Saying "sorry" via Facebook

Yesterday morning when I got into the office (having walked through the crowds in Martin Place) I made my own personal 'sorry' declaration on Facebook via Twitter (I appreciate doing that achieves nothing in a practical sense but yesterday was all about the symbolism, right?).
When I next checked back at the end of the day I found lot of my friends had done the same. I can't recall having seen that happen before and I thought it was an interesting outcome of on-line social networks. I wondered how many others did the same.
Perhaps in the future we'll no longer need to ask our friends the 'where were you on that the day X happened?' question around significant events -- because we'll already know.
Update: Looks like Chloe Lake over at News had the same idea.
Update 2: Here's an interesting counterpoint: Radio callers outraged: I'm disgusted, says one. My reading of on-line opinion (after all blogs etc are now another way people share their views en-mass, talk back radio is no longer alone there) suggests many were supportive.

What's next?

Interesting post-election column from Gerard Henderson in the Herald today. Will be interesting to see what direction this new Government takes and what influence that has on the country as a whole -- particularly on the generation of adults who've never really known an Australia without John Howard as Prime Minister (have trouble remembering it myself).

Vale John Howard?

I think there's an interesting lesson in last night's Federal Election victory by Labor -- and it's about issues management/competitive positioning.
As the campaign progressed, many journalists and commentators spoke of Labor's (uncharacteristically) disciplined campaign, and in particular their refusal to be baited on issues which have historically allowed the Government to marginalise them with the electorate.
It's a strategy that wasn't without it's critics -- it was derided as a 'me too' approach, and, I suspect, may have deepened existing voter cynicism regarding the apparent lack of differences between the two major parties -- but it clearly worked.
It brought to mind what I think was the best example of a similar strategy in business that I've personally seen, Microsoft's Judo-like response to the growing buzz around Linux and Open Source in 2003/4.
After several years of trying to (increasingly stridently) combat the growing support for Linux and open source, partly fueled by IBM, Microsoft neatly (and very cleverly I think from a pragmatic point of view) changed its position to one that claimed to embrace Linux and open source ... where appropriate.
Of course the devil was in the detail of that 'where appropriate' but the strategy effectively took the issue off the table for them and diffused media attention. And it made it all the more difficult for competitors to win an argument among customers and the media that MS was the enemy of interoperability.
So, my lesson from Saturday night is to know your audience, know your enemy and pick your battles, you don't need to fight them all to win -- obvious really.

Sorry seems to be the hardest word -- but is it the most important?

Now, I love News Radio and its continuous news but this rambling interview with John Howard yesterday morning had me half wanting to drive the car into a power pole.
For me, it underlined just how much Howard's lost touch (duh) but also what's wrong with some media/journalism at the moment.
After describing the debate over whether the Prime Minister did-didn't-or-should-have-said 'sorry' for this week's rise in interest rates as 'fairly semantic', News Radio's Marius Benson then goes on to spend the first minute of his interview with Howard rehashing it. He then coaxes from the PM a startling admission that yes, rising house prices are good for people who own houses but not for those trying to buy them. Oh my God! Really? (predictably, this bombshell was the lead story in News Radio's 7.30am bulletin). Not content with that, Marius then lead the PM into another semantic debate over whether Howard's support for nuclear power is 'less strong' than it was before.
I find it hard to believe that with two weeks to go to the election, the sorry/not sorry question is really the most important one for the national broadcaster and the Prime Minister to be spending their time on (not to mention mine).
Yes, interest rates are an important issue for many voters and, yes, the situation of the Reserve Bank lifting them during an election campaign is unusual, but I don't think this interview is likely to have actually contributed to anyone's understanding of it. Far more worthwhile was Ross Gittin's column in the Herald Thursday, especially this point:
"The very fact that rates are being increased less than three weeks before an election is incontrovertible proof that the economy is no longer managed by the government of the day. Rather, it - like virtually all developed economies - is managed by the central bank, acting independently of the elected government."
Marius, you owe me 80 cents ... on second thought, put it towards buying a copy of the Herald :-)