Massey University student Aaron Overington was keen and kind enough to publish an email interview about my role as social media chap at Telecom.
Do you have ROI goals or targets to meet, and if so how do you define them?
No formal ROI targets have been set yet. We feel our level of investment has paid off so far in reputation and issue management terms, everything else is a bonus. That’s not to say this won’t change in the future.
A new thing – I’m contributing to corporatelunchbox.com, “an open forum for lunch suggestions in and around Auckland city”.
My first post reviews Paneton Bakery: “All rolls and baps are well sized with generous fillings and go for around $6-7, a price that makes non-Aucklanders spit out their roll-up and shout “HOW MUCH?”, but makes Aucklanders say “Mmmm, that’s pretty reasonable for a roll these days”.
Look for more coming up, over there. The site is ‘curating’ an Auckland Burger Power Rating chart, I am looking forward to rating some burgers powerfully.
The NZ top Tweeter lists (one, two, three) probably did exactly what the Herald wanted it to – create a lot of page views. MUCH debate ensued as to whether your own humble tweet collection of chatter with your mates, with the odd artful zinger is as worthy as some breakfast jock’s.
Only you and your sense of self worth can decide that of course, but I bet I wasn’t the only one dialling up the Herald stories on the bus to see if their undiscovered genius had been validated by the paper with the sharks on it.
Yes, some of the people on the lists deserved to be on a list, some didn’t, and some people who should have been there weren’t. No shit. And surely trying to put a rank or value on the community, comedy and creativity we Kiwis produce 140 characters at a time every single day misses the point of Twitter itself.
Anyway. Part of the fun of Twitter is figuring out how it works and who to follow. I can highly recommend the people I like to talk to on Twitter, both the ones that are on the Herald’s lists and the ones that aren’t. Me, I like my Twitter stupid, and in the interests of drawing a veil on the whole debate, while making your Twitter more stupid, here are my favourite comedy Twitter accounts. Your results may vary, etc.
Leftover pizza dough freezes no worries at all. But in protest, it pops weird bubbles when you thaw it and put it in the oven. Here’s exhibits A and B (click to make bigger):
Pizza bread
Quick pizza.
Because our little family usually can’t eat a whole pizza dough on our own, leftovers usually go in the freezer – I’m going to keep doing it to see if this bubble trend continues (both of these were from the same lot of dough). While bubbles would probably make ‘proper’ pizza fans vomit yeast (much like the pineapple I imagine – hey, the kid likes it), they’re pretty tasty and fun to eat, in fairness.
PS I’ve updated the crap out of my Meals I Have Met Flickr set – go nuts.
There was a lot packed in to 2011. Earthquakes, an election, a world cup. A new baby and family stuff. Work. Here’s a summary in mobile phone photos, an idea I’ve pinched.
Our office moved to Victoria Street, and I’m lucky enough to have this view – I spent a lot of time staring out the window at the bustle of the harbor. It’s beautiful. I’m lucky.
A beer in the sun at Tauranga’s Harbourside restaurant on my birthday.
This was Telecom’s ‘war room’ table on the 2nd or 3rd day after the 22 February Christchurch earthquake. Work wise, I love crisis communication. The downside, of course, that to experience and develop your crisis comms skills, there has to be a crisis.
I haven’t been to Christchurch for years, and like most people not there, can’t imagine what it’s like to live with aftershock after aftershock – I have the greatest admiration for a mate living there with his young family determined to be part of the rebuild. It’s hard enough having a young family up here in wussy stable-ground Auckland, let alone among seismic uncertainty. For what it’s worth, I hope for a better 2012 for Canterbury.
Thomas The Tank Engine gave me a new channel to express anal retentivity.
My fav street photo I took this year.
I took quite a few photos of what I was eating this year – looking through, it seems to be bacon and bread that I was moved to photograph the most, so this is representative example.
I wrote this review for Telecom’s late, lamented co. magazine, after using the handset over the course of a weekend. I subsequently acquired a Sensation to use as my permanent, day to day phone. Reading the review again, it pretty much holds up – I love using it. The camera and video capability are really, really good, and the screen is astonishing – and it hasn’t succumbed to ‘creeping slowdown’ like other Android handsets I’ve used. I *did* install Launcher Pro however, the HTC Sense stuff is to frilly pour moi, and got old, fast. Recommended.
The first thing I thought when I got my mitts on the Sensation was that this phone is big. Big in every way. Conceivably, you could mount it to your roof and put your neighbour’s Christmas light display to shame. It’s got dual core chipset (which means it goes really fast), an 8 MP camera (which means it’s probably as good as your camera) and shoots full 1080p HD video (so you can show off your cat videos on your flatscreen TV), among other impressive sounding features. Everyone tells us our smartphones these days are small computers that just so happen to have a phone on them – this Sensation feels more like a small tablet to me. That said, making a call on this phone doesn’t feel like you’re talking into your ironing board – it’s extremely thin, light and slips easily into your pocket.
The thing that’s stuck with me, though, about the Sensation is the screen. My goodness, the screen. It’s bright and sharp, to say the very least, and for the first time I could imagine sitting down and watching an entire film (with proper widescreen) on a phone without feeling like I was in some kind of dubious adult interest theatre for insects. And with all that screen real estate, tapping out a text, tweet or email was easier than any other touchscreen handset I’ve tried.
The Sensation runs on Gingerbread, the latest and greatest version of Android (version 2.3) – if you’re an Android user, you’ll already be used to how it all works, but you’ll be blown away by how FAST it goes – it’s as responsive as a hungry puppy. It also features HTC Sense, which makes the Sensation even more user friendly with nifty thumbnail screens, people widgets, a WiFI hoptspot and a really neat weather feature you have to see to believe. Google’s apps like Gmail, Google Docs, Google Maps all run brilliantly, and there’s plenty more to choose from in the Android marketplace. Angry Birds, the incomprehensibly popular catapult game, is GORGEOUS to use on this screen.
So, what did I actually do with it? Sat about on my couch and played with it, mostly, marvelling at its speed and the screen. But I am a lazy, lazy man. Who’s going to want one? Early adopters, yes, but anyone interested in a highly spec-ed touchscreen phone that’s easy to use should have a look at the Sensation, it measures up to any phone out there, and beats them in places. I could imagine using one for work. I could imagine it coming in really handy for Googling and looking up directions when you’re out and about at the weekend. I can also imagine loading it up with Dora and throwing into the backseat for a happy family on a long car journey.
Luckily for us, the Sensation is one of two HTC handsets exclusively available on XT that come out in early July. The other one is the Wildfire S, a slightly smaller, slightly lower-spec-ed handset, which may interest those who balk at the Sensation’s size. It goes without saying that the Sensation goes FAST on XT – this is mobile internet at its finest, and before you know it, you’ll be using the fan on your desktop PC to dry laundry. Probably.
I made a late entry in the comment thread of the year over at Dim Post, a challenge to “submit a paragraph in which Shelley writes a passage from a classic New Zealand novel in her own inimitable style,” referring to the Herald’s Remuera housewife on Valium / crack columnist Shelly Bridgeman. My paragraph is from Chad Taylor‘s Shirker.
‘What did you say your name was?’ he asked, remembering.
It came out weakly: ‘Ellerslie Penrose’.
‘Penrose,’ he said. ‘We haven’t driven that far south since that ugly clay pigeon shooting spat at Hotel Du Vin. Much prefer taking a Corporate Cab to the airport and flying over it.’
AA Gill, the man himself, dismantler of restaurants and sharpest dictaphone in the west strolled slowly on stage suited and booted, ready to talk.
And talk he did, about food, criticism, his mother, his father, television,travel and his previous life as a drug dealer and alcoholic. There were quotable lines galore (I arrived in Auckland. It was lashing down. I thought “I’ve arrived in Hull”). He does a pretty bang on Prince Charles impression. The question and answer session gave him a couple of set piece opportunities (The Isle of Man and being chucked out of Gordon Ramsay’s restaurant), as well as a couple of bizarre, were-they-planted ramblers.
Fishing’s Al Brown was asking the questions, and looked a bit out at sea. Whenever Gill paused mid-tale, and looked to his right, where a Kim Hill or Russell Brown may have given the right rejoinder to really get the conversation cooking, he saw Brown looking at his notes. Gill couldn’t resist clawing him around a bit (“Oh, you’re a CHEF?), but let him off, mostly. Apparently Brown took him fishing on the Gulf that morning, where they both got a Kahawai (They ate it as sashimi, he told me when I had my book signed). Must have been been good.
I didn’t know what to expect from a man so clinically, hilariously scathing in print, but after an hour and a bit in his company, I thought I’d quite like to share a meal with him. A bit of a show-off, yes, but utterly charming, with a razor sharp eye for where best to take the piss from. Beneath the metaphor athletics and withering words, he just wants things to be enjoyable. Enjoyable food, enjoyable places to travel, enjoyable things to entertain us on the box. Not much to ask. Uncynical enthusiasm, and an artfully written take-down if you’re not up to scratch. I quite liked that.
