http://blogs.independent.co.uk| Blogs from the Independent newspaper - news, views and features from the world's most free-thinking newspaper| Wed, 22 May 2013 09:40:37 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2| en hourly 1 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/05/20/retail-tech-shops-have-got-dozens-of-ways-to-tell-you-to-talk-to-the-hand/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/05/20/retail-tech-shops-have-got-dozens-of-ways-to-tell-you-to-talk-to-the-hand/#comments Mon, 20 May 2013 02:00:44 +0000 Nick Booth http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=34970 There was a time, not so long ago, when shop staff lived in fear of a complaint letter to the manager. These days it’s impossible to have such an impact. Technology hasn’t improved relations between customers and the bosses. In fact, it’s made it a lot harder to communicate your dissatisfaction. Deliberately so, in many cases, I would argue. And yes, I do have evidence to back this statement up.]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/05/20/retail-tech-shops-have-got-dozens-of-ways-to-tell-you-to-talk-to-the-hand/feed/ 0 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/05/08/how-retail-technology-could-save-the-record/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/05/08/how-retail-technology-could-save-the-record/#comments Wed, 08 May 2013 04:00:03 +0000 Nick Booth http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=34686 Did you go to your local record shop on Record Store Day? It was a nationwide series of events aimed at saving the nation’s independent record shops. Come on, these are the keepers of the flame. If we don’t support them they’re gone and the world will belong to the likes of Simon Cowell. So did you go and buy something from your local record shop?]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/05/08/how-retail-technology-could-save-the-record/feed/ 0 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/05/03/interview-with-soundclouds-alexander-ljung/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/05/03/interview-with-soundclouds-alexander-ljung/#comments Fri, 03 May 2013 12:00:04 +0000 Alex Masters http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=34644 I was recently fortunate enough to get the chance to sit down with Alexander Ljung, founder and CEO of SoundCloud. For those of you not familiar with the service, SoundCloud is the web’s largest online audio distribution platform with over 30 million registered users, hosting content that reaches more than 180 million people per month. ]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/05/03/interview-with-soundclouds-alexander-ljung/feed/ 0 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/04/02/technology-could-give-shopping-the-fun-factor/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/04/02/technology-could-give-shopping-the-fun-factor/#comments Tue, 02 Apr 2013 14:49:37 +0000 Nick Booth http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=33671 The retail industry has always been fun because it’s about people. You see everything in this environment: all human life is here.]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/04/02/technology-could-give-shopping-the-fun-factor/feed/ 0 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/31/barking-blondes-doggy-apps-lost-pooches-and-petworking/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/31/barking-blondes-doggy-apps-lost-pooches-and-petworking/#comments Sun, 31 Mar 2013 04:00:07 +0000 Joanne Good and Anna Webb http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=33735 Dogs are big business! As well as dog ownership doubling in six years, the pet industry has boomed in the UK, with an estimated value of £7 billion, increasing by seven per cent annually despite the recession. The past decade has seen an explosion of doggy gadgets, toys and clothes. Well, now it seems the computer age has targeted dog owners with the app market believing it can enrich your relationship with your dog. ]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/31/barking-blondes-doggy-apps-lost-pooches-and-petworking/feed/ 8 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/21/twitters-7th-birthday-a-look-back-at-the-controversies/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/21/twitters-7th-birthday-a-look-back-at-the-controversies/#comments Thu, 21 Mar 2013 19:05:01 +0000 James Silcocks http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=33553 Today Twitter celebrates its seventh birthday. It was on this day in 2006 that creator Jack Dorsey sent out his very first tweet and a new social network was born.]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/21/twitters-7th-birthday-a-look-back-at-the-controversies/feed/ 2 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/21/can-you-get-rich-by-inventing-a-smash-hit-shopping-app/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/21/can-you-get-rich-by-inventing-a-smash-hit-shopping-app/#comments Thu, 21 Mar 2013 13:54:08 +0000 Nick Booth http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=33519 Most of us have crazy ideas for apps that we’re convinced will go global and made us millionaires. I tend to get mine just as the barman is ordering me to go home and I never get to write them down.]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/21/can-you-get-rich-by-inventing-a-smash-hit-shopping-app/feed/ 18 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/12/how-technology-is-helping-young-people-to-cope-with-mental-illnesses/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/12/how-technology-is-helping-young-people-to-cope-with-mental-illnesses/#comments Tue, 12 Mar 2013 15:19:07 +0000 Mei Leng Yew http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=33256 Mental illness can be your very worst companion. It might keep you in your bed all day, coiling round you with its tight embrace and soft whispers, “Stay here. The morning’s past and you’ll never manage anyway. You can try again tomorrow but today’s already lost.” When bedtime beckons, you might not sleep. Your illness bothers you with its tears and its worries or its silence until morning returns.]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/12/how-technology-is-helping-young-people-to-cope-with-mental-illnesses/feed/ 6 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/12/classic-retail-mistakes-what-they-dont-tell-you-about-online-shopping-and-trading/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/12/classic-retail-mistakes-what-they-dont-tell-you-about-online-shopping-and-trading/#comments Tue, 12 Mar 2013 14:27:36 +0000 Nick Booth http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=33251 One of the myths about online retail technology was that it would only pass on benefits to the consumer. That’s not always the case. Everything is cheaper online, right? Wrong! That’s what they want you to believe.]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/12/classic-retail-mistakes-what-they-dont-tell-you-about-online-shopping-and-trading/feed/ 2 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/07/tech-predictions-for-2013-and-has-apple-fallen-from-the-top-of-the-technology-tree/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/07/tech-predictions-for-2013-and-has-apple-fallen-from-the-top-of-the-technology-tree/#comments Thu, 07 Mar 2013 17:02:50 +0000 Mike Mathieson http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=33115 I was last asked to work up a few technology predictions in 2009 and looking back I was bang on the money with the Apple iPad. Even down to the size and material finish. My prediction on the rise of mobile-enabled shopping or mass consumer geotagging wasn’t so accurate then, but maybe I was just ahead of my time.]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/07/tech-predictions-for-2013-and-has-apple-fallen-from-the-top-of-the-technology-tree/feed/ 0 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/07/video-games-are-good-for-you/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/07/video-games-are-good-for-you/#comments Thu, 07 Mar 2013 13:04:33 +0000 Ian Livingstone http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=33098 Bigger than the cinema box office, bigger than music and bigger than books, the video games industry is big business. Global software revenues exceed £30 billion a year, and are predicted to rise to nearly £60 billion a year by 2015. Yet its growth and success are little known. Games are played by hundreds of millions of people around the world.]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/07/video-games-are-good-for-you/feed/ 32 http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/06/retail-technology-companies-could-do-far-more-to-help-the-charity-sector-and-it-would-cost-them-hardly-anything/ http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/06/retail-technology-companies-could-do-far-more-to-help-the-charity-sector-and-it-would-cost-them-hardly-anything/#comments Wed, 06 Mar 2013 16:10:14 +0000 Nick Booth http://blogs.independent.co.uk/?p=33040 One of the most enduring popular myths about the modern economy is that there’s an easy fortune to be made in online trading, if you can only be bothered to make the effort. The implication is that the unemployed really ought to jolly well pull their socks up and start a business.]]> http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/06/retail-technology-companies-could-do-far-more-to-help-the-charity-sector-and-it-would-cost-them-hardly-anything/feed/ 5