Christmas competition, 2010

Last year I had a bit of a rant about Christmas circulars and the rise of undisciplined writing in the digital age.

Working with clients since then, I've become increasingly concerned by the way in which more and more companies and organisations are abandoning the use of MS Word to write conventional prose in favour of using MS PowerPoint for preparing reports, proposals, internal and external corporate communications, etc. (for more on which, see HERE and HERE).

As the latest of this year's circulars fluttered to the floor from today's delivery of Christmas cards, I realised that this trend has yet to spread from the professional world of work to the domestic world of communication between friends and relations.

Christmas competition 2010

Readers are therefore invited to pioneer a new kind of Christmas circular.

Forget Word, forget prose, and forget about buying paper, envelopes and stamps.

All you have to do is to design a PowerPoint show for posting online to keep all your friends and relations up to date on the wondrous achievements of your children, the latest antics of your cats and dogs, your exotic holidays, etc., etc., etc. Whether you stick to the truth or tell a pack of lies is entirely up to you.

How to enter

Entries should be emailed to me via the link at 'View my complete profile' in the left-hand column before 24 December 2010. If your entry is made up nothing but bullet points, you may prefer to enter it in the comments section below.

Prizes

The winner will receive a copy of Lend Me Your Ears signed by the author. The runner-up will receive a copy of Speech-making and Presentation Made Easy, also signed by the author.

Access to the winning entries (and any other startling contributions) will be made available online some time after Christmas.

Orwell Blog Prize, 2011: a request for help from readers

I've had an email suggesting that I should nominate this blog for the 2011 Orwell Blog Prize, details of which can be found HERE.

The entry form asks for a list 10 posts between 1 January and 31 December 2010 on which the judges can deliberate - which is all very well except for two rather obvious problems:

1. There are 196 to select from (so far).
2. Authors are never the best judges of their own work.

HELP!

So I'd very much appreciate it if readers could let me know - either by email via 'complete profile' in the left-hand column or in the 'comments' section below - which post(s) you've liked the best, found most interesting, intriguing, instructive, amusing, etc.

If you've time to go back over the year, you can access a complete list of blog posts during 2010 via the link on the left.

Background from Owell Prize website
The Orwell Prize 2011 is now accepting entries, opening on Thursday 21st October 2010 and closing on Wednesday 19th January 2011. All work published for the first time between 1st January 2010 and 31st December 2010 is eligible. All entries must have a clear relationship with the UK or Ireland (which might include, but is not limited to, citizenship or residency of the author or the work being published first or only in the UK or Ireland) - (my emphases).

The Prize is self-nominating – somebody involved in the production of the work (author, journalist, blogger, publisher, agent or editor) must enter it. If you’ve come across some great political writing this year which you think should be considered, please contact the administrator or discuss on our blog.

Once the administrator has received your entry, you should receive a confirmation email. Please get in touch if you haven’t received one after a few days.

After the entry deadline has closed, a list of entries will be published on this website.

• Blog Prize 2011 Entry Form (online form)

Should prime ministers sing songs?

One of the videos currently available on the Sky News website is an extraordinary clip of prime minister Putin singing the Fats Domino hit I found my thrill on Blueberry Hill at a charity concert:

The sight of a prime minister singing took me back more than 30 years to the last time I remember seeing it happen - when James Callaghan kept the TUC guessing about whether he'd call an election in October 1978 (when he might well have won) or defer it to 1979 (which he did and lost to Margaret Thatcher) with his rendition of Marie Lloyd's Waiting at the Church.

On the basis of these two specimens, Putin comes across as the better singer of the two - and, unlike Callaghan, is unlikely to have done his future prospects any serious damage.