down the avenue

London: Rich Stories at their Best

I always go to a melancholy place when I head back to the streets of London, even moreso when I visit my old stomping grounds. I suppose you could say that this is the case for everyone when they return to anywhere in the world they once lived, yet having lived in more than ten countries, England is different. London is different.

I think part of it is its heritage. Part of it is the left over piece that feels embedded in you as if some part of some generation before you walked the same streets before the turn of the century and their passed on DNA shows up at the oddest times….whenever I have a cup of English tea brewed the old fashioned way for example.

It also shows up when I feel the sense of community in both rural and urban pubs that has been watered down in the states over the last two generations.

And so, I cherish these melancholy walks. They take me through narrow alleyways with a surprise around every corner, crowded obscure bookstores near Tottenham Court Road, into cafes and wine bars where the tables are close together and people are wearing hats even in summer, past well manicured lawns in London’s northern burbs and well behaved dogs in Regent’s Park.

And then there’s Camden Town. Every time I think about my need to return for a meander for old time sake, I sometimes wonder how much of a hippee I was, or whatever the equivalent of that was in the late eighties.

I was drawn to the place then and still am today, despite the fact that my first introduction to it was 25 years ago and it’s become a very different place and I’ve obviously become a very different person.

Yet, it all still draws me in for the taking. The colorful stalls, the tattoos, the edgy haircuts, the funky boots, my favorite creperie that is still in the same place it always was, the incense that burns upstairs and that fabulous material and linen shop I can never remember the name of.

When you think about the energy of the universe and how it works, it’s no grave surprise that an old South African friend I first met in London before I hit the big 21 has returned to live here with her husband. She still lights candles and drinks Cabernet Sauvignon.

We were both blondes at the time and are now both brunettes or close to it. We both sold art from around the world – or so we tried. We both threw fabulous international parties where we danced and drank cinzano and lemonade until dawn.

Mine were held in my Earls Court basement flat which opened up to a small but tasteful garden courtyard. I still remember the faces as if it was yesterday and what a fascinating representation of friends I had at the time: Morocco, Ireland, France, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Germany, Holland, Sweden, Iceland, Russia, Italy, Denmark, Israel, Greece, Belgium, Scotland, Zimbabwe…..

As you can imagine, the food was diverse and an important part of our experience with one another and we were never tired of conversation. We’d often land at someone’s flat for espresso at 3 in the morning after stopping into a famous Jazz Club near Kings Cross.

It was nearly a daily part of our evening routine for months until the big Kings Cross fire and then suddenly the bus, train, bus, and then bus again hassle to get there forced us to find a new locale.

Did I mention that we never tired of conversation? Everyone had a story, a rich, diverse and emotional story they were passionate about, and so, passion ruled our every exchange with each other, through some other form of expression we shared: art, music, dance, cooking, poetry or mime.

Although the international diversity was much less when I moved to the country, the stories remained an integral part of my experience living in the U.K. and now an integral part of my memory.

My neighbor Bill was the managing director or some such close to the top of the food chain title at Harrods Department Store in Knightsbridge, which was always a bit too much for my budget in those days.

I remember recruiting him and his wife for a play I wrote, which involved the launch of a marble tile company. I wove in Vivaldi to one of the scenes and Bill would dance around out of character, pause for a whiskey sundowner and then return with a smile and say “shall we begin?” Yes, but of course. And so, we’d begin again. And again. And again.

Life was much simpler even for the workaholics around me. I did a stint at Saatchi and Saatchi Advertising which was near or on Goodge Street at the time. We had an American Managing Director and his office was always open for any of us to waltz in to solicit advice.

People worked late and instead of beer and pizza which is what I think of when I think of late nights in Silicon Valley, particularly if engineers are involved, it was gin and tonics and cheese and crackers.

Account management merged with creative and vice versa and the place was a dynamic one, full of bright and interesting minds I learned something new from every day. We worked hard and then we played hard. It was always like that and results came, award winning ones.

So that brings me to this trip, which is different than any other I’ve made to London in the past couple of decades. Nearly every memory and experience I’ve had in this place, whether it was 25 years ago or two, was centered around creative energy: artists, designers, travelers, authors and musicians.

I’m here to contribute to a different kind of creative energy, one which just like every other English memory, involves storytelling.

Along with 11 other writers, bloggers and content creators, I’ll be capturing people’s stories on and off stage, company backgrounds, tales of technology successes and perhaps failures, lessons learned in business and government, and how emerging technology and new media is being used in innovative ways.

Weymouth & Huffington Talk Journalism: On & Offline

Katharine Weymouth of the Washington Post and Arianna Huffington talked about news and political coverage on and offline at last week's D.

Weymouth says for their audience, its about learning how people digest news on the web. “We’ve blown up our news room and restructured. For years, the newspaper was centered around sections,” she says.

Arianna says, "people consume information online differently. It’s not as if you make a choice to buy Time or Newsweek. You never just visit one site online. The more interesting stuff that you see online, the more habitual your online behavior becomes.”

Talk about a dialogue where old media meets new. Arianna has just over 60 people working for her now whereas the Washington Post has 800 people, some who have been in the business for decades.

Kara asks them how they deal with cost structures. Says Katharine, “the mistake is to think of them as substitutes. Our biggest readership is not surprisingly during the day. People may read the paper in the morning then check the rest of it online during the day or for searching for something specifically. We need to do this on different platforms.”

Regarding the topic of 'saving newspapers,' which was bound to come up, Arianna, who still loves reading a newspaper says, “its not about saving newspapers, its about saving journalism." She adds a humorous saying by a Greek philosopher from 2,000 years ago - ' you cannot enter into the same river twice.'

She adds, "the conversation on whether its going to be online or in newspapers is done. Let’s stop talking about old media and new media, its about the media of yesterday and the media of tomorrow."

Kara asks Katharine what the Washington Post will look like tomorrow. She believes in the newspaper and print but online is part of that. “I still do believe in print and I see it as a compliment. We’re looking at the DX, Plastic Logic and the Kindle. Nothing yet has been invented that replaces what is really good about a newspaper.”

For the Huffington Post, it's all online and that isn't going to change. That's where they started and where they're going, in addition to other platforms, such as the iPhone and the Kindle.

Someone from the audience asks Arianna what her vision is for the Huffington Post four years from now. She never leaves an interview on the table without infusing a bit of humor.

“I don’t like to make plans that far in advance, partly because I’m a superstitious Greek girl," she says. "I don’t like to count my clams before they’ve hatched.”

It's clear that Huffington Post's digital online world will stay that way and remain interactive. "Consuming news online is like galloping on a horse," she says. "You get involved in what you’re reading and you pass it on. It’s a great era for journalism because in the end, we’re creating a new generation of 'news' consumers. We can become really engaged citizens.”

Nokia's Ovi Maps for Mobile and Web

As part of TravelingGeeks prep for London, we met with the Nokia Ovi maps team to learn a bit more about their mobile and web apps. Ovi maps allow you to see the world in new ways with 3D, satellite and terrain views, weather, information and more.

Features include collections, which allow you to collect and store your favorite routes or destinations for quick and easy access. You can also search for new places from restaurants to remote towns and the service helps you with routing prior to your trip as well as navigation on-the-ground.

You can do all your pre-planning on the desktop if you'd like, save your favorites into collections, and then sync up with your mobile device so you can later navigate using the same information when you arrive at your final destination.

They currently have 216 cities worldwide and 30 landmarks per city. “If you do a really deep dive into the maps, you may not really want to see labels, but its something you can turn on and off easily depending on your preference,” said Berlin-based Jörg Malang, head of Ovi Maps for Nokia.

There’s also a very cool terrain view which gives you views of mountains and landscape.

Maps 3.0, the latest version, which came out in the first quarter of this year, includes hi-resolution satellite and terrain maps in 2D and 3D views and you can walk with enhanced pedestrian routing and features.

You can download updated maps for free anytime from over the 200 countries and of those 200, roughly 74 are navigable today (meaning you can do real-time pedestrian and car navigation in those countries).

You can also share locations with your friends but you can’t yet export or have multiple profiles, that is if you don’t want those two profiles to be synced with each other. Sharing features are coming in the not too distant future however.

Talk Show Tips

Out this week, TalkShowTips uncovers 72 Secret Master Host Techniques.

More than a book, Susan Bratton has compiled a culmination of learning from five years of podcasting, hundreds of interviews and more than a dozen years of public speaking, emceeing and moderating panels. Anyone who does interviews would be interested in learning more about this new system: bloggers, vidcasters, podcasters, radio and TV hosts or interviewers.

It contains a eBook with all the techniques and teachings, a worksheet for sending a guest invitation, a script for talking to a publicist or assistant to book a guest, a Mad-Lib's style worksheet to cement the format and flow of your show, ton's of in interview tricks and techniques, a strategy called, The Grid, that helps you get ready for a show efficiently.

On Blogging: A Word From the South Africans

Winners of the South African blog contest have been unveiled across multiple categories. The "best blog across all categories" this year is 2 Oceans Vibe.

My buddy Nic, who was on the South African blogging expedition with us last December is listed as the first runner-up although they did win for best group blog. Matthew Buckland who also joined us for part of the tour is included in the runner-up list as well.

Interestingly enough, there have been a few debates raging since the ceremony on Friday night. including disappointment from one of the judges.

2oceansvibe won in 6 categories and although she was a judge, votes were weighted in favor of public votes. According to the rules, that means that ‘in the voting phase the vote weighting will be 30% judges and 70% public’ whereas in the nomination phase it is ‘50% judges 50% public.’

It sounds like she is disappointed with the voice of South Africans, in other words, where they spend their time and what they think about. She says, "I realise that there is a pretty large audience for tits, ass, cars, rugby and surfing, but the fact that this is the blog that we hold up to the world as our national pride and joy makes me want to hurl."

She encourages the need to distinguish between popular voted blogs and then get the judges together to discuss their choice of winners that best reflects where South Africa is right now and where it is heading. Of course, that model is the old media model where two men decide which movie gets a two thumbs up or three book reviewers can influence whether a book makes it to the NY Times Bestseller List or not.

She talks about brand and the power of brand, in this case, something that stands for quality in the way that perhaps the Oscars do here. Her take: if the blog awards brand doesn’t have any meaning, any vision, any unique take on the world of blogging, then - 'it becomes just another popularity contest.'

"The masses decide" is where its heading though - no more judges, very few editors (who can afford them now in the new Google economy where everything is expected for free), and less calling for experts, although we'll return to experts soon enough as quality goes down. We now live in a Digg and Yelp society where hopefully over time, quality will rise to the top and the unauthentic voices and players will drop to the bottom.

The upside: more feedback and discovery than anytime in history. The downside: too much clutter and noise until the next genius brings out advanced filters that make that online discovery process even more efficient, more compelling and more fun.

South African Blog Contest

The South African Blog Awards is live. Given that I've lived there a couple of times and just spent a chunk of time down there late last year into early 2009, I'm a fan of several of their blogs in countless categories and hey, South African bloggers voted for my blog in the PR Week blog contest last summer.

The SA Blog Awards is a showcase of the very best of South African blogs. The goal is to bring South African bloggers to the forefront of peoples attention, both locally and internationally, increasing exposure for South Africa's great bloggers.

Voting is live and the winners will be announced on April 3rd, 2009. Check out Brand South Africa, SARocks and Matthew Buckland.com. There's also a great photo blog called Cape Town Daily Photo.

Categories are broad and include: The Best of the Best from South Africa, Best Entertainment Blog, Most Humorous, Best Post on a South African Blog (the one that stood out in 2008 was Moral Fibre), Blogs written by a South African in any foreign country (interesting one - South African Sea Monkey: what a great name), Best Original Writing on a South African Blog, Best Political Blog (there's some provocative reading here), Best Photographic Blog, Best Food and Wine Blog, Music Months, Gay / Lesbian / Bisexual / Transgendered Blogs, Best Design Blog, Best South African Podcast, Best Group Blog, Best Business Blog, Best Technology Blog, Best Sports Blog, Best Blog covering Enviro-Friendly Content, Best African Language Blog (cool, eh?), Most Controversial Blog, Best Travel Blog, Best Personal Blog, and lastly, Best Parenting Blog for the trials and tribulations of dealing with "little people."

Do some scanning, do some reading, so some digging, do some laughing, and by all means, do some voting.

Talking to Matthew Buckland

Below is an interview with South African blogger extraordinaire and serial entrepreneur Matthew Buckland. We were on a van in the southern Cape for a few days moving in between a panoramic helicopter ride, Stormhoek and a night at the infamous Lanzerac Hotel.

Buckland is an online media guru, firstly in a product development and editorial guise, and then in the last 8 years in a managerial, business and product development role as GM of the Mail & Guardian Online.

He is also the co-founder of award-winning blog aggregator amatomu.com and group blog ThoughtLeader, which scored a (Webby Honoree and won SA blog of the year).