Social media

Article — 26 September 2025 — 1,247 words

Autonomy, independence, federation, WordPress and concrete

I have had to make some behind-the-scenes changes to this website. In the process, I am planning to make it more interoperable with the fediverse and indieweb standards — and I am sticking with WordPress.

Article — 4 February 2025 — 1,406 words

There’s no such thing as a technology problem

Business — Social science — Society — Technology — Web

Information has become the forgotten half in “information technology”. Tech companies are struggling because they aren’t focusing on the human problems they need to solve.

Article — 30 December 2022 — 1,261 words

20 years of blogging

Personal — Technology — Web

Today marks the 20th anniversary of my first blog post. Blogging is important to me, but it has seen many changes. The online publishing ecosystem is having a moment right now. So what’s next?

Article — 6 November 2022 — 1,179 words

One twit can make a service a dodo

Digital — Politics — Web

I have complicated feelings about the apparent imminent demise of Twitter in the hands of a reckless owner.

Article — 1 January 2019 — 938 words

A year of blogging daily

Personal — Web

Last year I began a routine of publishing shorter posts on an almost-daily basis. Today marks a full year of blogging on a daily basis. It’s also the day I’ll stop posting each day.

Article — 29 March 2018 — 1,984 words

The media also has lessons to learn from the latest Facebook furore

Media — Politics — Technology

I am no fan of Facebook. But I am less than impressed with the media’s coverage of Facebook as well.

Article — 1 March 2018 — 2,087 words

Media dinosaurs have the wrong scapegoat in Facebook

Media — Technology

Anyone who reads this blog will know by now that I am no fan of Facebook. But I will defend them on this. The newspaper industry’s attempt to pin the blame of their woes on Facebook is wrong.

Article — 2 January 2018 — 1,303 words

Happy new year 2018 — reflections and resolutions

Cycling — Personal — Technology — Travel

2017 is a year that showed that I have a lot to be grateful for. But even though I don’t normally set new year’s resolutions, I am setting myself three broad goals for 2018.

Article — 13 November 2017 — 1,239 words

Facebook and Twitter are repeating the catastrophic mistakes of past designers

Architecture — Digital — Technology

Architects had to face up to the problems that eventually emerged with bold modernist designs. Now Facebook and Twitter need to wake up to the fact that their platforms are damaging society.

Article — 12 October 2017 — 327 words

The open web has rough edges, but this is why we need to protect it

Digital — Web

Native apps, social media networks and big content silos are slick. But the whole idea about the web — the reason it has been so successful — is that it is open and democratic.

Article — 1 October 2017 — 1,208 words

Why it’s time to reclaim our digital lives

Personal — Web

The more we come to understand about the big social media networks’ impact on society, the less appealing it becomes. It’s time we stopped letting them control our digital lives. This is why I will start blogging again.

Article — 18 November 2016 — 1,310 words

Ten years of twitting about

Digital — Media

In ten years, Twitter has transformed from a geek enclave to a mainstream form of communication. But I find it difficult to imagine signing up to Twitter today.