Blogs, links, jumps, sidebars, comments and emails. Spend enough time on the Internet and you will come across hundreds of thousands of each one.

This one lead me to this.

Then I saw this and I encourage you to read it. It is important, it is Canadian, and it is good. I am even going to encourage you to forward the link to people you know.

Then I read this.

No matter what happens over the next few weeks the spirit of these discussions will not go away. Even the requirement that foreign journalists will need to apply for access to Tiananmen Square 24 hours in advance if they want to interview, broadcast or film in the plaza won’t turn this story off. (Intrepid journalists will, I believe, find people to interview, film, record and photograph at other venues. I’ve visited Tiananmen Square and it isn’t the only venue in Beijing where one can reasonably expect to find citizens milling about. It is, after all, a big city.)

It is just not possible, you see, to shut the Internet down. Nor can true public conversation be silenced. Shouts might become whispers but never silence.

I have been labouring under the misconception that people (youthful ones, usually) were “running the Internet” but it appears now that I have been wrong. All this time the ‘net has been under the control of the Chinese government.

If you don’t believe me click here.

Promising journalists one thing and then delivering another is never a wise move.

Quoted:

HE SAID:
Jacques Rogge, IOC President

“I’m not going to make an apology for something that the IOC is not responsible for,” Rogge said. “We are not running the internet in China. The Chinese authorities are running the internet.”

SHE SAID:
Giselle Davies, IOC Spokeswoman

IOC spokeswoman Giselle Davies blamed Rogge’s use of the words “no censorship” on the fact that English is not the Belgian’s first language.

“There’s been no change in the IOC’s position,” she said. “Again, I think we are trying to hang on every single word often spoken by people whose mother tongue isn’t English. Let me be clear again: The IOC would like to see open access for the media to be able to do their job.”

HE CLARIFIED:
Kevan Gosper, IOC Press Commission

IOC press commission head Kevan Gosper has said that open reporting may not be possible with the Olympics in a “communist society.”

“I guess there will be some debate as we move toward the games if there are sites that may or may not be open,” Gosper said.

“And the line between what could be considered as a national-interest issue might be a bit blurred. But we’ll work on it and we will deal with any potential grievances.”

Is the Internet free?

Is the Internet private?

One news item about China and another about the United States of America.

As we draw closer to the start of the Beijing Olympics savvy media dwellers will start to tally the number of Beijing-Olympics-focused articles, features, editorials, op-ed pieces, essays, rants, opinions, diatribes, thoughts and so forth spreading through all forms of media.

Topics will be all over the map, of course, but look for some tried-and-true pieces that are already part of the public conversation.

Tibet will appear here and there, with all manner of references to the mechanisms put in place by the Chinese government to stifle any possible suggestion of even a whisper of discord. These stories will dovetail with references to “protest pens” and increased border security measures to make sure no one smuggles a “Free Tibet” lapel pin into China. If (and this is a big if) an athlete stands to accept a medal and–gasp–whips out a protest lapel pin the world media will take loud notice.

Look for a few heartwarming notes about athletes away from home, forging new friendships in the Olympic Village, and adjusting to training conditions in Beijing. Blogs home to hometown newspapers are a nice touch, but a cozy blogpost home to the neighbourhood might be difficult to see and hear amid the media clutter of the Olympics.

The pollution in Beijing will be given a great deal of coverage. I visited Beijing in late 1999 and while there was, indeed, a 30 storey building across the broad avenue from my hotel I couldn’t see it 5 mornings out of 7. Back in those dark days daylight could not penetrate the morning smog (cheerfully called “fog” by private and state tour guides) and the city planners devised an ingenious solution for lighting the murky streets.

Streetlights about 4 feet tall interspersed with their regular counterparts serve to illuminate the day, like taller versions of garden or pool lighting found here at home, because light does not sink to street level. Pedestrians would be hopelessly lost without these lamp posts in miniature and I used them as dim beacons leading me back to my hotel. The air quality truly is terrible.

The old adage taught to children, “Stop, look and listen before you cross the street” is a handy guide for any visitor to Beijing where crossing even the quietest backstreet is an exercise in both courage and luck. Passenger cars are being reduced from the local trafficsape (a word I hope I just coined) using a “day on/day off” plan while old beaters that are deemed to be embarrassingly high on the pollution inducing scale are made to disappear. Reducing vehicular traffic is a clever move–look for media features about how citizens are coping without their cars–and will have the pleasant side effect of making crosswalks safer. (Urgent Footnote: When in Beijing always cross the street in a crowd. There is safety in pedestrian numbers.)

These are very useful devices.

Everyday, more and more people get one and use it to stay connected while away from their office.  However, if you’ve ever used one to exchange emails back and forth with a person or people who’s organization(s) insists on adding a ‘Notice of Confidentiality’ (in Canada often in both English and French) like this at the bottom of every message, you know it becomes a real pain in the ass to scroll through a thread.

NOTICE OF CONFIDENTIALITY
This communication including any information transmitted with it is intended only for the use of the addressees and is confidential. If you are not an intended recipient or responsible for delivering the message to an intended recipient, any review, disclosure, conversion to hard copy, dissemination, reproduction or other use of any part of this communication is strictly prohibited, as is the taking or omitting of any action in reliance upon this communication. If you receive this communication in error or without authorization please notify us immediately by return e-mail or otherwise and permanently delete the entire communication from any computer, disk drive, or other storage medium.

If the above disclaimer is not properly readable, it can be found at: abc.com/legal 

AVERTISSEMENT DE CONFIDENTIALITE
Ce courriel, ainsi que tout renseignement ci-inclus, destiné uniquement aux destinataires susmentionnés, est confidentiel. Si vous n’êtes pas le destinataire prévu ou un agent responsable de la livraison de ce courriel, tout examen, divulgation, copie, impression, reproduction, distribution, ou autre utilisation d’une partie de ce courriel est strictement interdit de même que toute intervention ou abstraction à cet égard. Si vous avez reçu ce message par erreur ou sans autorisation, veuillez en aviser immédiatement l’expéditeur par retour de courriel ou par un autre moyen et supprimer immédiatement cette communication entière de tout système électronique.

Si l’avis de non-responsabilité ci-dessus n’est pas lisible, vous pouvez le consulter à abc.com/legale

COME ON!  Is all this text really necessary in every email sent from every person in your organization?  Particularly when some email messages are only a sentence or less (e.g. Yes, No, OK).

Do organizations actually think people read these notices and take the action of notifying the organization if they receive the message in error?

If a Notice of Confidentially absolutely needs to be there, would something simple like this, on one or two lines, not be sufficent?

Notice of Confidentiality: abc.com/legal  / Avertissement de confidentialite: abc.com/legale

For me, nothing says “I refuse to put any effort or expense whatsoever into this” quite like an e-Christmas / e-Holiday card does.

I’ve received quite a few e-cards this year.

Some are well done and you can tell the sender/sending organization actually put a fair amount of time and effort into creating something clever and memorable, like this one from McMillan, an advertising and design agency here in Ottawa – I don’t mind those as much.  In fact, I liked McMillan’s so much I forwarded it to a few people.

However, others have (pardon the expression) been STRAIGHT SHITE!  And worse, a lot of them have been very similar: a winter scene with the ‘cutting-edge animation’ of falling snow and some generic, unoriginal greeting.

Christmas / Holiday cards is a contact with your customers, partners and suppliers, and like all contact with those parties, its an opportunity to build the relationship, so it should be done right.

Now, I’m in favour of electronic versus paper when in comes to most things, but I’m sure I’m not the only person that likes to put received Christmas cards up on the window sill in my office or on my fireplace mantle at home.

Further, at Thornley Fallis & 76design a lot of what we do is electronic communication, but I still think its important to send our clients, partners, suppliers and other contacts an actual card that they keep longer than the time it takes to open and delete an email.

We usually start work on original concepts in October, we then have them printed, pull together about 1000 addresses/labels, and get them out late November/early December.  Over the years, I think we’ve come up with some pretty good cards that reflect the ‘personality’ of our firm. Last year our card included a line of perforated gift labels.  With concept development, design, printing, envelope stuffing, labelling, postage, etc. it’s more costly and time consuming than an e-card, but I think it’s worth it.

Of course, not every organization can design a card in house, but firms (like our design studio) are available for hire. If you can’t do it in-house, hire a firm or freelancer to help you do it right.  It won’t cost that much and will enhance this contact with your customers, partners and suppliers.

A while back I posted about how ePost had got together with Canada’s banks and credit unions to make bills received through ePost available within online banking.  I commented how it was unfortunate, from a convenience and waste perspective, that many of companies I receive bills from (e.g. Home Depot, Hydro Ottawa, Enbridge, Sears, Best Buy, Future Shop) don’t give me the option to stop receiving paper bills.

This morning I signed on to online banking and got another pleasant, paperless surprise.

I can now view images of my cleared cheques online.

Not that I use cheques that often anymore.  In fact, with being able to email money around (which incidentally is what I signed on to do), I use cheques very rarely, and had opted out of receiving cleared cheques in the mail some time ago.  However, there have been a few occaisions in the last couple of years where I had used a cheque (small amounts) and when it cleared my account I didn’t know / couldn’t remember what it was for.  It would have been nice to have been able to see it online.  Now I can!

In terms of convenience and waste reduction, this is a good move by CIBC.

In my role on the Board of CPRS Ottawa, I have organized a panel discussion on how social media and online networking are changing the communications landscape for next Tuesday, November 13th (all board members organize professional development events for our members throughout the year).

This event sold out a couple of days ago and unfortunately we’ve had to turn several people away, granted the venue can only accomodate 50 people.  However, we’re always in rooms about this size for our professional development events and this is the first time we’ve sold one out, and well in advance, since I’ve been on the board (2 years).  And its a first for several years according to colleagues that have been on the board longer than I.

This is a testiment to the growing interest in the area amongst PR and communications professionals in the national capital region and also to the great moderator and panellists I was able to line up for this session – thanks again gentlemen for agreeing to participate.

Rob Henderson, President of CNW, will moderate panellists John Blackmore, Joe Thornley and Colin McKay in free-ranging discussion on blogs, podcasts, wikis, Facebook, online communities, etc and the impact they are having on traditional media, public policy and communications with customers and citizens.

John Blackmore is leader of the Internet Marketing and Content team at Cognos, Canada’s largest software company. His team’s responsibilities include content creation and navigation, search engine optimization, pay-per-click advertising, eNewsletters, a regular iTunes podcast Radio Cognos, and a non-media blog outreach.  John and his team have directed the evolution of cognos.com from educational “brochure-ware” to its current role as demand-generation engine that delivers tens of millions of dollars in marketing pipeline.

Joe Thornley is President and CEO of Thornley Fallis & 76design, the company he established in 1995 to provide senior executives with communications counsel and programs aimed at achieving business and organizational objectives.  Mr. Thornley developed the company’s blog strategy to establish thought leadership through active participation in the blogosphere and early adoption of new methodologies and technologies. His blog, ProPR.ca, is dedicated to best business practices, practitioners and building the ideal PR firm.

Colin McKay, aka CanuckFlack, is Director of Public Education and Communications at the Office of the Privacy Commissioner. In addition to his two personal blogs, he is responsible for the recently launched Office of the Privacy Commissioner blog. He has been dabbling in social media and online communications for more than four years. 

I do all my banking online (like most people, other than my parents).

In terms of bills, I have a pretty good handle on how much I owe to who and by when.  So most of the paper bills I receive in the mail go directly into the recycle bin without being opened.  Therefore, I could do without receiving them in the mail, but I don’t always have that option.

I’ve been using Canada Post’s ePost service for several years now, basically since it was launched, although I don’t remember when that was.

ePost works pretty well.  I add my billers by company name and account number, then instead of receiving monthly paper bills in the mail, an electronic copy goes into my ePost inbox.  If I wish, ePost will send me an email notification when I have received a new bill.

No fuss, no muss, and BTW, no unnecessary waste.

Recently, ePost got together with Canada’s banks (Montreal, CIBC, Citizens, Laurentian, National, RBC, Scotiabank, TD Canada Trust) and numerous credit unions to make bills received through ePost available within online banking.  I bank with CIBC who calls this service ‘E-Bills’ – my E-Bills inbox is shown below.

The unfortunate thing is that many of companies I receive bills from (e.g. Home Depot, Hydro Ottawa, Enbridge, Sears, Best Buy, Future Shop) don’t give me the option to stop receiving paper bills and only receive electronic bills through ePost.  Rogers, MasterCard and the City of Ottawa are some of the billers that do let me receive my bills only through ePost and have for some time now.

It’s really time for companies to provide customers with the option to only receive their bills electronically whether through ePost or another system. 

If you’re like me and use Facebook a little, but haven’t really taken the time to go through the various settings and applications, check out this post on Internet Duct Tape.