Guy Fawkes prevented some of us from enjoying bonfire night

For former pupils of St Peter's School, York like me, 5th November is an annual reminder of our deprived childhood.

Because Guy Fawkes also went to the school, as too did some of the other gunpowder plotters, bonfires and fireworks were banned - on the grounds that burning an old boy was deemed to be 'bad form'.

Some years ago, whilst listening to some primary school children reading on 5th November, my wife told one of the children that her husband had gone to the same school as Guy Fawkes.

"Oh" said the child, "Did he know him?"

Does your credibility improve when you admit ignorance?

Olivia Mitchell, via Twitter, has posted news from a Stanford Graduate School of Business research project showing 'that an expert who expresses minor doubts seems more credible'.

It reminded me of something that happened on one of the first commercial courses I ran as I was beginning to make the move out of full-time academia into training consultancy.

Then, as now, my policy was and is not offer any firm advice that can't be supported by at least something in the way of research or observation. In reply to a question from one of the delegates, I must have said something along the lines of "we don't know".

The reason I remember it so vividly is because there was considerable discussion over lunch about the fact that I was apparently the first consultant they'd ever come across who'd actually admitted that there was something he didn't know.

This, coupled with something I'd seen a few weeks earlier, gave me the confidence to carry on admitting that there were plenty of things I didn't know.

It was the case of another training consultant running a presentation skills course in which he had criticised one of the participants for failing to switch the overhead projector off and then on again every time he put on another slide. But this particular particular pupil wasn't convinced:

'(he) complained that, when he was in an audience, he found it extremely annoying when speakers kept turning the projector on and off. He even dared to ask why it was deemed to be good practice. After some initial hesitation, the consultant quickly recovered his capacity to sound authoritative in the face of mindless ignorance with the memorable line: "because it's correct"' (Lend Me Your Ears, pp. 9-10).

Another classic TV interview (with Gerald the Gorilla)

Regular readers of this blog will know that television interviews are a constant source of fascination, irritation and (occasional) amusement for me.

Going through my archives the other day, I came across another classic from Not the Nine O'clock News that seemed worth posting for those too young to have missed the many gems from the show.

And, in case you haven't seen any of the video clips posted earlier, you can link to a selection of them below (the first one of which includes another Not the Nine O'clock News clip as well as links to more 'serious' posts on political interviews):

• Televised interviews and political communication
• Politician answers a question: an exception that proves the rule
• A prime minister who openly refused to answer an interviewer's questions
• A Tory leader's three evasive answers to the same question
• A Labour leader with no interest in spin

Whom are we not remembering with our poppies?

As the son of a farmer, with two grandfathers who were also farmers, I wear a poppy with a slight sense of unease. Our family was, to say the least, a bit short on relatives who fought in either of the two world wars, let alone who died in them.

This was because those in 'reserved' occupations didn't have to go to war, although my paternal grandfather used to grumble about having had to hand over some of his horses for military duty in WW1.

But there were others working in occupations no less harrowing and no less dangerous than those in the armed services.

The father of a primary school friend of mine was in the London fire brigade throughout the blitz. Also in London at the same time was one of my father's cousins, a Quaker and conscientious objector, who drove an ambulance to and from bomb sites.

Although both of them survived (though not without scars), there must have been many of their colleagues in the rescue services who did not.

But, like those who 'were digging for victory' and countless others on whom the war effort depended, they never get a mention on remembrance Sunday.

Shouldn't we be remembering them too?

Tips for new bloggers

Blogger Shane Greer of Total Politics magazine has a link to an interview, which he offers some tips for new bloggers that I'd have found useful when I first started out.

If you're thinking of starting a blog, you might find some of his points helpful, even if you're a bit older than the questioner's target audience!

If you could give a 17-year-old startup blogger three top tips, what would they be?

Greer: 'Firstly, you have to have a strategy. Not in a Machiavellian sense, but you have to know what you want to achieve. Do you want to reach tens of thousands of people? If that’s your goal and you manage it, then you’re a successful blogger. If it’s just two very specific people that you want to reach and you do, then you’re a successful blogger. Know what you want to achieve, and don’t just write for writing’s sake – unless that’s your objective.

'Secondly, engage in the wider blogging community. Share links, ask for a place in a blogroll – but the bigger bloggers, like Iain, tend to keep blogrolls that only show what they read, so you might not get on there. When I was starting out I also found it useful to get involved in comments. If you’ve written something that’s interesting, then, without spamming, you can share the link in comments. Drive traffic by getting people from that bigger site to find yours through those links. If someone links to me from Iain Dale’s Diary or Political Betting, the effect can be quite phenomenal.

'Thirdly, a lot of times people get caught up in how their site looks, with loads of widgets and so on, but content is king. You can have the worst-looking site in the world – Drudge Report – and still have a gazillion readers because you’re putting up very good content that an audience wants to read. Your audience won’t come back to your site because it’s got lots of shiny things on it, they’ll come back because it has good-quality blog posts that actually add something to the discussion.

'... a fourth piece of advice to a young blogger, don’t just toe the party line. No-one wants to read someone who is just relentlessly on-message – it’s dull. If you disagree with the party, say it' (extracts from an interview on the Tory Rascal blog).