Now, I like Christmas as much as the next guy, but I am becoming more and more annoyed by the Christmas holiday season. Every year its starting earlier, this year I saw Sainsburys putting out their xmas stock in September!

I do enjoy this 4 month slog and festive crescendo of adverts,shopping  and Christmas songs but I have to admit that I find it increasingly hard to listen to any Christmas songs on the radio (especially those cuddly and lovsie Heart FM ones). In the past I would listen and try to conjure up nice images of christmas mornings, but now I can’t turn to the next station fast enough. And why is it that every man and his dog thinks they should produce a Christmas album that invariably features the same songs that have been covered by other artists

Although their is one shining light at the end of this musical Xmas tunnel, that is the impeding release of X-Factor’s guaranteed number 1 super ballad.

Personally I cant wait!

After more than a year of repairs, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) finally collided some atoms this week. In the experiment the LHC created similar conditions to those that occurred after the Big Bang. The project had been plagued by problems, from it over heating, to a bird dropping a baguette into the machinery. But now we are one step closer to discovering the ‘god particle’ and the existence of further dimensions.

Although I am not 100% sure about what happens in the 27km collider, I think this is an interesting advance in science.  It may prove that there are more dimensions than we currently know about and why gravity is a relatively weak force compared to others in the universe, which is pretty cool!

Now for the Competition:

First person to properly answer the question: below will win a chocolate bar and soft drink of their choice.
 
“Who postulated the existence of the elusive ‘God’ particle that the LHC looking for “

Climate Chief Howard Stern ‘of the Stern Report Fame’ has stated in an interview with The Times that People will need to turn vegetarian if the world is to fight climate change. In the interview, Lord Stern said: “Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world’s resources. A vegetarian diet is better.”

He predicted that people’s attitudes would evolve until meat eating became unacceptable. “I think it’s important that people think about what they are doing and that includes what they are eating,” he said. “I am 61 now and attitudes towards drinking and driving have changed radically since I was a student. People change their notion of what is responsible. They will increasingly ask about the carbon content of their food.”

UN figures suggest that meat production is responsible for about 18 per cent of global carbon emissions, including the destruction of forest land for cattle ranching and the production of animal feeds such as soy.

Having recently become a meat free convert it has opened my eyes to lots of things connected with meat and our insatiable need to consume it. We know it’s bad for the planet, vast amounts of studies suggest it’s bad for us http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/jul/01/vegetarians-blood-cancer-diet-risk, it’s certainly not good for the animals. So why do we continue to consume it on an industrial level.

I would contest that we are addicted to meat?

Welcome to news at your Fingertips-uk

http://www.fingertips-uk.com/

Fingertips is a news and interest RSS aggregator, that gives users the chance to create a unique newspaper ‘homepage’ (think iGoogle homepage) based on their individual preferences.

Its quite easy to set up and gather all of the RSS feed you like. It went live in April ‘09, and claims to monetise the product through selling adspace that, targets usership via age, gender, location, interests etc. They claim ” they can enable Fingertips users to develop strong and lasting relationships with your company and your products”

It appears to be a good product and easy to use and set up but I don’t think it will catch on in any major way due to the amount of work involved in creating your homepage. In addition to this people may have 1 or 2 preferences of content providers but across the board are willing to buy into an existing provider for their news and interest i.e. Skynews and The Guardian

In addition to this it doesn’t seem to be marketed very well, unfortunately there SEO isn’t very strong as a search for “fingertips” ranks Psoriasis at Your Fingertips: The Essential Reference Guide to Dealing with Psoriasis: Amazon.co.uk: Tim Mitchell, Rebecca Penzer, Gillian Clarke, … 2 higher places higher.

This is just my opinion – have yours.

As lovers of the show will know, last night saw the inevitable climax of the 5th season of the Apprentice with Sir Alan Sugar “Sralan” announcing his new apprentice. Yasmina Siadatan, a restaurateur, who beat Kate Walsh (the blonde one) in an exciting finale. 

The series which saw record audiences with the debut episode drawing in 8.1m viewer. As the show is now over  I thought we would take a look at the some of the quotes from one of the ‘most belligerent men in business’.

1. “You are not here to enhance some form of media career, so if any of you gentlemen are thinking of prancing around in your Calvin Kleins, showing off your three-piece-suite bulge, you can forget about it.”

2. “I’ve written books on advertising. Cheque books.”

3. “If you survive here, I promise you this: as sure as I’ve got a hole in my bloody a**e, when it’s down to two of you, people that are nice about you now, will not be.”

4. (after Ben’s indecision over who to take back into the boardroom) I hope you’re bringing in people for the right reasons. I hope you’re not thinking about James, that there might be a village missing an idiot somewhere…

5. I don’t like liars, I don’t like cheats. I don’t like bullshitters. I don’t like schmoozers. I don’t like arse-lickers.

6. I was born in Hackney. When you’re born in Hackney and you do well in life, you move to Chigwell.

7. “Could be you’re here because you’re good with words and know the right thing to say at the right time. I know the words to Candle in the Wind. It don’t make me Elton John.”

8. “Howard I’m thinking whether I should get you a cushion because sitting on the fence there you could get a sore arse. So are you gonna talk up?”

I bet you’ve only just got to grips with MP3’s, well I hate to break it to you but they are already out of date…

Spotify is a Sweden-based proprietary music streaming program, which allows listening to specific music without delay via browsing artists, albums or created playlists. So no need for downloading music anymore you just listen to it online ‘on demand’ stylee.  Downloading the itunes-esk interface for £10 means you have unlimited access to all the great artists of our time.

There is also a new business opportunity for all you forward thinking advertising folk. Spotify sells in-album advertising (like a radio ad) meaning you can target specific audience based on musical taste in a similar way to radio.

Check out http://www.spotify.com/en/

You heard it here first!

It seems today that every brand, media owner or marketing agency is jumping on the video advertising band-wagon. Wether its Nintendo claiming to have nothing to do with the video viral Why every guy should buy their girlfriend wii fit. The Telegraph Online launching their “new” Telegraph TV package, giving advertisers the ability to wrap existing video content with their branded message. Or specific video entertainment sites utilising existing digital ideas to stretch their media portfolio.

Advertisers are utilising these new developments and trying to capture the increasing amount of user migrating from traditional media’s to the ever more prolific online world. My only concern is that there is a fine line between advertising a brands message and forcing people to view it. By covering every last piece of free space on the internet with obstructive adverts and advertising to people without their full knowledge or consent. In my opinion the major challenge facing video advertising is that people will become bored, annoyed with obtrusive ad’s or blind to branding messages

This is just my opinion have yours.