Suzanne Morrow's blog

SXSWi BizSpark Accelerator deadline - Friday, 4th Dec

SXSWi moleskin notebook sketchSXSW Interactive festival is the digital conference to attend. Yes, it helps that it's based in sunny Austin, Texas and that the BBQ food is *awesome*, but it's also packed full to bursting with top notch panels from the brightest minds in tech

There are hundreds of networking events hosted by industry leaders and an unbeatable line up of special programs showcasing the best new websites, video games and startup ideas the community has to offer - all happening over 5 days!

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ipadio and Sport England Bring Community Sports Hub to Facebook

Sports England, Facebook & ipadio announce Community Sports HubMore great news from companies who've taken part in the Digital Mission series, with an announcement from live phonecasting service ipadio, who recently returned from the Digital Mission to New York.

ipadio have joined forces with Sport England and Facebook  to encourage more young people to get involved with sport with the announcement of the Community Sports Hub.

The initiative will produce a beefed-up fan page on the social network which will integrate with ipadio's phone-to-web technology to encourage participation. Facebook are putting up in-kind advertising valued at £5m/year until 2013.

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Chinwag's Practical Guide to Internships: Creating a Program

woman at desk flickr photoThere are a lot of challenges for any company taking on an intern.

From where to advertise the vacancy to the costs involved in hosting and training can all be a drain on company resources.

It's been challenging at Chinwag, so I bent the ear of Dominic Potter, co-founder of Internocracy, a company that helps employers set up and run their internship programmes.

Here's a brief run-down of his top-tips to consider before taking on an intern:

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Your Company Could Own Your Tweets

Twitter follower profile picturesSocial media is the bread and butter of customer relations management and there's no doubt that for companies, employees who communicate well online hold a certain cache.

Any personal blog or website you have could be owned by the boss and the trouble lies where personal and work collide and whether blogging takes place in the office or at home.

If your blog mentions company-related news, who owns the rights to it, will be difficult to ascertain. In theory, working for a prominent organisation and mentioning their developements within your personal site is treading on terra-infirma. Should the site become successful, things get even more complicated. Once revenue is involved who gets a share of the profits?

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Chinwag's Practical Guide to Internships: Making it Legal

photocopying image FlickrFor the debt-riddled graduates flooding the jobs market, an internship is an essential bridge to full-time work and enthusiastic young, relatively cheap, talent has its own rewards for employers. But stay on the right side of the law.

Employment law can be a tricky business and the fallacy that an internship equals free labour could potentially land a company in hot water.

There are a few basic legal rules worth bearing in mind should you wish to offer an internship.

Danvers Baillieu, technology lawyer at Winston & Strawn LLP and Bootlaw founder addressed this very issue at a Bootlaw meetup evening earlier this year:

"The shades of grey apply particularly in relation to the requirements of the National Minimum Wage Act 1998 (NMWA 1998)"

Under the National Minimum Wage Act (NMWA 1998), anyone who is a worker, that is a person who is employed by you and no one else, must be paid, the minimum wage and according to the act a worker is defined as:

an individual who has entered into or works under (or, where the employment has ceased, worked under)" is an employee and must be paid accordingly.

Exemption from the rule are builders, accountants or other types of contractors. The minimum wage for over 22 year olds is £5.73/hour (£229.20/week based on 40hrs) and £4.77/hour (£190.80/wk) for 18-22 year olds.

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New EU Proposals Threaten a Cookie Clampdown

Cookie image flickrA revision of EU privacy law could have a devastating effect on online advertising.

Under the new rules publishers must gain users' consent before placing cookies on their machines. Online ad practises like behavioural targeting, retargeting and audience segmentation will all be effected.

The change will see national governments having to:

"ensure that the storing of information, or the gaining of access to information already stored, in the terminal equipment of a subscriber or user is only allowed on condition that the subscriber or user concerned has given his/her consent, having been provided with clear and comprehensive information."

The EU are objecting to online advertisers collecting data without the users' knowledge. Common practice is to make users aware of cookie use through privacy policies posted in their small print. With ever-improving behavioural and semantic targeting relying on cookies, the EU's threats to step in if the industry doesn't regulate itself will raise concerns at publishers in an already-difficult advertising market. The gloves, it appears, are most definitely off.

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Social Media Salary Report: Ladies, It's Not Pretty

Twitter me CakeIf the latest figures from Forum One Networks' Online Community & Social Media Compensation Survey are to be believed, it's not good news ladies. 

The company's 2009 survey found that the gender pay gap is widening in social media at least. Male respondents to the survey made just over $86,644 (£52,249) while female respondents, in comparison, averaged just $75,624 (£45,702) a difference of almost $9,000. According to the survey women make 87% of what a man in a similar role brings home every month.

This time last year Forum One's 2008 study found that 55% of community managers were women. In 2009 this figure fell to 52%. Even with a slight dip in the number of women in social media's top jobs they still out number men in the sector; something which makes the pay difference strange.

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Chinwag's Practical Guide to Internships: An Introduction

Gordon: chinwag's first tech internThe benefits of having an intern are numerous. It’s not just cheap labour and someone to make the tea.

Many organisations are reaping the rewards that come with an internship and a skilled graduate.

It was a case of unknown territory when Chinwag took on Gregory, our first tech intern. It took time and effort to get him started, but the investment paid off and the work he did was invaluable.

So, in the sprit of this, we’ve created a series of blog posts, from an employer's perspective, that aim to cover everything you need to know about offering an internship.

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Keep the Kids (And Geeks) In Your Household Happy This Christmas

Pleo Flickr picture

I may have found THE perfect geek Christmas present with only...49 shopping days to spare. Well done me.

It's a tiny interactive dino robot, that goes by the name of Pleo.

It's the brainchild of "Mr FurbyCaleb Chung, who told the story behind the little robodino at this year's Thinking Digital (25% discount for Chinwaggers on the 2010 event) - video below...

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BIMA Awards 2009 Party - Shortlist Announced

Koko, Camden by cormac70The BIMA Awards 2009 have rolled around again, with the presentations taking place on 19th Nov.

The awards celebrate the innovative work of UK digital companies and this year has seen a record number of agencies applying.

The Shortlist has just been announced showcasing some of the UK's brightest digital talent and, the good news, there are still a few precious tickets left.

Categories range from display and interactive advertising, online games, mobile to social media and word of mouth marketing. Those companies lucky enough to be shortlisted are some of the best the UK digital sector has to offer and with the BBC iPlayer in the best website section, T-Mobile's "Life is for Living" in the viral seeding category and the MINI Convertible launch up for an e-mail marketing award they are some of the most memorable campaigns from the last year too.

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Xchangeteam Freelancer of the Year Awards 2009

Xchangeteam office Flickr pictureXchangeteam are launching their Freelancer of the Year Awards 2009 and they’re looking for entries across the spectrum of Marketing, Media and Communications.

Since their first incarnation back in 2003, the awards have been recognising the work of freelancers in these mediums across the UK.

Nominations can come from peers, colleagues, an appreciative manager or from the freelancer themself so if you know an exceptional freelancer, or indeed if you are one, get in touch. To date the highest number of nominations for the awards are 350 but Xchangeteam are looking to beat that in 2009.

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Search is Dead, Long Live Search Pics & Podcast Available Now

Chinwag Live: Search is Dead Long LIve SeachHello again to those of you who went along to Chinwag Live: Search is Dead, Long Live Search event last Tuesday. If you were otherwise occupied, don't worry. You won't be missing out on the night's eureka moments; our podcast from the evening is now available online.

It may never actually die but there's no doubt that search is certainly changing. Twitter has changed search, mobiles have changed search, our terms and how our findings are communicated to us, the early incarnations of which we're seeing in the iPhone with location-based tools, have changed search too.

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Northern Journalists Get a Career Boost

Flickr typewriter image You could be an experienced journo looking to update your skills, a poverty stricken graduate or just after a career change, there's a new training scheme going by the name of inFUZE, that will make things a whole lot easier for struggeling hacks and those looking to break into the industry.

InFUZE was developed in conjunction with  the BBC and the University of Central Lancashire's Meld team, will be launching on Wednesday 21st October and is set to improve the fortunes of journalists of all levels.

Included in the course are seminars, technical training and a 12 week placement at various news offices across the north of England. The course will provide 10 journalists in the region with up-to-the-minute skills across the spectrum of online, TV, radio and mobile.

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Ralph Lauren Threatens Photoshop Critics

Flickr catwalk imageYou can never be too thin or too rich, right?

I totally agree with the second half of the statement you can never be too rich, there's no such thing. Too thin? Yip. You can definitely be too thin.

Not so for Ralph Lauren. They recently found themselves in a spot of hot water over some dodgily photoshopped images. They should have known something wasn't right when their model had a head bigger than her pelvis and a neck the size of a tooth pic. It was published anyway.

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Online Ad Spend Overtakes Television

monopoly-e-commerce by danielbroche - http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielbroche/2258988806/Figures released from the Internet Advertising Bureau’s (IAB) bi-annual online advertising expenditure study, carried out in partnership with Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PwC) and the World Advertising Research Centre (WARC), makes for enlightening reading.

For the first time in the UK the internet has surpassed TV to become the single biggest advertising medium in the country.

Online adversiting spend overtook TV to become the UK's biggest advertising medium in the first half of 2009. It grew 4.6%, to £1.75 bn in H1, giving it a record market share of 23.5%.

Even as advertising experienced a 16.6% decline overall, online's ability to engage audiences, its measurability and a sturdy ROI is keeping the sector above water, where TV and other mediums have floundered and sunk.

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