What’s possible with open government

When I go on about free wifi, it’s not just some vague election promise. Someone mentioned that I should have put the reason behind the message on my first billboard, but the reasons are too plentiful.    It’s not just about giving businesses and tourists the access they expect in a modern society. It’s also […]

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I found a new search engine (after Google signed me up to another mystery service)

I’ve a bit more reason to moan about Google of late, after a few more dodgy happenings on the site.    But before I do, some good news: I found a very good search engine. And it’s not Bing.    Ironically, one of the alternatives to Google search that I liked was Yahoo!, but even […]

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Making free wifi pay—at no cost to ratepayers

With the first billboard going up in town, I’ve been asked about whether my free wifi programme will cost ratepayers.    In a word, no. The wifi programme will be supported by selling the space on the home page.    Upkeep of such a service, and I am looking at several alternatives, is in the […]

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Deciphering geo-targeting on OpenX; and why Mediaplex is a cheeky sod

Between a few of us here and my friend Pete in the UK, we’ve spent nearly two weeks trying to get OpenX to work. We’re finally getting ad-serving technology put in in-house, after years of relying on the US ad networks we primarily work with. It’s also walking the talk: since I have advocated that […]

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It’s ‘Chevy’—even President Obama says so

Dear Chevrolet: even your own nation’s president calls the brand ‘Chevy’: You might want to rethink that memo. You may also like A whinge about whinging Johnny Foreigner might be better at running a car company in Shanghai Volkswagen’s scandal won’t spread to other German car groups How can we help those fooled into believing […]

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Let the Outrageous Fortune come

Almost any New Zealander will recognize this image: a cast photograph from the long-running TV series Outrageous Fortune.    When I first heard of this show from Antonia Prebble, before she started filming, I have to admit I didn’t think the premise would see it last five years (and counting). But for New Zealand television […]

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Chevrolet doesn’t understand branding

After the chaps at Autocar began following me on Twitter yesterday—after all, I had been reading the magazine since it was part of the Ministry of Magazines, in the post-Iliffe days—I noticed a Tweet about Chevrolet asking its dealers to not refer to the brand as Chevy.    What?    According to Autocar: A leaked […]

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A tribute to Mission: Impossible’s nice guy

Maybe I plain did not watch the news on the 15th—goodness knows what I was doing to have missed that Peter Graves, best known for his portrayal of Jim Phelps in Mission: Impossible, passed away, after suffering a heart attack. Today would have been his 84th birthday.    I am a huge fan of Mission: […]

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The rise of the city brand

I don’t have the other writers’ permission to show their side of this Facebook dialogue, but we had been chatting about growing the creative clusters here in Wellington as one of my mayoral policies.    I wrote: Mostly by focusing on growing creative clusters and taking a bigger slice of the cake. So it is […]

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The ‘Wellywood’ sign: people power gets things done

That was a very interesting 30 hours. I found out about the ‘Wellywood’ sign yesterday afternoon, through Twitter, and Tweeted to say I hated it. Little did I know then that there was a huge Facebook group—6,000 strong at the time of writing—where Wellingtonians were making their voices known.    And when I got there […]

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