“We might beliving on ‘the edge’, but that’s a passing label that now only reflects a by gone way of working”

It has been a month of unexpected invitations. I’m afraid you’ll have to wait another four weeks to discover what probing questions I eventually manage to lay in front of Tony Blair, but like most events these days this will be over a remote video platform. I’ve even decided to create a dedicated “two-way chat over video” device, as this is going to be the way things will be for the rest of 2020.

While videoconferencing does have its positives – not least all those interesting invitations – there’s a conflict between the type of control required in a corporate conversation versus the needs of the journalist. In corporates, especially outside the English-speaking world, it’s a case of don’t speak until you’re spoken to. This supports the function of the “ringmaster”, bringing in questions or responses in a choreographed way, politely introducing the speaker and their publication. That’s not how technical news conferences work! We’re commonly dealing in complex and newly presented technologies, and questions flow freely and easily in most meetings because a technical writer understands the field: very often, their interjections help the presenter over an especially far-fetched analogy. It’s not always the case that every interruption is malicious or point-scoring. When Barry Collins and I sat opposite the “security CEO” of BT on the train back to London, the conversation was so intense in both