Lambing with LEDs

Farming isn't all bad after all, especially if you can produce these fine specimens.

Hat's off to the people who make/are making/made this year's lambing season go well.

The Rutland Correspondent doesn't just blog...

...he's also made it onto his old school's Drama homepage movie. 

Check it here

Who said politics & acting never went together!

We, the people....

...produce a video advertising the 'Tax day tea party', which has the right message, but delivers it in a wholly wrong way.



I like: The idea and the message: Boston tea party as a sense of revolution/protest. Some of the banners too. 'Repeal the pork or your bacon is cooked' and 'tcot report dot com' (of which The Rutland Correspondent is a member: SnudgeB). The child holding the 'I read as much of the Stimulus bill as my congress did' is also a classic.

I don't like: The music, it's a homage to Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, but still, a tad inappropriate. The constant 'we the people' flying across the screen, 'Speak now or forever hold your peace' as a final slogan, and the slightly haunting picture it dubs. The Windows PowerPoint backgrounds at the start

Breaking News: Outen is Out!

Sarah Outen, of 'Rutland's news is a bit like Preston Hill...' fame, has sadly been forced out of her record attempt to cross the Indian Ocean.

The latest can be found here.

I'm sure Raddlemen across the UK will be wishing her well, and hoping she hits the water again soon.

Hello, Afternoon, Morning. I mean, what time is it?

Boris at his best. And a bit of bread and butter PR at the same time.

Viva la Conservatives....

Shooting, Conservatives, Palin and The Rock?

This month's The Field Magazine has a couple of interesting items I can thoroughly recommend reading. The opening story is of how the Olympic shooting team was snubbed by Cherie Blair when they received the opportunity to meet dignitaries at Number 10. The article goes further into how the Olympic Budget has seen shooting's slice slashed by 80%. A temporary shooting ground (quite indicative of the current administration) is to be erected at a cost of £25 million to the tax payer at Woolwich. This comes as Bisley still maintains it's world-renown status following the 2002 Commonwealth games.

The second item comes from the letter's page, where a lady wrote in to inform The Field of friend of the author hitting a right and left at a woodcock ( a very difficult manoeuvre to pull off in shooting). The end of the letter ends as such:

'...the more ladies we can encourage into shooting the more support we can expect from the public at large'

Being a typical PR student, I pondered this end statement. Normally a celebrity spokesperson may add weight to a cause, but more women in a oft-mistaken male-orientated sport? A most interesting idea....

Let's look stateside for some answers. The Rock (Dwayne Johnson) of WWE fame, and a Correspondent recommended auto-bigoraphy, once spoke at the Republican National Convention (much like Conservative Conference Season). A known Republican, he could be seen as a brand champion: 

O. Burns Celebrity Endorsement Formula

'Keen & Clean' celebrity spokesman + product/belief + media channel(s) = air time

air time ÷ new/renewed interest in product/belief = % positively changed public opinion

Perhaps this idea might help our shooting cause. What if someone like The Rock could become a brand champion for one of Great Britain's most traditional of past times. Would that celebrity be willing to take the regular flak from the often left-wing (and possibly there biggest fan base) argument that it is the sport of the rich killing the defenseless for pleasure? I might conclude not. 

What if our brand champion wasn't quite as big as The Rock. What if that brand champion wasn't just one person? Perhaps the author does have the right idea of getting a group of people (in this case, UK women of 18+) to start taking up the sport and championing it's cause....

Then again, would we get a Palin effect? Great ideas, great image, great to start off with, but will it just wither out over time very rapidly? Would our brand champion/champions fit the 'Keen & Clean' part of our equation? Again, I may argue not.

We might find, therefore, that brand champions for shooting are a no-no. Perhaps having pictures of women holding guns is the way forward for the sport. Political Parties may be the stopping point for celebrities to publicly endorse without too much flak. 

One thing is for certain: for the great sport to survive the next ten years, it needs to get more supporters. How to do that without celebrity endorsement?: another blogpost for another day.

A Rutland minute on Blogging and Social Networking 2.25

Our PR class today was taken by another lecturer from the University, who was an experienced blogger and journalist.

As a class we brainstormed the things we had learnt from our blogs, and what we would do to improve/enrich audience and readers. The two words which proved most popular were varied and relevant.

If I was to create a mission statement on what I'd like to achieve with this blog, I might actually struggle. Not simply because I can't think of what to write, but because I might be struggling to put it into 150 words. Much like Twitter's 140 character limit, I think I might need to sort out and compartmentalise my goals.

"I try to be funny, though careful as to my style of humour. One great business lecturer once said that "No one buys from a clown". I try to interest my readers in politics. Particularly so from a conservative viewpoint, as it is often a subject many shy away from socially, but willing to discuss with great account otherwise. I also try to bring news from my home county Rutland, which would mostly go unnoticed in the busy world around it. I also find the blog somewhat personal, even though I were advised not to be overtly life-sharing."

98 Words. Hang on, I just thought I'd struggle to write that. Perhaps I can't quite touch the word count, but it is a very messy statement. 

Perhaps the answer is in the blog sub-title

"Multum In Parvo, Latin for Much In Little" (Rutland's motto)

I do have a lot to say and do, and not a lot to say it in. I do have much to talk about, though find it hard putting it down as a condensed posting. I also have much to say about Rutland, but in a too smaller channel for mainstream media to pick up. Truly, it is Much in Little. So it may not be the most auspicious mission statement, though my county is proud to carry it as it's motto. I too shall be proud to have it as this blog's mantra.

As an aside to today's class, we were also asked to think about Twitter, 5 weeks on from our original opinions. To use my regular lecturer's words from our internal class blog, 'the often dismissive and unflattering' comments we pass about twitter are still fairly prevalent. I would agree to an extent with them, though I am pleased to have found very like minded people on their. My 76 followers are mostly US-Born. Is this good or bad? Who knows. I'm pleased, though, that I have met them online and that Twitter does allow me to see all their happening without digging to deeply into their lives. Perhaps this is Social Networking 2.25? Personal, Online, Global and yet not too personal?!

Rutland's news is a bit like Preston Hill...

On the up-side:This week Sarah Outen, of Oakham, heads into waters known along the the Indian Ocean, and you can follow her progress with her blog live from the boat here. We wish our intrepid Raddleman well.

On the down-side: It was a sad story this week to hear RPC, one of Rutland's biggest employers, is set to make redundancies. Based along the Pilling's Road industrial estate, RPC is well known for it's plastic works within several key industries.