The country has seen devastation this week as youths run riot in the cities looting and destroying high streets. For what reason? No one is entirely sure… what started off as a peaceful protest regarding the shooting of a man in Tottenham has escalated into anarchy!

Social media has been credited for playing a huge part in the story for both the organisation of the riots and also the reporting of it. As events happened, trending occurred on Twitter giving users second by second updates of where the rioting was taking place and also what was happening from all perspectives. Clapham residents even organised a clean-up meeting via it, 7 hours after the riots finished!

Social media has changed the news reporting landscape, making news stories emerge as they happen. The problem being though – which bits are true? As Twitter is totally unpoliced and gives everyone, rioters and your average blogger alike, the freedom to say exactly what they wish. So on the positive side the public have access to up-to-the minute news, changing the way we consume and respond to news stories. However, negatively, there is no proof as to which information is true or false!

Should this be allowed? Twitter thinks so “Our goal is to instantly connect people everywhere to what is most meaningful to them. For this to happen, freedom of expression is essential. “ So like it or not, the use of Twitter for both good and evil is here to stay. How you choose to use it is down to you…

MOVE from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

Social media isn’t just for the big brands, a great example of an ice cream truck in LA using social media to tell customers when they’re nearby.

Pioneering a New-wave Food Truck from I Am Los Angeles on Vimeo.

Today the ASA upheld a complaint against L’Oreal against two of its current campaigns (Lancome Teint Miracle featuring Julia Roberts and  Maybelline’s The Eraser Foundation with Christy Turlington) for the over use of digital retouching.
The complainant, Liberal Democrat MP Jo Swinson said that images of both celebrities had been digitally manipulated and were “not representative of the results the product could achieve”. Swinson is the Co-founder of the Campaign for Body Confidence and has said that she wants to ‘tackle body image pressure by requiring advertisers to label all adverts, disclosing the extent of digital retouching of images of people’.
However, Swinson won this time due to a technicality. The complaint was upheld on the grounds of misleading advertising and exaggeration. Basically, the retouching made over claims on what the product could actually achieve. Apparently due to contractual obligations with the stars L’Oreal failed to supply the ASA with the ‘before and after’ pics that would allow them to see what affect the touch-ups had on the final images so they had no choice but to uphold the complaint. In fact, had the image been for a product not related to a visual reference (for example perfume) the ASA would have had no grounds on which to ban the ad as the retouching wouldn’t directly relate to the claims of the product.

So although not the body blow against the use of retouching that Swinson is pushing for she has gained valuable PR for her campaign. 
The whole discussion is complicated by where you draw the line – improve the lightening here a bit, get rid of a spot there, removed all wrinkles and any signs of aging here – opps gone too far.  Check out these great celebrity shots of before and after to see what can be achieved with a couple of clicks of the mouse. Bizarrely retouchers seem to dislike lower eye lids! http://sastha-knowyourledge.blogspot.com/2010/12/celebrities-before-and-after-photoshop.html

Ok, so first up, let’s me just say that of course what they did was bang out of order. Disgusting, grim, puke in the snow, just plain nasty. But was it shocking? From the paper that wheeled out the Fake Sheik? Well, it didn’t shock me. Or at least it didn’t surprise me.
 
It’s interesting that Twitter has brought down a media empire, but further to Martin’s blog below, I’m not sure if it’s all good. The NOTW was a poisoned brand and needed to close. Fine, and no doubt a replacement will ghost up from its ashes, built on new firm and unflinching journalistic principles. But here’s the thing:
 
I think we all knew that Bad Things went on at the NOTW and other papers too. We didn’t want this wafted up our noses but every morning we smelt it- and we quietly ignored it because we wanted the stories to keep coming. Partly because we are nosey, but partly because, in a world where politicians, the police, councils, companies and almost everyone in fact, is trying to cloak or spin the truth, it’s a relief to read the words of organisations who make money out of telling the you (largely) the truth.
 
It’s cracking that the press profits from getting its hands mucky on our behalf, and on countless occasions they have revealed things that the police and other public bodies have not been willing or able to do. They have done this by posing, hacking, lurking, lying and with a kickass dressing up box full of fake tan and adhesive goatees.
 
Fair enough, the NOTW got lost in its dressing up box and came out looking like Darth Vader. As the whole saga is tucked up to bed, I pray that, in this age of injunctions and twitchy twitterati, editors will have the balls to use their humanity as a lens through which to bend the rules. For instance hats off to Sunday Herald editor Richard Walker for putting Ryan Giggs on its front cover – thereby putting the poor sod out of his misery.

Who said that outdoor can’t deliver engagement….

Bluebloodsbillboard from bluebloods billboard on Vimeo.

t the Superbowl 2011 (or XLV as it’s affectionately known), Volkswagen released their Passat ad featuring a young boy dressed as Darth Vader.

Greenpeace however came back with a response, piggybacking the ad’s success to highlight Volkswagen’s resistance to cutting their CO2 emissions. They released their own video ad that went viral across the internet featuring the Darth Vader boy being met by Luke Skywalker, Princess Leya, Yoda and the gang. In addition to this, Greenpeace were extremely clever in using social media and the power of the internet to gain support for their cause by allowing users to ‘Join the rebellion’ on their website as well as connect to their social media channels on Facebook to voice their opinions.

And then, just when everybody was getting excited with where Greenpeace were going with this, LucasFilm, copyright owners to all that is Star Wars, stepped in to ruin the fun and used their force (sorry) to make Greenpeace remove all videos for copyright breach.

Now that Greenpeace have shown that they aren’t afraid to attack big brands on a big scale, we can only wonder who will be the next target. It could even be our own Kate and Wills for all their recent jetting about!

The past week will be long-remembered for the way in which the previously slow-burning News of the World hacking affair suddenly caught light.

Many hands were at play as the flames were stoked (step forward The Guardian and Mumsnet, amongst others), but I was struck by the role that numerous voices on Twitter – many of whom household names – acted as lightning rods for collating information and inciting the masses.

Maybe it’s just my penchant for following politicised, liberal individuals of a certain level of public renown, but the way in which the likes of @DaraOBriain (500,000 followers), @RufusHound (285,000), @SuePerkins (105,000) , @LaurenLaverne (92,000), @Prodnose (Danny Baker, 75,000) – and even, in a gentler way (@Wossy, 1.1 m) – launched into the NotW and its management in such an angry, public, tub-thumping way struck me as being a first for Twitter. These are mid-major level public figures, all borne of the BBC, who temporarily held back from posting anodyne musings and witty asides and instead decided to try and mobilise the public behind a common agenda. They had a fair wind at their backs, but they succeeded all the same.

To date, Twitter has always struck me as being about the individual – it was a way of one person broadcasting their news, or for another to follow. Naturally, you can extend this to include the way that groups of individuals, organisations and media outlets broadcasted more widely, but the recipient still felt part of a one-to-one communication at some level.

Twitter has also long been used as a means of addressing customer service issues – for many service companies, Twitter is a simple and direct way to engage with consumers and their grievances (@BTcare, etc.).

But here’s the thing, last week we saw these hitherto benign public faces align behind a topical and politically charged cause, with the sole view of using their public leverage to bring about change. And this change wasn’t ‘for the good’ in the way that support for a charitable or environmental cause might be; this was to bring down a major player in the UK media landscape. Their influence, in my opinion, was considerable.

Their output was also not without significant individual risk – invoking the wrath of News International comes at an almost guaranteed cost – how long till The Sun exposes Dara or Rufus for some matter of major public interest?

I’m not to judge whether their actions were worthy, or if they will have a lasting impact on the methods and output of the UK media, but I do believe that their actions brought Twitter to the top table for the first time – it has now proven itself to be an agent of change.

Encouraged by their success, we can expect to see more of this. I note with interest that in the last few days @The_SteveCoogan (1,000 followers) and @GrantHugh (7,000) – both of whom voiced strong opinions on Newsnight in the past week – have now taken to Twitter for the first time.

The week that Twitter grew up? Maybe, but most definitely a fascinating time.

When I first received my Sky+ HD box, I thought to myself this was really TV at its best: I would never miss my favourite programmes; I would be able to pause live shows, record entire series. Could I really ask for more? I didn’t think so until the Smart TV came in.

We have all heard of Internet or IP TV in the past, manufacturers like Sony have been making them for years now. However, Smart TV goes one step further: not only you can surf the web via your TV but like a mobile, you can get access to hundreds of apps which open you to a whole new world of entertainment. With this new piece of equipment the viewing experience becomes something else altogether: you can rent movies via Lovefilm, use social network applications such as Facebook or even chat with your friends on Skype. With VOD being part of our day to day TV consumption, the market of TV apps has become the next best thing. Samsung predicts that by the end of 2014 70% of all TV’s will be Smart TV’s. I remember when I first started in the media industry people kept saying “TV is dead”, “Video on Demand is the end of TV”. In reality VOD is simply another way for people to watch even more of the TV that they love. Gaming consoles are already challenging laptops and PC’s with BBC IPlayer, ITV player, 4OD and Sky Anytime all on Playstation and Xbox. Yet, Smart TV will bring television back in to the heart of the home and bring a whole new viewing experience. This new technology is not just about watching TV but also sharing and connecting with the world.

So to those who were quick to say TV is dead, I would say TV has risen from the ashes!!