Food at The Flackenhacks. . .

We've upped the ante on food this year.

Pieminister, a Bristol-based start-up, is going to furnish us with its Pie Pod. This lovely little vehicle will be dispensing pies, mash and gravy at The Flackenhacks. We'll be laying out some big long tables so that you can all sit down, eat and chat.

You can forget about Pukka Pies and the like. Pieminister will be serving up some top-of-the-range stuff, as follows:

The Matador Pie -- Beef, chorizo, olives butter beans and sherry

The Chicken of Aragon Pie -- Free range chicken, tarragon, smoky bacon, vermouth

The Heidi Pie (Vegetarian): Goats cheese, sweet potato, spinach, roasted garlic.

Plus mashed potato and gravy.

The small print contains all of the good stuff you'd want to see: full traceability of all food, free range meat and eggs, use of local suppliers etc etc.

Nice people, good food: we reckon you like 'em both…

A word about your compere. . .

Ladies and gentlemen, put your hands together for the shockingly good Paul Wooding, the only man in tech PR brave enough to tread the boards at The Flackenhacks. . .

Last year, Paul did the honours onstage. He was good, really good. This year, he says he is going to properly let himself off the leash. We're already receiving broad hints about gags involving cancer-stricken celebrities.

Anyway, here's the boy's own Miss World-style biography. . .

What did you do before PR?

I spent my formative years giving Sonic The Hedgehog a hard time in print.

Why did you become a PR?

I like to tell everyone it was the lure of working for a client in the pneumatics’ industry, but if I'm honest it was the lucre.

Tell us about your hobbies. . . 

I have a penchant for Styrofoam. I sometimes roam the streets of East Sheen making owl noises.

Your greatest wish?

To climb Primrose Hill.

Ideal job?

Selling vegetable stew at music festivals.

In these straightened times, we reckon that publication of this could add a frisson to Paul's next performance review. As in: Paul, we'd like to discuss your stew concept. When do you think you can start?. . . 

EBay auctions: More to come

Mark Samuels (ex-Computing, now editor of CIO Connect) is up and running on EBay.

Coming up very soon (ie: tomorrow): Mark Dye, Dan Ilett, Andy McCue, Michael Dempsey and. . . oooooohh yes, Rob Kerr.

Mike Magee tells us that he can't make it on the 29th. He's in Hyderabad. Or somesuch. Sorry, Mr Palmer: you'll have to find someone else to spend your lucre on.

Separately (honest). . . we're sworn to secrecy about the hack who gave us permission to auction him off, complete with an image of himelf naked. Oddly, his bosses objected, and we had to pull the auction.

Got requests? Stick 'em in the comments. Thanks y'all...

Flackenhack Award Categories: Part 3

Thanks for the nominations we've received so far. Some look very promising. . . Funny even.

A further package of awards categories has appeared beneath the gooseberry bush. . . Any suggestion that the judges have already arrived at a decision about the category labeled "most hyped new business of the year" is scurrillous and will attract the attention of our most learned friends. You have been warned.

Loyalty to dead media formats

Stop crying…you'll make all the pages go soggy. This one's the opposite to the muppet above. Can't quite bring himself to believe that the printing press's day has come; that paper's about as fashionable as a career in investment banking. Get over it grandpa. We all have.

 

Most hyped new business of the year

PR Weak called it 'the most sought-after retainer of the year' (arguably). Was it bollocks.

 

Rebrand of the year

Company in trouble? Call it something else…nobody will ever guess. Product not selling? Give it a new name…that'll boost sales. Do they think we're stupid? No, they don't think it. The research said so.

 

Bandwagon jump of the year

Green washing? Crunch washing? Shaky Olympic tie-ins? There's always unashamed hype-surfing happening in the PR industry. Who's had the most blatant crack at it in 2008?

EBay update -- Muncaster takes the lead: ignition trouble for Spark?

Oooh-errr missus.

Signs of life on Ebay, where we are auctioning off the right to invite hacks to The Flackenhacks. (Low start, 50% goes to Byte Night -- you know the score.)

Just a moment ago, Phil Muncaster of Vnunet/Computing sent us a missive bemoaning the fact that someone has bid more for Rupert Goodwins than for him. 

What outrage is this?? I am officially less popular than Goodwins?
That hurts man, that hurts....

It must have taken a while to get to us. As we write, the bidding for Muncaster's hand has risen to £31.00. That's courtesy of a lively tussle between Spark Communications and "doran321".

Goodwins? He's languishing at the start price of £19.99. But at least someone has bid for him. Andrew Smith of Escherman has nipped in with an offer.

Martin Veitch of CIO magazine has gotten off the blocks, too. Bidding for the right to squire the suave northerner is led by "leoking1981".

It looks like this is working. We'll get another batch of hacks up there sharpish. 

Quick thought: if anyone is on the phone to Charles Arthur this afternoon, can you remember to ask him if he'd like to sold off too? We're looking forrard to that 'un.

For sale on EBay: Three hacks, lightly worn, in excellent condition

The Flackenhacks' Adopt-A-Hack Troubled Assets Recovery Programme (TM) has gotten under way at EBay.

Seven day auctions, no reserve, a low starting price -- and 50% of everything goes to Byte Night.

Thus far, you may bid for tickets on behalf of. . .

• Rupert Goodwins, editor of ZDNet
• Martin Veitch, editor of CIO magazine
• Phil Muncaster, senior/chief reporter at Vnunet

Here.

(We'll see how these ones go. If you like the idea and we get some bids, we'll put some more up, sharpish. Cheers!)

Flackenhack Award Categories: Part 2

Two weeks to go until The Flackenhacks 2008. . . 

And here are more categories dredged up from beneath the gooseberry bush in the Flackenhacks' back yard. . .  Let us have your nominations, please: you can do so in the form of a comment, anonymously if you prefer. Elsewise, feel free to drop us an email at theflackenhacks [AT] gmail.com.

Rude hack

Charles Arthur. Nuff said. No? There are more..?

Media budget cutter

Whoops! There go my advertisers. When the ads dry up, these fellas unsheath their swords. Who wields the most ferocious weapon in media?

Up its own arse

They've drunk the Kool-Aid, they've eaten the dog food. How come we're the ones who are yacking up? We say, don't ever believe your own PR. They say, "but we're the world's leading…"

Pointless press release

We're just going to sift through PR Newswire for a couple of days. Sure we'll dig something up. But if you've got a particularly good example (anonymity guaranteed) then let us know.

Wank 2.0: User-generated twat

Yes, yes, we know, everything's going digital. Wiki, blog, 2.0, 3.0, social, Facebook, crowdsourcing, viral video, widget, feed, comment. We buy it, OK? But Christ, some people just will not stop banging on about it. Who's the one you just wish would shut up. Just for a bit, eh?