Pinboard (guardiantech)

Confessions of an ex-tech journalist >> Medium

guardiantech — 2014-03-18T21:27:21+00:00

Bekah Grant worked at Venturebeat, where she wrote nearly 1,740 articles in 20 months (an average of five per day):

Busy days were a blur of furious typing, rushed calls, and ignoring everything that wasn’t news (like food and water). There would be days with 20 funding announcements, on top of everything else we covered. VB writers could have a post up in 15 minutes if the situation demanded. Online publishing is a horse race and speed is critical.
When a story breaks, you could take a couple hours to do research, call to sources, and write a contextualized, edited piece — but by that time, 5 of your competitors will have posted on the story. You will look slow and readers will have moved onto the next thing. The reality is that original reporting and careful editing fall by the wayside in the desire to be fast.

Worth reading in full at your leisure.

Say hello to Samsung's fanboy factory - the Mobilers program >> The Next Web

guardiantech — 2012-09-02T21:33:28+00:00

The title that was being shared on Twitter on Sunday night was "Here's how Samsung flew bloggers halfway around the world [from India to Berlin], then threatened to leave them there"

Jeff told Samsung again, in no uncertain terms, that they were not there to be product demonstrators for the brand. They reiterated that they had agreed to the trip so that they could cover Samsung, but also the other brands that were launching products. They were shuttled off to a meeting where they once again stated ,this time to a stern-faced PR person, that they had no interest in playing Samsung’s employee for the event. They were told that they had some free time while the company made its decision, so they headed to the local Starbuck’s to grab a pre-show coffee.

An insight into the very murky world of pro blogging - and how companies treat them.

PandoDaily >> the site-of-record for silicon valley

guardiantech — 2012-01-17T07:25:08+00:00

Sarah Lacy, former TechCruncher and author, launches the newest technology news site on the blog. It already has its accusers. (Hello, Gawker.)

"You should have your tongue ripped out": the reality of sexist abuse online >> New Statesman

guardiantech — 2011-11-03T13:01:10+00:00

Important problem. What on earth do we do with the online mysogynists? Helen Lewis writes: "What does it feel like to be subjected to regular rape threats or death threats? To have people send you emails quoting your address, or outlining their sexual fantasies about you? That's the reality of what many female bloggers experience. It's my belief that "normal" net users simply don't realise what it feels like to open the front door to a chorus of commenters howling at you about your opinions, your name, your appearance, your sexuality. If they did, we might all have a little less tolerance, be a little less ready to excuse sexist abuse as part of the "rough and tumble" of blogging."

Octopress framework >> Octopress

guardiantech — 2011-09-09T20:37:51+00:00

"Octopress is a framework designed by Brandon Mathis for Jekyll, the blog aware static site generator powering Github Pages. To start blogging with Jekyll, you have to write your own HTML templates, CSS, Javascripts and set up your configuration. But with Octopress All of that is already taken care of. Simply clone or fork Octopress, install dependencies and the theme, and you’re set."

HTML5-ready, mobile-ready, built-in third-party support for Twitter, Google Plus, Pinboard, Google Analytics and others. Interesting?

Metafilter's Matt Haughey interviewed >> Willamette Week

guardiantech — 2011-07-17T21:52:21+00:00

"Q: That’s still pretty remarkable, though—most news sites get almost entirely trolling or abusive comments. What is it about the Internet that turns people into assholes?
"A: I think the anonymity; they think they can get away with it. Anonymous speech—like whistle-blowing—definitely has a role in society, but any time you introduce anonymity people can freely be assholes. Like, I grew up in L.A., and when you’re in a car in L.A. with 8 million other people, you’re totally anonymous; people drive horribly. And then you move up to Oregon, and everyone’s waving at each other and people drive much nicer. I see that online—it’s like, whatever level of anonymity you allow, is how much garbage you’re going to get."

Second lesbian blogger exposed as a man >> The Guardian

guardiantech — 2011-06-14T16:40:05+00:00

All the other lesbian bloggers who are really men must be quaking in their boots. Note the amazing care with this one, though: a fake persona going back as far as 2007; daily updates to a web site.

Still, it shows that there's life after construction work.