UK News

What did Twitter make of the leaders’ debate?

History was made last night with Britain’s first televised political leaders’ debate, which was seen as an opportunity for Labour’s Gordon Brown, The Conservatives’ David Cameron and the Liberal Democrats’ Nick Clegg to stamp their authority on an election campaign that has so far failed to generate much excitement.

Outsider Clegg was judged the clear winner by almost every snap poll followinged the ITV broadcast. Today a ComRes/ITV opinion poll of over 4,000 people who watched the programme has the Tories on 36 percent, LibDems on 35 percent and Labour on 24 percent — a 14 percent jump for Clegg’s  party.

The debate sparked lively discussion on Twitter.com (most of it via the hashtag #leadersdebate), and exclusive analysis for Reuters.co.uk showed a big spike in anti-Labour sentiment after the first of three debates.

U.S. marketing firm Crimson Hexagon archives all tweets about the election and analyses them for positive and negative sentiment.

As of 10.30pm yesterday 27 percent of tweets in our survey were anti-Labour, versus 13 percent the day before, the highest since April 6. The graphic below shows the percentage of anti-Conservative sentiment falling to 23 percent from 24 percent, while Clegg’s strong performance saw the Liberal Democrats drop to eight percent from 14 percent.

“All talk and no action basically sums up Gordon Brown and Labour. Complete fail,” said @amberlangstreth in one of the tweets in our automated analysis.

Tweeting about the Tories, @respros said: “The Tory local agenda is particularly disjointed. Policy decided by diffuse ad-hoc groups with finance and power still centralised.”

Election TV debates or social media to have biggest impact?

There are at least two new factors in the coming election — the first-ever televised prime ministerial debates and the first full-on deployment of social media during a British election (Facebook was a year old, YouTube had just started and Twitter didn’t even exist back in 2005).

In a City University panel discussion on the ‘new media election’ on Tuesday, host Evan Davies of BBC’s Today programme framed the debate in terms of which would be most influential:  The old, controlled media in the form of the three 90 minute TV debates to be broadcast by Sky, ITN and the BBC? Or the new, uncontrolled variety in the form of anyone with access to Twitter, Facebook, YouTube et al?

The agreed guidelines on the TV debates were published shortly before the event. Amongst other things, they forbid heckling, and applause is only permitted at the start and end. The contrast with the ‘anything goes’ spirit of social media couldn’t be sharper.

So is it possible to predict which will be the most influential?

Matthew McGregor of Blue State Digital,  the company that ran Obama’s IT, believes that the way social media is used in “activating the activists” will be the untold story of this election. He made the case for email (the original social media?) being considered as the most important part of campaigning –  1 in 5 Obama voters were on an email distribution list that helped raise hundreds of millions of dollars. UK parties should take note ad invest 90 per cent of their election funding on email, he suggested.

McGregor also thought that “the way in which the TV debates are reported will be shaped online” given that viewers will be able to log their responses using social media far faster than any opinion poll can be undertaken. This linkage between social media and mainstream journalists was, he thought, illustrated neatly by the way in which Obama’s White House spokesman has finally got onto Twitter after accepting that journalists weren’t reading his media releases.

DJ Collins of Google suggested that the camera-phone — seemingly purpose-built to capture politicians’ gaffes — would prove the social media star of this election. He reminded the audience of how informal footage of allegedly racist comments by Senator George Allen had ended his bid for the Presidency back in 2006.

from Reuters Soccer Blog:

You can still watch Ukraine v England on TV … you just have to come to Croatia

A quick look around the blogosphere suggests that for many England fans the idea of watching the World Cup qualifier against Ukraine in front of a computer screen at the mercy of an ISP, or at a crammed cinema, sounds about as appealing as making the long trip to Dnipropetrovsk.

But do not despair, England fans, because there is an option for those of you determined to watch it on telly.

Croatia's HRT 2 state television, also viewable in Serbia on cable, is showing the game live, so here is your chance to combine a bit of light football watching with an autumn dip in the Adriatic somewhere along Croatia's mesmerising coast, or an evening spent sampling Belgrade's unique and vibrant nightlife, epitomised by boat-bars and clubs along the Danube.

And fear not that the Croatian faithful might have a go at you after their team's recent 5-1 drubbing at Wembley. They will be praying for an England win that would leave their boys in the driving seat for a runners-up spot in Group Six.

PHOTO: A subscription page is shown on a laptop computer at a cafe in central London October 5, 2009. REUTERS/Toby Melville

Nostalgia makes a comeback in TV ad-land

The recession is bringing back the strangest characters.  Rising from their graves like the zombies in Night of the Living Dead are people we thought had been buried decades ago.

The Milky Bar Kid is one, Persil mum is another and, inevitably, the Hovis bread delivery boy struggling up his cobbled hill while the brass band plays on.

What next? Bing Crosby singing about Shell perhaps or the famous Smash-peddling Martians who thought it was so funny that Earthlings bothered to peel potatoes?

Advertising experts believe nostalgia works because it takes adult consumers back to a time when they were young and without any worries. Never mind recession, the old ads say, these are value brands that have stood the test of time.

Marks and Spencer has been trying a similar tack with the launch of its 75p plain jam sandwiches. “For those who haven’t eaten one for years, one bite takes you straight back to your childhood,” runs the blurb.

The old ads are peculiarly effective transports to the past. Some of us go so far back we can still hear the jingle from Esso Blue adverts and remember those gobsmacked housewives comparing the whiteness of their newly washed sheets with Daz man. Ah, takes you back …

Are there any old adverts that you would like to see come back?

Too many celebrity cooks spoiling the broth?

Sir David Attenborough has accused the BBC of chasing ratings and overloading the schedules with too many makeover programmes and celebrity chefs.

Where, he asks, are the programmes about science for example like the long-defunct “Tomorrow’s World?”

“Do we really require so many gardening programmes, makeover programmes or celebrity chefs,” he asks. “Is it not a scandal in this day and age that there seems to be no place for continuing series of programmes about science, or serious music or thoughtful, in-depth interviews with people other than politicians?”

Attenborough joined the BBC in 1952 so he’s been around the corporation a long time. Do you think he’s right or has he had his day?

“The Apprentice”: Jenny, the Deflector

Jenny does it again.

Despite showing a woeful lack of common sense with the doomed environmentally themed greetings card idea, and exhibiting a total lack of awareness during a sales pitch when she admitted no longer buying cards to be environmental, she still managed to deflect attention from herself in the boardroom by picking on the quietest woman in the room.

She did it in the second show when Shazia was kicked off, and attempted it against Sara in this week’s episode.

This is not to say she is Miss Teflon – Alan Sugar seemed to be aware of what was happening, but it clearly shows her tactics and helps extend her stay in the house.

“The house” is becoming the right phrase as “The Apprentice” is increasingly beginning to resemble the thinking-man’s “Big Brother”.

The barracking of Sara on her return from the boardroom was just aggressive showmanship. Raef, in pointing out the firing had already been dished out by Sugar in the boardroom, was the only one to come out of the situation well.

The sad thing is how the others so easily jumped on the bandwagon, including Lee, who, for me, is beginning to resemble a loose cannon, and Kevin, who was clutching at anything in the boardroom, except the obvious.