The end of another four-year period means it's time to renew the oversight bodies that help keep diamond geezer ticking over. If you think you've got what it takes to contribute to one of these important voluntary groups, please submit your credentials before 6:59am tomorrow. SITUATIONS VACANT
Diamond Geezer Content Strategy Caucus
• Remote
• Unpaid role, expenses not paid
• 2 hours weekly Purpose: to determine the editorial focus of upcoming posts and stir the creative pot
Commitment: weekly Zoom meeting (Sunday evening, 2 hrs approx)
Role: to trawl through upcoming anniversaries; to pinpoint unreported unusualness within and beyond Greater London; to identify permissable transport foci; to propose quirky topics for reportage; to formalise the collective investor pitch; to assign dates to future topics; also to discourage too many posts about buses because nobody wants to read them Typical engagement
dg: So what's everyone got?
Rob: I see Oxhey Grange footbridge is due to be demolished next week.
Dan: You've never covered London's most equidistant pubs.
Uy: How about following the London Strategic Heat Main?
Sergei: Also the Florence Nightingale Museum is free to enter next Monday.
Alex: Nobody's yet written about Tottenham Hale's 'new' Platform 4a.
Ashley: I'd like to propose "How do I know which end of the platform is the front of the tube train?" - it always catches me out!
Tania: I mean, just off the top of my head, an analysis of leaf-fall timetables, could Zak Polanski win, how do litter bins vary borough by borough, a quiz where all the clues are chemical symbols, my favourite chocolate biscuit wrappers.
dg: And Tony, you've been looking into obscure London suburbs starting with S. So which is it to be?
Tony: Obviously Sundridge, Selsdon and Shacklewell are top considerations, also let's not overlook Shirley, sadly you've already covered Southborough, alas I fear Sipson might be quite limiting, personally I'd quite like to see Stroud Green, perhaps you might consider Stonecot?
Diamond Geezer Daily Planning Huddle
• Remote
• Unpaid role, expenses not paid
• 30 minutes daily Purpose: to confirm the broad-brush outline of tomorrow's post
Commitment: conference call every morning at 8.30am (also touch base at 5pm)
Role: to agree tomorrow's topic, to research background information, to plan locations to visit; to optimise the itinerary; to complete necessary risk assessment; to react to fast-moving news stories; to provide bullet points for article composition; to veto patently tedious outcomes Typical engagement
dg: So what's everyone got?
Kieran: No sign of a fresh TfL press release this morning, so it's all systems go.
Louise: We reckon you can be in West Finchley by 10.15am.
Kieran: I've emailed a map of the walking route you should follow.
Louise: Apparently the bollard on Sydney Street used to be part of a medieval outhouse, so make sure you get a photo.
Kieran: You should be wrapped up at New Southgate by noon.
Louise: After the opening summary write about the history, then the connection to Winston Churchill, then the six bridges in chronological order.
Kieran: Do not under any circumstances mention the local bus route.
dg: I'll ping you the early drafts before the teatime catch-up.
Diamond Geezer Overnight Quality Review
• Remote
• Unpaid role, expenses not paid
• 10 minutes nightly Purpose: to pedantically check the content of tomorrow's post
Commitment: receive copy by 1am, submit email feedback by 6.45am
Role: to read through pre-final draft and identify a) spelling errors b) grammatical errors c) factual errors d) substandard text e) potential improvements in order to prevent embarrassment when the post goes live at 7am Typical feedback
Ian: "sup-optimal" in the second paragraph.
Richard: I think that you meant to say “steps of 20 km/h” rather than “steps of 20mph”.
Michael: The parade referred to is NE rather than NW of the station.
Carl: You seem to have omitted the fact that Margaret Thatcher cut the ribbon near Watford.
Nick: You have different numbers of bulls gored on your Flickr photo compared to your post.
Frank: Is the description "just a bunch of backroom gibbons" necessary in relation to something quite so trivial?
John: Surely that should be fewer than ten services a day, not less than?
Diamond Geezer Retrospective Appraisal Surgery
• Peer-to-peer
• Unpaid role, expenses not paid
• 1 hour weekly Purpose: to critique the week's content, identifying successes and points of weakness
Commitment: weekly win/loss review (Saturday, 7pm)
Role: to apply 360-degree feedback techniques; to set future targets; to optimise continuous improvement; to identify individual development needs; to formalise lessons-learned; to engage in dispute resolution; to compare with AI-generated content to ensure human input is still preferential; to offer praise if merited Typical feedback
Amir: I'm not surprised the Sutton post only got three comments.
Vince: Did we really need a whole fortnight focusing on your holiday to Spain? Perhaps stay in this country for a while.
Sophie: I thought you were quite rude to Derek.
Amir: Personally I enjoyed the analysis of museum leaflets but I may have been alone in that.
Vince: Please tell me no more bus routes are changing any time soon.
Sophie: Take more Saturdays off.
Amir: Perhaps tone down the use of all those unnecessary commas.
Vince: I don't understand why you spent eight hours crafting a post of interest to hardly anybody.
Sophie: To be honest I enjoyed your posts more in 2012.
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