Disqus - Latest Comments for markpack

Re: 6 innovative new search engines to keep an eye on

Mark Pack — Fri, 08 Dec 2017 06:38:50 -0000

Thanks for responding. I guess I'm surprised that given the very low, even disturbing, quality of search results GoodGopher provides for some fairly standard searches, there wasn't even any caveat such as "innovative, but currently failing to provide good results" or even "innovative but shows many drawbacks from the approach it is taking".

I'm not sure how you can judge something as being innovative without also taking into consideration how well or not it is working - innovations that are of interest are ones that achieve something, surely? Otherwise I've got 528 perpetual motion innovations to share...

Re: 6 innovative new search engines to keep an eye on

Mark Pack — Tue, 05 Dec 2017 04:35:54 -0000

Rather surprised at the inclusion of GoodGopher: do a search on something like 'Holocaust' and look at the results which come up. Is this really an example of a good, innovative search engine?

Re: Imaginary money: your cash won't be real in the future

Mark Pack — Fri, 10 Jun 2016 04:17:30 -0000

What's "real" about the money we carry round now? I've got in my pocket a tattered piece of paper with an out of date picture of the Queen of England on it. In what sense is that a "real" piece of value? It's a social and economic construct (and one which works rather well I reckon) but it's not real. It's an artificial signifier of value.

Re: Five most interesting search marketing news stories of the week

Mark Pack — Tue, 31 May 2016 07:42:53 -0000

Is the margin of error on ComScore's data really so low that a 0.2% change can be reasonably described as a 'rise' or a 'fall' rather than 'statistically unchanged'? I'm sceptical (and writing up every change as being a story even when it's within the margin of error makes is a widespread journalism flaw) but perhaps there's some solid evidence that a 0.2% change really is statistically significant...?

Re: The Ad Contrarian: Nothing's Older Than An Ignorant Young Person

Mark Pack — Wed, 13 Apr 2016 04:30:32 -0000

I think I have just the PR company for you: http://www.markpack.org.uk/...

Re: WordPress file type is not permitted for security reasons

Mark Pack — Sat, 13 Feb 2016 06:33:17 -0000

Just what I was looking for - thanks for providing such clear instructions. Much appreciated.

Re: How to use Facebook’s new Audience Optimization Targeting

Mark Pack — Tue, 26 Jan 2016 05:06:57 -0000

Now this is curious - when I hover my mouse over the cross-hairs button, I get a different, and clearer, pop up text. For me it says "Narrow the audience..." which (seems to) answer the question about whether using this feature means the post will be seen by people who haven't yet Liked the page.

Re: 'Cooperative Energy has double billed me for electricity'

Mark Pack — Sat, 23 Jan 2016 04:00:53 -0000

It's not only Co-op Energy's communications that are flawed. Their move to a new IT system was badly botched and even worse managed, with Co-op directors repeatedly failing to mention sorting out the mess as being a priority for them (details at http://www.markpack.org.uk/... ). No-wonder that the latest Ombudsman figures shows Co-op Energy to be the most complained about utility company in the country.

Re: The 10 most annoying phrases in Marketing 2015

Mark Pack — Wed, 16 Dec 2015 04:15:52 -0000

The less you use phrases such as these, the more time you have for opening thought corridors for your clients.

Re: How PR embargoes killed news

Mark Pack — Mon, 30 Nov 2015 05:54:50 -0000

Press release embargoes were a normal thing well before 2005. Take as an example this book from 1995 - https://books.google.co.uk/...

Far from the idea of embargoes being something new that has recently crept up on people, surely the more accurate account is that they've been around for longer than the web, and if anything what's happening recently is the death of them?

Re: The Ad Contrarian: Same Circus, New Monkeys.

Mark Pack — Mon, 10 Aug 2015 09:11:28 -0000

One day I'll hear someone say, "The population is getting older, so we must get better at appealing to older people". Perhaps. Possibly. Just maybe.

Re: Billing bungles: is Co-op Energy the new npower?

Mark Pack — Mon, 15 Jun 2015 04:13:01 -0000

And are all the problems really stemming from the March change? My problems started before then and from what they've told me through my various complaints (now with the Ombudsman) they were having other problems before that too.

Re: Buzzfeed investigation emails undermine business of 'rival' online news provider

Mark Pack — Wed, 29 Apr 2015 10:00:49 -0000

Now that Buzzfeed has published its investigation, I wonder if that's still your view? It looks a pretty rigorous investigation to me - and just the sort of scrutiny media outlets should subject each other to.

Re: The newspaper preparing for a coup - and Labour is doing nothing to stop them

Mark Pack — Tue, 07 Apr 2015 15:43:51 -0000

There are two problems with that scenario Adam. First, it's hardly a "newspaper coup" if, as you put it the events "relies on Labour refusing to form a government". How is Labour refusing to do something which then ends up harming then anything other than a case of self-harm by Labour?

Second, hanging on as PM to call an election - which you talk about in the piece - still isn't relevant, as the power to call an election doesn't rest with the PM. So why mention it at all?

Re: The newspaper preparing for a coup - and Labour is doing nothing to stop them

Mark Pack — Mon, 06 Apr 2015 16:43:39 -0000

How does "If Cameron can stay even briefly as PM, then he can call a second election" with the Fixed Term Parliaments Act?

Cameron can only call a second election if he can put together a two-thirds majority to vote for one (or if he contrives to lose a no confidence vote against himself but then manages somehow to win one against Labour). Neither look at all plausible routes, so I'm left baffled expect perhaps by the reference to "if Cameron can stay even briefly as PM" which makes me wonder if you've forgotten about the rules of fixed term Parliaments and think the PM can still act unilaterally?

Either way, the restrictions of fixed term Parliaments seem to blow a big hole in the chain of possible events that is painted.

Re: Exclusive: Nick Clegg enlists Basil Fawlty to play Farage in TV debate rehearsals

Mark Pack — Wed, 01 Apr 2015 04:02:50 -0000

Given his record of doing party political broadcasts for the party over the decades, I'd guess he therefore knows rather more about the party than you if you'd missed that :)

Re: Don’t judge a book... Why the Lib Dem manifesto cover belies their green record

Mark Pack — Fri, 13 Feb 2015 08:52:57 -0000

Really surprised by the comment "I can only judge what has happened, not what might have happened in different circumstances."

Surely judging what might happen under other circumstances is absolutely central to effective campaigning?

You need to judge what the possible different scenarios are and so how best to influence what happens as a result. If you've got those skills, then of course you can apply them to understanding (or judging) the past just as much as to trying to shape the future.

If you want to be even half-decent at campaigning that is... which I'm sure you'll argue is what FoE aims to be!

Re: The danger of hanging your hat on experimental statistics

Mark Pack — Sun, 01 Feb 2015 08:50:04 -0000

You're quite right to caution about how these statistics are interpreted. I wonder though if you didn't apply enough caution to your own interpretation as you talk about the average rent increase, then make a reference to some figures being above average - "And for some people – particularly those in London or for new entrants and people moving home – costs will have increased even more" - but don't similarly talk about other figures necessarily being below average.

Or in other words, you say - here's the average, now here are some outliers one side and let's ignore the outliers the other way.

It's of course a very common habit in the media to do just that, but I'm surprised in a piece about how to interpret statistics you go for the same lopsided approach?

(On a more subjective point, I think the revised figures still show a big gap between rent changes in real levels overall and most of the rhetoric about rent increases. As your graph shows, there hasn't been a huge different between rent increases and inflation over the last few years, but that's not what you'd guess if you listened to the phrases usually used when people talk about rents.)

Re: De Re Commentari

Mark Pack — Sat, 13 Dec 2014 13:50:24 -0000

Given what a small proportion of the audience of most blogs read the comments section, doing pretty much anything to it is unlikely to kill it off I'd have thought.

Re: The lost art of software testing

Mark Pack — Mon, 29 Sep 2014 05:14:37 -0000

A big problem with consumer products (and reviews of them) is that those reasonable trade-offs are rarely communicated to the possible purchasers.

For example, for tech I use every day I prefer solid and reliable over latest and flashiest. There's no reason every product or version should be like that as lots of people have different views - but it's a real pain that reviews so rarely get into this sort of information.

I guess it's easier (exact weight and precise height is far easier and quicker to give than 'is it reliable?') - but easier isn't always best.

Re: Warren Buffett’s Best Kept Secret to Success: The Art of Reading, Remembering, and Retaining More Books

Mark Pack — Fri, 02 May 2014 05:10:37 -0000

One other tip I'd add - I started writing book reviews for Amazon for most of the books I read, as it's a great way to capture my thoughts on the book and the most useful points whilst they are fresh in my mind.

Writing them down helps crystalise my thoughts and put them more firmly in my memory (a bit like writing notes in a training session) - plus it means I have the notes readily available for future reference.

Re: Warren Buffett’s Best Kept Secret to Success: The Art of Reading, Remembering, and Retaining More Books

Mark Pack — Fri, 02 May 2014 05:08:53 -0000

Absolutely - listening to audio books on my commute has restored my previous voracious reading habits which had got squeezed out by being just too busy.

The tricky thing I find is to select books that don't require full concentration all the time, so that I don't miss a key piece of information because I've stopped to concentrate on a train destination indicator board for a few seconds.

Re: The Illiberal Democrats

Mark Pack — Wed, 29 Jan 2014 03:03:21 -0000

My own personal experience is that it's far from rare for the media, including the BBC, to get how they describe me wrong, even if I've checked it in advance with the relevant producer. For me it's never caused a serious problem, but it also means I'm not surprised if it has caused a bigger problem for others.

Re: Microsoft Research built a smart elevator that uses AI to figure out what floor you’re going to

Mark Pack — Tue, 21 Jan 2014 09:08:22 -0000

I think you've got that right. The actual implementation in this case isn't of much use as pushing a button works pretty well for an easy interface. What's significant is that it's the next few baby steps towards technology pulling data about you to predict what you want.

Re: Haringey send man £147 council tax demand for home he hasn’t owned since 1996

Mark Pack — Thu, 09 Jan 2014 07:17:35 -0000

No wonder Haringey Council is one of the most complained about in the whole country!