The 90s Life!

If you grew up in the 90s you have to follow 'The 90s Life' on Twitter. Great quotes from retro kids TV shows such as 'The Rugrats' and 'Hey Arnold' and musical blasts from the past with 'Backstreet's back all right!'. Ok, showing my age now, but it got me thinking about my fav 90s things....

Without a doubt my biggest '90s love' was the American TV series, Dawson's Creek (Dawson's Geek if you were a mean anti-fan!). I vividly remember gathering round with my friends on a Sunday to watch it on Channel 4 and screeching with excitement when the trailer for 'coming up next week...' appeared at the end of the show. Sad? Yes, probably, but looking back on my adolescent self I think it's kind of endearing.

Are you being paid enough?

Great article from Marketing magazine that I thought I'd share with you...

Take a look at the person sitting next to you. The chances are you know the intimate details of their lives, from where they shop to when they last had an argument with their significant other. In fact you probably spend more time with them than your family. (As the Chartered Institute of Marketing’s latest Marketing Rewards salary reveals 26% of marketing professionals at director level are working more than 50 hours a week.) Yet the chances are you don’t know how much they earn.

The culture of secrecy that surrounds the British workplace has made it virtually impossible to establish if we are being paid enough, or at least if our salaries are in-line with the market.

For women this culture of secrecy has profound implications in maintaining the disgraceful gender pay gap that, rather than becoming the relic of a bygone age it rightly is, is actually thriving.  According to the CIM Croner Marketing Rewards survey the gender pay gap for marketing directors is now 16.3% up from 2005, where women were paid 2.8% less than male CMOs.

The Equal Opportunities Commission calculated that, over the course of her working life, the gender pay gap would lose an average woman working full-time a staggering £330,000 (or £210,000 after income tax and National Insurance contributions) Astonishingly, according to Unison, the UK is ranked 78th in the world’s pay inequality league, behind countries such as Malawi and Egypt.

PR vs. Journalism

Working in PR, I suppose I'm not best placed to have an 'objective' view on the subject of PRs vs. Journos, but I read an article last week that really addressed the differences and more to the point, tensions, between the two gatekeepers of the news.

Weber Shandwick's head of media north, Sarah Park wrote an article on leading media site, How Do last week titled - ‘Strained relations - can PRs and journalists get along?' Not surprisingly, the article has sparked a lot of interest from people in the industry, chipping in with a gripe to justify their side of the debate. But unlike the endless list of bitter commentators, Park had a very subjective and eye opening account of why she believes communication between the two has hit an all time low.

Hollywood comes to Manchester!



The 'Captain America' set in The Northern Quarter


If you live in the great city of Manchester you're sure to have heard about the Hollywood blockbuster that is currently being filmed in our town centre.

The aptly chosen location is the retro epicentre of Manc land, 'The Northern Quarter'. Brimming with mounds of personality, the production team obviously thought it was a perfect location to film two weeks of their action/adventure classic, Captain America!

'It's good to talk!' - A brief look at the Social Media trend

Social media is fast becoming the number one communication tool. Gone are the days of, 'can I get your number?’ now it's 'can I add you on Facebook?' or 'Tweet me!'. Social networking sites have changed the way in which people in today's society interact with one another and as a result, it's changing the very fabric of communication.

Back in the day, if you wanted to leave someone a message, all you had at your disposal was a landline answering machine! Nowadays you have at least five media channels to check before you can be sure no one's trying to get in touch with you! 'Has anyone msn'd me? I wonder if I have a Facebook notification? Maybe I should just check Twitter too'. But is that the appeal? The success of Facebook, for instance, relies on the simple notion that people are actually interested in what other people are doing; and with 500 million registered users worldwide they must be onto something?!

The Vamp Obsession...have you been bitten???

Something that really interests me is the current trend surrounding all things 'fang' related. You only have to look at the phenomenal successful of the 'Twilight Saga', True Blood & The Vampire Diaries, to see that the world really has gone crazy for all things vamp! The interesting thing is all these films/programmes have been a hit. Not one flop between them!

So why then, are we all so obsessed with the un-dead??!!