Day 9–Wednesday 1 April 2020

I’m still taking Pip the Dog on the same walk every morning at 7am. I’ve noticed that she’s becoming quite familiar with the route as normally she would be running most of it, even whilst being on a flex-lead. But after 9 days she’s walking most of it. So I’m resorting to calling out Go! Go Pip!

In fairness she does react to that and does a hop and skip and a litte run.

So, last week I signed up to a series of webinars via Zoom promising to help our mental health during this period. It was promoted via someone I trust implicitly, I have witnessed his work for at least 15 years and he’s awesome.

I signed up immediately, didn’t read it properly and they did ask for a donation or whatever we could afford. So I did pay $10, just $10 not a lot of money, I did feel bad but I suspect my business is going to suffer during this period, like so many others, it’s inevitable.

I joined the first one on Monday 30 March 2020, full of expectation, but the person I was hoping for wasn’t there, instead someone I didn’t really know. Yes, I was disappointed for sure but stuck with it. A guest appeared who was going to take us through a Yoga Nidra exercise. I am very familiar with it and definitely not what I expected but I stuck with it.

Day 2, I joined also but it was late evening and I was feeling tired already, this time it was covering healing crystals. I’m not a non-believer but felt more uncertain as the webinar went on, so felt quite low and disappointed. I asked for my money back. I know it was only $10, I felt bad, I should have just let it go. Oh well, I did it and just will have to let it go. The person I was expecting is due to be on at the end of the week Friday 3rd April but I won’t be joining of course seeing as I asked for my money back.

So what is this telling me? There are so many do-gooders at the moment, including coaches, spiritual people and many other genres giving stuff away to try and help. The trouble is just as much overwhelming as the news media, the fake news and round robin hug messages via Facebook messenger.

It’s too much and has to stop. It has to stop with me, people are free to tout whatever they wish, I should just stop reacting to it. So this is my new habit along with the other one I adopted the other day.

Habit 1: Stop judging people who are not adhering to the social distancing rules.

Habit 2: Stop reacting to all the so-called useful content and let them go.

Michael de Groot

Today’s U.K. government data sets:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/877458/2020-01-04_No10_Comms_Slides_Tableau_Version.pdf

Day 8–Tuesday 31 March 2020

Right then we’ve achieved one week in social distancing in the UK. Well, survived is not really the right term is it, because a load of people in the UK (2,352 as at 5pm 31.3.2020) have crossed over due to this horrible virus.

Wow!

My day was filled with completing a Whiteboard Animation project for Gorilla Spirits, which landed just before it all went crazy and fair enough the client continued with the project, which is really awesome. I have included it below for you to view.

[embed]https://youtu.be/UU1G2cb5wTk[/embed]

I got this project through Fiverr, but I have to say I am hugely disappointed with them for a number of reasons. Would you like to hear, I am sure you do!

Firstly let me share with you how my Gig looks like online, see image below.

As you can probably see the cost for the premium package is £763.28. Why is it such a strange figure? Well, it is because you can only add US$ as the amount, but as I’m in the UK, it is shown in UK£. Okay that’s fine. As it happens I had to quote the client a specific higher amount. But when I then had to quote that to the client, it only gave me the option to enter it as US$ again, but it converted that to UK£, just like the packages. It meant that in order to quote the right amount through Fiverr, I had to keep quoting and experiment with different figures until the correct UK£ showed up.

The experience was just awful and made me look so amateurish to the client.

Then I discover that when the client paid, Fiverr took 20% of that amount.

WHAT?!!!

You’re kidding right? I had no idea they took that much, this is a crazy amount and definitely not what I would have expected or wish to pay. After this experience and complaining to Fiverr, I will definitely put my offer on hold or take it off altogether. There’s no way that this amount is reasonable or achievable for me or any other freelancers.

Anyway, we did manage to deliver a great project to the client and delighted to have received a 5 star review and some great comments too.

Hi Michael, I have completed the order and feedback. Many thanks for getting this done in such a short time. We are delighted. Best Wishes, Andy

---

After I completed this project with great satisfaction, I must say, we had a nice meal and I went to Lidl supermarket in Stourport on Severn, Worcestershire to do our weekly shop. It was nice and quiet there and managed to get most things on our list, so that was good. As usual not everyone was adhering to the social distancing rules, but hey ho, I am practicing to stop judging them all, which I have to say I had been doing.

Okay that’s about all for this journal entry, managed to write this the day after, so I’m getting better now.

Michael de Groot

Today’s U.K. government data sets:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/877187/Comms_slides_for_No_10_31st_of_March.pdf

Day 7–Monday 30 March 2020

This morning I was greeted by the news that a breathing aid that can help keep Covid-19 patients out of intensive care, had been adapted by mechanical engineers at UCL and clinicians at UCLH working with Mercedes-AMG High Performance Powertrains (Mercedes-AMG HPP) and has been approved for use in the NHS. This was truly amazing news indeed, this will likely save a lot of lives I believe. Great engineering by probably the best engineers in the world. The image above shows what has been created.

Today is my sister-in-law’s 60th birthday. Last week it was my Aunt’s birthday, the week before that my brother’s birthday and a few weeks ago my uncle’s birthday, who lives in France and is on total lock down. They have much tougher restrictions compared to us here in the UK, we have it quite easy compared with them.

Below is the image I created, which I sent as a digital card to my sister-in-law. I’ve been using either sending physical cards through an app called ‘Thortful’ or usually creating my own digital postcards and emailing them.

This was the email I received from my aunt, who lives in France with my uncle.

We are coping well and very fortunately there is one supermarket which will deliver food to Beaulieu so we are taking advantage of that and have had food etc delivered for the last three weeks. I am not going out at all for fear of bringing the virus back into the house and passing it on to Ian who is, of course, terribly vulnerable. It would be a disaster were he to catch it with all the health problems that he is coping with already. The pharmacy delivers his medication to the door and our neighbours and friends have been wonderful.

The restrictions here are strictly enforced by the Gendarmes. You have to have your official piece of paper with you whenever you step out of the door for any reason. You must state on that bit of paper what time you left the house because you are only allowed to be out of the house for one hour and only for certain reasons, shopping, to get medication etc. You are allowed to take exercise, alone, no cycling, but only within one kilometre from your home. Any breaking of these rules or will be fined — starting with a fine of €135 for the first offence. Hardly anybody on the Boulevard, very few cars.

I signed up for a week worth of webinars, titled ‘Resilience — a week of sanity’. Webinars with health tips, suggestions and practices. Today’s one was doing ‘Yoga Nidra’ together. We were just listening to audio and either sitting comfortably or lying down, following the instructions by the practitioner. I decided to lie down and promptly fell asleep through most of it. I am familiar with Yoga Nidra and because it is so relaxing it is quite difficult to stay awake. Anyway, let’s see what’s on tomorrow.

Stay safe and well.

Michael de Groot

Ps. The U.K. government charts started today, as far as I can figure out,

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/876889/FINAL_Press_Conference_Slides_20200330.pdf

Day 6–Sunday 29 March 2020

About 2 weeks ago, when the panic buying started in the UK, I decided to purchase some toilet rolls and a few other things from Asda stores online for a click and collect order. I thought probably by the time the date came round for collecting these items they would be out of stock. By my big surprise, I received an email on Sunday morning, telling me that the toilet rolls were in stock and ready to collect, but the other items, yellow split peas and a couple of other things were not.

Anyway, it meant I went out to collect those and there is a dedicated parking space, only two, for people that come to get their items through click and collect. But the one space that was left had people standing in it queuing for the store. This is what’s happening now, we have probably never seen this happen in this country. People queuing to get into grocery stores. So I had to signal them to say that I was needing to get into that space. Well the looks I got were quite incredible.

Once you are in your space, there are two ways of letting the staff know that you are there to collect your shopping, either call them or identify where you are on the app. Well I had never done this on the app previously so tried calling them and of course I got a message to say they weren’t able to connect me. So I tried the app and kept fingers crossed that they would come out with my shopping.

Next to me was another car, who had their boot open, so when the shop assistant came out with their shopping, they could just load it in, shut the boot and off they go. That was a good idea I though and got out of my car to open the boot, but by this time all the people in the queue were queuing up at the back of cars in the car park including my car. They were literally 10 cms away from my car. So I had to ask one chap to move on, so I could be 2 metres away from him whilst opening my boot. When I called out to him and called him, sir, he got quite a shock and said that nobody ever calls him sir unless it’s the police! Anyway opened the boot and waited. When the car next to me got their shopping loaded in their car, I called out to the assistant, gave him my name and asked if he could get my shopping.

This whole episode was ridiculous really, we’re all treating each other as zombies, walking on the planet with some deadly disease, which of course we could have. It was in that moment I realised life would never ever be the same again.

Michael de Groot

Day 5–Saturday 28 March 2020

So, remember Luke’s bicycle that had to be repaired, well today is the day that I will be dropping the bike off with him. Luke lives in Kidderminster and I live in Stourport on Severn, about a 5 mile journey. My wife told me that police have started to stop car drivers, asking them where they are going!

So I was definitely a bit apprehensive in taking Luke’s bike back to him. I called him as I was on my way to his flat and told him that I would park up, get the bike out of my car, put the front tyre on and park it up near his building, together with some toilet rolls that I was bringing for him.

Was my trip essential? I thought it was, Luke is stuck in a one-room apartment for 3 weeks and probably longer, his bike is potentially his only way of getting some exercise and fresh air, which is essential for his mental health and well-being. So I do believe it was essential.

Whilst I was driving to his flat I noticed a grocery store that had just a few people in the queue. So I decided that on my way back I would check whether the queue was still the same and pick up a few essential items that we needed at home. The methods for entering the store was quite strict, I had to sanitise my hands before touching the shopping basket. It was only a small store but they had very strict rules for staying 2 metres apart from each other and even a one-way system in the store. There were actually only a few people in the store, but some of them were having real issues staying within the distance rules, despite the markers on the floor being very clear.

I do find it incredible that folks have such trouble sticking to some very basic rules. I know it is hard to have your freedom taken away from you but it is also so wrong that some just do not care who lives and dies from this virus.

Politicians and medical professionals keep repeating the same mantra. Stay Home, Protect the NHS, Save Lives but still some just do not understand.

Apart from taking that trip, my wife was at her mother’s looking after her as she’s in 12 weeks isolation, due to her health complications and I spent about 4 hours watching Netflix, mainly the new season of Ozark. I have watched the previous 2 seasons, so couldn’t wait to get stuck into that.

Stay safe and well.

[embed]https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/pm-video-message-on-coronavirus-27-march-2020[/embed]

Michael de Groot

Day 4-Friday 27 March 2020

I’m losing track of the days, are you too? All the days are starting to look the same to me. Started the same routine, walking Pip the Dog for a walk, avoiding the streets, where I might meet other dog walkers. Not me being paranoid, just want to make sure I follow the rules but also staying safe. If I were to catch the virus, my wife would have to isolate too and that’s not good, because she’s her mother’s carer at the moment.

Though I have been thinking aren’t we supposed to all get this virus anyway, so we can develop immunity? Probably not, because it will definitely cause more deaths. Waiting patiently for the antibody test to come out, this would be a massive game changer I believe.

Apart from walking Pip, having breakfast, shower etc., all the normal boring things, I spent some time working on the only animation project I have going on at the moment. I was sorting out the best music and submitting the storyboard to the client, which apart from one sketch, which we amended, was approved. Josh can now go ahead with the proper illustrations.

If you have been reading my previous posts you will know too that I’ve also been working with my Taiko drumming teacher on getting him teaching online. Well we both joined a Zoom online teaching session by a Taiko group in Germany. I joined for about an hour and I wasn’t that impressed with how it went. I believe we would really need to rethink our approach altogether. The sound quality is a real issue for participants. More to come on that next week.

I suspect over the coming days/weeks I will start to run out of things to write about. I must make some notes during the day, so I remember what actually happened. I’m sitting down writing this post on Sunday 29 March, so I’m actually behind on capturing the days events. Must get my act together on this.

Stay safe and well.

[embed]https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-bill-what-it-will-do/what-the-coronavirus-bill-will-do[/embed]

Michael de Groot

Day 3–Thursday 26 March 2020

Had another wonderful long early walk with Pip the dog. We had some excitement though, usually we don’t meet anyone, but this morning, someone and his very young 6 month old spaniel also had the same idea as us. Damn, it’s catching on, that’s not what I was hoping for. Pip is not always great with other dogs, we rescued her 5 years ago, she is now 10 years old.

The rescue place told us she was fine with other dogs, however whenever she came close to other dogs, she would be quite feisty and she even delved her teeth into a dog’s ear once. She didn’t draw blood, it was okay, she just managed to get hold of it’s hair, which was lucky as she definitely would have been in trouble. Ever since then she’s always on the lead and I just do not allow her to socialise with other dogs. A real shame I know!

Well, this other dog we met on OUR field, was not on the lead and made a bee-line for us. I had to pick Pip up and hold her in the air. Normally Pip will grow and bark, like she wants to eat them up, but this time after a few minutes, she started squeaking, she so desperately wanted to play with this other dog, but I just didn’t want to risk it. This 6-month old spaniel looked beautiful and I would hate for him to be damaged in any way. Eventually the owner managed this puppy to listen to him and we could go down our own paths. I really hope he’s not there tomorrow!

Right then apart from some emails, reading, listening to the news updates, I spent another good amount of time helping James with virtual Taiko drumming experiments. Today we had Kate, who is an awesome drummer, based in her home, helping us test out the technology her side.

The bottom line, it doesn't really work. There will be too many variables across all the students and as such it will be too big a task for very little return. So back to the drawing board and we will have to think of a totally different approach, which may be still having the Zoom call, for a chat and a social, then showing everyone the song to practice by James playing it to everyone, we know he can be heard with his iPad and then everyone using air drumming to rehearse the song.

After that James will have pre-recorded the song on his camera, which everyone can then watch back in their own time and practice over the coming weeks. All of this testing is taking a huge amount of time to sort out actually, but I believe we’re getting closer to finalising an idea.

Apart from all this, I also took the time to apply to STEAMhouse. They are a European Funded business support organisation. I was with them from August 2018, but to be honest they didn’t do much for me. They have new funding, I guess not European and therefore I am trying again to get some support for my Augmented Reality ideas. They now are setting up a specific lab that deals with AR, VR etc. This is what I ideally needed last time around, but never got. So fingers crossed I will get the support this time around.

In the evening I am getting into the habit of watching Adam Dacey of Mindspace doing his evening 1/2 hour meditations at 7.30pm GMT, soon to be BST. It really is very useful and enjoyable. Please do check him out. I am including a playlist below:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1DrvSW1_WqgD3LtGP1u1at3vXcNA62GG

Be safe and stay at home most of the time!

Michael de Groot

Day 2–Wednesday 25 March 2020

So the day starts as follows. Awake around 6.30am, that’s when Clair’s alarm goes off. Pip the dog, by this time, has managed to quietly get on the bed during the dead of night and starts to stir, wanting her walk. I manage to fight her demands off until about 7am.

With the new rules, I have got a new route. Instead of walking her on the streets through housing estates, I take her across fields, nickname for those fields are ‘cow pat’, titled as such, because during the summer those fields are occupied by cows, who leave humongous cow pats. Obvious I know! After the fields I have to cross the main road, which actually still seems very very busy and then we go down a dirt track towards the water tower. Not really a tower as such, it’s just where the water company has their pumping station. It is on a slight hill, which means we both, Pip and me, have to exercise to get up the hill. I have to say she manages much better than me. We then walk a tiny bit further on to a bit of farm field, which is like a dead-end. We turn around, retrace our steps down the track, but have to walk on the pavement alongside the main road and then back through a housing estate, back to our house.

In the last couple of days we noticed, Pip and I, because she has this nose that can smell and detect anything, that the farmer left huge mounds of manure. He’s obviously getting ready to plow the field and sow something. Over the years we have walked there before and it’s about time that he’s sowing something because the fields have been resting for at least 3 — 4 years I think.

Then back and breakfast for us both.

I had another very long call with my Taiko drumming teacher, testing the Zoom set-up across his laptop and iPad, to evaluate sound quality for remote teaching. We were reasonably happy that this worked, but the unknown is whether the participants with their individual technology set-up and practice drumming equipment will be able to follow the teaching and then relay their understanding to the teacher. Tomorrow we will test what the result of that will be with another drummer.

In the evening we heard about the support for the self-employed in the UK and very disappointed to hear that they are offering 80% of their profits over the past 3 years. Now I know and you know that self-employed folks will try to minimise their profits each year so they can limit their corporation tax bill. This is a well known fact and therefore the UK Government are trying to get away with having to support very few self-employed at the end of the day.

My situation is even worse. Sure I am so-called self-employed but my company is actually a Limited company, however I do not fit into any of the announced support packages and therefore I am not eligible for any support whatsoever. Okay I can defer tax payments, but that will be virtually nothing, seeing as business has dried up!

Hey ho, so be it. This too will pass…

[embed]https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/pm-statement-on-coronavirus-25-march-2020[/embed]

Michael de Groot

Day 1–Tuesday 24 March 2020

On Monday 23rd March the UK was placed in quarantine in response to the global pandemic. Everyone was told to stay at home, apart from some basic rules for key workers and infrequent shopping trips for medical supplies and food necessities. This intervention was inevitable but probably earlier than expected. I do believe it was in direct response to many millions of people in the U.K. spending the weekend in parks and on the beaches for Mother’s Day and not taking the previous advice seriously enough.

Many people had already been isolating and taking all the previous advice seriously, but as is always true with human behaviour, many believed it didn’t apply to them. Actually probably many people are still not taking it seriously and I can share one small example in my own family!

Last night at around 8pm, my wife was called by her son, my stepson, asking to be collected from the countryside. He had cycled with his 2 friends into the countryside, about 10miles away to a quarry site, where unfortunately his bicycle encountered a puncture and of course he couldn’t cycle back.

So I went to collect him and his bike to take him back to his flat, he lives on his own. But he also needed some food, so I had to stop at the supermarket and buy a few things from there. Fortunately the supermarket was still open and I was able to get some essentials for him and also for my wife and I.

His 2 friends walked up to the car and I had to raise my voice for them to keep away from me. These 3 lads do not live together, they are not form the same household and they could have infected each other and in turn I could be infected also. Hopefully I haven’t been but the next few days will tell for sure.

I did give these 3 lads a bit of a roasting, because they definitely hadn’t taken the advice seriously and quite probably hadn’t heard the advice either the previous evening!

Apart from that event in the evening, my day was filled with a some work for a client, creating a storyboard for a new whiteboard animation project, which are featuring Gorillas! I also started a new walking routine with the dog to stay away from houses as much as possible, across fields and down a track to a water tower and because the weather has been so nice, it’s been wonderful very early in the morning at 7am. Pleased to say that I never had to cross anyone’s path.

The other project that filled my day, was helping my Taiko Drumming teacher set up his technology with the purpose of him starting virtual Taiko drumming lessons using Zoom. Zoom is probably the best technology for doing it. We just have to test a few other things before going live.

Because my work has been done from home for many years now, it definitely is not strange for me to work from home, but I’m definitely not looking forward to the prospect of lost revenue, which will inevitably be significant. More about that in my future journal posts, as I will explain why my business will likely not receive any support from the government. Quite worrying.

Be safe and stay well. #stayingaliveuk

[embed]https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/pm-address-to-the-nation-on-coronavirus-23-march-2020[/embed]

Michael de Groot

Your wisest words inside your car?

Whoever started the craze of recording a video whilst sitting inside your car? Maybe too much noise in your office or home office? Maybe you saw someone do this and you also thought it would be a good idea?

Either way it is a method overused and over-copied.

It’s looks inauthentic, too staged and this is what you are saying to us!

I don’t have time to do this properly, I am too busy and only have time to record a quick video, in between jobs and appointments with clients. Because I’m so busy, I need to demonstrate to you how truly busy I am and the only time I have without any interruptions is whilst I have 30 seconds to pause inside my car. You should be really grateful that I am able to make the time to record a video with some free guidance and coaching, that normally you would have to pay for. My objective is to make you feel unworthy, a failure and jealous of the fact that I am SO busy.

But that’s not the intention I hear you say?

Seriously, think about it, think about how the viewer is feeling about themselves, you believe you’re doing them a favour and in fact you’re making them feel worse.

Get over yourself and stop this ridiculous practice!

Happy driving!

Michael de Groot

What do you do?

This by far is the worst question asked at networking events all over the world. I literally cringe at hearing that question. I usually answer with, ‘don’t you have a better question?’, which usually gets me a really disgusting look from the questioner.

The chances are when you go to a networking event you’ve already been agonising, on your journey there, about how to introduce yourself. In the end, when posed with that question, you’re likely to just say, ‘well I’m an accountant’. So that ended the conversation, 100% guaranteed. Everyone knows what an accountant is, don’t they? Well not really, accountants have stories too, they have clients, whose stories may interest you as a business owner and may actually reveal something about the values of this particular accountant. Nothing is certain in life, not even the life of an accountant.

How about instead of saying, ‘well, I’m just an accountant’, which is very likely what you would have said and just replace the title with your own title by the way, because that’s what I’ve heard you say. How do I know? I’ve heard thousands of people say the same thing, no matter where in the world.

Where was I? Oh yes, instead say the following, ‘do you have 60 seconds for a story?’, nobody will say no, you’ve just told them it will only take 60 seconds, great they think and you’ve told them that you’re going to share a story and EVERYONE loves a story.

Fact, we’ve been literally hard-wired (in our brains) to love stories. After all, you’ve loved stories since you were knee-high.

So to explain what I mean, I crafted a short 60 seconds story for an accountant. His name is James Ashbrook. Made up name completely fictional, so if your accountant has this name, it’s a complete coincidence.

Have you ever come across folk that leave their business finances until the last minute? Not you of course! Well, I had this client the other day, of course their business remains nameless, but his name was James. Well James hadn’t done his business accounts for 6 months. He kept the receipts though, really great job I thought, but he arrived on my door step with a couple of carrier bags. A couple of carrier bags! And they weren’t even bags for life, they were these really old supermarket plastic bags, you know the ones I mean right? I don’t think they even make those now! Anyway I got to work and then later that day, he chased me to see how far I got! The cheek of it, but I said nothing. Then he told me he needed to submit his accounts to his board of directors the next day! It was just bad after worse all along the way. Anyway, I’m sure you don’t need to hear ALL the ins and outs. The fact is I got it done, he was happy and the great outcome was that he hired me on a permanent basis, plus has recommended me to loads of his clients and connections. Sometimes it JUST pays to go the extra mile. I don’t only think that now, I know I go the extra mile. Yes, my name is James Ashbrook and I run an accountancy called ‘The Extra Mile’, I know we’re meeting now but I’d love it if we met for a coffee and cake too. Who doesn’t like cake, right? Here’s my card!

Not difficult was it?

So now it’s your turn, write your short story, make sure you include a character, yes it can be a completely fictional character, in order to demonstrate your business prowess. Share something that’s memorable, that includes how you solved your customer’s pain points. It’s always about the pain points.

Send me your draft and I will critique it, give you some pointers and then you must practice it in front of your camera and watch it back. Keep doing it until you are word perfect. And then try it out on the unsuspecting public at networking events. You will be in the minority, so you will be remembered for sure.

Happy networking!

Michael de Groot

Mind Map by Michael de Groot as presented at The Technology Supply Chain meeting 25 February 2020 in Birmingham UK

Do you know The Cookie Monster?

By Gnasher

I never knew him as well as I do now, thanks to HubSpot for making it clearer for me. They shared a blogpost with me, which contained the following key bit of text.

What’s the difference between a first party and a third party cookie?

The difference between first- and third- party cookies is how they’re saved and who can see them. When a website saves a cookie, it’s given a domain. If the domain on the cookie matches the domain of the website setting it, it’s a first party cookie. If the domain is different, it’s a third party cookie. First party cookies can only be seen when on the website that set it, where third party cookies are visible from any website.

This is why most ad tools use third party cookies; they enable a tool to track a user across multiple websites, and they can use that cross-site data from any other website to tailor ads.

One specific example:

Let’s say you’re on a website, a.com. It’s an ecommerce business. You put something in your shopping cart. When you come back later, the site remembers you, and keeps your same items in the shopping card. That’s the result of a first party cookie doing its job. The cookie was set by the same domain you’re on.

On the other hand, let’s say you’re on a.com, and the page you’re on contains an iframe from a different website (b.com). Cookies set by b.com accessed from an a.com page are third-party cookies. Accessing them from a.com is a cross-site request. This iframe might show you an ad via Doubleclick — — they track you across multiple websites, and serve you ads wherever you go online.

Every single time I click on a news story, that someone has shared on social media and I click through to the news website, I am confronted with a massive cookie notice, rendering the news story impossible to read. Of course most of us just agree to the notice, because we’re so hungry for that news story. But you have no idea that they are sharing your cookie with hundreds and maybe even thousands of vendors (that’s what they call them), actually advertisers, names you have never ever heard of all across the globe.

I did a video for you, so you can see for yourself and of course Facebook is complicit too, because they add an extra bit of spice on top of the tracking process with the Facebook Pixel. That way doesn’t matter if you’re active on Facebook or even have an account, they will track you off line as well.

[embed]https://youtu.be/nWUwZ2IXRqM[/embed]

The web has become an ugly and evil marketplace, the desperation of making money off every single visitor to your website has made the surfing experience a total waste of time. The TV once again has become attractive, I’m talking of course about the channels that do not serve ads, but that means we’re still paying aren’t we? Maybe an Internet that needs to be paid for, like your Spotify and Netflix could be a better future?

Happy surfing!

Michael de Groot

ps. My discussion on LinkedIn below.

[embed]https://www.linkedin.com/posts/stayingaliveuk_thats-it-ive-had-it-im-never-again-clicking-activity-6636525673294905344-Axdk[/embed]

HS2 has been given the multi-billion £ go ahead

RAILWAY SHOT

Excuse me for being cynical or even critical at all. I find it astounding that the U.K. government can find billions for a HUGE infrastructure project (HS2 = High Speed Rail 2), with promises of fortunes for who? The mega rich of course, told you I was being cynical. I also heard on the news today that the U.K. have 300,000 homeless people. That’s a ⅓ of a million people and nearly 0.5% of the whole of the U.K. population.

Those billions would build an awful lot of houses for many homeless and the best we can get are a ‘housing first’ trial. If we were really serious about creating infrastructure projects, building houses would not only create more jobs throughout the whole supply chain, it would solve one of the largest social issues we are experiencing in the 21st century, Homelessness.

I guarantee you that in about 20/25 years when HS2 is due to be complete, we will still have a homeless problem in the U.K.

We mistake, economic prosperity for the rich with a moral duty to enrich every person in society, including the homeless.

U.K., get your priorities right!

Michael de Groot

Is the Corona affecting your business…it will!

Corona Virus

Corporations big and small are after growth, year in year out and then something like this happens;

“Our best guess is that the economic disruption related to the coronavirus will cost the world economy over $280 billion in the first quarter of this year,” said Capital Economics. “That would mean that global GDP will not grow in quarter-on-quarter terms for the first time since 2009.”

Is it all worth it? You decide…

Michael de Groot

🥴

Episode 1 — The ‘Share Your Story’ Comic Strip

[embed]https://youtu.be/050fZ9Lvb28[/embed]

A move on from our ‘Weekly Cartoon’, experimenting for our clients with this approach a 3 panel comic strip, which can have multiple use. Use a panel independently, as a animated GIF and release it weekly, creating anticipation and tension in your audience or create a new strip each week, moving the story forward step by step. I see very few people doing this and for sure you’d stand out from the crowd.

Tap on the box below to learn more about our creativity:

[embed]https://stayingaliveuk.com/michaelandjosh[/embed]

Michael de Groot

Online Storytelling Workshop

I am running Online Storytelling Workshops to reach more businesses and make it accessible for more start-ups, small businesses and students.

I’ve been curious about business for over 40 years. The main reason? Well, money of course! My father worked for the Bank of America in Amsterdam and he was the most frugal spender I have ever come across. Whenever we as kids and there were four of us, asked for money he used to point to his back and ask if we could see any money growing on it.

A very strange saying but it has stuck with me for all my life.

So my desire to make my own money came at a very early age. I started work at the age of 16 and got the taste of money whilst working for a family friend’s business in Amsterdam. When we moved to the United Kingdom and after having had the first taste of my own money there was no way I wanted to continue with my education, I wanted to work in London and become independent. So at the age of 17 my employment in business had begun. I’ve worked for several large organisations in the Textile Industry and have come across hundreds of managers, several CEO’s and Managing Directors and there was just one thing that separated the good ones from the really bad ones and that was Storytelling.

Those that could tell a great story, stood out for me and got my respect, those that couldn’t didn’t.

Storytelling applies to people in business just as much as those that are running their own business, it makes no difference. Let me explain why.

All communication is Storytelling. Just pay attention to your next conversation with anyone, a friend, a family member, a colleague or a complete stranger. I am 99.9% confident that the dialogue you engage in contains many many short stories. Well, if all communication is Storytelling, we should be paying more attention to it don’t you think?

I come across many business people and listen intently to how they introduce themselves, whether its at networking events, during public speaking, presentations etc. I am astounded and quite frankly shocked on how little Storytelling is used by business people. You may not appreciate how programmed you are for Storytelling. You started listening to stories, potentially before you could even talk properly. In those early years you listened to words uttered by your parents and grandparents, those sounds you had to convert into pictures in your brain and that’s how your cortex started its development to comprehend stories and the start of all communication.

In the decades that you have been walking on this planet you have been exposed to stories through the medium of TV, Radio, Cinema, Books, Podcasts, Music, Theatre, The Internet, Social Media and many other media channels.

Your exposure to Storytelling means it is already second nature to you. All you have to do is understand the mechanics, the framework and the structure to get started in crafting your own story and your business story. I’m not asking you to become an author, a script writer or an amazing orator, I’m asking you to become better at doing something, you’ve already been doing all your life.

When you join the Online Storytelling Workshop, you will leave with a storytelling blueprint for your own business by recording your own story using the Share Your Story canvas. This online workshop is only the beginning of your journey. Afterwards there are 2 optional paid for (£24) follow-up coaching calls to keep you on track and finalise your own ‘Share Your Story’ Blueprint. That’s not all, read on and you’ll be pleasantly surprised with all the additional online support and free resources included in your initial workshop!

INCREASE YOUR SKILL TO SHARE MEANINGFUL STORIES:

• In digital and online

• In your branding and off line

• In your speaking

• In your networking

• In your conversations

WHO SHOULD ATTEND?

• Small businesses (typically with less than 9 employees)

• Freelancers

• Solopreneurs

• Start-up businesses (Discounts provided, please ask!)

• Speakers — Presenters

• Trainers

• Coaches

• Unemployed (Concessions available, please ask!)

WHAT IS INCLUDED FOR EVERYONE WHO ATTENDS THE ONLINE SESSION:

• Free access to LinkedIn Lectures course with 13-hours of on-line video training. Value — £90

• Membership of a private LinkedIn mastermind group for all workshop attendees. This group will support you to follow-through with your actions, share best practices, progress and allow constructive and supportive feedback. Value — Immeasurable!

• Opportunity to be a guest on the ‘Share Your Story’ Podcast and share your story with thousands of podcast listeners. Value — Priceless!

I really look forward to welcoming you at a forthcoming Online Storytelling Workshop

Online Storytelling Workshop

Hugh MacLeod

I am running Online Storytelling Workshops to reach more businesses and make it accessible for more start-ups, small businesses and students.

I’ve been curious about business for over 40 years. The main reason? Well, money of course! My father worked for the Bank of America in Amsterdam and he was the most frugal spender I have ever come across. Whenever we as kids and there were four of us, asked for money he used to point to his back and ask if we could see any money growing on it.

A very strange saying but it has stuck with me for all my life.

So my desire to make my own money came at a very early age. I started work at the age of 16 and got the taste of money whilst working for a family friend’s business in Amsterdam. When we moved to the United Kingdom and after having had the first taste of my own money there was no way I wanted to continue with my education, I wanted to work in London and become independent. So at the age of 17 my employment in business had begun. I’ve worked for several large organisations in the Textile Industry and have come across hundreds of managers, several CEO’s and Managing Directors and there was just one thing that separated the good ones from the really bad ones and that was Storytelling.

Those that could tell a great story, stood out for me and got my respect, those that couldn’t didn’t.

Storytelling applies to people in business just as much as those that are running their own business, it makes no difference. Let me explain why.

All communication is Storytelling. Just pay attention to your next conversation with anyone, a friend, a family member, a colleague or a complete stranger. I am 99.9% confident that the dialogue you engage in contains many many short stories. Well, if all communication is Storytelling, we should be paying more attention to it don’t you think?

[embed]https://www.linkedin.com/events/shareyourstory-onlinestorytellingworkshop/[/embed]

I come across many business people and listen intently to how they introduce themselves, whether its at networking events, during public speaking, presentations etc. I am astounded and quite frankly shocked on how little Storytelling is used by business people. You may not appreciate how programmed you are for Storytelling. You started listening to stories, potentially before you could even talk properly. In those early years you listened to words uttered by your parents and grandparents, those sounds you had to convert into pictures in your brain and that’s how your cortex started its development to comprehend stories and the start of all communication.

In the decades that you have been walking on this planet you have been exposed to stories through the medium of TV, Radio, Cinema, Books, Podcasts, Music, Theatre, The Internet, Social Media and many other media channels.

[embed]https://www.linkedin.com/events/shareyourstory-onlinestorytellingworkshop/[/embed]

Your exposure to Storytelling means it is already second nature to you. All you have to do is understand the mechanics, the framework and the structure to get started in crafting your own story and your business story. I’m not asking you to become an author, a script writer or an amazing orator, I’m asking you to become better at doing something, you’ve already been doing all your life.

When you join the Online Storytelling Workshop, you will leave with a storytelling blueprint for your own business by recording your own story using the Share Your Story canvas. This online workshop is only the beginning of your journey. Afterwards there are 2 optional paid for (£24) follow-up coaching calls to keep you on track and finalise your own ‘Share Your Story’ Blueprint. That’s not all, read on and you’ll be pleasantly surprised with all the additional online support and free resources included in your initial workshop!

INCREASE YOUR SKILL TO SHARE MEANINGFUL STORIES:

• In digital and online
• In your branding and off line
• In your speaking
• In your networking
• In your conversations

WHO SHOULD ATTEND?

• Small businesses (typically with less than 9 employees)
• Freelancers
• Solopreneurs
• Start-up businesses (Discounts provided, please ask!)
• Speakers — Presenters
• Trainers
• Coaches
• Unemployed (Concessions available, please ask!)

WHAT IS INCLUDED FOR EVERYONE WHO ATTENDS THE ONLINE SESSION:

• Free access to LinkedIn Lectures course with 13-hours of on-line video training. Value — £90
• Membership of a private LinkedIn mastermind group for all workshop attendees. This group will support you to follow-through with your actions, share best practices, progress and allow constructive and supportive feedback. Value — Immeasurable!
• Opportunity to be a guest on the ‘Share Your Story’ Podcast and share your story with thousands of podcast listeners. Value — Priceless!

I really look forward to welcoming you at a forthcoming Online Storytelling Workshop

Michael de Groot

250 Ways to get your Data

Typical News Website Cookie Notice — now read below and weep!

Lots of us that are on Twitter get our news from there. There are millions of users posting links to news websites and most of these news websites, these days, are behind a paywall, so we can’t read the article unless we pay!

But there are also 100’s of news websites who do not have a paywall, but they need us to accept their cookie notice. Their cookie notice is SO big, it means that unless you accept it, there’s absolutely no way that you can read the article that you have been lured towards.

So what do you do, just click away? Well you’ve taken the trouble of being enticed to go and read the article, so you might as well click the cookie notice and read the article. But have you ever really investigated what you are giving acceptance too?

After investigating many websites who have this very large cookie notice, obscuring the article, I have discovered that there are around 250 companies, who are after your data.

They introduce their cookie notice with the following wording. I have grabbed this from a media website named archant.co.uk.

We are committed to building local communities through high-quality journalism and content. We and our partners use technology such as cookies to personalise content and advertising for you, to provide social media features and to better understand our audience. By enabling cookies you will help us to fund the journalism & content you enjoy, safeguarding it for the future and personalising your reading experience across all Archant Community Media Ltd owned brands. By choosing not to accept cookies you will receive a generic content and advertising experience, not tailored to you or your local interests. If you do not wish for us to use cookies (other than those that are strictly necessary) please change the buttons below and save & exit. You can revisit your choice at any time by clicking ‘Manage cookies’ at the bottom of this site.

Let’s be clear, this is not just Google or Facebook ads, these are 250 companies across the world, who wish to push ads to you based on your unique IP address. These aren’t just ads on their website, these are ads wherever you go.

In essence The Internet and the media websites and others, have constructed a new tax, that tax is your data and ads. If you wish to consume any content these days, that is the tax you are paying. Regardless of their suggestion that you can manage, what you receive in terms of ads, it’s not that easy to manage it and it takes time, a lot of time, especially seeing as we’re all so time poor and surf the web in split second increments.

I move away now from any website that has this huge cookie notice — I avoid them all the time. Instead I consume my news in other ways, Twitter is great, but definitely avoid clicking through to news websites. The Apple News app is not bad, but even inside there they have loads of ads and now most news channels request a subscription.

I’m afraid this is only going to get worse as media channels are trying to get their revenues up.

The company I researched by the way has a £87 million turnover and employ 1,277 people. See the stats below.

Happy news surfing, but just know what you are saying YES too.

Michael de Groot

The MOST stressful modern issue

Photo by Paul Hanaoka on Unsplash

Kids, teenagers and adults have never felt as much stress in their lives as they have today. The pressure put upon every age group by advertisers is immense. It is actually worse than paying tax in fact it is like paying tax. It’s draining.

But not even as stressful as Chargers, WiFi and Internet access as they are potentially the MOST stressful and comes even before stressful relationships and stressful family. If we don’t have security around Chargers, WiFi and the Internet, we become very short tempered and moody. We will be short with others and even rude. You may even accuse others for the reasons why you don’t have access to those essential human needs. Seriously that has happened to us at home!

It even comes ahead of food and water. We can live without food and water for at least a day, but not without Chargers, WiFi or the Internet.

We now expect to be able to walk into any public place and be able to connect to WiFi, free of charge. Do you remember the days when you visited hotels and you had to purchase a 1 hour or 24 hour internet access voucher. I know some hotels still do this, like the UK’s Travelodge, but I’m talking more about the bigger hotels, when you made use of their reception area for meetings. Now we can walk into any reception in any hotel and expect to be able to go to the reception desk and ask for a WiFi code totally free of charge.

Amazing!

Michael de Groot

Why do you need all those votes?

We all desire plenty of votes, let me give you a few examples.

Votes from our parents, to confirm we are enough.
Votes from our teachers, to confirm we are worthy students.
Votes from our employers, to confirm we make a great contribution.
Votes from our peers, to be recognised and feel like we belong to the tribe.
Votes from our friends and families all over social media, non-stop confirmation that we are loved.
Votes from our industry in the form of awards to prove that our company is among the best in the industry, in our region, in the world etc.

Why?

Everyone wants to be loved, feel good enough, feel recognised and we are constantly looking for this throughout our lives, it shows up everywhere!

Even when I’m writing this I need you to agree with me, that you can see what I’m saying is true, confirmation that I’m enough.

We are already enough, but we don’t wish to accept it.

This is the human experiment, the human drama, all of our individual stories acting out every single day, searching for approval, searching for acceptance, for love and belonging.

Look in the mirror and there you will find it all the votes you need!