There’s a book out there that’s a series of interviews between the very good chap who brought back Dr Who to TV and a journalist. As someone who profited from Dr Who (breaking the tales of who was going to be Doctors 10 and 11 back when I was a journalist) I can’t fault that, especially when the reviews have been very kind to both versions of the book.

But the URL show’s why every domain name I use has a hyphen it it. Yes, the book is called The Writer’s Tale, the new version is called The Writer’s Tale – The Final Chapter and apparently there’s 300 or so new pages of material, which is fair value for money (I never got the original so this is tempting).

The URL for it reads: thewriterstale.com which can be The Writers Tale or The Writer Stale. Now it’s not as bad as anything with Therapist or Pen Island, but it’s still a bit of a dig – especially given a few people put their digs in at RTD’s writing during the show and from a digital PR point of view, you wouldn’t have it as it just gives people ammunition for cheap digs (though you could buy it to prevent a competitor using it against you for cheap digs).

The pic to the left (and larger below) just turned up in my inbox and in this day and age of social media and fan interaction, I’m wondering if it was put out there deliberately to judge the feedback from fans…
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Presenting the third Scottish Social Media Dinner with a theme of Politics and Social Media. As with previous events, the idea is that people speak inbetween courses telling us their experiences of social media, what they’ve learned from it, what they use, how they use it and what their general thoughts are. There’s also a Q&A at the end which does what it says on the tin.

This month has been in the planning for a while and it’s got some good speakers lined up. We’ll be having speakers from either each of the main political parties in Scotland or someone well-known for a party in blogging circles. Talks are ongoing with a few people still but I can reveal that we have confirmed for Wed, Feb 17:

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It amazes me how many people in this day and age of digital and social media communications don’t do that most basic thing of checking domain names or cross-checking a brand name with domain names before they go to launch. Even slight gaffes like Penisland.com or Therapist.com can be put down to early days naivety.

But whoever didn’t check this one should be sacked immediately. That tops the Green Police gaffe I mentioned in the Social Media Roundup.

(Well done to Gordon Macintyre Kemp for breaking this story on The Drum blogs and More4Mums for spotting it).

We announced it last Friday in Business7 but now it’s time to go wider with it: to combat the rip-off companies and the phonies out there who claim to be the Google Ranking masters or social media gurus we’re launching a £1000 traditional and digital/social media PR package aimed at getting Scottish businesses online and benefitting from 21st Century communications.

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As part of Aye Write, The Herald is putting on charging for an event called The Future of Media. But when you look at the panel of speakers, it’s anything but. In fact it’s more Aye, Wrong than an Aye Write…

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Digital Communication and engagement in Scotland is something that for many people appears to be stillborn in the mainstream media of the country, so it’s been with absolute glee that I’ve been sitting down and reading the winners from Duncan Stephen and his Scottish Roundup of Blogs over the last few days.

They had more than 140 entries – and what’s clear from that is that the blogging scene in Scotland is thriving – because some of the best known Scottish bloggers aren’t even in the final lists, so there’s tons of Scottish blogs out there.

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Proper write-up soon for the Scottish Social Media Dinners, but here’s some dates that may prove of interest:

• Feb 17 – Glasgow – Politicians and Social Media. MPs, MSPs and councillors from all parties talk about digital engagement.
• End of March – Edinburgh – topic to be announced.
• April 21 – Glasgow – Podcasts Matter. One of America’s most popular podcasters and two of Scotland’s best talk about podcasting and share tips.
• April – Dundee – Gaming and Social Media – more details to be announced in April.

Also, a website for the Scottish Social Media Dinners will be going live this week – www.ssmd.biz.

It’s a never-ending battle: journalists v PRs. On both sides, many a person claims to be harassed by the other while many others on both sides keep making mistakes in communicating (it’s not really that hard – the communicating or, sadly, the mistake making), but this list by Bristol Editor (which is a thumpingly good blog) shows one of the great errors that journalists often make in their ‘let me tell the PRs how the world works’ in that they don’t understand a lot of PR – some through ignorance, some through having no experience of the other side of the fence.

Anyway, I’m going to go through the list, offering some observation and if anyone ever compiles the three million blog posts and articles that have been written on this topic, perhaps it may help.

Many of the points are fair, I don’t doubt it’s been written with a sincere desire to improve communications and should be taken on board by PRs, but it shows three failings:

• An understanding that journalists are no longer the sole providers/outlets of news
• A lack of understanding of what PRs do.
• In parts it comes across as incredibly smug and arrogant, which is probably not the point but tone is important.

Anyway, it hasn’t been written to start a flame war or anything like that, but perhaps in 2010, PRs and journalists can understand each other a bit better and we can get rid of lists like this, along with the incessant ‘why social media rulz’ postings.

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A couple of top writers – Iain Dale, Iain Martin and the not-called-Iain Alan Cochrane have all written about the poor state of the Conservative Party in Scotland in the run-up to the 2010 General Election and it’s got me wondering if they could boost their funds, membership and ultimately election results by embracing social media.

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