Having put the mining tax “to bed”, political commentators are now stating that Julia Gillard’s (@juliagillard) next big test before the election is to resolve the “asylum seeker issue”. The Liberals have long capitalised on sensationalising the “threat” of being swamped by boat people. Howard used this as a wedge issue against Labor for years, [...]
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Google News has destroyed a valuable asset
This won’t be a major issue for most people, but Google once had a very valuable asset: Google News. Google News once aggregated 1000s of news stories from across the web and allowed users to customise “sections” according to their preference – even using news keyword searches. You could even decide how many stories would [...]
Gillard and the Labor leadership
Gillard makes history as Australia’s first woman prime-minister. Today marks an important historical milestone for Australian politics and civil society. Julia Gillard is without a doubt Labor’s best political operative and most effective communicator. She has shown she can cut through. Ultimately, this is what sealed Kevin Rudd’s fate. Rudd was only able to communicate [...]
The mining-tax scare website is an excellent case study
The Minerals Council of Australia is running a scare-campaign in opposition to the Federal Government’s proposed resources super-profits tax. The Federal Government is quite rightly proposing to introduce a profits tax on exceptionally high profits to ensure that Australians get a greater share of the profits made by mining companies made from Australia’s non-renewable resources. [...]
Four harsh truths about union websites
There’s been a lot said about union websites – here’s four things we all know but are worth saying again. You’re not engaging anyone Your website doesn’t engage your members. Even if you allow comments. Even if you create a union “blog”. Even if you add a “share” or “tweet this” button to the bottom [...]
Should your union invest in a proprietary CMS?
I’ve been having a few conversations with people around the traps about content management systems for websites. For those who may not be familiar with the lingo, a content management system is the online software that runs websites. Most complicated websites use a content management system (CMS) to look after all the various pages and [...]
Use A/B split-testing for your union website
Split testing is a very useful tool for online union websites and is used by major businesses, advertisers, campaigns like the Obama campaign, and giants like Google and Facebook. All unions should use split testing for their campaign sites, and should consider how to integrate it into their Joining pages. What is split testing (also [...]
Crikey runs with misleading coal-lobby ads
NewGenCoal is a slick marketing campaign by the coal lobby to try to convince politicians and Australians that the fossil fuel industry is serious about climate change. Unfortunately, the reverse is true, and the coal lobby has done everything in its power to stall comprehensive action on climate change. Crikey has often lambasted the Australian [...]
The importance of design for political campaigns
Everyone refers to the Obama campaign as benchmarks for so much in political campaigning, so forgive me while I do the same. Below is a video from the99percent, a think-tank in the US that has a series of talks, lectures or seminars that they video and put on the web. There’s a lot of really [...]
Union website design tip: always include a favicon
Just a quick tip for when you’re designing your union website: always include a favicon. A favicon is the little 16 pixel by 16 pixel icon that represents your website next to the address bar or in a tab. The favicon is an important part of your union’s website design. All major browsers will render [...]
Joe Hockey doesn’t understand productivity: Great news for Tony Abbott
Joe Hockey’s budget reply speech yesterday to the National Press Club, universally described as a “shemozzle”, has revealed that the Shadow Treasurer doesn’t understand what productivity is. This is, of course, good news for Tony Abbott. Productivity is considered amongst neo-liberal economists as the key driver of economic growth and health. It is the key [...]
“Carefully scripted remarks” scandal is great news for Tony Abbott
You know when your remarks are reported by a major overseas news agency as “editor’s pick” that you’re on a winner. Tony Abbott has been getting great press recent after he told Kerry O’Brien from the 7:30 Report that voters they should only believe his “carefully prepared scripted remarks” and not his off-the-cuff comments. Anthony [...]
Chomsky barred entry to the West Bank
In a largely unreported story (in Australia at least), internationally respected professor Noam Chomsky was barred entry to the West Bank by Israeli authorities. The New York Times reports: Front-page coverage and heated morning radio discussions asked how Professor Chomsky, an 81-year-old professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, could pose a risk to [...]
Rooted in fantasy land
Tim Hollo from Crikey blog Rooted is living in fantasy land: The government’s hope of clinging to any remaining climate credibility relies on pretending that it was the Greens who were intractable, not them. This fits neatly with the Labor mythology of who the Greens are, but it contrasts dramatically with the actual behaviour of [...]
Book Review: “Yes We Did” by Rahaf Harfoush
Yes We Did: An inside look at how social media built the Obama brand Over Xmas, I purchased and read “Yes We Did: An inside look at how social media built the Obama brand”, by Rahaf Harfoush, a volunteer new media campaigner on the Obama 2008 election campaign. This 185 page book promises to give [...]
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