02/02/09 - A groundbreaking day for UGC

As Siberian winds sweep the worst snowfalls into the UK for the last eighteen years, media outlets all over the country find themselves in their element. Editor’s rub their hands with glee safe in the knowledge that they have a free news story affecting the country worth at least three or four different genres of package.

The worst snows the country has seen for over a decade saw the BBC record their most successful day of User Generated Content ever! Floods of pictures and video’s from all over the country were provided onto the TV and internet via mobile phones and email of the different emotions being experienced during this very public snow day.


Images showed children enjoying a second Christmas, this time putting those sledges to good use. The lengths people would go to ensure they had some form of sledge to enjoy the snow with. The images of London yet again grinding to a halt as transport chaos sets in. The images of Westminster frozen over, reminding me of scene described in some Victorian novel, the endless picture and images of snowmen and igloos and the desperation of people as they tried to get to work by digging out their car or walking through the blizzard conditions to reach their destination.



It’s not the first time newsrooms have used UGC to help illustrate their story, however, to date it has usually been the more depressing side of news where this form of journalism has dominated. The London bombings and Buncefield oil depot explosions spurned the public into action to take part in this new technological age of citizen journalism.

Today encouraged more than usual to volunteer their images to newsrooms meaning another groundbreaking day for UGC. Technological and journalistic history made. When will the next time be?



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All images taken from the BBC website provided by citizen journalists

2009 - Blogs coming soon!!!

Welcome to De Facto 2009.

I have a feeling 2009 will be a dramatic and important year for news and events.

Blogs coming soon - Sport and the recession, Myspace - the graveyard of information, The fall of Gazza.

Stay tuned.

No Brains for Welsh Rugby Shirts

Back when I had no sense or taste towards who to support in football I used to wander around in the latest Chelsea shirt. Inspired by the likes of John Spencer, Ruud Gullit and Gianfranco Zola, I was proud to wear the blue top with roaring lion badge placed over the heart and Coors sponsor across the front. What made me prouder was that I was wearing a replica shirt to that of my hero’s, one of the main reasons why I wanted the shirt so much.

All grown up and now supporting a different team in a lesser division, it came to my surprise the other week when I was walking around sports shops in Cardiff to find that the Brains beer logo had been removed from the junior replica Welsh national rugby shirts. Taken aback I asked the manager if the kit was awaiting a new sponsor. She laughed and told me that when the new kit was launched back in October the Brains logo was excluded from the junior shirts because it was seen as unsuitable for children below drinking age to be wearing a shirt sporting an alcoholic beverage logo for fear that it would encourage children to drink.

I was honestly shocked and quite baffled. “It’s not a replica if the shirt is not the same as what is worn by the players on the pitch!” came by reply. The lady just shrugged.

I thought back to all the times I used to wear those Chelsea shirts with Coors on the front. Then I thought of all the times I had wandered into a pub and asked for a pint at age ten because I had been encouraged too from the logo.

Wait a second? I never did! Nor can I ever recollect being driven to want to drink due to the fact Zola had just smashed in the winner at the bridge whilst wearing a shirt with an alcoholic logo on it.

.

This was all very confusing to me and the strange thing was the more people I asked in Cardiff, the fewer seemed to know about the decision taken.

When I called the WRU and Brains to see who had authorised the decision neither were able to give me an answer to the question.

Neither probably wanted to, as far as I can make out this was a decision taken

by stealth with no official statement made through the media.

More interestingly why take away the sponsor logo from the shirt when the Brains logo will still be plastered all over the stadium and on the adult’s version worn by the likes of Shane Williams and James Hook? Player’s youngsters look up to.

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Will removing it honestly stop young fans from drinking? Will keeping the logos on junior replicas mean that more innocent lips are due to taste alcohol this year?

The removal of the Brains logo has left a huge void on the shirts and I honestly think the WRU and Brains will run into a huge problem with this move.

I thought back to my younger years, let’s face it most children are fickle. Like me, the majority only want the shirt because it’s a replica of what their sporting hero’s on the pitch are wearing. I don’t think I would have worn my Chelsea shirt so proudly if it was any different to that of Zola’s.

If the logo is removed then surely this will have a huge impact on sales figures of the Welsh junior replicas. I have already heard a child in one of the sports shops complaining to his mother because the shirt he was shown was “not the same as dads or James Hook’s”

What’s the solution?

Is there one in this politically correct world?

Wales are not the only sports team to use alcoholic sponsors on their shirts.

Liverpool and Everton are the best examples of alcoholic sponsors in the UK.

In Wales, Super League team, Celtic Crusaders are also sponsored by Brains. I called their office to see if they had been asked or told to remove their logo from junior replicas ahead of the new season.

It was confirmed to me from a very good source from within the club that there were NO plans to remove the logo from the junior shirts, nor had they been asked to via any authority.

However I was reminded that whenever the team play in France, the logo is either removed or changed due to the fact the advertisement of alcohol is illegal and banned.

This of course begs the next question. Will the UK follow suit to the French example?

It seems the only possible answer, not that I think this should happen! But if you are changing or removing logos from junior kits for this reason then they are no longer replicas to what the players wear on the pitch. If they are not replicas people are unlikely to pay the expensive price for them. From this sales could drop, if this happens the club will find a new sponsor that is not alcoholic.

Due to the money involved, neither Liverpool or Everton are likely to give up their sponsors without a fight any time soon.

However, a big shake up could be around the corner from taking place with sports sponsorship in the UK. The tobacco industry has already been quashed, no longer allowed to advertise via any means in Britain.

Will the Government soon follow suit with alcoholic advertising?

It’s a real possibility and the first steps could have already have been taken in Wales.

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Images courtesy of - http://www.rbs6nations.com/, www.scrumoftheearth.com/rugby_news/content, http://www.theage.com.au/news/soccer/zola-puts-hands-up-for-job/2007/11/23/1195753308212.html, http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/aug/15/advertising.sun

The facts about Hollywood's true story - Changeling

Warning!!! The following blog contains information that may spoil the plot line of the new Clint Eastwood film Changeling. If you have not seen the film yet and don’t want the plot unravelled I would advise you NOT to read this post.

Fact or Fiction, is Hollywood capable of telling a

true story on the silver screen?

It’s not often I come away from a film knowing that I have just experienced a piece of real cinematic drama.

Changeling, directed by Clint Eastwood is based on a true story and easily stands out from other big budget blockbusters that regularly flow from Hollywood.

Set in the romantic era of 1920’s U.S prosperity. America was undergoing rapid urbanisation following on from continued industrialisation. Largely untouched from the catastrophic effects of the First World War that tore much of Europe apart, the devastating Wall Street crash hadn’t taken place and an economic depression and Second World War were distant nightmares.

The story is set around single mother Christine Collins (played by Angelina Jolie). Jolie delivers a powerful display as she returns from work to the realisation that her son, Walter Collin’s, is missing.

The police are alerted but don’t take her concerns seriously. When a boy matching the descriptions of her son is found by the LAPD, the concerned mother realises that the child is not hers.

Again the police force fail to take her claims seriously, insisting her son has been found and that the child is hers and eventually having Christine Collin’s committed to psychiatric care.

From this point the story plunges into dark details of the Wineville chicken coop murders that took place outside Los Angeles in 1928. Children walking the streets were snatched by ranch owner, Gordon Northcott and caged in chicken pens before being brutally murdered by their captor.

The reality has never been confirmed but it’s believed that Walter Collin’s was one of the victims of the brutal serial murders that shook the state of California.

When the new evidence is brought to the attention of the Los Angeles police, it proves Christine Collins is right, that the child found was an imposter (Arthur Hutchins) and that her son was still missing.

The discovery of the murders and Christine Collins testimony blows open the LAPDs corruption and mistakes that eventually lead to Captain J.J Jones and chief of police, James E. Davies being dismissed from their positions in court.

Both Clint Eastwood and Producer Ron Howard deliver a rollercoaster of emotions that can’t fail to move the viewer.

Christine Collins plight to find her son moved me so much I came away knowing I had to find out more about the story and her search.

Eastwood does stay true to reality but slightly bends the outer edges allowing the viewer to cling to hope in a story depicting desperation and despair.

As shown in the film Collins never does find her son, nor the true fact of what happened to him. Walter Collins body was never discovered, it’s believed Christine Collins never stopped looking for her son. However records of Mrs Collins, apparently, only go as far as 1941, no information can be found on her past this date.

The more sour details of this true story are that Collins never received the money awarded to her in court after she brought a law suit against the LAPD for neglect and mistreatment.

As for the two characters behind the corruption in the police department, J.J. Jones and James E. Davies were both reinstated into their positions two years after being dismissed.

Shocking true life twists, absent from the film that you hope would not happen today.

Why does Eastwood leave these details out?

Its obvious Hollywood can never tell any story completely true to life, any happy ending is always overblown and any ending is made to look happy.

However, in defence I would like to believe it’s more due to that fact that Eastwood thought Christine Collins had suffered enough and that people viewing this film needed to take some, even a small piece of hope away from this story.

Leaving out these details lets the viewer walk away with the satisfaction Collins was victorious in her battle to rid a police force of corruption.

The sad facts are that this wasn’t the reality.

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Image courtesy @ http://thecia.com.au/reviews/c/images/changeling-2.jpg

Woolies - Death on the high street.

I know it will sound spoilt, but in my younger years, every Christmas when I knew I would get voucher from a member of the family. I would be praying in my mind "please not a Woolworths voucher, please not a Woolworths voucher".

OK, having just written this down it sounds terrible, what a bad person I am. All will be forgiven I promise. My point though is this. I would never want the vouchers because I found there was nothing I could spend them on in store. And when your a teenager it begs the question... What was Woolworths brand? and who was their target consumer?

It's a name that has been on the high street for almost a hundred years but it looks as though that the economic downturn has finally been the one to put the last nail in the coffin of this well known store chain (unless of course there is some dramatic buy out at the eleventh hour)

The news prompted me to think. When was the last time I went to Woolies and what did I buy?

To be honest I don't think it was all that long ago and classically it was to get a bag of pick and mix. An item the media were all to keen to jump on in news reports last week. To be fair the sweets were good.

But was that all Woolworths was? A glorified sweet shop? People forget the range of items available from Cd's, DVDs, games, toys, clothes, stationary, gardening tools, the list goes on.

If the place was such a treasure chest of goodies why did the consumer not do what it's best at and spend spend spend?

The main problem Woolies had was a marketing one. What was the prime item the store sold? Because it never advertised itself as a shop that sold everything.

The second problem is the company never kept up with the changing and developing conditions of twenty first century shopping. Customers were more likely to get Books, Cd's and DVDs from Smiths, Waterstones, HMV or the Internet. Asda and Tesco provided cheap clothes and Wilkinson or Homebase could usually provide anything else.

When you go back 30 years, I'm told via family sources that customers used to cue outside every Saturday morning because Woolies used to be the first store on the high street to get the new vinyls. How things have changed since then.

Woolies lost it's way along the path set by the capitalist consumer high street. With so many chains specialising in certain products being born over the last 20 years, steadily increased wall to wall advertising and the Internet offering a web of quick, cheap and easy shopping, Woolworths was always going to be fighting a losing battle.

When next shopping ask yourself, will we miss Woolworths that much? Items Woolies used to sell will still be available in other chains and shops, even the pick and mix.

The customer simply is spoilt for choice, it's sad to say, but it's unlikely the store will be missed.

Woolworth was one of the oldest chain businesses the UK had to offer. However if you fail to offer the public something new and keep regenerating then the consequences will be suffered

Woolies looks doomed to high street history, De Facto is, its not the first, it certainly won't be the last.

All eyes now turn to Dixons and Currys to see if they are the next chain on the high street to fall.

As for my sin of not wanting a Woolies voucher as a gift. I always found I could get Cd's and DVDs cheaper in other stores, I was too old for toys and I would never have brought ten pounds worth of sweets. Therefore I used to spend them on other people, usually Christmas shopping for family members eleven months later.

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Image courtesy @ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1089694/Currys-PC-World-post-half-year-loss-20-years-High-Street-gloom-spreads.html

Welcome to De Facto

Welcome to my new Blog... De Facto.

De Facto is a Latin expression I used in history class when it came to referring to Governments. It means "concerning the fact" or "in fact"

The aim of this blog and the posts that follow will be to do just this. Deliver the facts of the day, week, month, year on topics that concern people.

I hope you enjoy.

Blog on!!!