I’ve spent the last 15 years pretty much reviewing stuff – the last 10 years of which have been solely in the mobile field. I like hardware and picking things to pieces, that’s what I like to do for a living. I don’t get too hung up on what OS it has, as long as it works, and I don’t get a tingle in my belly just because it has a spec list that looks like it fell out of a death-star. What I’m most interested in is getting behind the hype and seeing whether it’s fit for purpose.
For better or worse, I’m what you’d call a belts-n-braces reviewer. When it comes to testing stuff, my policy is fairly easy – act like a punter. It’s easy for a journalist to get excited about the latest tech when it’s couriered over and they get to play with it for a month, and get paid for the privilege. That way also leads apathy, as you end up only wanting to review the latest and greatest, which in truth is only a small part of reviewing with an audience in mind. Most people only turn to reviews when they are actively in a buying mode and then it’s all about the experience and not the hype.
Experience and expertise aren’t about getting excited at the drop of a tech spec (or a carefully crafted press release), it’s about understanding the market you’re writing for and getting that across in as entertaining but informative a manner as possible. If that just so happens to be with a good measure of SEO and social media tools on top, then all the better.
These are the things that have been going round my head of late, as we’re gearing up for a changes around Republic Towers. Electricpig is in a period of change, but I’ll leave that for James Holland to discuss at a later date. My news, as you may have guessed, involves mobile computing, reviews and a large dollop of common sense buying advice. Over the next few weeks we’ll be bringing you more news about what this entails but for now, it’s enough to know that it’s all going to be in the safest of hands!