

They also need a strategy for whatever presence they have on social media.  Like anything else done by the organisation the strategy needs to be consistent with the organisation’s brand and claimed values.  This point is vital.  Communications should always be of the highest standard whether in letter, e-mail or on Twitter.  Standards and clear policies need to be in place to ensure this is clearly understood by all concerned.  Habitat and Vodafone are two prize examples of how not to let your corporate presence be used.  Both companies will say they acted quickly in removing the offender.  The point is that the standards and policies should never have been broken in the first place – these are service and communications professionals!

Paperchase didn’t have a Twitter account before this story broke.  Their FromPaperchase account smacked of thinking “We’d better get something – anything up on Twitter so we can go on the defensive” and not really having any strategy.  It doesn’t matter how companies phrase things, if they are seen to be descending into a slanging match then they’re going to lose reputation and customers.  “Reputation management” companies (aka legal bully boys) may come into the fray at this point but if they do then the organisation’s reputation is not only already damaged but will surely be further damaged.  I’m looking at Phorm again.

The amazing thing is that so much of this is not rocket science.  It’s sensible stuff to anyone with a clear head. I’ve written such policy documents and trained staff on their contents.

BT and Virgin Media (two companies of whom I’m not the greatest fan) are using Twitter as a branch of their customer service and seem to be getting things mostly right in my experience.  Whether or not I get any more junk mail from Virgin Media will be the proof of that particular pudding.

Is this the start of a major change in the way organisations engage with their customers?  I hope so.  Customer service and ethics need to be truly at the heart of organisations’ cultures.  I don’t mean overdosing on those supposedly “motivational” posters.  I mean by ensuring every staff member works to an accountable code of conduct and standard.  I mean by ensuring that every customer’s communication is welcomed rather than just “processed in line with procedures”.  I mean by organisations employing people who truly believe in doing the right thing rather than programmable drones who are reprogrammed after failures and learn nothing from them.  I mean by organisations being open and honest with customers, not hiding behind misleading spin and mendacity.  Spin should stay on the cricket pitch.  It has no place in business.

There are a few entries here dealing with some experiences of poor customer service.  Why won’t organisations listen to the customers whom they are supposed to serve?

Let’s end on an idealistic note. Wouldn’t it be nice if there were no longer snotty council officials who refused to answer questions, just putting the phone down on people?  Wouldn’t it be nice if there were no longer companies claiming to offer a revolutionary service but who were actually breaking the law?  Wouldn’t it be nice if justified complaints from customers were responded to openly and honestly, with real apologies and proper action to compensate and prevent recurrence?

Social networking can help move towards this point.  We may never get there but the organisations that will not move will be named and shamed.  The lessons are here for Managing Directors and CEOs.  Times are changing: organisations’ approaches to customer service need to change with them.  It could be messy for those who do not.  Vox populi can be a force for good.

The Paperchase plagiarism issue continues to roll on.  Hidden Eloise reports that the truth about the copied image has now emerged.  But not from Paperchase.  No sign of an apology from Paperchase.  Even though they were the ones selling products using the copied image.  Isn’t selling items infringing on copyright illegal?

An apology is due from Paperchase and from its CEO Timothy Melgund.

Not only to Hidden Eloise but to the Twitter users who they have patronised and offended with their comments:

“What upsets us as a whole is that a lot of our good customers have been angered by this and there is no reason for it…

Oh really? Selling products which infringe on someone else’s copyright should be ignored then?

“We take all reasonable precautions when we purchase our designs from companies or individuals, because, to be blunt, we want to make sure they are entitled to sell it.”

Well Timbo, your precautions seem to have fallen short in this case. Begs the question are there other cases where your precautions have fallen short? Will you be reviewing your procdures and publishing the results of your review?

“I am sure it can be beneficial but if you get an untruth (on it) it can be very dangerous,” he said.

Where’s the untruth here Mr Melgund?  Paperchase sold goods infringing a designer’s copyright.  Regardless of the supply chain here it is the Paperchase brand that has been damaged by the story and your subsequent reaction.

I’m sorry if you were surprised and shocked by the response that this story got.  You really shouldn’t have been.  It’s called Vox Populi.  Corporations ripping off the smaller one person enterprises will always generate a strong reaction.

Instead of dealing with the issue sensibly and politely, taking ownership of the issue and investigating it sensibly, Paperchase ignored it then corporately crapped itself and panicked when the issue came to a larger audience.  The result was a snotty (and expanding) statement on the Paperchase website, a hastily created Twitter account, comments made to newspapers which are now shown to be poor attempts at spin and a complete refusal to acknowledge their part in this story.

This whole issue could and should have been resolved by Paperchase taking ownership of the issue when Hidden Eloise originally contacted them.  Paperchase should have been honest, polite and worked with Hidden Eloise. They didn’t.  What could have been an example of how to enhance one’s brand and reputation when something wrong has happened has turned into a classic example of how to damage one’s brand and reputation in a few easy steps.

I’ll say it again clearly:

An apology is due from Paperchase and from its CEO Timothy Melgund.

Hidden Eloise reminds Paperchase of a few relevant facts, which I repost here.  If Mr Melgund and Paperchase have any honour and decency they will apologise in full to Hidden Eloise.  And I mean a proper apology which wholly accepts their part in this, not some bulldust spin statement which tries to blame others.

Come on Paperchase, do the decent thing.

“But I would hope you also regret, Paperchase, saying this to an international newspaper:

“If we had been plagiarising, I completely understand why we would have received so many emails and Twitter posts concerning our business but we haven’t”

And this:

…raised serious concerns about the “powers, and there in the danger of Twitter”.

“I am sure it can be beneficial but if you get an untruth (on it) it can be very dangerous,” he said

So: Paperchase was selling plagiarised items….. Check!

I informed them back in November…..Check!

Paperchase continued selling the items even after my mail…..Check!”

Vox populi is being heard again.  Neil Gaiman tweeted about Hidden Eloise and how her work has been plagiarised by Paperchase.  You can guess what happened.

In this internet powered age it is an indisputable fact that bad news can travel very quickly indeed.  It certainly did in this case.  Word spread as this was retweeted.  The Amazon product page for the Paperchase item was visited by people who commented on Paperchase’s behaviour and asked Amazon to withdraw the item.  A couple of hours later and lo, the product page is a 404 (not working, not there).

A number of people commented on Hidden Eloise’s blog that they had written to Paperchase.  Paperchase are now reported to be claiming that they purchased the image  in good faith from a London Design Studio.

Whether they did or not, Paperchase’s apparent conduct towards Eloise is unacceptable.  Once they were made aware that there was an issue with the image use they should have investigated properly and held back further distribution of products using the image.  Paperchase may believe they were acting in good faith with the design studio but where was the good in their conduct towards Eloise?

Will Paperchase be publishing a full account of from whom the image was purchased and how the image was presented to them?  Will Paperchase be publishing a list of the actions they undertook to verify the image was owned by the design studio in the first place?  Will Paperchase be compensating Eloise appropriately for the misuse of the image she created?

If the design studio was at fault then Paperchase should make a public statement naming the agency concerned and confirming that their involvement with said agency is terminated.

Come on Paperchase, let’s have a full explanation of names and dates.  If you claim to have been acting in good faith then prove your honesty now by coming completely clean.

Today saw a gathering in London by an estimated 2000 amateur and professional photographers in protest at the continued harrassment of photographers by Police and “authorities” such as private security guards.  Regular readers will not be surprised by my attendance at this gathering.  There is a common law right to take photographs in public areas which is being eroded by the misuse of Section 44 of the 2000 Terrorism Act.

Professional photographers, bus spotters, train spotters, people who enjoy architecture and more are being treated as if they were terrorists; arrested, subjected to searches and unlawfully detained by Police misusing section 44 and completely lacking in common sense in so doing.

There is a Flickr group containing photos from the Mass Photographers’ Gathering that is well worth a look.  I’m in there somewhere else too, along with a selection of photos from my own set.

I heard about it through Twitter.  That’s another demonstration of vox populi for those who think Twitter is a waste of time.

Any state that arrests people taking photos of buses, trains, planes and buildings for their own personal enjoyment, believing them to be terrorists has lost any claim to legitimacy or true democracy.

I am a Photographer, Not a Terrorist.

Being vigilant does not excuse being stupid.

Michael Gove’s announcement of Conservative education policy has now got me seriously considering whether the Conservative party deserves the votes of me and my partner.  Andrew Lansley’s “Let’s use Google for everyone’s health records” was at best ill-considered but Mr Gove’s proposals are a disgraceful example of soundbite politics which completely ignore reality.

Firstly it plays directly into Labour’s hands and their claims of “Tory toffs”.

Just because someone has a 2:1 degree (which I do) or higher doesn’t mean they will make a good teacher (I don’t think I would).  Where is the evidence to prove this belief?  I know some extremely intelligent people who (no disrespect intended) struggle to engage people in one to one conversations and who have no ability to engage groups of adults let alone children. Where is the evidence to prove claims that those with 2:2s or other qualifications lower than a 2:1 are poorer teachers?  Alientating lots of people plays right into Labour’s hands.

The problems I am seeing teachers struggle with have nothing to do with having a first class degree.  They have everything to do with incompetent leadership, unprofessional conduct, a complete lack of support for teaching staff and protecting vested interests.  You get those kinds of behaviour from people of all education levels.  You don’t need a degree to behave unprofessionally.

Let us consider the reality of life in education today.  Teachers are deluged by paperwork, fearful for their careers if OFSTED come sniffing, if a pupil with a grudge makes a malicious allegation or if a narrow minded head teacher decides they have the right to dismiss staff for having perfectly legal outside interests.  Teachers fear for their safety, knowing that the school rarely supports them in cases where their safety is threatened.  Poorly behaved pupils can’t be disciplined or, God forbid, excluded because that would affect the child’s education.  Conveniently forgetting that the rest of the class are having their education affected by the poorly behaved child.

Discipline is no longer allowed to be enforced.  Teachers are no longer treated with respect.  Head teachers are more concerned with results than with engendering a culture of respect, correct behaviour and doing the right thing which are surely attributes needed to progress and contribute.  If I called a superior a c**t then I can expect to be disciplined and almost certainly fired.  Yet such conduct by pupils in a school goes unpunished?  Did you ever call your headmaster a c**t?  I certainly didn’t.  How does allowing that to go without sanction match the real world?  It doesn’t.

There is no one magic bullet to fix the problems in the education system.  Structure, provision, curriculum, discipline, management and pupils’ circumstances all play a part and all need to be addressed individually.

Education models in Japan, Sweden and Finland have been touted as ideal.  Let’s look at the reality of these models.  They work because they are well suited to the societies of those countries.  I’ve met a fair few Swedes, Finns and Japanese.  Not only are they well mannered, the ethics of hard work and doing the right thing are ingrained in those societies.  Unlike this country.  The current generation in school seem obsessed by a sense of entitlement; if something isn’t allowed or achieved then it’s someone else’s fault and they will whine, moan and bitch until they get what they want.  In other words they don’t accept the ethic that says if you want something you have to work for it.

Look at the “apologies” offered by the bankers recently.  Just like Gordon Brown’s apologies they aren’t true apologies, recognising the effect their conduct has had on other people and wishing to atone for it.  Compare that to Japanese executives’ apologies.  Now those are real apologies, realisation and acceptance of failure and being in the wrong.  So this is a society thing.  No magic bullet is going to fix that.

Then there’s the idea of bankers or other such professionals going into teaching.  Now things on finance floors may well be quick but are such professionals used to being physically threatened, told to “p*** off”, being called a “c***”?  How many bankers have had knives held to their throats or had threats made against their families?

There are a few things you really need to look at before making half-witted (anything that ignores reality is, in my opinion, half-witted) statements like this.  I’m happy to offer a few suggestions. If you really want to make a difference to education….

1) Stop burdening teachers with excessive paperwork and half-assed initiatives from those who lack real world experience.

2) Return discipline to schools, return the power to suspend and expel to heads, back teaching staff in enforcing discipline and hold parents to account for their child’s poor behaviour.  School rules are to be adhered to.  Failing to enforce that leaves children with no respect for the law or other people.

3) Dismiss incompetent managers and leaders from schools and LEAs.  It is these people who are supposed to provide leadership and an atmosphere of excellence. If heads and deputy heads (these people rarely teach) cannot manage properly or professionally then they should not be in those jobs.  I have heard plenty about one particular person at an LEA who in my opinion should not be in that job.  I am sure there are more out there.

4) Provide enough textbooks and don’t bind the schools in to some silly purchasing system which takes ages to get anything in.

5) Don’t allow children who should not be in mainstream education to be in mainstream education in the first place.

6) Overhaul OFSTED.  It needs bringing down to earth and the reality of education today, not some tick list based assessment by people who have no relevant experience and an attitude problem.

Once you’ve done all of the above, take a look at what you’ve achieved.  Yes, it will be hard work and it will upset the incompetent, the arrogant, the gutless, those who can’t be bothered.  But if you want teaching to regain the valued and respected status it had then this is what you need to do.

The best isn’t about a piece of paper on a wall.  The best is about passion, commitment, desire and hard work.  To get the best you have got to provide an environment for people to perform to their best, excellent leadership, supportive management, a transparent and clear assessment system, an environment that doesn’t drive people into the ground but makes the best of their talents.  Isn’t making the best use of talents and having aspirations what Conservatives stand for?

I’ve seen a lot of teachers quit recently. Not because they weren’t up to it but because they feel there is no value, no respect and no support for their profession.  It is perhaps to be expected from pupils but not from the management who are supposed to support and work with you.  As Sir Geoffrey Howe said in his memorable speech “It is rather like sending your opening batsmen to the crease only for them to find, the moment the first balls are bowled, that their bats have been broken before the game by the team captain.”

These, Mr Gove, are facts.  These are things I have seen.

Mr Gove, I’d love to know what your experience is in the education sector.  I don’t mean your degree, I mean how much time have you spent teaching in a real world school?

I’ll make you the same offer I made to Ed Balls and Gordon Brown: please get in touch with me and I’ll see what I can do to arrange some real world front line experience for you, Mr Cameron and your advisors.  I’m sure it will be very enlightening for you all.

All I am asking is that you base your policies in reality.  Right now that doesn’t seem to be the case.  We  have a “government” with a very distorted view of reality.  Is Her Majesty’s Opposition also afflicted with a distorted view of reality?

Since when have GPs been career advisors?  I ask this because today I saw a GP completely contradict what they had said to a patient a couple of months ago.  GPs are paid a very good salary to provide healthcare and advice related to healthcare.

They are not paid to lecture patients on careers about which they know nothing.  They are not paid to offer financial advice.  They are not paid to offer advice on issues to do with housing.

Don’t offer advice on subject and situations about which you know precious little.  If you want to do something to help improve the situation then ask “What can I do to help improve the situation?” and the patient will tell you.

Did you know that you actually added to the stress your patient was feeling?  Not a very sensible thing to do really.  Thanks very much for that, more clearing up mess not of my own making.  Really helpful stuff.

Next time I think the patient will be seeing a different GP.

One who actually listens, considers and then offers constructive advice.

2009 nears its end and I for one won’t be sorry to see the back of it. There have been some very enjoyable high points including the Ashes win, the test win this morning, a wedding in my family and Phorm being all but forced out of the UK but overall 2009 will be a year I remember as a year in which far too many people lacked Clue, balls and ethics.

Some might accuse me of being a Grumpy Old Man.  According to the series I am now in the age bracket for being a Grumpy so there may be some truth to the suggestion.  My response to that is that I’m not grumpy, I’m a realist and some of what I see is less than pleasing, often lacking in Clue, ethics, common sense and the other attributes I used to expect from those in positions of power and influence.  Now I just expect self centredness, obsession with protecting the vested interests and the status quo and control freakery trying to interfere in areas where the state has no right to.

I’m not the only one.  Guy Aitchison has written his review of the year.  It’s well worth reading; it highlights other areas where government and authorities have failed or fell victim to control freakery or halfwittedness.

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