links for 2011-08-09

"So to sum up…it’s messy. On the plus side, I do think real-time web’s ability to self correct is extraordinary. My blunderous retweet was corrected within five minutes. If you don’t mind taking stern words from other users, it’s a rock solid facet to the platform."

"As the London riots entered their third night last night, and spread to Birmingham, Liverpool and Bristol, Twitter was continuing to be in the firing line again as the media heaped blame on social networks. The Sun gave over a page calling for the Twitter rioters to be “nailed”. But in opposition to that community groups began to take back the initiative as the hashtag #riotcleanup became the UK’s number one Twitter trend as people started to come together on Twitter and use it, and other social networks, to organise."

"Doing little things in the interface that promote transparency and help people move from being a web-user to a web-maker is important, so long as we don’t make things difficult for the people that just want to be users. I’ve never found my parents or other non-technical users to be confused by the presence of http://, which is part of why I don’t see much gain in removing it—especially given the behavioral shortcomings of this change. Far more exciting to me is the exact opposite approach: designing experiences to help users understand what the URL in their address bar means, and encouraging them to create things on the Web instead of just browse."

Great article looking at whether faith in HTML5 is stronger than evidence of it being able to deliver mobile apps.

"On the other side of the spectrum, start-ups ‘just do it,’ they use trial and error, passion, and a fervent can-do attitude to churn out ideas and “make stuff.” However, as soon as they mature into more formal organizational designs and operations, they usually begin to hire consultants who tell them how to do and label what they had been doing and known all along. These consultants then replace intuition with frameworks and routines with methodologies, and they impose processes on organisms, analyze the obvious, and worship “strategy” – as if such thing existed in the messy world of creativity."

"On June 19, in Trinidad and Tobago, mainstream media and social media collided. The Trinidad Express, in publishing a follow-up story about allegations that threatening emails to journalists had been traced to the home computer of the Prime Minister’s advisor, quoted comments about the issue from Kathryn Stollmeyer-Wight’s Facebook wall without her permission – or the permission of her Facebook friends."

"Now arriving in Westminster #londonriots http://twitpic.com/635104" - my favourite tweet on a difficult night. You seem to get a better class of eyewitness from behind the Times paywall...

"Everyone seems to be looking for a culprit, with some blaming Twitter and Facebook, and others pinning the violence on BlackBerry and its instant messaging abilities. But that’s a little like blaming individual trees for the forest fire. As we’ve pointed out before with respect to the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt, these are just aspects of our increasingly real-time, mobile and connected lives, and that can be an incredibly powerful force for both good and bad". Another great analysis from the consistently good Mathew Ingram

"The most difficult bit, at least in my limited experience, is trying to keep your head straight and focused on the facts. Anyone whose done any sort of politically-charged reporting, especially protests, can find the adrenaline to be staggering. It sweeps you off your feet and you get caught up in the rush of emotion."

Adam rounding up some other links so that I don't have to...