Sam Michel's blog

What could be a finer idea for a Thursday evening than to make some new friends whilst chewing the fat over the some of the finest ales London’s west end has to offer?

Chinwag and Chinwag Jobs are proud to be supporting the second Ale 2.0 (see below) meet up which is being held tonight at a charming little pub called The Cross Keys near Covent Garden.

The agenda for Ale 2.0 is nice and easy; there is no agenda, it’s simply a monthly meet up for all ye digital marketing folk to discus the finer points of the industry whilst enjoying a pint of the good stuff, there’s no name badges, no boring presentations and more importantly no egos.

In spite of job prospects for graduates looking bleak, there appears to be lots of opportunities in the digital sector to score some fantastic internship opportunities.

Roll up, roll up, we'll be publishing the list of programmes at the end of this week...if you'd like to include your company's programme/requirements, fill out the simple form and yes, it's all free, just something we're trying out.

It might sound like a slightly odd mixture, but the combination of digital futurology, a chance to hear Wired UK's, David Rowan whilst chowing down on a cream tea, sounds like a rather ideal Friday afternoon.

Organised by the (prepare for your afternoon tongue-twister), Creative Industries Knowledge Transfer Network, or (thankfully) KTN, who have already run a major nationwide survey and carried out interviews with leading figures as well as workshops and networking events, Digital Lounges, nationwide.

Last week, a student on the hunt for work experience, posted to Chinwag's uk-design email discussion list:

"I am looking to do a web dev / usability / UX type internship but the results of my search thus far have been disappointing. Most of the places I have been in touch with seem to want a general office bod who will do menial tasks for free under the guise of "work experience". I'm aware that most of these positions are unpaid, and I'm happy to do that, as long as I'm learning something along the way.

Fortunately, the good folks on the uk-design list responded en masse and we later heard that she'd found a suitable spot in under 24 hours. What followed, was a flurry of firms asking for interns.

We're big fans of intern programmes at Chinwag and have had a few successful candidates pass through Chinwag Towers. Seeing such a strong interest, we've decided to gather the information together, and summarise in a blog post, or something more industrial, if necessary.

If your firm, or you know people looking for real interns and not just office juniors, please do get them to fill out the form below.

There's some exciting positions that have been added already from the likes of Pharmiweb and Adidas, so add yours. We'll leave the form open for a few days.

London’s Business Community Connects for Social Media Week 2010

PRESS RELEASE: London, UK, Thursday 28^th January 2010

A diverse range of events, covering everything from music, property, politics and charity through to recruitment, will be held next week from 1st to 5th February for Social Media Week London. A global initiative that sees simultaneous activity in New York, Berlin, Toronto, San Francisco, and Sao Paulo, Social Media Week aims to identify and advance social media practices and policy in the corporate, public and non-profit sectors.

Organised in London by Chinwag, the UK digital community, Social Media Week has drawn the support of industry bodies such as the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB UK) and British Interactive Media Association (BIMA) and generous support from sponsors including Meebo & icrossing and a wide range of companies which are organising events as part of the schedule.

Over 20 debates, panel discussions, presentations and socials are running over the course of the week, many of which are free to attend, bringing together experts in social media strategy and practice with those interested in or already deploying these new communication channels in different business sectors.

UPDATE 1: @decappeal have been in touch with official banners.

UPDATE 2: Please use #techhaiti in tweets & blogs, tech volunteers and Crisis Camp.

I was working late when the news started to come in about the earthquake in Haiti. The sense of something major unfolding on an unimaginable scale reminded me of listening to the radio as I heard reports of the tsunami.

What can you do? Put your hand in your pocket. Done.

Next up, spread the word using the channels at your disposal. For me, one of these is using the advertising space on Chinwag.com for worthy causes. We've helped Do The Green Thing in the past and using the space to help promote donations is a no-brainer.

I did a lot of searching for banners to use, as I'm conscious of copyright and keeping everything legit when there's money involved. I tried Twitter to no effect and then through LinkedIn, was pointed in the direction of Oxfam Ireland who have a page full of banners (congratulations to their comms team for turning this round so quickly).

Unfortunately, none of them fit the size used on Chinwag (MPU - 300x250), so I've mustered my meagre design skills (and that's probably overstating the case) to create a banner that'll have to do in the meantime:

As our thoughts to turn the holiday dash round the country, to over-eat, over-drink and play with kids' new toys instead of making small talk with the in-law, Christmas is almost upon us.

But wait...there's still a few, well a lot, of work-related festive action to cram in before the last vestiges of real-world contact are swapped with chance meetings in Farmville in post-indulgence downtime.

We're rounded up just a few of the Christmas get-togethers listed on Chinwag's Digital Events Calendar for the next couple of weeks, which we're hoping to get along to:

You've got to hand it to The Sun for its latest set of ads. Taking firm aim at Apple and harnessing the full wit of it's sub-editor's headline legendary word smithery to great effect in these parodies created to celebrate The Sun's 40th birthday.

The ads are beautifully pitched avoiding invective and taking a tongue-in-cheek approach,

"The Sun has been the UK's best handheld for 40 years. Top news, sports, photos, gossip and games in an easy-to-share format. No waiting for pages to load, no contract, no losing reception. There's no substitute for the Sun."

Congratulations to Dom, Seb and Juliet and the crew at Plug-in Media on their win at last night's Children's BAFTA awards held at London's Park Lane Hilton.

Juliet joined the Digital Mission to LA & San Francisco earlier this year as part of the group of 14 companies showcasing the best of the UK's digital talent. Applications for the South by South West interactive trip are still open.

Hosted by favoured kids presenters, Dick'n'Dom the team picked up the Interactive BAFTA, a hefty golden visage, for Big and Small Online produced with Kindle Entertainment for CBeebies. Check out the post-award interview with the winners.

The Digital Mission to New York are ensconced in the Big Apple's frenetic networking scene making contacts and wrapping their heads around the US market.

Contacts are being made, meetings followed up and progress made in building overseas partners, trade and investment for some of the best the UK digital sector has to offer.

But things don't go quiet just because they're out of the country...

It's Digital Mission time in the Big Apple and we're delighted to formally announce the 21 companies who'll be joining this year's Digital Mission to NYC.

Thank you to everyone who applied, we really appreciate your time and effort. Don't be downhearted, the applications for the Digital Mission to South by South West interactive open next week.

Congratulations to the companies selected for the Digital Mission to New York: BandCentral, Bizk.it, Box UK, Can Studios Limited, Cognitive Match, coull, Digital Clarity, ipadio, Ixaris Systems, KMP Digidata, LAMP Digital, learn2lingo, Martingale, Mobilized, Open, ShareMyPlaylists.com, Stylescape, SubHub, The Filter, Type 3 and Wolfstar.

NSFW-ish: If a bit of swearing blaring from your speakers will raise eyebrows in your workplace.

Links to this video, from Irish journalist Markham Nolan, are working their way round Twitter faster than requests for invites to Google Wave.

PRESS RELEASE: London, UK, Wednesday 23rd September 2009.

The UK digital industry will once again get a boost when enterprise and expertise connect in the Digital Mission to Los Angeles and San Francisco, from 11th - 16th October 2009.

Organised by Chinwag and UK Trade and Investment (UKTI), the five day mission provides the perfect vehicle to make business connections, discover the logistics of setting up shop, build international profile and understand the US digital market.

14 UK-based companies have been selected to take part and they are:

• agency2
• Amaze
• Audioboo
• etv media group
• Great Fridays
• Ideonic Limited
• Littleloud
• MoviesThatRespond (Creative Works)
• NixonMcInnes Ltd
• Orangepanda Digital Media
• Plug-in Media Ltd
• Twofour
• Type3 Limited
• Videojuicer Ltd

Further information and contact details for each company is available on the Digital Mission website: http://digital-mission.org/lasf09-companies.

Our friends at The Glasshouse are running a competition in the run-up to their Pop Idols event on Thursday where Daniel EK, Spotify's CEO will talk about his experiences as an entrepreneur.

They have  thrown down the gauntlet to Chinwag's readers to send in questions that will help reveal the secret of Spotify's success. The best 5 questions will each win a pair of tickets worth £25 each.

The deadline to apply for a place on the Digital Mission to New York is this Friday (18th Sept).

If you've been putting off filling in the application form - don't worry I procrastinate with the best - then dive right in. It's a very short form that shouldn't take more than a few minutes to fill out.

After all, we just need to know what your company is about, and what you'd like to get out of going on the Digital Mission. Things you're thinking about every day, right?