Sorry if you’re expecting something profoundly spiritual from that title, but I just wanted to share this as it made me laugh. Child 1 has given up chocolate for Lent. She’s not doing too well at it, to be honest: brownies don’t count, apparently, and neither does hot chocolate. It made Child 2 – aged […]
Continue readingI was chatting the other day to someone who’d moved back to the US recently after living in the UK for two years. What really struck her, she said, was the sudden ubiquity of voice assistants. ‘Everyone has Alexa, and they’re continually asking, “Alexa, remind me about this,” or “Alexa, what’s the weather like tomorrrow?”‘ […]
Continue readingFor the past decade, Facebook has focused on connecting friends and families. With that foundation, our next focus will be developing the social infrastructure for community — for supporting us, for keeping us safe, for informing us, for civic engagement, and for inclusion of all. With 1.86bn users, Facebook’s reach is greater than any single […]
Continue readingA milestone today: the 50th episode of The Extraordinary Business Book Club podcast. It doesn’t seem 50 minutes since I was hovering over the ‘publish’ button for episode 1, wondering whether I’d hooked up the plumbing correctly between LibSyn, iTunes and the WordPress site. 50 days was the point at which I realised there was […]
Continue readingThis morning’s run (day 167) took me through the churchyard of St James’s church here in Bramley. I’ve always loved running through graveyards (in bright sunlight, obviously, I’m not sure I’d be so keen on a dark night): the stark contrast of on the one hand a profound sense of being alive, here and now, […]
Continue readingThe Full Monty is one of my all-time favourite films. I love that triumphant freeze-frame finish, as the hats that were preserving the last shreds of modesty are flung aside and six blokes stand there butt-naked while the room goes wild. Nowhere to hide, nothing left to the imagination. In the This Book Means Business […]
Continue readingWe’ve just been to see the Lego Batman movie. It is absolutely brilliant, and full of clever details that fly straight over the heads of kids to provide a knowing chuckle for their parents. Alfred wears a grey Batman suit at the end (‘I miss the 60s’) and there’s a nod to the comic-book convention […]
Continue readingPublishing books is a pretty darn marvellous way to make a living (assuming you CAN make a living at it (there’s an old industry joke: ‘I run a non-profit publishing house. It’s not supposed to be non-profit, that’s just the way it turned out.’). It may not be high margin, but it’s rich in intrinsic […]
Continue readingRoses are red, violets are…. Well, they’re violet, actually. It may sound less romantic But it ticks the boxes factually.
Continue reading‘Post-truth – Relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief’ Oxford English Dictionary’s word of the year, 2016 I don’t usually ‘do’ politics, but these are not usual times. I can’t stop thinking about what happened while I was in […]
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