Steve Parks Profile picture
Tech, startups, public service, writing/journalism, food. I lead @convivio and believe in healthier forms of entrepreneurship. @cbcreative alumnus
M 3.5% 💙 RightToProtest #FBPA #FBPE #GTTO #RiseUp Profile picture 1 subscribed
Sep 5, 2018 7 tweets 4 min read
Anyone who works at the Home Office, in any role: at some point, just saying you were only doing your job and following orders is going to no longer be an acceptable defence. Stop enabling these wrongs, and stand up for what is right, before it is too late History shows us there will be a public enquiry into the hostile environment policy, and these kinds of actions. It may be in 10 years or so, but it will happen. Do you really want to be waiting to be summoned to account for what you did or didn’t do? What you saw and heard?
Aug 26, 2018 23 tweets 6 min read
Next up at the @BylineFest is @GaryLineker, someone who has chosen to use his position and celebrity to engage positively in public discourse and faced the wrath of the Press. He’s being interviewed by @thelisamaxwell
#BylineFest First up, how does he respond to people who criticise him using his social media platform to share his views and discuss politics. People who tell him to shut up and stick to football.

He says, I’d say they’re probably right, for all the grief it gives me...
#BylineFest
Aug 26, 2018 14 tweets 4 min read
Next at @BylineFest is a session on what has happened since the first part of the Leveson Inquiry and what has happened to the second part.

#BylineFest

First speaker is @BrianCathcart He starts by talking about the Cairncross Review (gov.uk/government/con…)

He says politicians are talking about an outcome of this being taxing tech companies and using the money to fund journalism...
Aug 26, 2018 24 tweets 7 min read
Next at @bylinefest “Monstering Muslims in the Media”, hosted by @DrShazadAmin of @mendcommunity and a panel of journalists and academics

#Bylinefest The discussion is started by @BrianCathcart a journalist turned academic. He says that the media has always liked to create monsters. It helps to sell papers to stoke a fear of ‘other’.
Aug 26, 2018 25 tweets 7 min read
I’m at a panel on ‘is Silicon Valley a threat to democracy?’ with @carolecadwalla @DamianCollins @RVAwonk @JamieJBartlett and @CatrinNye
At @BylineFest

#Bylinefest #BylineFestival #FixingDemocracyInTheRain Carole talks about the resistance of the big SV companies to any real transparency or accountability. One of her Guardian colleagues ran a story about Facebook data a long while ago, but Facebook wouldn’t respond, when Carole started with story got the same brick wall...
Aug 25, 2018 29 tweets 8 min read
Next up at @BylineFest a panel with @DamianCollins and @carolecadwalla

Damian is chair of House of Commons Select Committee for culture Media and also sport, which conducted investigation into ‘fake news’ which followed evidential trail that broadened the remit...
#BylineFest That investigation ended up looking into Brexit and the Cambridge Analytica law breaking, and produced a comprehensive and extensive report.

Damian starts by speaking a little about his work with the enquiry...

#BylineFest
Aug 25, 2018 32 tweets 13 min read
Now it’s time for the @BadPressAwards at @BylineFest hosted by @johnmitchinson

He says there’s a Chinese proverb - lies in a newspaper are like rat droppings in a soup. They are both disgusting and obvious.

He says today the awards are a cornucopia of shit soup…
#BylineFest @BadPressAwards @BylineFest @johnmitchinson … John says that standards are lower than ever before, and this year international bodies have cited the UKs news industry as an outlier in terms of how little the public trust it.
Aug 25, 2018 24 tweets 10 min read
The next panel at @BylineFest starts with a few words from Tom Watson. He starts by saying there’s a few things he wants to say about monopolies and media ownership, and how things might change under a Corbyn Labour government…
#BylineFest He talks about the decline of the local press, titles closing all the time - byt that the loss of local journalism also brings a loss of trust in local political institutions.
What has then been happening is local press has been bought at fire sale prices
Aug 24, 2018 4 tweets 4 min read
The key points I took from the session with @carolecadwalla and @lukeharding1968 at @BylineFest are…

1. There is a plethora of compelling evidence of criminal activity relating to Brexit campaign
2. Many trails lead in the same direction as for the Trump campaign

#BylineFest @carolecadwalla @lukeharding1968 @BylineFest 3. In the US the Mueller investigation is making solid progress because it has such power, freedom, and resources.
4. In the UK, law enforcement is completely unprepared for investigating complex high-level political conspiracy and financial fraud
….
#BylineFest
Aug 24, 2018 22 tweets 8 min read
Next up at @BylineFest is a conversation between two of the UK’S leading investigative journalists @carolecadwalla and @lukeharding1968

Thread of live tweets starts here…

#BylineFest Carole begins by asking Luke when he began investigating Trump. He says he first investigated Manafort, when he was a senior Republican strategist who got involved in the Ukrainian elections… and began to see patterns that linked back to emerging Trump campaign
#BylineFest
Aug 24, 2018 21 tweets 15 min read
Next up it’s @JohnCleese being interviewed by @peterjukes about why he’s decided to leave the country, the state of the Press, and “I was a national institution until last Friday and apparently I’m now a legend”...
#BylineFest @JohnCleese @peterjukes Cleese starts talking about his daughter, when his phone rings and it’s her... he takes it for a laugh... she invites him to go with her tomorrow to the Fawlty Towers dining experience as a joke, and he agrees... (!)
#BylineFest
Aug 12, 2018 6 tweets 3 min read
Given today has been indulgent — a rare chance to have a pub Sunday roast on my own with a book (Writing A Novel by @RichardNSkinner) in my rather excellent local, and now an Old Fashioned as I read on the sofa — I thought I’d share my Old Fashioned recipe/tips... @RichardNSkinner This owes much to recipe from @markofrespect’s excellent but too short-lived @ShakenCocktails

You need:
- glass tumbler
- teaspoon
- bitters (details soon)
- agave/maple syrup
- bourbon/rye/whisky
- an orange / fresh cherries

First, fill a nice whisky tumbler with ice...
Aug 8, 2018 7 tweets 2 min read
Wow, Brexit is such a farce it looks like even the Leave voting MPs are putting together a night of standup comedy about how shit it all is...
;) “We’ve got a great Stand Up For Brexit set for you tonight folks. But first... An Englishman, an Irishman and a Scotsman walk into a bar... well, not actually the Irishman - he had some problems at the border... and actually the bar had to close with the recession and that...”
May 18, 2018 13 tweets 3 min read
A quick GDPR no-bullshit primer:

(1) it’s a good thing, and mainly just firms up what you should already be doing, by ensuring there’s process, documentation, auditability.
(2) Don’t be scared, especially when consultancies try to make you scared of fines etc to hire them

... (3) Don’t panic. Information Commissioner has made clear there is a period of adoption in which they expect to see a good plan and a commitment from orgs rather than perfection. If they see this they will help/guide rather than punish. It’s better to get it right than rush.
...
Mar 26, 2018 49 tweets 13 min read
Once again the @frontlineclub is packed with journalists, @Byline_Media folk, and TV cameras for the latest revelations in the Cambridge Analytica / Trump / Brexit saga from two whistleblowers.

Follow this thread for live-tweeting coverage, and forgive my typos... ... first thing to note is that security has been increased a level or two since last week’s gathering. Two checkpoints against the guest list, and a minder scanning the room.

We’re about to kick off...
Mar 20, 2018 36 tweets 10 min read
Speaking now, @chrisinsilico, the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower - how @carolecadwalla (who is held back at the @guardian newsroom writing tomorrow’s big story) provided the patient and nurturing environment that allowed him to come forward... ... what persuaded him to talk to her was that she was a journalist willing to share with other journalists for the greater good, such as C4 and NYT, rather than clinging to her own exclusive as most would.
He started as an anonymous source for her early stories...