The Digital Week

Welcome to Porter Novelli’s weekly digital news post.

The digital policies of China have been in the news again this week, and this time it’s beginning to get serious. No sooner had last week’s instalment of this column been published than the Official Google Blog posted a revealing account of its relationship with China.

The search giant claims to have been a victim of state-initiated cyber-attacks, the primary objective of which was to access the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists. Google, making a stand for both its own security and for global freedom of speech, is threatening a complete withdrawal from China and has already postponed the launch of two Android phones in the country.

In his post (linked above), Google SVP, Corporate Development and Chief Legal Officer David Drummond states that Google has been monitoring the situation in China since launching google.cn, and so it’s no surprise that it is now reviewing its business ops there.

Haiti and the mobile payment barrier

Mobile is big news, and where there’s big news, there’s big money. But mobile commerce is yet to find its feet and is suffering the same reluctance from its prospective customer base as did e-shopping back in the day. You know, to a point. The main concerns seem to be reliability and security, but Econsultancy‘s Meghan Keane made an interesting observation in the days following the tragic earthquake disaster in the Caribbean republic of Haiti.

“If consumers are reticent to make purchases with their phones,” she says, “ they certainly haven’t been demonstrating it this week. After the horrible earthquake in Haiti on Tuesday, individuals around the globe have been trying to donate money to relief efforts.”

In fact, as of Meghan’s post on 15th January, over $4 million had been donated to the Red Cross by mobile phone. But does this demonstrate a new-found willingness to use mobile payments, or our wish for a quick and easy donation method in the face of immeasurable human tragedy?

Personally, I think it’s probably the latter and that one needs a more routine proof point before trumpeting such a breakthrough. However, Meghan rightly notes that the large number of smartphone applications requiring or facilitating online payments has helped make us more comfortable with the idea (by ‘us’, I mean Americans, of which I’m not one).

Dave

The UK election(eering) campaign is already in full swing, and the Conservative Party’s campaign poster has been mirth-inducing in the extreme. Featuring a picture of party leader David Cameron as he would look were he a character in The Sims, the poster shows the boy Dave making various emotional pleas and promises.

It’s caused a storm politically, of course, with several Tory chaps criticising the government’s negative campaigning after Dave was ridiculed by Alistair Campbell’s Gordon Brown’s hilarious quips about airbrushing. But here on the interwebs we’re more interested in people mucking around with funny photos*, so mydavidcameron.com is right up our street (thanks to Neville Hobson for the heads-up).

Thanks to the suspiciously quick-sprouting site, the UK electorate can arm themselves with a template of the notorious poster and add their own amusing touches to the mix. My favourite, above, comes from Will Sturgeon.

France and Germany: say no to Internet Explorer

Imagine our surprise, dear readers, when we were e-flicking through the BBC News website and discovered, by way of this story, that some people still use Microsoft Internet Explorer! Seriously.

Not for long, mind. The section above about Google has far-reaching implications for Internet Explorer, which was implicated in the attacks because of a vulnerability exploited by malicious code. Microsoft has defended itself fully, claiming that users should upgrade to Internet Explorer 8, “the most secure browser on the market” (the compromised version is the IE6).

France and Germany aren’t yet convinced. The two governments have urged users to stop using Internet Explorer in order to preserve security. Industry rumours that Google executives have spent the week laughing into their sleeves are as yet unconfirmed.

Oxford University expels Spotify

Students at Oxford University are understandably nonplussed about the institution’s ham-fisted response to bandwidth problems caused by the widespread use by students of Spotify, the (wonderful) legal music streaming application: a complete ban.

The comments in Mike Butcher’s post at TechCrunch (again, linked above) make for particularly interesting reading. While the stand-off appears to be a simple case of university v students in which both are right – bandwidth is a genuine issue and Spotify is great – it should also be considered that some technical types seem to think a well-configured network would have no trouble handling such issues.

Either way, I’m glad I’m not at Oxford Uni because I ruddy love Spotify, and without it wouldn’t currently be listening to the downright brilliant Hardcore Superstar.

…and finally

“Rules for living in civilised society in the year 2010, number one: don’t joke about bombs and airports. Ever.”

It should be abundantly clear by now that saying the words “bomb” and “airport” in the same sentence these days is going to land you in hot water. Earlier this month, my stepsister was on a runway at Heathrow (in an aeroplane, not just milling about) when armed police stormed the aircraft and hauled off the men two rows in front of her. There was no bomb, of course, but I imagine the authorities made the offenders in question feel as if there had been.

And now, a similar “threat” has been made on Twitter and resulted in similar consequences. Paul Chambers, a frustrated snowboarder unable to travel through a closed Robin Hood airport, tweeted: “Robin Hood airport is closed. You’ve got a week and a bit to get your shit together, otherwise I’m blowing the airport sky high!!”

Bad move. After six hours of questioning and the confiscation of his computer and iPhone, Chambers was released – on bail. Common sense appears to be on his side, however, and his updates are protected. But the question is why would anybody be so stupid? After the events of the last ten years, comments like that are really not funny anymore.

He obviously wouldn’t actually blow up an airport, but the authorities will continue to make examples of these people and as a pretty dodgy flyer at the best of times I’m glad they do.

* We’re not really. We are in fact deeply political.