Stuart Waterman

As my flatmate is moving out in March, I need to locate me a new one. I live in a rather nice place in N8 near Crouch End – details and photos below. You’d be sharing with me and me alone. The double bedroom up for grabs has an ensuite bathroom & shower!!1

As a thirtysomething year-old adult, I’m not really after a perma-partying party person. I also feel like I’ve paid my dues as far as sharing living space with full-on lunatoids like Eddie here.

What I’d ideally like is a considerate, stable, relatively grown-up, laidback-but-not-horizontal type (male/female/whatever) who has an awareness of basic hygeine and isn’t averse to washing dishes and using a hoover in a frenzied manner now and again 15 minutes before people come to visit.

Email me at waterman.stuart(at)gmail.com/call 07929 358 179 if you’d like to arrange a viewing. Please make some attempt to convince me you’re not a maniac when doing so.
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Available mid-March. £600 pcm excluding bills – council tax, electricity, water, phone line, internet, TV licence. Flat is all-electric – no gas central heating. Heating comes via Economy 7 heaters in lounge, kitchen, hallway and bedrooms (flat is pretty well-insulated).

Double bedroom with ensuite bathroom on 2nd floor of a modern, secure purpose-built block in London N8.

3 minutes’ walk to Hornsey train station: First Capital Connect southbound trains to Finsbury Park (5 minutes), Highbury & Islington (7 minutes), Old Street (15 minutes) and King’s Cross on the weekend (15 minutes).

7 minutes’ walk to Turnpike Lane tube station on Piccadilly Line, Zone 3. Buses to Camden, central London, Crouch End, Muswell Hill, Alexandra Palace, Tottenham, Leyton, etc.

15 minutes’ walk to Crouch End, 10 minutes’ walk to Wood Green high street which has Sainsbury’s, M&S, the usual high street suspects, cinema, etc. Corner shop/off licence nearby (and proper chip shop, too).

BEDROOM

Ensuite bathroom with toilet, shower, basin, towel heater.
Desk & wardrobe included; bed not included.

ENSUITE BATHROOM

Includes shower; toilet seat also goes down.

LOUNGE

Table & chairs, shelves, TV stand included.
TV, sofa, coffee table not included.

Sofa and coffee table on the right included.

Balcony off the lounge!

KITCHEN

Microwave included.
Also has dishwasher, washer/dryer, cooker (electric), fridge/freezer.
I own hardly any pots, pans, crockery etc and my flatmate will be taking his with him, so if you have loads of that kind of stuff there’s plenty of room for it.

HALLWAY

Including entryphone and small wardrobe for coats, hoover, etc.

A little update on where I am and am not “at” these days.

Along with several other folk, I was laid off by Shiny Media. Boo hoo, etc. We managed to come to an agreement regarding My Chemical Toilet, and I now run it independently. It’s much prettier nowadays (if more irregularly updated) and that’s all thanks to my friend Ben from PowerOn Communications, whose services I would heartily recommend.

More pressingly, from next week I’ll be working as “Web Editor / Social Media Manager” at Lucky Voice, the karaoke folk. The prevailing reaction on informing people of this seems to be one of laughter, so I’ll pause here to allow you to do that.

Obviously I’m very excited by this development – it allows me to combine my passions of music and web geekery, and it’s a brand (sorry) most people seem to be quite affectionate towards. I’ll be editing the company blog, which you can find here, and I imagine I’ll be looking after all the other social media gubbins as well.

I’ll be spreading word of (warning: autoplay video) Lucky Voice Home – which allows you to stream karaoke tracks and video through your computer – while also alerting folk to the fact that you can get your hands on some rather pretty accessories to improve the experience, too.

If you follow me on Twitter at @mychemtoilet I hope you’ll do likewise at @luckyvoice, because I intend to make it a fun and amusing feed to follow. And if you’re reading this and think there’s a way we can work together, feel free to drop me a line.

So there we are; despite asterisking out “S*cial M*dia” on my LinkedIn profile, it’s now my job title. I should probably get used to “affectionate” insults, huh?

[image: Corie Howell]

With major broadcasters – and Five – slashing staff and channel bigwigs pooing their breeks over the state of TV ad revenues, there’s a fair amount of soul-searching going on in the ad world these days.

There are any number of folk out there willing to tell you why TV ad revenues are down, but not many have hit on the fact that watching commercial breaks these days requires a steel stomach and nerves of granite. Amongst the usual barely-distinguishable spots for cars, shampoo, mobile phone networks and home furnishings lie terrifying public service announcements whose aim, you’d think, is to terrify you into flipping the channel.

The latest one that has me sprint-reaching for the remote is the Act F.A.S.T clip warning of the symptoms of a stroke. I’ll post it here but I imagine you’re as keen to avoid it as I am, so no offence taken if you skip past it:

I know it’s just a lady acting, but God it upsets me.

In that sense, the ad has done its job. It got my attention, preyed on my mind, darn well gave me a nightmare or two, and has led to me writing about it. Someone’s getting a bonus because of all that, you know. Someone’s getting a bonus for giving me nightmares.

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CIPR

The other night I went to the CIPR Fifth Estate/Bloggers’ Party, which was an event designed to give PR/marketing folk working in the charity sector some ideas on how to engage with those pesky blogger types. Darika from Grapevine Consulting gave a talk to raise some points on how social media could be harnessed to help charities spread their message, before a Q&A at the end.

At this point I chipped in to help answer a few questions, as did my esteemed colleague Gemma. It was interesting to note the range of knowledge of social media among the PR folk – some literally didn’t know how to start finding blogs related to their area of interest, while others clearly read blogs but were unsure of the best way to contact a blogger with related PR material. On this point Gemma soon made it clear that commenting on a post out of the blue with a related link was definitely not advisable.

It struck me at this point that engaging with bloggers does entail learning a new and foreign set of behaviours. Yes, comment on their posts – but only if you have something to add to the discussion. If you comment with a link and a tone that makes it obvious you’re just there to flog something, you’ll be sniffed out. Yes, email bloggers – but show that you’ve read their site, are interested in what they’re covering, have a little knowledge about the area. Hell, give them a little compliment if you liked something they wrote. But don’t start an email with “Hi guys” and expect a blogger to help you out.

I think the ensuing exchange was useful for a lot of people, although I got the sense that a practical demo of some of the things geeks like me mentioned might be required in order to “prove” to the third sector how easy it is to use free web tools to track brands, follow blogs and so on.

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Yesterday I went to the second ever FRUKT Sessions, hosted by the Brands Bands Fans folk. It’s one of those things where leading “thinkers” go. I’ve always wondered what a room full of thinkers would look like, and it turns out they look quite similar to normal people, only they always tend to be staring at Blackberries.

Anyway, the FRUKT Sessions are all about discussing where music marketing is at in this tempestuous time for the music industry, etc. With record companies taking forever to get to grips with Music 13.0, or whatever you want to call it, there’s an increased opportunity for “brands” to step in and “engage” with music fans. Session #002 was all about how brands could do more to engage with fans of live music.
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Working from home a couple of months back I happened to remark on Twitter that I was experiencing a bit of laptop trouble. That was enough to get the attention of a nice man at Toshiba who offered me the loan of a Satellite X200, with a view to getting my opinion on the laptop from the point of view of someone who listens to a lot of music online.

It’s a hefty piece of equipment, that’s for sure – I’ve seen someone using the X200 in a pub, but I’m not sure I’d want to lug it around due to its chunkiness. Having said that, this bulk does make it feel like a rather macho toy, which is cool for people like me who don’t have enough manly status symbols in their life.
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After a week of London rain, I’m heading to Madrid for a wedding tomorrow. This is what the weather holds. It’s sad how unbelievable this looks to British eyes.

Oh, and – woohoo!

Who Ate All The Pies, Shiny Media’s football powerhouse, last week walked off with Soccerlens‘ Best Overall Blog 2007 award.

Also, Kickster, the women’s football site which launched just in time for last year’s Women’s World Cup, won Best Women’s Football Blog 2007. I worked extensively on Kickster in its pre and post-launch stages and it’s great to see such a young site get recognition.

This week’s most intriguing referral. I’m going to have to be extra watchful for errant apostrophes if we have journalism students reading…

I suppose I’d sound really old if I said I wish I could have done stuff like this when I was at university?

From London Transport Museum