My memories of Blockbusters’ Bob Holness – much more than the Baker Street saxophonist*

Bob HolnessIt is with great sadness that I heard news of the death of Bob Holness.

To many 30- and 40-somethings, he will be remembered as the host of iconic quiz show Blockbusters, but his career started long before that, being an early BBC Radio host (alongside Terry Wogan and Jimmy Young) and he was also the first person ever to voice James Bond.

However, my memories of him are more personal, having been lucky enough to appear on Blockbusters in the late 90s and a far less well-remembered primetime game show called Raise the Roof in the mid-90s.

The genial face he put across on screen was completely mirrored off-screen. The atmosphere backstage at Blockbusters was bit like a youth club, with up to 40 contestants waiting in the green room at any one time to appear on the next programme (some contestants waited up to 2 weeks to go on).

Blockbusters dictionaryAt lunchtimes in the canteen, Bob happily ate with all of us and chatted away about his life and experiences, as well as found out about all of us – it was clearly a fantastic gig, as far as he was concerned.

Much later – in 1995 – Yorkshire TV tried an ultimately-doomed Saturday night game show with Bob once again in the quizmaster’s chair.

He claimed he remembered me from my appearance on Blockbusters 6 years previously – which I know now probably wasn’t true, but at the time, it seemed emininently believeable.

As before, he was very warm, genuinely interested in all the contestants and merely confirmed my previous memories of him.

That Raise the Roof failed to become the star vehicle for Bob that he probably deserved was in no way down to him – the format and questions were the problem, not the host.

One of the nicest men in showbusiness – completely genuine and totally unstarry. RIP Bob!
Bob Holness autograph
* Yes, I know it wasn’t Bob who played on Baker Street – it was really Raphael Ravenscroft.

Why Nikon’s Facebook ‘epic fail’ wasn’t really that bad

Major fuss today over on the Facebook page of Nikon, after it posted a status update that enraged many of its followers.

The Japanese camera company’s fans took offence at the suggestion that equipment was more important than the photographer.

Nikon received almost 1500 comments, many of which blasted the company for being too concerned about their own equipment and not caring about the craft of the actual photographer. The word ‘fail’ appeared a large number of times.

But was it really the awful ‘integrity suicide’ that many commenters suggested? I’d say no for the following reasons:

1) Nikon is a brand that sells camera equipment – why else would you follow them? Surely, they’re going to use their Facebook page to try and encourage people to lean towards more Nikon kit. OK, so their words were a bit hamfisted, but they were essentially trying to get people to talk about Nikon products. That may not have been the greatest use of social media, but fans complaining about Nikon trying to ‘promote’ Nikon are very misguided.

2) The number of complainants were very small. At time of writing, Nikon has around 841k followers on Facebook. Of that number, only 0.17% left a comment and not all of the roughly 1500 comments were negative.

Admittedly, you never want to get bad press as an organisation, but it wasn’t exactly widespread condemnation.

3) A slightly more semantic point on the original post. Agreed, Nikon shouldn’t have dissed the art of the photographer, but if it’s all about the person, why doesn’t everyone use a disposable camera to take photos? Why do snappers need to shell out on the equipment and lenses that Nikon were trying to promote?

Interestingly, what this does highlight – yet again – is how fraught with difficulty social media can be for commercial organisations. People want to follow their favourite brands, but it seems as if they don’t like them being too important and opinionated.

Nikon did post an apology, but it took them 15 hours to do so – pretty poor. It really shouldn’t have taken them that long to react to a crisis situation. To be honest, that was probably their biggest faux pas.

Ultimately, though, they’re unlikely to lose that many of their followers and in a couple of months, most people will have probably forgotten all about it.

5 golden rules for aspiring journalists

Whether it’s at a careers conference, or via online mentoring services, I’m often asked for tips on how to get into the business that is journalism and writing.

It’s a bit of a loaded question because, unlike many more vocational careers, writing for a living doesn’t really come with an easily-defined path.

What’s more, different people will tell you different things, depending on their own experience.

So what are the guaranteed rules that everyone should follow, regardless of their intended route?

1. Start writing
Probably the most obvious one to start with, but actually putting pen to paper (or rather key to screen) and forming coherent sentences is something that many people overlook. Getting used to writing and discovering your own style and voice is crucial early on.

And with the advent of the internet, blogs offer a ready-made place to getting your own work out there and read.

2. Read, read and read a bit more
While writing is the crucial bit, experiencing the way other people write also comes in pretty handy. Whether it’s other blogs, newspapers, magazines, books, it doesn’t matter. Reading how other people construct their sentences and turn their phrases is a vital ingredient in forming your own writing.

It’s also a great way to discover how not to write in some cases, because not everyone’s writing style will be to your taste.

3. Get some on-the-job experience
If you think you want to become a journalist, it will pay immensely to find out what it’s like. Get in touch with anyone you know who has connections and beg them for some time in the office as an intern.

Yes, you may end up making the tea or be asked to a job lot of photocopying, but you’ll also start to get a feel for what it’s like to be a journalist. You’ll learn some new skills, make some contacts and also possibly learn where you do, or more likely, don’t want to work.

Moreover, any prospective employer worth his or her salt won’t look twice at anyone who claims they want to be a journalist without racking up any work experience.

4. Don’t expect to get paid much
You may have noticed that the world and his wife think they can write at the moment. That makes your job even more difficult than ever before.

Of course, if you want to give up now, that makes it easier for everyone else, but you have to accept that writing isn’t generally a well-paid profession. After all, anyone can do words, can’t they?

Well, no, obviously they can’t, but sadly the ability to turn out a well-crafted piece isn’t given the kudos it deserves.

So, if you want to earn big bucks, now’s the time to forget being a writer and retrain as a barrister or a dentist. If you can cope with your friends looking at you pityingly, when you can’t afford to stump up your tenner for a night out at Pizza Hut, then read on.

5. Be lucky
In a fair and just world, the best, most coruscating writers would be the ones that win all the plaudits, are feted the world over and get all the best gigs.

Sadly, we don’t live in a world like that. Plenty of fantastic writers are left slaving away for a pittance, while the most well-known are not always as brilliant as they think they are.

So if an opportunity comes your way, grab it with both hands. You can’t plan for luck, but you can be aware of it and make sure you seize on any glimmer. It’s then what you do with that slice of piece of fortune that counts.

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Of course, there are more than those 5 and I’d love to hear any thoughts from others to add to the list.