Eye for Image took part in a great seminar on why companies should embrace blogging this morning.

Held at the studio of our design partners Spoiled Milk, the seminar addressed two key issues - why companies should blog, and how to do it.

I had the pleasure of speaking about the former while Spoiled Milk founder Russell Quinn addressed the technical issues.

Both our presentations will soon be available as PDFs. If you would like to receive them, either leave a comment below, or email our marketing manager at nathalie.erb@eye-for-image.com

Recently, a colleague and I got into a debate about commas and quotes.

He had edited a document for a client and I was taking a second look at it to ensure consistency.

I came across a split quote. Something along these lines:

“Why there you are Johnny,” said Jeremy. “I’ve been wondering where you’d gotten to!”

I had something of a brain-freeze and decided that the comma after Johnny needed to be outside the quote marks.

I found a source on the net that backed up my assertion, made the change and then sent the document back to my colleague.

Thankfully, my colleague is not one to back down easily and did a little research of his own. Somewhat more thorough research!

It turned out that my colleague was right, and I was wrong. All’s fair in love and war, and it was a good learning exercise for both us.

But what I really wanted to share with you was the following extremely insightful observation from the World Wide Words site which I came across during the course of my own research:

“Nobody will misunderstand what you write because of where you choose to put your stops relative to quotation marks. A writer who fixes too much attention on the correctness of his punctuation, or a reader who does the same, is missing the point: the job of text is to communicate, not satisfy pedantic rule makers.”

This seems to me to be the key learning here. It’s all too easy to get bogged down in the minutiae sometimes, and lose sight of the big picture.

The highly respected Monocle magazine has named Copenhagen as the world’s second most livable city.

The article is for subscribers only but thankfully Visit Copenhagen has provided a précis of Monocle’s chief findings:

“When it comes to quality of life, Copenhagen is pretty hard to beat. In fact, only Munich does better in Monocle magazine’s recently published survey of the world’s most liveable cities. To sum up the spirit of the Danish capital, Monocle writer Stuart Husband quotes the advertising slogan ‘there’s something modern in the state of Denmark’, which in his view ‘encapsulates Copenhagen’s current mood of creative maelstrom and youthful dynamism rather adroitly’.

Contributing to this sense of dynamic modernity is the new wave of architects, designers and chefs - combined with ’some joined-up thinking by city officials’ - which has seen Copenhagen reborn with ‘a bullish mood’. Monocle lists a number of ‘metrics’ that contribute to Copenhagen’s high placing. They include public transport, the extension at the city’s airport, the freshly-minted statement buildings lining the harbour, a well-developed bicycle network, the café culture, the neither harried nor sleepy pace and design and creativity.”

I couldn’t have said it better myself. But I wonder what your thoughts are?

Oh, and in case you were wondering, here’s the full top 10:

1. Munich
2. Copenhagen
3. Zürich
4. Tokyo
5. Vienna
6. Helsinki
7. Sydney
8. Stockholm
9. Honolulu
10. Madrid

A friend of mine who is a web and graphic designer occasionally sends me amazing links.

The latest, and one I thought I would share with you, is the site of UK design consultancy Checkland Kindleysides.

It’s Flash-heavy but is still beautifully functional. The loading between sections is playful and rather soothing, and the overall design is a triumph of simplicity.

As a copywriter, I really admire their economic use of text. Everything is kept short and sweet. In this way the text serves simply to underscore the visual brilliance of the site.

I know, I know. . . we expect this kind of thing from creative agencies, but that shouldn’t stop the rest of us picking up a few lessons!

Apparently the Danish army has evacuated around 200 Iraqis who it feared may have been targeted for the part they played in assisting the troops.

With the troops poised to withdraw next month, fears were growing that reprisal attacks were likely.

So now these Iraqis will presumably have the chance to build new lives for themselves here in Denmark.

While this is good news in itself, the part of the story that caught my eye was the quote from the officer who reports that “of course, we want to take care of our employees”.

To my mind, this is indicative of the Danish corporate culture as a whole. Staff are generally looked after very well here, at least in my experience.

I think back to the impersonal way I was treated at several large companies back home in the UK. I left those companies because I felt like I was little more than an insignificant cog in a very large wheel.

Speaking personally, my quality of life is far higher here.

Go Danmark!

That ‘About’ page on your website is important. Why? Because people like people. To put it as simply as I can, people want to know who they’re dealing with.

People want to put names to faces, they want to connect. It’s why social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook exist. We’re all just big gossips deep down!

But to get back to my point, I’ve seen some great ‘About’ pages recently. Companies that have obviously gone to the trouble to think a little bit outside the box.

I find the best ones are those which really emphasise the company’s human side. Take Pownce for instance, the newest information sharing and networking site on the block. With a little bit of thought (and humour) they have created something which, while achieving its aim of conveying background and context, also serves up a big dollop of personality.

The feeling I’m left with after looking at their ‘About’ page is : ‘They’re just ordinary folk like me!’

Now, not every company can take such a personal approach. But even the big boys could take a leaf out of the Pownce book.

My advice? Be direct, be a little light-hearted (if you dare!) and don’t be afraid to use pictures. Show your customers who you are. When you meet, it’s one less obstacle to break down.

As the social media revolution gathers pace, how are you keeping track of the upheavals in communication?

What steps are you taking to ensure that your marketing department is moving with the times, and not relying on the same old techniques to generate new leads and connect with potential customers?

Many people now talk of the fragmented marketplace - the long tail. But in many ways the opposite is true. As a new generation of networked and net-savvy consumers arrive in the marketplace, it is tempting for companies to worry that it is nigh on impossible to reach mass audiences in the same way as before.

While that may be true to an extent, reaching your audience is simply a matter of understanding them - their reading habits, the nature of their media consumption. Did you know TV viewing figures are dropping drastically? The same is true of newspaper readership. Advertising revenue is moving online because that is where the consumers are - particularly those in the 18-34 age bracket.

These are uncertain times. We are at a generational intersection - every day the young shape the future of business and media a little bit more; and every day the preceding generation cede a little bit more territory.

But this isn’t the end of the world as we know it. For companies everywhere, it’s simply a matter of adjusting, and approaching this brave new world with an open mind.

Books like The New Influencers will help. As will Robert Scoble’s Naked Conversations.

I know I can sound a little evangelical at times, but big things are happening right now. Are you in the loop?

Here at Eye for Image Towers we’re all looking forward to the launch of our brand new website.

The existing one is functional but rather simplistic and a little unwieldy. The new site, which we hope to go live with next month, will not only be a lot more attractive it will also enable us to engage with our customers and readers a lot more.

As well as a more streamlined and better integrated area for our popular Wordspin portal, this blog will also benefit from enhanced functionality. For example, we’re currently working on putting together a list of other sites that you might find interesting - known in the blogging world as a blogroll.

Definitely making that list will be hovedpaabloggen.

But what about you guys? Can any of you recommend any business or communications sites we should be checking out?

I must admit I’m quite fond of cursing, though I try and avoid using the ‘f-word’ during business meetings.

Danes, though, seem to positively relish a spot of profanity, particularly the Anglo-Saxon variety. And they’re not shy about swearing during formal occasions either.

Even the textbooks they use in my Danish lessons are full of English swearwords. Personally, I find this a little strange. While it’s fascinating to me how Danish has adopted words from other languages - just yesterday I learnt that the Danes use the word ‘budget’, albeit pronounced in a quasi-French way - it also strikes me that blithely adopting the worst words of another language is not the wisest course of action.

I’ll sign off with one example. I have heard many Danes use a particularly unsavoury word when talking about black people. Apparently it was even used on a prime-time TV programme recently.

Now, I know the vast majority of these people are not racist, but they are nevertheless unwittingly perpetuating an extremely negative stereotype.

I know there are many ongoing debates about the future of the Danish language with some fearing its dilution as ever more English words enter common usage.

All languages evolve, and Danish is no different. Still, there are several words I would like to see Denmark throw off.

I finally figured out all the technical details, so here’s some pics of our housewarming party last week, albeit a little late!