simoncrerar.com :: Simon Crerar's website » Journalism

Facebook buys Instagram for $1 billion

simon — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 14:01:39 +0000

On Monday I woke to horrific news. My favourite iPhone application of all time, the time-wasting fun-machine photo social network Instagram, had been snaffled up by Facebook for a frankly mind-boggling sum.

Read my takes on the biggest tech swoop of the decade.

On The Punch: Another billion reasons to hate Mark Zuckerberg

And Cairns.com.au: How is a company with zero revenue worth $1 billion?

Paid Content 2011: an epochal moment in the history of journalism

simon — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 01:00:03 +0000

If the industry I love cannot pay for itself it will wither and die.

But as The Australian launches its “freemium” website, I’m confident journalism has an exciting future in the digital age.

Read this week’s Weekend Post column: http://crerar.me/Paying4News

Like 1848, 1917 and 1989, 2011 will forever be a year of revolution

simon — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 14:01:38 +0000

Social media is unlikely to power revolution in the USA, but then who called the Arab Spring?

Originally called by the Canadian-based anti-consumerist group Adbusters, the Occupy movement lacks the clear message of protests in the Middle East.

Among other things, participants are angry about perceived economic inequality, corporate greed and the pervasive influence of lobbyists on the US political process.

But as copycat demonstrations spread to more than 100 cities, the Occupy movement is hitting newspaper front pages and TV bulletins around the world.

Read my column in the Weekend Post

Steve Jobs 1955-2001: thanks for the memories

simon — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 14:01:42 +0000

Technology visionary Steve Jobs created revolutionary devices that changed our lives, says our Online Editor. Do you agree? Has the iPod, iPhone or iPad changed your life? My love affair with Steve Jobs began on Christmas Day 1987, when my mother unveiled our brand new Apple Macintosh II, my first computer.

By captaining the finest creative, engineering and techological team on the planet and dedicating them to the pursuit of design perfection (and damn the cost), Steve Jobs changed the world, and turned my childhood fantasies into reality.

Read my Weekend Post column here

At 8:46 on September 11, 2001, the world changed forever

simon — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 02:07:21 +0000

Where were you? I was having lunch in my office canteen in London when the television flicked from Neighbours to a live Sky stream of the burning World Trade Centre. The newscaster said a light plane had crashed into the North Tower, but it looked too big for that. Surrounded by journalists from four Fleet Street newspapers, the normally bustling restaurant went eerily silent. Five minutes later, as the second plane smashed into the South Tower, the room erupted as us hacks ran back to cover the biggest story of our lives.

Read my column in today’s Weekend Post
http://cairnspo.st/WhereWereYou911

iPods, MP3s and filesharing have changed how we listen to music forever

simon — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 22:45:41 +0000

As my CD collection gathers dust, I marvel at how music has changed since the launch of the iPod ten years ago. Do you miss record stores? Do you buy music? Do you go to gigs? What does music mean to you? My column in today’s Weekend Post http://crerar.me/DigiAgeMuzik

From pre-Dawn to post-Dusk: the iPhone rules…

simon — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 14:48:34 +0000

Mobile penetration in Australia climbed to 120 per cent last year, boosted by phones specially designed for children and the elderly. Your mobile phone is with you from dawn to dusk, could you live without it?

http://crerar.me/MobileAddiction

Crocodile arrives just in time for Cairns Post’s video PC!

simon — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 22:00:43 +0000

Thanks to the sterling efforts of our IT department, our new multimedia PC was installed in the newsroom this morning.

Right on cue, a saltwater croc tried to cross one of the busiest roads in Cairns! Check out the video.

Crocodile cornered by police on Mulgrave Road after attempting to cross six lane highway

This is the first video edited with our new newsroom multimedia PC. A couple of weeks ago our reporters and photographers attended a training course with News Ltd’s senior video journalist. We’re hoping breaking news videos will become a regular part of Cairns.com.au over the next 12 months. Stay tuned!

Way out west to Outback Far North Queensland

simon — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 23:01:51 +0000

On a steamy day in the sultry tropical heat and humidity of Cairns, it’s hard to believe that the Outback’s wide open dustiness is just half a day’s drive away.But skip up and over the lush Tableland via Ravenshoe and you are soon cruising through increasingly scrubby savanna stretching to the Gulf of Carpentaria, 800km west.

Massive termite mounds extend as far as the eye can see, mobs of wallabies and wallaroos skip away as you pass and, apart from farmers’ Land Cruisers, the only other vehicles on the highway are cattle trucks and grey nomads.

This is the Savannah Way, the epic road-less-travelled scenic route linking Cairns with Broome.

Read the full story of our trip to fabulous Cobbold Gorge in today’s Weekend Post, or here on Cairns.com.au.

Is the internet making life easier or harder? It’s taking over right!?

simon — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 23:01:49 +0000

My job requires me to be online for large stretches of my working day. Like anyone working for a medium to large sized organisation, I receive hundreds of emails each day, a large percentage of which are completely irrelevant, although they must usually be read to ascertain this. Although I am paid to be online all day, occasionally I find my constant contact with the network overwhelming.

Do you sit at your computer night and day? Ever wonder what it’s doing to your brain? Are you enjoying the digital age? Read my Weekend Post column on our 24/7 networked lifestyle at http://bit.ly/AlwaysOnline