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What to read on Beacon, as well as the Ends of Britain

Beacon, which hosts my series the Ends of Britain – which last Friday looked at the controversy over whether an independent Scotland and the rest of the UK could share the pound – now has more than 70 writers. If you subscribe to one you get access to all.

To read the articles mentioned in this post in full, you will need to be a subscriber – but you can sign up for a 14 day free trial here. So why not do that, then come back and read the rest of the post? Continue reading “What to read on Beacon, as well as the Ends of Britain”

NHS news is now easier to search with the @ImpatientNHS news database

impatient-nhs-logo-2I set up the @ImpatientNHS Twitter feed of NHS news and comment articles in August 2012. It’s been running automatically ever since, now tracking more than two dozen specific sources and hundreds more through Google News, with 443 followers currently. It’s not perfect – in particular, stories from some sites have a habit of appearing more than once, possibly through them being republished. But it doesn’t miss much.

Updated: this concerned an online archive of these tweets. It has since been suspended due to technical problems. Continue reading “NHS news is now easier to search with the @ImpatientNHS news database”

Aberdeen’s NHS centre for Guardian; its views on referendum for Beacon

Two articles on Aberdeen, one for the Guardian’s Society section, one kicking off my Ends of Britain series on Beacon. The Guardian piece focuses on the Aberdeen health village, a newly-opened NHS Grampian centre in the city centre. It’s of interest because it is the first to be funded by the Scottish Futures Trust, Scotland’s antidote to PFI funding. The detail is in the article, but essentially the public sector is involved on both the customer and supplier sides. Continue reading “Aberdeen’s NHS centre for Guardian; its views on referendum for Beacon”

Made it! The Ends of Britain starts later this week on Beacon

Thank you to everyone who has supported me to start The Ends of Britain series on the future of the UK on Beacon. With 25 backers and $463 pledged – including five subscribers in for a full year – it’s going ahead.

If you are one of those who backed me, you should receive an email from Beacon saying it’s all on. You should also get access to everything published on Beacon. I plan to blog here about some of the other writers on the service soon, although it’s easy to explore.

And it’s not too late to subscribe for the first article in The Ends of Britain series later this week – you can do so here.

Again, thank you!

I need just four more backers to start The Ends of Britain project

I am nearly ready to start The Ends of Britain, my planned new series on the big issues facing Britain. Having started two weeks ago with a target of 25 backers, I have found 21, so need just four more by the end of today. You can find out more and back the project here.

There’s more explanation of my plans in previous posts on this site, here and here. I also provided some answers to questions from my old friend Ben Whitelaw last week. One answer, which he pulled out in a headline, sums up why this project excites me: Continue reading “I need just four more backers to start The Ends of Britain project”