I went to the People’s Vote march on Saturday. It’s a long haul in a space suit from Brighton and the trains weren’t running with NASA efficiency, but I got there OK and was glad […]
Best shop puns
I love shop puns and van puns and snack van puns. I’m not a massive pun fan generally, mostly because they seem to be created by people who find a word and then grind the […]
My 15 Golden Rules of PR
These rules are solely about the craft of PR, how to do it, and how to avoid some potholes and roadblocks. They’re today’s version. Tomorrow they’ll probably be different. They work for me because they’re mostly about anti-orthodoxy, […]
Fractal fractured politics
A fractal is an object, each part of which has the same statistical character as the whole. Those fancy Romanesco broccoli we’ve been importing from Europe are a good example. Fractals are useful in describing […]
Laver’s Law
Laver’s Law, well known to students of fashion, describes the story arc of a fashion trend – from ‘OMG’ to ‘Ooh, I like that’, to ‘OMG, what is he wearing?’. It was the invention of […]
The questions
I watched Elon Musk’s webcast of his presentation about interplanetary travel a few weeks ago. At the end there were questions from the audience. It’s always a problem at these sorts of events, handing the mic […]
Political jargon
A couple of years ago, I set up a service called Polifiller. It was a jargon removal tool for politicians, designed to strike a line through cliches and economies with the truth. “What I’m clear […]
Painting
I’ve been having a go at oil painting. Art was my favourite subject at Secondary school. Getting lost in paint or pencil and just daydreaming was the best part of the day. I’ve occasionally picked […]
Giant concrete hearing aids
The Greatstone Sound Mirrors, massive concrete listening devices shaped like crude ears, were built in marshland in Kent in the late 1920s as part of Britain’s national defence strategy. The ears pointed towards the European […]
The ‘How Not To’ Guide to PR
INTRODUCTION: ABANDON OLD ROPE YE WHO ENTER HERE Hello. This guide features the contributions of several hundred journalists, writing or editing for national and regional papers and trade magazines or reporting for broadcasters. Periodically I […]