HTC Desire HD - full review

It's only been two weeks, but my HTC Desire HD feels like an extra limb already and my prehistoric Nokia feels like a distant memory (it'll still be useful, though: I'll keep it by the door as something to hit burglars with).

Once you take a little while to appreciate its full functionality, it's a magnificent beast. Perhaps the best way to describe it is that it does everything you would hope a phone to do; the sort of phone that you fantasised about five years ago and thought "one day, phones will be able to do all these things..."

I was astonished to discover that it really does work straight out of the box. The 130 page PDF manual looks daunting, but it's a remarkably intuitive phone - you don't need a PHD in geekology to make the thing work, and by spending a surprisingly painless period tweaking the settings, it turns into an object combining beauty, power and common sense.

The handset itself is beautiful. There is almost no wasted space; it's all taken up by the screen. Never having had an iPhone or similar, it seems to me like a "normal" size for a phone, but there have been "ooohs" and "aaahs" wondering what it is, and admiring its dimensions. The display has been criticised for not having the same brilliance as the Samsung Galaxy S; but the resolution, to my eye, is excellent, and is bright and colourful and looks amazing...although with a pretty major caveat, of which more later.

I've seen a review of the Desire HD which advised people to think of it less as a smartphone, and more of a PDA which can make phone calls. That pretty much sums it up, but its primary purpose, for most people, will still be to make calls and send texts. Speech quality is excellent - although I have severe problems with reception in my flat, which I've never had before. Calls have cut out on more than one occasion. Texts, meanwhile, are handled in a fairly simple manner.

Contact syncing is intelligent, simple and generally good. The phone will recognise when the same contact is listed in different places (email, phone contacts, Facebook, Twitter) and prompt the user to merge them. How this will work in practice when it comes to transferring the contacts onto another phone in two years' time I've no idea, but for now, it's a simple and "quietly brilliant" system, to use HTC's own strapline. Searching for contacts is slightly clunky, and phone numbers "borrowed" from Facebook accounts are in the wrong format to call directly. Another niggle is that it's not possible to "edit" a contact that doesn't have a phone number attached; which in turn means that you can't add a phone number manually. Instead, you need to create a new contact with the phone number and then merge with the other accounts, which slightly undoes some of the excellent work done by the phone already. There is also duplication of Facebook profiles within a contact page thanks to two different Facebook applications running simultaneously (Facebook for Android and Facebook for HTC Sense, and yes, you do need them both running really), but this isn't an inconvenience, it just makes contact pages look a little cluttered.

HTC are heavily tied in with Google; so much so that I have decided to migrate from Hotmail to Gmail. It is possible, in theory, to sync with Hotmail via Microsoft Exchange, but I couldn't get it to work properly. So I took the plunge and moved to Gmail (Hotmail now allows other accounts to pick up emails automatically, which Gmail does neatly; this was the straw that broke the camel's back). In truth I'm not a huge fan of the Gmail interface on a PC, but Gmail for Android is simple, elegant and intuitive. However, I'm not convinced that emails are being picked up in anything like real time; that's a combniation of Gmail not picking up Hotmails instantly (it usually checks every 20 minutes or so, but you have no control over this) and the Gmails not being sent to the phone in real time as they should. I'm still trying to diagnose which is the greater problem, but having emails arrive an hour after they were sent is really quite annoying when the whole point of having emails on a phone should be to have them in near-real time. You can open and view Word and Excel attachments; in theory you should be able to edit them, but good luck trying to manage a spreadsheet from a mobile.

The standard Facebook and Twitter Android apps are built in and are both excellent. I'm an on-off user of Tweetdeck on a PC, but in truth the branded apps work fine. Using HTC Sense, the networks are both integrated into other functionality, via HTC Peep (the built in Twitter app) and FriendStream. The latter is essentially an aggregate feed of Twitter and Facebook; convenient and that's about it - with limited functionality to comment/reply/like etc. Notifications duplicate themselves for Twitter, too - another tiny niggle. I'm rather tempted to try uninstalling the Twitter-and-Facebook-for-HTC-Sense functionality, but there may be other implications which I'm unaware of.

Internet browsing is, quite simply, brilliant. Pages load instantly via Wireless or 3G, the automatic resizing and realigning of text is superb, and there are no sites I've visited so far that have caused any problems whatsoever. As someone to whom internet browsing on-the-go is an entirely new experience, to my amateur eye the browsing experience is almost as good as on a PC. Zooming, scrolling, and navigating are a joy.

Typing on the touchscreen is...OK. It definitely helps to turn the phone to landscape, which makes the "keys" larger, but despite the screen's size, it's impossible to get close to even a fraction of PC typing speed. I had intended to use the phone to blog on-the-go, but that'll really be a chore. On that point, it's astonishing that Google haven't built a Blogger-for-Android app; that's a serious oversight and something they need to resolve quickly as there's a Wordpress app. I've tried using Bloggerdroid which is reasonable, although it doesn't seem possible to sync with the account, meaning that part-writing a piece on the go and finishing it at a machine (or vice versa) isn't possible as far as I know.

The camera is simple to use. I haven't given it a really proper test yet, but from a bit of casual use picture quality is up there with entry-level compacts, which is all you could ask for. Video quality is seriously good, as you'd expect from a machine with the "HD" moniker. Folder management is unconvincing, however; as it uploading to a PC.

The music player is moderate - does the job, but nothing as elegant to use as my iPod Nano (and, presumably, the iPhone). The headphones, in combination with Dolby Mobile, do provide excellent sound quality, however.

There is a baffling array of mapping software - with "Maps", "Navigation", "Places", "Latitude" and "Locations". It seems that the first two are essentially Google Maps, whilst the latter three are HTC's own branded mapping system. This is confusing, but I'll be taking the advice of another review and ignoring the HTC effort in favour of Google Maps. The Google Navigation is basically a Satnav; no, it's not a TomTom, but given that it's bundled for nothing, it works very well. As an aside, it's a shame that TFL haven't released an Android app combining JourneyPlanner and Travel Alerts functionality. Here's hoping.

As for other apps: "News" is simply Google Reader. I've had an account for some months but never really got into it; it feels artificial to sit down and read a set of blog posts like a newspaper, in a structured way. Instead, I tend to use Twitter to drive interesting blog matter to my consciousness. With a mobile, however, it's a different story: public transport is the perfect time to have 20 minutes to waste to catch up on some blogs and the best thing about HTC's effort is that it caches the data offline - meaning that you can read the posts on the tube. Thus my blog habits are on the increase!

That's basically it for built in applications, although the "behind-the-scenes" functionality is extensive: voice recognition, universal search, and the ability to use he phone as a wireless hotspot (in other words, to connect a laptop to the 3G), for example, are all intelligent and work well. I haven't really got any use of HTC Sense yet, although the ability to make the phone ring remotely at full volume (if you've mislaid it) and remotely lock it or delete data is clever and sensible. There is supposedly the ability to track the phone's location via GPS - in theory, a great idea if it's been stolen - but I've had direct experience of this having met someone who'd just had theirs snatched and it didn't seem to work.

In terms of Android Store apps, I've only installed a handful. Angry Birds really does live up to the hype; Google's Sky Map and Goggles are both ace. Stupidly, the Desire HD doesn't have any obvious simple way just to jot down a note (shopping list, for example); I installed InkPad, which does the job.

So where's the catch? The Desire HD has a reputation for having a poor battery life, but it's far, far worse than I expected. With the moderate use I give it, the phone really struggles to make it through a single day. There are several solutions.

The first is to stop using so many apps, turn off unnecessary syncing and generally tone down the multitasking. This I refuse to do. There's absolutely no point in having a machine with the processor power of the Desire HD if you don't push it. Besides, as I mentioned, I like to be able to have emails and tweets coming through in  real time as if they were texts.

Next, there's an app called JuiceDefender which is, quite simply, brilliant. It intelligently manages your wireless, 3G and GPS use so that they're turned off when not needed, but will still allow connections to be made every so often to check for emails and tweets, according to your syncing settings. This works like a dream, although sometimes I'm not automatically connected to my work's WiFi - a minor irritation. While it's all customisable (more so if you pay £3), there are default settings; I anticipate setting JuiceDefender to "Aggressive" or "Extreme" for a weekend away. It's a simple, unintrusive app, which HTC should take some inspiration from. An essential installation, and the premium version is worth the investment.

However, by far the biggest juice muncher is the screen itself. This is something that you simply have to compromise on. I have the screen set to switch off after 30 seconds inactivity (which is annoying) and the brightness turned right the way down to 15% - making visibility a problem outdoors. Even so, the screen routinely uses more than half of the battery. Sorry to sound like an old man, but there's absolutely no point in having a sumptuous, high definition, colour-rich, super-bright screen, if you have to have it turned down to near-dark just to get the machine through the day. HTC really need to think about battery life and/or battery management as a matter of urgency before their next model is released, because it's very nearly a dealbreaker.

As it is, though, the HTC Desire HD is a stupendous piece of kit. Within a fortnight, it has become an essential part of my life - no exaggeration. HTC really have put usability and simplicity at the top of their priorities - with devastating effect. Connectivity ain't ever been so good.

Bunhill Fields

One of my favourite places in London is Bunhill Fields, just off the City Road, just a few minutes walk from my work, and my favourite place to have a wander at lunchtime. There are a few "celebrities" in there.

John Bunyan:

Daniel Defoe:

William Blake:

But my favourite memorial of all is a different one.

Yes, it's quite large and prominent. But it's dedicated to somebody called Henry Hunter. The epitaph is quite brilliant - so much so that I had to copy it out in full.

Beneath this Pillar, raised by the hand of Friendship sleep the mortal remains of the Rev. HENRY HUNTER D.D. who through a long Life deemed by those who knew him alas too short, served with unwearied assiduity the Interests of Religion, Literature and the Poor. In him to distinguished Talents and a capacious Mind were united Energy of Disposition, Affability of Manners, Benevolence of Heart, and Warmth of Affection. In the Hearts of those who were blessed with his Friendship is preserved the most sacred and inviolable Attachment but his best Eulogium and his most durable memorial will be found in his Writings. THERE he has an Inscription which the Revolution of Years cannot efface. When the nettle shall skirt the base of this Monument and the moss obliterate this feeble testimonial of Affection, when finally sinking under the pressure of years, THIS PILLAR shall tremble and fall over the dust it covers his Name shall be transmitted to Generations unborn. READER! Thus far suffer the weakness of affectionate Remembrance where no adequate Eulogium can be pronounced and when no other Inscription was necessary to perpetuate his Memory than HENRY HUNTER. Thirty one years he was Pastor of the Scots Church London (...) and on Wednesday the twenty seventh of October 1802 left his Family and his Church to deplore but never to retrieve his loss and silently took his flight to Heaven in the sixty second year of his Age.

They don't make 'em like that any more, do they! Saddest of all is the fact that most of the office workers are oblivious to the charms of Bunhill Fields - it's simply a shortcut to Pret. Shame on them for not even turning their heads.

No longer a Luddite

After ten years of being behind the times, I have what can ony be described as a posh phone. IT's the HTC Desire HD. It is truly a stupendous piece of kit. Some of this is old news, of course, but the ability to be able to take great pictures, access the internet, receive emails in not-quite-real time, manage Twitter and Facebook accounts, and synchronise contacts so that you can see the same person's phone number, email, Facebook and Twitter all in the same place - that's space-age stuff (hardy surprising given that the computing power in one of these dwarfs that in Apollo XI). The Android operating system is great - although heavily tied in with Google. I have taken the plunge and am slowly migrating to Gmail from Hotmail (update your address books: eoghanlondon@gmail.com will reach me).

The only down side, and it is a massive downside, is the battery life. I'd been warned it was poor, but it is really abysmal. Circa 2002 the main selling points of upmarket phones were small size and lengthy battery life; nowadays phones are enormous with terrible battery life. Que sera.


All the same, it's an astonishing piece of engineering. I am very, very excited by it.

We also bought a new laptop today - not a particularly posh one, but more than adequate for our needs. A £9 copy of Microsoft Office (thanks MetBenefits) is now installed, and we're firing on all cylinders. One thing I noticed about it is that in contrast to computers a few years ago, it works straight out of the box with minimal installations and preamble required. In fact the only work that needs to be done is to uninstall all the junk that Packard Bell and Microsoft have shoved on there.

Dave Godman

The other day I had a pub conversation about "who you know who should be given the MBE". To borrow a phrase from Sir John Stevens, Gordon Brown and others (last used last night, which got me thinking) - the everyday heroes.

Mine would be a bloke called Dave Godman. I went to a primary school in Bounds Green called Rhodes Avenue. It was a pretty decent school as they come, and I was mostly happy there. One downside was that there was no organised sport whatsoever, except for rounders in PE lessons.

Dave was dad to a lad called Joe, several years below me, and set up and ran the Football Club (ironically, Joe paid no interest in football whatsoever, if I recall). It was far and away the best thing about going to school - this would have been 1991-94 for me. Every Wednesday and Friday lunchtime we'd bolt our lunch down in record time (five minutes was considered VERY slow), go down to the local rec and have real training sessions. We had everything we could ever need: cones, bibs, and we'd all get changed into our best football gear (for some reason I had a particularly hideous stripey top and nasty burgundy jacket from a jumble sale that I decided was my training top...I've no idea why). We even started to play matches against other local schools; who could forget the first competitive game, against Coppetts Wood, which finished 5-0, shortly followed by a 14-0 win over Coldfall - a fifteenth goal was scratched from the records as we accidentally started the game with twelve men! - and the home game against Copthall, which was 19-1. Sadly, I was massively crap, and didn't feature in most games - although I played most of the return match with Copthall, by which time they'd got their act together, and held us 2-2.

It's the same all over the world, but the best players sat at the top of the social tree by default. In the year above, there was Chris Condon, a really nice lad whose mum (Clare?) used to come and help out at the training - she was quietly brilliant. Chris was probably the best player we had. There was Ankeet, a powerful full back, and of course the rocksteady central defensive partnership of Shona and Eleanor. There was Johnny, a skinny lad who always used to wear an Arsenal jacket, who I used to think was brilliant. In my year there was Dillan Leslie-Rowe, who used to play up front; Dominic Hill in midfield; and my best mate Liam Charalambou, a brilliant keeper, although he used to throw massive strops whenever he let in goals - so much so that he was eventually usurped in the first team by Harry in the year below. I also remember Jonty, who was an irritating kid, but a tricky playmaker. Then there was Duncan, who famously broke his toe midway through a match but kept quiet because he didn't want to be substituted.

The school hall, where we used to hold our meetings at lunchtime and have a team talk before the training, was a sacred place. Once the doors were shut, Chatham House rules applied. We were men in there, and everyone was equal. Petty squabbles and minor bullying disappeared ("Stop screwin' around" Dave would drawl, and we'd shut up instantly). Dave would talk tactics, and we'd hang on his every word.

But there was more than that. The school actively discouraged the Football Club. Dave used to have to jump through hoops to get permission to take us out, and the school provided no support whatsoever. None. Everything that we did was organised by Dave, with Clare's help. In the sanctity of the hall, Dave would rumble about the ruling powers and how we were always on the brink of being shut down (the Chatham House rules were just as well). For us, it was an unspeakable thought, but galvanised us together. The school  never had a good word to say about football, and never lifted a finger for Dave, but made damn sure to make a fuss when we won a match.

Sometimes, without warning, Dave didn't turn up. We'd sit in the hall with increasing frustration. No Dave. Time would go on and on, until we'd drift away in bitter disappointment. Next time he's turn up saying "Sorry lads, I had to sort a guy out who's losing his job..." Never before was someone's impending unemployment met with such a lack of sympathy! We couldn't care less about Dave's trade union work; what about football training?

Dave would sometimes play himself in training, and it was honour to have him on your team. He was grizzled with a craggy face and a cheeky smile - he seemed to be a bit older than the other dads, but it didn't matter at all. He always used to bang on about the new astroturf centre which  would be the ultimate playing surface and was just around the corner. In four years we never came close to seeing astroturf!

I wonder where Dave is now and how he's doing. I hope he realises even a fraction of the extent that we respected him - he was our idol. After school, picking up Joe, he'd be surrounded by throngs of kids wanting his opinion on the latest England squad or Spurs transfer rumour, giving out his wisdom as friendly and patiently as ever. If I ever met someone who inspired dozens of people, and made them feel better about life, an everyday hero, it was Dave Godman.

A lonely Christmas

With every unexpected death there's someone who'll feel the pain most. A December night, minus five on the scale and a blizzard on the way, and a light has gone out in someone's life. For me this is a stressful situation as I gather my thoughts, try to follow protocol, hoe I'm not forgetting things, concentrating on doing a good job, and keeping new colleagues under my wing. We are not the only people present. There is a newly bereaved brother. He is keeping up appearances, answering stupid questions, trying to be helpful. The realisation has not yet kicked in. The loneliness of someone alone in the country will not manifest itself for a few hours.

Hours pass as officious feet trudge muddy footprints through the hallway, radios bleep, hard male voices converse mixed with hushed tones at appropriate moments, occasional, accidental, stifled bursts of laughter break out. Hustle and bustle is everywhere, paperwork flows. Finally it is all over.

There is a week until Christmas. What would have been family affair has suddenly turned into a void. With any luck there may be a friend or colleague who will take pity. I hope so for his sake. I pass on final information about the coroner, mortuary, an apology that due to health and safety we cannot clean up the mess in the now silent living room. I mutter a limp euphemism about this not being pleasant. With an effort I look him in the eye, attempt a smile, which I hope conveys something approaching empathy, and, ridiculously, my final words are almost as if I'm saying goodbye to a mate after a pint. "Take care."

Suddenly the stony, glum resignation falters. I see shoulders slump. I know what this means. I shoo everyone out the front door and make sure not to look behind me as I pull the door shut. Some privacies are inviolable.

Hours later, nearing the end of a continuous 27-hour working day, hysterical exhaustion invading, I stare out from the window of a deserted, stifling twelfth floor over central London. Outside, nothing but a whiteout - the snowpocalypse descends. On an always-on radio somewhere on the other side of the bleak office, Chris Rea's "Driving Home for Christmas" comes on, and I have a little moment to myself which I am glad there is nobody with me to share.

A week later, it's Christmas night, and although I'm not really the praying type, that poor woman's lonely brother, who I'd never met and probably never will again, is in my thoughts. Christmas is no time to be alone.

Struck off my Christmas card list

A big "sod off" to:

• The Tories
• Labour
• Robert Peston
• Rupert Murdoch
• The Telegraph

Anyone else? I am pretty riled today.

The Damscille Triangle

In secondary school maths, around the time we were taught Pythagoras's famous theorem, Mr Stark taught us the equally famous relationship between distance, speed and time.

He called it the Damscille Triangle, at least that's what I heard; I assumed Damscille was a Greek mathematician - a contemporary of Pythagoras, Archimedes and Euclid.

It wasn't until I was about fifteen that I suddenly realised that it was in fact a mnemonic: Damn Silly Triangle (distance, speed, time). Damscille was no more, and won't be found in any textbook or history book, but still has a special place in my heart.

The continental shelf

I was a precocious child. (Pity it's been downhill since). I used to read all kinds of books and encyclopaedias which were aimed at kids much older. When I was about seven, I read about continental shelf in a picture book.

I couldn't swim at the time. I refused to wade out too deep, because I was convinced that at the edge of the continental shelf there was a sudden drop off, and that you could accidentally step off the edge and fall in. It took years before I found out that the truth was less dramatic.

NewMR Festival - some thoughts on the daytime session

I did actually set my alarm for 4am with the intention of catching some of the Aussie/Far East sessions of the NewMR festival, however willpower (or lack thereof) won the day and I could only haul myself out of bed in time for the 9am GMT sessions.

Brainjuicer's John Kearon kicked things off with a presentation on his "research robots" or DigiViduals. I'd already seen a presentation online on the same subject, but preferred this new one. Basically the concept is that you create a virtual persona, consisting of any attributes you like: behavioural traits, attitudes, tone of language, personality types, lifestyle choices...with or without more traditional sampling attributes like demographics. With your subject created, you go and scan various forms of social media (Kearon always starts with Twitter, but it can go to shopping sites, forums, YouTube...) looking for REAL people whose personal characteristics, as evidenced by the content they have created, "match" our virtual person. Then, you can simply lift content from those people and analyse the relevant parts to your study.

This is a brilliant concept. Sampling can move away from the old "middle class mothers who read magazines" to groups who share characteristics that are much more tactile. I wondered about the volume of data that you'd have to go to before you'd get people who form a "close enough match". Kearon pointed out that while much of the work is done automatically by the research robots, there's still a lot of manual data cleaning to be done.

I imagine in practice there is some sort of "threshold" that people have to meet to be counted in. For example, perhaps they meet at least 60% of the attributes, or else they are 40% more like our digividual than the "average" person.

The real beauty in this is that your digividual can be a totally artificial construct, not based on any real people at all; in fact, it could be an experiment to find a type of person who you don't know exists. The potential for discovering new or niche markets is endless.

Talking of artificial situations, this led nicely into Tom Ewing's presentation comparing research methods with gaming. In the last year or two, more and more commentators have predicted that online gaming will really take off to new levels in the next few years thanks to the social side. All sorts of games - whether web-based, console-based or whatever - have had a new lease of life thanks to the social aspect. Ewing mentioned FourSquare as the ultimate example (I'm only just about to get my first posh phone so I barely know anything about it!); I was surprised he didn't mention Second Life (does anyone actually play that any more? You heardly hear about it these days).

Ewing rattled through a series of nice analogies - but there was a linear theme about showing how research can learn from the best games which keep their players entertained and engaged. He pointed out that a game like chess, whose mechanics are simple and dull, has millions of possible game scenarios, which quickly become complex and involving, requiring a lot of thought and effort on the part of the player (or respondent!). He also pointed out that different people have different motives for playing games, and that good game designers can take this into account; similarly, research respondents have different reasons for giving up their time, and the canny research designer will bear this in mind and try to take advantage.

He makes the point that Sonic the Hedgehog would be a dull game if there was a constant progress bar! However, the concept of levels in games means different things to different people and a sense of achievement (and therefore the effort that goes in to fulfil that achievement) varies from person to person. Monopoly playing styles also vary - people's approach to risk results in very different ways of taking the game on.

Ewing also showed he similarities between gaming and research like simple mobile tasks/apps and also community building. While the analogies came thick and fast, the presentation was full of real-world suggestions for ways that researchers could actually go away and make their projects more interesting for respondents tomorrow.

"Gamey" was how the next presenter, Jon Puleston, described some projective techniques and again this presentation was full of practical ideas of how to improve data quality. He recently undertook a study showing increases in respondent productivity as a result of changes made to online survey designs. Imagery and snappier introductions both made a significant difference, but most interesting were the increase in data quantity/quality from using more interactive, projective techniques. One in particular (where researcher and respondent trade ideas one-for-one) was shown to be particularly effective, as was the game of "put yourself in someone else's [the client's?] shoes..." A very nice presentation.

Completing the first mini-session was Graeme Lawrence of Virtual Surveys. His presentation seemed to have less of a structured narrative, but was no less interesting for that. It was all about "not just listening"; the point that successful "NewMR" needs to be a mixture of large-scale, passive listening/monitoring ("why ask some when you can listen to all?") - but also more proactive asking of questions. I suppose this must vary depending on the subject - there are some areas where there are vast volumes of data already out there, but others where respondents need to be prompted and pushed. I suppose there's less noise to eliminate once people have more of a focus - at the expense of things being a bit less natural (looking forward to Mark Earls's keynote later - my rather verbose review of his book here). One example he gave showed some data on "where else" on Facebook fans of a particular page go - does anyone know what tool was used to get that insight? He gave examples of Facebook fans of Next and H&M providing opinions and insight - it occurred to me that here you are restricting yourself to brand loyalists. It doesn't necessarily work for all brands, either: people may be shy to become Facebook fans of a feminine hygiene product or political party, for example.

After a short coffee break, Annelies Verhaeghe gave a terrific talk on research using social media. I loved her initial analogy of a house of cards - companies are throwing themselves into social media without having a clue about best practice, then getting surprised when things go catasrophically wrong. My current line of work is closer to PR than MR but the facepalm horror stories come thick and fast. She quickly moved on to the issue of representativeness of online and NewMR techniques - a subject dealt with at some length by Ray Poynter in his excellent Handbook of online and social media research. Her main point was that we don't know who is talking. Real people become personae, defined by their content and personalities rather than their demographics. But haven't we heard something like that before? It's all about John Kearon's digividuals again. The sampling goalposts haven't been taken away, just moved along. She also talked about the fact that most sampling online is convenience sampling, and touched on issues of data quality (for example content that is "quoted" or duplicated). There was also a very nice graphical representation of data volume vs sentiment for a particular topic.

Rijn Vogelaar followed with his take on opinion leaders or "Superpromoters" as he calls them. He divided thoughts up into conscious, subconscious, and brand opinions. Personally I found myself a little skeptical - for a start I'm not convinced that there are an elite few brand evangelists who shape community opinions, but also because I'm not convinced that the opinions of the blind optimists, the hardcore fans, are necessarily the most important: aren't the drifters, the disloyal, and the indifferent, of more interest?

Rich Shaw finished up the second mini-session with a presentation about the "hacker ethic". I must admit I missed most of this - initially distracted by "NewMR chatup lines" on Twitter, and then by the gas man knocking on the door. I'll come back to it.

Academic researcher Dr Agnes Nairn gave a great overview of the ethical issues surrounding new research techniques in a talked entitled Oi, you took that without asking! Her own work is concerned with children, and she brought up practical concerns about getting the appropriate level of consent from both the child and their parents (by phone: consider mebeingmymum@gmail.com!!!) There is also an issue of data protection: I was pleasantly surprised at the level of confidence in the police dealing with personal data, but market researchers were at the bottom of the trust pile - way behind bankers.

She moved on to the central issue of informed consent. The old rules have been thrown out of the window where social media monitoring is concerned. It is difficult to inform people for whom you have no point of contact (for Facebook, forums etc) or details (Twitter), particularly if you are collecting data on a very large scale. The level of intrusion also varies on a sliding scale: there is a world of difference between taking one person's personal essay, quoting it in client meetings and using it to influence decisions on he one hand, and merely using a sentiment analysis tool to add an opinion to a set of positive/negative sentiment aggregate data at the other. I also have some sympathy with the view of Mark Zuckerberg who caused a storm when he said that people in the Facebook generation are less bothered about privacy and more inclined to open up their lives in public online; yes, of course he has an ulterior motive, but I get the feeling that he's mostly right despite the noisy protests of various pressure groups.

Henrik Hall's chat with Ray Poynter wasn't really relevant to me, but Bernie Malinoff's presentation on the pitfalls and differences between different approaches to online surveys was interesting. Incredible that two similar methodologies, with only some small tactical differences, can give completely different results. It's the sort of thing the research industry needs to tackle quicksticks to avoid being seen as a waste of time and money by clients. Ian Ralph's practical talk on smartphone research was also interesting, although as a non-practitioner I find these highly tactical discussions a struggle to keep up with.

Betty Adamou finished with a brilliantly rousing call to arms for Facebook research. She made some bold claims about young people - email is as dead as the CD, for example - and pointed out that researchers must make the effort to reach out to respondents, not the other way round. She made some great points about the sorts of times and places respondents might want to take on a piece of research: at a bus stop, for example, or waiting for a late-running boyfriend. I'd love to see some "situation-based" research. She also said that researchers need to be more flexible about adapting to the way young people behave, especially online - by embracing things like txt spk and smilies.

The evening session features one of my recent heroes, Mark Earls, and lots more goodies: I can't wait. If it's half as good as today's session then it'll be a very enjoyable few hours.

I have cross-posted this on the NewMR site as a blog post.

Assembly Rooms under threat: why the council must reconsider

It has emerged that Edinburgh council want to "refurbish" James Henderson's magnificent Assembly Rooms on George Street to incorporate some shops and a restaurant. William Burdett-Coutts's Assembly Theatre, the council's key tenant during the summer, are petitioning hard against the plans. It is a worthy campaign.

As a student, I spent four summers working for Assembly on the promotional staff. It's the ultimate student job at the festival: fully involved at one of the most buzzing venues in town, mingling with actors and comedians, chatting and drinking (heavily) with a vast range of fun people, and seeing a whole host of different shows. For a nineteen year old, it was a dream come true; I bust a gut for Assembly, as I was so desperate for things to go well - it was an attitude typical amongst staff there for whom Assembly was, and still is, a way of life. As a venue, it's at the heart of the festival both geographically and metaphorically, with important productions (many of which transfer to national tours following their Edinburgh run), world-class comedy and more contracts and agent signings than you can shake a stick at.

That's not to say the venue is perfect. I was appalled at one or two of the managerial decisions that were made in my final year there (to the extent that it took a while to get over my bitterness), and the backstabbing atmosphere in the main admin office was oppressive to the extent that in my final year, when I was mainly office based, I was desperate to escape to the relative relief of handing out flyers. The programming is desperately dull, with Burdett-Coutts and co wheeling out the usual suspects year after year: Guy Masterson, Bob Kingdom, Adam Hills, Soweto Gospel Choir, Antonio Forcione, and various mainstream dance acts all add up to a painfully risk-averse and predictable programme each year. (That's not mentioning those atrocious Otar Imerlishvili artworks which appear year after year). Not that there's anything wrong with those acts listed; there's just a certain inevitability about opening the glossy brochure for the first time and seeing the same names yet again. There are only so many times one can sit through tango fusion dancing. Like once. The lack of courage on the programming front has resulted in venues like the Underbelly becoming the place to hunt for the really off-beat stuff.

Yet the size of the venue means that a heavy leaning towards the mainstream, the tried and tested, is understandable. The quality of those "old favourites" tends to be pretty strong. From Caroline O'Connor's Bombshells to Jerry Springer the Opera to Lee Mack to John Clancy's explosive Fatboy to Masterson acting in an outstanding Oleanna, there are always likely to be hits worth seeing (if you can afford the ticket prices). They make up for the critically panned moneyspinners (hello Nancy Cartwright).

To lump all Assembly productions in as pre-West End warmup runs would be unfair, too. I have seen some outstanding shows from relative unknowns, and some real offbeat, alternative productions that have been breathtaking. In my first year working at Assembly, Demitri Martin won the Perrier with his particular brand of poetry, gentle one-liners and...palindromes. In the same year I was wowed by Michael Raynor's autobiographical one-man play Who's Floyd Stearn? A fellow colleague of mine (whose own show I saw this year at the Underbelly) was in floods of tears after watching Teatro Sunil's kooky, almost autistically optimistic view of freedom in Icaro in 2003. More recently, mime artist Julien Cottereau (2010) and Northern Firebrand's Scarborough (written by Fiona Evans, herself formerly on the Assembly payroll), in 2008, were highlights. Best of all, though, was back in 1995. Slava Polunin's extraordinary Snowshow was, and still is, the best show I have ever seen, of any kind, in my life. I saw it aged twelve, and saw it again ten years later, and my opinion didn't change. (I believe it was a nightmare for the staff, who had to crawl on their hands and knees to pick up thousands of little pieces of paper from between the seats after every performance).

The Assembly Rooms may not have quite the same cutting edge as the Pleasance, Aurora Nova or the Traverse (although the latter is falling into the trap of putting on productions by the same people, year after year) but it still a creative hub bursting with talented people, ideas, inspiring conversations. It remains a place where deals of nationwide artistic significance are struck in the Club Bar.

Ah, the Club Bar. An elegant place for the creatively exalted to relax over a coffee? Yes. But also a place for top actors and comedians to get utterly smashed by night. I could tell you some stories. But I won't.

Actually, I will. Which married London stand-up had a drug-fuelled affair with a member of street team staff? Which comedian made a home-made porn film with another street teamer the same year? Which actor drank so much each night that he eventually got alcohol poisoning? Which Hollwood A-lister was thrown out of the Club Bar on his own birthday after going behind the bar and pouring drinks uninvited? (That was Christian Slater). Which fifty-something performer was finally shown the door after a string of complaints from attractive seventeen-year-old staff who he'd been repeatedly pestering for dates? That doesn't even scratch the surface, either.

Those were good times. Not all the stories were booze-and-drugs related, either. There's Gerry, the genial retired American teacher, who practically lives at Assembly for the entire festival, blags his way into everything with his long-suffering wife and two friends in tow, then stands outside loudly giving his opinions on the performance to anyone who'll listen (his opinions are usually limited to a drawling "that was a goooood showwwwwww" or alternatively "pooooooor"; I have noticed his positive and negative reviews seem to be equally good at putting people off buying tickets). In all seriousness, though, Gerry is a solid gold legend, and someone for whom the festival means a huge deal, and Assembly in particular. Edinburgh would be a poorer place without him. Talking of Gerries, there was the famous day when Jerry Spring's lawyer heard about the Opera bearing his name, called up and demanded tickets for him and his twenty-strong entourage. The entire run was completely sold out. The lawyer played hardball. The box office somehow found twenty tickets. The story goes that Springer and co flew in from LA by private jet, went from the airport to George Street in a fleet of limos, went to see the show, hopped back in the limos, and back on the plane having loved the show.

As usual, I digress. The point is that despite having many shortcomings (what about the despicable decision to use their financial and marketing muscle to try and split from the Fringe along with other mainstream venues, leaving the beating heart of the festival - the small, independent venues - fibrillating weakly) Assembly remains a true hub of festival activity, a creative zenith, a theatrical and comedic centre round which punters, critics, performers and tourists alike naturally gravitate. A festival institution in contrast to so many transient ventures in the city. Part of the festival furniture.

Yet longevity alone is not a reason to keep the Assembly Rooms going as a festival venue. They are perfectly suited to performances. The unique layout of the Wildman Room and cabaret vibe of the Supper Room, combined with the opulence and airy space of the Ballroom and Music Hall, with plenty of space for bars and admin all around. Apparently the Supper Room and Wildman Room will be gone forever following the proposed "upgrade", along with the Edinburgh Suite and Drawing Room; not to mention the "Scott Room" which I believe is the tiny space used to such great effect by the production of Scarborough in 2008. The great festival venues range from university function rooms, through tents, churches and inflatable cows, to Masonic lodges; the wedding-cake surroundings of  the Assembly Rooms are part of that wonderful mix.

The focus of this campaign has been on the festival, understandably, since it's Assembly Theatre who are behind it. Yet it is a disgrace that such a magnificent building can be so criminally under-utilised during the remaining months of the year. There is a mish-mash of tired craft fairs, ceilidhs, record fairs, and the occasional wedding. It's all too easy, when the building is covered with hoarding, posters and stage scaffolding for the festival, to forget just how spectacular the building is: the Assembly Rooms are a stunning set of ornate chambers.

So what are the council proposing? With an imagination only seen in the public sector, it's a shops'n'restaurants package which will "transform" the building and "guarantee the building's future as one of the most sensational events venues in the city".

I have several problems with this. Shops'n'restaurants is default thinking. George Street does not lack either. The sterile Multrees Walk, which feels like the afterthought to a business district that it is, can hardly be a model to aspire to. But more worrying for me is the thought that the Assembly Rooms needs a refurbishment. It desperately needs something to be done. But change the physical layout? The Assembly Rooms are a simple set of function rooms, with unlimited possibilities for their use. The problem is not the venue itself - only a numbing lack of imagination. Whilst Burdett-Coutts and Assembly's artistic programming may leave a lot to be desired, they have managed to make brilliant use of the space, utilising some of the unsexy spaces as well as the first floor blockbusters, with areas like the famous Lane Bar a real hub. The council, meanwhile, can only muster a few craft fairs. Why have we not seen art exhibitions? What about musical performances? Awards ceremonies? Entertaining foreign dignitaries? Club nights (Vegas used to put nights on)? Talks? Conferences? One of the most spectacular buildings in the country has had its potential ignored, and now the council are planning to shove in some shops.

When refurbishments of this sort are done well, they can be brilliant. The transformation of an old RBS building (a Grade A listed James Craig construction) by Caledonian Heritable into what is now The Dome, a few doors along from the Assembly Rooms, was a classic example. Such tasteful refurbishment, combined with commercial success, is rare. It's not something you would expect Edinburgh council to emulate. Certainly not if the best they can come up with is bunging a few shops in the front.

Assembly Theatre have tried to convince the council to let them take over the running of the venue year-round. This seems to have failed. Personally I'm not sure I would want the venue to be run solely by the theatre company - its transformation in August is one of the unique selling points of the Rooms and I'm not convinced that the year-round programme would be of much interest. I can, however, see the sense in improving the catering potential of the building. It's all very well for people like me to idly mutter about conferences and events, but unless there's the possibility for world-class catering and facilities to go alongside the world-class architecture, then outside companies won't want to invest. The Assembly Rooms website talks of its proud history "...as a venue that, whilst still catering for both public and private balls, was now equipped to accommodate public meetings, concerts, recitals, music festivals, dinners, banquets, Royal occasions and public readings by celebrated authors such as Dickens and Thackeray." So why does the council think that their "ambitious" plans to shove in a few shops, whilst sacrificing the potential for one of their key clients to operate freely, will suddenly transform the ailing venue to the way things were in the glory days?

The petition/campaign website has been set up by Assembly Theatre Ltd, whose focus, somewhat understandably, is on their own contribution during the summer, which remains the principal operation of the building these days and has, by all accounts, transformed the venue which was in an even worse state in the 70s. The comments on the site reveal some of the depth of feeling for the venue, much of it unconnected the the festival (although understandable as I mentioned, it's a shame that so much of the focus of the campaign is on the venue's use as a theatre rather than is initial and ongoing purpose as a civic function suite). A few examples of comments which I agree with 100%:


The Assembly Rooms as they stand are a priceless reminder of the glory of Edinburgh...


Dare to put a paint brush near your own listed building they come down with a vengance on you...


Please help to keep Edinburgh a beacon of culture and preserve the Assembly Rooms! They are an integral part of Edinburgh's unique and extremely rich heritage, which will only be diluted by more shops and restaurants catering only to mindless consumersim, and will probably end up a Gap, a Banana republic and a TGI Fridays like every other souless urban block in the world! 


To transform the ground floor of such a beautiful historic building into shops and a restaurant is quite frankly vandalism. I have to ask what is motivating the decision for this change? Is it down to money? If so, I am sure refreshing the sales and marketing strategy for the venue would make a significant improvement financially.


Can you imagine Bath turning their Assembly Rooms into shops?? The Assembly Rooms should be used even more for their original purpose.


It is one of the basic foundation stones of Edinburgh at Festival time, and so it should remain.


This decision will impact on the attractiveness of Edinburgh as destination festival to International tourists and companies. (Aurora Nova hero Wolfgang Hoffman)


There certainly have been occasions when a Glory of a City is badly messed up, but such attacks have usually involved enemy bombing. (Jack Klaff)


I feel deeply sad that this melting pot for culture, this down and dirty artistic mash up sited in a beautiful old council building - a PEOPLE's building - is set to be turned into some nasty little franchise bitch. What a terrible shame. (Jackie Clune, another Assembly performer during my time)


Edinburgh council have form for white elephants: the underground "Princes Street Galleries" shopping mall, or the tram, anyone? (It's not just a modern thing; what about the National Monument on Calton Hill?!). Realising the potential of the Assembly Rooms and reclaiming former glories should be a priority for the council, and some sort of action plan is desperately overdue; but turning such an iconic venue into a retail outlet is clearly not the answer. They must rethink.

Blasted (Lyric) - review

Why would anyone want to kill you?

Revenge. Things I've done.

I read a lot of "pre-match hype" about Sarah Kane's Blasted, and found it difficult to shake off the stereotypes of it being a "cry for help" shortly before her suicide, and didn't know what to make of the hypocrisy (there is no other word for it) of critics, who denounced it as "filth" (among other things) at the time of its first production, but lined up to laud its genius after her death. Sean Holmes takes it on at the Lyric.

I went in braced for an onslaught of harrowing visual imagery. Blasted isn't as simple as that, however. It's a series of rather disjointed tableaux, darkly comical at times, post-apocalyptic at others, with shades of everything from Greek tragedy to Wilfred Owen to Kafka along the way.

Ian and Cate are spending idle time in a hotel. The hotel is plush but bland: perhaps a Hilton or Marriott. The nature of their relationship is never fully revealed; it is mainly sexual, abusive, domineerin on the part of Ian...but Cate does not walk away. Ian's foulmouthed misogyny and vices clearly have some sort of appeal. The dialogue is framented. Many questions are unanswered at this stage: why does Ian carry a gun?

The tone darkens as scene two opens: Lydia spits "Cunt" and it is clear that she has been violated in the night. Even now, the conversations are broken and ambiguous, Ian's paranoia ever more apparent. A soldier bursts into the room, and enages in philosophical debate about the nature of wartime atrocities with Ian. From then on, the surrealism, graphic brutality and black humour crescendo to a grotesque endpiece.

Danny Webb and Lydia Wilson take on the lead roles with mixed success. They are fearsomely difficult parts to play, and the uncomfortable chemistry that is inevitable between a foul-mouthed, abusive, paranoid alcoholic and an attractive introvert thirty years his junior, is clear to see. Webb, despite a rather bizarre accent, was excellent for the most part, although he took a while to warm up. His central conversation with the soldier (it reminded me of Owen's Strange Meeting) crackles with tension, coinciding with some of the best dialogue in the play, while his descent into the tattered rags of a man towards the end reminded me somewhat of the central character of Paul Theroux's deeply disturbing The Mosquito Coast - paranoid, self-destructing, hideous. Wilson, meanwhile, plays her part bravely, but rather surprisingly is let down by technical basics rather than a lack of depth: her hammy stutter, unconvincing movement, and inability to deliver the humorous lines, are all surely details that could be ironed out, as she tackles the uncomfortable role fearlessly.

In truth the script left me rather cold. The soldier dialogue, Ian's complete mental collapse in the later stages, and some of the black gags are terrific, but ultimately I didn't find the play particularly thought-provoking as a whole. Is it shocking? Yes, the material is pretty graphic, but again, I found it all leaving little emotion on me. Much of the attention is understandably on Ian's grapples with the morals of suicide, but these are only really interesting in the context of the playwright's situation - little original thinking is presented. Meanwhile, for truly horrifying rape scenes, look no further than The Paper Birds' In a thousand pieces or Biuro Podrozy's Carmen funebre which are both infinitely more harrowing, without an explicit scene in sight. (The Paper Birds take their latest show Others to the Camden People's Theatre in a couple of weeks). But the shocking truth for me was that it all left me feeling a bit nonplussed.

Sean Holmes left me feeling pretty flat with his Three Sisters earlier this year. This time, his production is terrific, with only irritating details from the actors letting the side down. The post-holocaust latter scenes are quite brilliant, and the final scene rightly had the audience gripped in horror. A special mention to Paule Constable's lighting, which was particularly good.

Finally, a gripe. I was running late, and charged from the tube station, thrust my tenner at the box office staff, and hurried upstairs, sweating, into the auditorium at a minute to seven. It was practically empty. I had to check my ticket to confirm that it was indeed a 7pm start. Only ten minutes later did the press night audience start wandering in, seemingly under no pressure from staff to hurry up and get to their seats, and some even wandered out again to refill their drinks. The show finally got under way at a quarter past, seemingly because the becocktaildressed PR team couldn't be bothered to chivvy the critics inside. Now, I know it's press night and there are whims to be pandered to, but that strikes me as discourteous and disrespectful to the paying punters. If there's an advertised time, there should be no reason (technical hitches apart) not to stick to it.

Verdict: a brutal but disjointed script is overhyped, but neither that nor stilted acting can spoil a thoughtful production of this post-holocaust vision. Worth seeing.


Until 20 November. Tickets from £10.

An open letter to Foxtons, Willesden Green

Mr Andrew Weir
Area Director, Foxtons
Willesden Green Sales
2-6 Station Parade, London NW2 4NH

Dear Mr Weir

Thank you for your fourth letter in as many weeks which plopped on my mat this morning. In your most recent unsolicited communication you encourage me to sell my home for free. I understand that I should "seize my chance". You assert that "there is no catch" despite your offer sounding "too good to be true". Yet something is holding me back.

Ah, that's it: I'm not a homeowner. While the prospect of selling a property that doesn't belong to me tickles me greatly, it is also illegal, as a certain Mr Anthony Lee found out to his cost recently. A five year jail term does not appeal. More than that, however, and how shall I put this...I am getting mighty cheesed off with the incessant stream of paper (posted locally from Andover, I note) clogging up my hallway.

I believe I am not the only person to have such sentiments. I understand that the Willesden Green office has been in operation for three weeks now, and already you are making your mark on the community. Alas, I suspect the local reaction will be one of intense irritation at being bombarded with ceaseless junk mail rather than ecstasy at the too-good-to-be-true-ness of the promised offer.

Incidentally, you boast of your "cafe-style" office. Why on earth do you expect this would be of benefit to anyone? If I have to deal with an estate agent there are certain criteria I look for: (1) ability to get things done efficiently with minimal screwing me around, (2) that's it. To think that either as a landlord/seller or buyer/tenant that my fees or rent would be increased by the fact that my estate agent wants to install some sort of fung shui in the office leaves me cold, to be honest. Offer me a cup of tea if you like - a common courtesy to a client in any form of business - but I couldn't give two hoots what your office looks like.

Mr Weir, you are probably younger than me and may not have worked for Foxtons four years ago when BBC's Whistleblower exposed your company's vile, scurrilous, low-life business practices for what they really are. I have not forgotten the programme. If you don't know what I am talking about, then take a look at this article. It is not for the faint hearted (also anyone in the process of buying a property through Foxtons should read it with a health warning attached).

In fact, on reflection, perhaps you are an experienced estate agent, as you were giving quotes to national newspapers in January 2008. While your manager will doubtless have praised you for showing such public confidence in the market at the time, it doesn't say a great deal for your credentials: 11 months after you confidently gave the opinion that "I don't think we will see house price falls...I just see no reason for it", the Halifax reported that house prices were down a record 16.2% year-on-year. Oh dear.

Yours ever

Eoghan

PS. In case I forgot to mention, or in case the message didn't come across, pretty please, with sugar on top, never ever write to me again. xx