The Blue Cat

On reflection…

The Blue Cat — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 10:46:23 +0000

… I’ve bitten off more than I can chew in launching this blog on top of my other sites. So the Blue Cat’s going back into quarantine.

You can contact me via Sparkloop.

Brown’s known unknowns

The Blue Cat — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 15:25:57 +0000

Gordon Brown interviewed in yesterday’s Observer:

Do you have no regrets, no feeling that there is anything you could have done in the last 10 years that would have better positioned us for this storm?

The truth is that not even the heads of some of the major financial institutions knew what was actually happening and what the risks they were taking were.

Brown needs to choose his advisers more carefully. The “heads of some of the major financial institutions” might not have known, but he did, she did, he did, and he did – not to mention him, him and her.

One person who didn’t know was former US central bank chief Alan Greenspan, signed up by Brown as honorary adviser to the UK Treasury in 2006. But at least Greenspan, unlike Brown, admitted he’d made mistakes.

There’s more at Bubblewrapped.

Vacuum-packed spam

The Blue Cat — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 16:58:59 +0000

Whenever a client asks me to add a discussion forum to their website, my first questions are: Do you have anyone to moderate it? And will anyone use it? Here’s what can happen if both answers are negative.

The Future of the NHS Forum was launched in 2006, on the 60th anniversary of the National Health Service. It accompanied the book of the same name, which featured views from experts and politicians of all shades. Since then, the forum has gathered a mere 36 entries and 15,858 registered users (and rising).

A browse through the members’ list explains all – they include “slots avenue casino”, “AdultMasterXXX” and (suitably for an NHS forum) ViagraComprarOnline. As air will fill a vacuum, so spam will fill a forum.

Of course, one way to get your new forum going is to do what letters page editors of under-read magazines have done for years (and I’ve worked on quite a few): make them up. And if that sounds a bit desperate, imagine having to resort to making up your own blog comments…

Keep Obama out of the White House

The Blue Cat — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:17:56 +0000

“Ladies and gentlemen, Barack Obama is our new president,” announced US talk show host David Letterman. “And I think I speak for most Americans when I say, anybody mind if he starts a little early?”

In fact he probably spoke for most of the world. But shouldn’t we be demanding that Obama starts later, not earlier? Sure, it will give George Bush more time to rush through loopy last-minute laws, but the odd devastated national park is a small price to pay to prolong the deliciously warm and tingly sensation of Obama’s honeymoon period.