As part of this ‘hard-hitting expose’, Jane Moore stopped people in the street outside a Pizza Hut, and asked them to guess the calories on their favourite dishes, then a Harvester, to guess calories in a kids meal, and finally Cafe Rouge for more mainstream meals.

And, no surprises, people were consistently under-estimating the calorie count of the food they liked. “Disgraceful” came Jane Moore’s cry ‘ “why not put calories on menus like they are in New York?”, and “why doesn’t the FSA act?”.

According to Ms Moore only three chains in this country actually put out information on the calorie content of their menus. “More should be forced to do so”.

And who are these paragons of virtue? Erm… Pizza Hut, Harvester and Cafe Rouge. In other words, by doing good and being honest and transparent, they laid themselves open to attack by a programme whose researchers didn’t have to work very hard for the ammunition they wanted. So instead of encouraging more restaurants to be open, this programme has, in reality, done the cause no service whatsoever and, in my humble opinion, behaved disgracefully.

Usmanov - the oil billionaire trying to take over Arsenal football club - has taken umbrage at some accusations made by Craig Murray, the former British ambassador to Uzbekistan. Of course we can’t go into detail, but they aren’t very nice. Someone has kindly added to Wikepedia so click <here> to know more.

Schillings the lawyers into action. ISP told to take down Craig’s site - which is operated by Tim Ireland, along with his own (bloggerheads) and Boris Johnson’s to name but a few. Boris Johnson, Bob Piper and Clive Summerfield have lost their sites for the simple reason that they were hosted on the the same server as Craig’s and Tim’s sites and went the same way when the plug was pulled.

Only Craig Murray and Tim Ireland made blog posts concerning Alisher Usmanov. It is these blog posts that were objected to by Usmanov’s lawyers.

So now there’s a hell of a spat going on, and the blogger community has rolled into action. As Mr Eugenides writes: “let’s be clear on this point; these blogs are down not because Usmanov has been libelled, but because he says he’s been libelled… if you can be silenced for calling a businessman a crook, then you can be silenced for calling a politician a crook, too. Then it’s everyone’s problem.”

And then he produced this great banner:

The effect of all this is that it’s the worst possible outcome for Usmanov and Schillings - and a great one for Murray who is promoting a book (and, it is said, that’s the motivation for all this). As Dave Warner notes writing on AOL Sports: It appears Schillings has fallen victim to something our pals at Techdirt like to call “The Streisand Effect.” Back in 2003, Barbra Streisand sued a photographer in an attempt to remove an aerial photo of her California home from the Internet, despite the fact that the photo was part of a publicly funded coastline erosion study and wasn’t even labeled as her home. As a result, photos of her house were published all over the web within days.

And just to show that Schillings don’t quite get it, try Googling Alisher Usmanov and looking at the fourth entry down. At least you get the intro into what the post was all about.

For all their claims that Murray is libeling their client, Schillings has not actually sued Murray for libel. They have told anyone who will listen that Murray’s book, Murder at Samarkand, is defamatory against Usmanov, but it’s been out for more than a year, and they have never taken any legal action against Murray. Instead, they seem more focused on getting any mention of Murray and his allegations against Usmanov removed from the web — and as the Streisand Effect teaches us, that’s pretty much impossible.

If you want some idea how many people are writing about this, here’s a few links! If only Robert Maxwell were alive today!

Curious Hamster, Pickled Politics, Harry’s Place, Tim Worstall, Dizzy, Iain Dale, Ten Percent, Blairwatch, Davide Simonetti, Earthquake Cove, Turbulent Cleric (who suggests dropping a line to the FA about Mr Usmanov), Mike Power, Jailhouse Lawyer, Suesam, Devil’s Kitchen, The Cartoonist, Falco, Casualty Monitor, Forever Expat, Arseblog, Drink-soaked Trots (and another), Pitch Invasion, Wonko’s World, Roll A Monkey, Caroline Hunt, Westminster Wisdom, Chris K, Anorak, Mediawatchwatch, Norfolk Blogger, Chris Paul, Indymedia (with a list of Craig Murray’s articles that are currently unavailable), Obsolete, Tom Watson, Cynical Chatter, Reactionary Snob, Mr Eugenides, Matthew Sinclair, The Select Society, Liberal England, Davblog, Peter Gasston Pitch Perfect, Adelaide Green Porridge Cafe, Lunartalks, Tygerland, The Crossed Pond, Our Kingdom, Big Daddy Merk, Daily Mail Watch, Graeme’s, Random Thoughts, Nosemonkey, Matt Wardman, Politics in the Zeros, Love and Garbage, The Huntsman, Conservative Party Reptile, Ellee Seymour, Sabretache, Not A Sheep, Bartholomew’s Notes on Religion, The People’s Republic Of Newport, Life, the Universe & Everything, Arsenal Transfer Rumour Mill, The Green Ribbon, Blood & Treasure, The Last Ditch, Areopagitica, Football in Finland, An Englishman’s Castle, Freeborn John, Eursoc, The Back Four, Rebellion Suck!, Ministry of Truth, ModernityBlog, Beau Bo D’Or, Scots and Independent, The Splund, Bill Cameron, Podnosh, Dodgeblogium, Moving Target, Serious Golmal, Goonerholic, The Spine, Zero Point Nine, Lenin’s Tomb, The Durruti Column, The Bristol Blogger, ArseNews, David Lindsay, Quaequam Blog!, On A Quiet Day…, Kathz’s Blog, England Expects, Theo Spark, Duncan Borrowman, Senn’s Blog, Katykins, Jewcy, Kevin Maguire, Stumbling and Mumbling, Famous for 15 megapixels, Ordovicius, Tom Morris, AOL Fanhouse, Doctor Vee, The Curmudgeonly, The Poor Mouth, 1820, Hangbitch, Crooked Timber, ArseNole, Identity Unknown, Liberty Alone, Amused Cynicism, Clairwil, The Lone Voice, Tampon Teabag, Unoriginalname38, Special/Blown It, The Remittance Man, 18 Doughty Street, Laban Tall, Martin Bright, Spy Blog The Exile, poons, Jangliss, Who Knows Where Thoughts Come From?, Imagined Community, A Pint of Unionist Lite, Poldraw, Disillusioned And Bored, Error Gorilla, Indigo Jo, Swiss Metablog, Kate Garnwen Truemors, Asn14, D-Notice, The Judge, Political Penguin, Miserable Old Fart, Jottings, fridgemagnet, Blah Blah Flowers, J. Arthur MacNumpty, Tony Hatfield, Grendel, Charlie Whitaker, Matt Buck, The Waendel Journal, Marginalized Action Dinosaur, SoccerLens, Toblog, John Brissenden East Lower, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Peter Black AM, Boing Boing, BLTP, Gunnerblog, LFB UK, Liberal Revolution, Wombles, Focus on Sodbury…, Follow The Money, Freedom and Whisky, Melting Man, PoliticalHackUK, Simon Says…, Daily EM, From The Barrel of a Gun, The Fourth Place, The Armchair News Blog, Journalist und Optimist, Bristol Indymedia, Dave Weeden, Up North John, Gizmonaut, Spin and Spinners, Marginalia, Arnique, Heather Yaxley, The Whiskey Priest, On The Beat, Paul Canning, Martin Stabe, Mat Bowles, Pigdogfucker, Rachel North, B3TA board, Naqniq, Yorkshire Ranter, The Home Of Football, UFO Breakfast Recipients, Moninski , Kerching, e-clectig, Mediocracy, Sicily Scene, Samizdata, I blog, they blog, weblog, Colcam, Some Random Thoughts, Bel is thinking, Vino S, Simply Jews, Atlantic Free Press, Registan, Filasteen, Britblog Roundup #136, Scientific Misconduct Blog, Adam Bowie, Duncan at Abcol, Camera Anguish, A Very British Dude, Whatever, Central News, Green Gathering, Leighton Cooke (224), , Skuds’ Sister’s Brother, Contrast News, Poliblog Perspective, Parish Pump, El Gales, Noodle, Curly’s Corner Shop, Freunde der offenen Gesellschaft, otromundoesposible, Richard Stacy, Looking For A Voice, News Dissector, Kateshomeblog, Writes Like She Talks, Extra! Extra!, Committee To Protect Bloggers, Liberty’s Requiem, American Samizdat, The Thunder Dragon, Cybersoc, Achievable Life, Paperholic, Creative-i, Raedwald, Nobody’s Friend, Lobster Blogster, Panchromatica

A lot of original brand thinking was done by ad agencies and I would argue that USP is a construct of the advertising mindset. Advertising requires a process of reducto ad absurdum, because it requires simplicity and single-mindedness of thought to get its message across in the limited time or space available.

But brands aren’t simple. They are complex and our reasons for inter-acting with them are often multifarious. The example I use in the UK is John Lewis the retailer. We don’t just use it because of – or only associate the brand with – ‘never knowingly undersold’. It’s also because of the range and quality of goods, the service, the ambiance to name but a few.

In other words brands are about a sum of knowledge - all the little things that we know and deem important to us. And it is all the touchpoints that confirm or force us to confront that knowledge.

The model I used to use was ‘brands as diamonds’. The top face might be the one we notice (the USP) but what makes it shine is all the other facets and how well polished they are.

Have you ever looked at the underside of an Innocent Smoothie bottle? To go so far as writing little messages there (I particularly liked”If you are reading this you must be really bored”) without ever talking about them in your marketing shows a brand that really understands itself and its consumers.

More recently I have been intrigued by the idea of brands as Velcro – lots of little hooks that people attach on to. A colleague - James Gordon-Macintosh - introduced me to this and has written about it here>.

I suspect that the truth lies somewhere in between - brands aren’t just about lots of little hooks - but they aren’t just about the ‘one big thing’ either.

Because that’s where the rip-off comes. If you don’t use your minutes, you get charged anyway. If you go over your minutes, then you pay at an extortionate rate. So, you might think, the only way to win is to get it right and use up your minutes and no more. But even then, you’d be wrong. What happens if the price of your commodity goes down? You lose out, because you’ve agreed to pay that price for 18 months. And you could lose out big (my current contract is 25p a minute, and there are people out there doing 10p a minute or less).

Ah, but the price might go up. Unlikely - there’s too much competition (and regulator pressure) for mobile rates to go up. So we are all losing out big time. No wonder we keep getting free phones and upgrades - it’s so they can lock us in to another over-priced contract.

As they say, if it looks too good to be true, it probably is. .

There it is described on the internet as an electric wheeled mower. The box arrives. There on the outside it says:

‘Advanced grass collecting electric wheeled lawn mower with roller‘ and ‘Powerful and easy to manoeuvre‘.

Perfect - easy mowing, perfect stripes here we come.

But… it’s not actually ‘electric wheeled’. Or, to be precise it is ‘electric, wheeled‘ and not ‘electric-wheeled‘. No wonder it’s easy to manoeuvre: you can push it where you want it to go - unless you are aged 77 that is.

So mis-representation, poor punctuation or my stupidity?… I’ll let you decide.

It’s a great example of a what makes a viral - original and compelling content, presumably created specifically for the web, with alternative endings that make you want to look at more. Great bit of casting for the lead.

They could have done a bit more with the out-takes, even though the dog and ball one is reasonably funny.

Sneeze it on!

 Written in 1990, he ascribes the following dialogue to two characters talking about Edward and Mrs Simpson.  I thought the view expressed so appropriate to today that I paraphrase it here…

 ”There’s no logical reason for having a Royal family.  In fact there are good reasons for not having one, their power is illusory now.  But in Britain they’ve come to represent the living symbol of the state.  When people sing God Save the King, they’re really singing, God save my country.  Royalty only maintains its position by impeccable behaviour and moral superiority over the rest of us.”

 ”But is that fair?  After all, they’re they are only human beings.”

 ”That’s the very point, they aren’t supposed to be ordinary human beings.  They have to give the impression of total superiority to mere mortals, otherwise the illusion will vanish.  Above suspicion.  If they lose that they’ll just become disreputable actors dressing up in uniform and wearing medals they’ve awarded themselves.”

 How very true… Harry and William be warned.

Click to <here> take a look.