Should political parties be worried about their "social media reputations"? One company thinks they could be key in the election.

Over the summer, the blogs took some interest in the Department of Health's "Consultation on the future of tobacco control". Since I was an expert witness for Japan Tobacco International (JTI - the world's third largest tobacco company), I forbore...

Demos is launching a proposed Social Care Constitution, in partnership with Leonard Cheshire Disability and the MS Society, and supported by in Control.

Bromley has been ordered to urgently improve the quality of it's Social Care Services for adults following an independent report. Bromley is one of only eight councils in England to have been criticised by the Social Care Commission. The council's provision has been criticised as only adequate in the areas of Improving Health and Well Being, Increasing Choice and Control, Freedom from Di...

One of the most common reasons I hear people give for not joining a social network site such as Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn is, “I know it’s useful, but where would I find the time to keep up with what’s happening?” A typical way of tackling, at least in party, this dilemma is to go through

A secretive multi-billion dollar industry is offering cutting-edge systems that enable governments to identify, track and monitor people through their phones and computers, a cache of hundreds of surveillance brochures and other marketing materials reveals. A German company offers the ability to track ‘political opponents’; an Italian company claims it can remotely seize control o...

If anything convinces me that the people who design public services (and commercial for that matter) need to get closer to their audience using social media, it is the story of American company Mortrin. They launched a little video for the start of International Babywearing Week basically saying that carrying your child in a sling

While our own government dithers impotently on the sidelines, the German government are taking direct action to protect workers and production for Germany as they bail out GM Europe and effectively take control of the company. The German government has pledged billions of euros in loan guarantees to the company that takes over GM Europe. Of course, the German government are not going to pledge bil...

Alex makes some points on definition: I especially like the distinction between a “social enterprise” – a Blairite upsexing of what used to be called a charity and then became an NGO – and a “social purpose” company, which appears...

  It's official: the job of handling conversations online is a REAL JOB! Social media guru, Jeremiah Owyang has started a list showing the emergence of people filling the roles of Social Computing Strategists and Community Managers in the larger corporations. And ok, it may look US and tech industry-centric now, but the Web knows no geographical boundaries (erm,