pandemic Archives - NevilleHobson.com

The Internet and a brighter future

Most people would agree that what we have experienced over the past 12 months has changed – in a lasting manner – the ways in which we share information and communicate with each other, whether for business or for pleasure. Indeed, the coronavirus pandemic has accelerated far-reaching change in ways that no one could accurately have predicted in 2019. Communications technology and the Internet are central to all of this and are at the heart of discussion I had in…

SDF 43: The wearing away of trust

In the first episode in 2021 of our monthly Small Data Forum podcast, Thomas, Sam, and I discussed the big picture of Trump and what’s next for him, Joe Biden and America post-Trump, and in the context of our predictions in episode 42 in December. Those predictions weren’t that shabby, as it turns out. We considered what social media is: platform, publisher, or leech, which provoked some lively and trenchant opinion. We pondered the consequences and outcomes of the Capitol…

The uneasy case for face masks and enforced wearing

In the UK last November, the most frequent locations people with the COVID-19 virus had been prior to testing positive was supermarkets. Two months on, that may still be the case. It makes sense, then, that if you are going to a supermarket, you wear a face mask for your own protection as well as that of everyone else. Unless you have valid exemption, wearing a face mask when in an enclosed public place like a supermarket is also the…

SDF42: 2020 Caught in the Gaslights

Last week, we published the 42nd episode of the Small Data Forum podcast. As this is December, this is our Christmas Special that, in previous years, we have recorded live from the Olivelli restaurant in south London where Sam, Thomas and I enjoy some outstanding Italian cuisine and wine, during which we put the world to rights, analysing and dissecting the uses and abuses of data big and small that have dominated politics, business, and public life in 2020. This…

FIR 200: Tune out for better wellbeing

In the October edition of the ‘Hobson and Holtz Report,’ episode 200 in the FIR podcast series, Shel and I covered a lot of ground in our one-hour discussion that it’s hard to pick a stand-out: all are highly topical issues that are worthy of discussion and perhaps prompting thought and opinion from you as you listen. But if I had to pick one as a stand-out, it would be the topic we started this episode with – how the…