I was sent a great link to a great column by Charlie Brooker yesterday.

And sadly - I felt myself nodding in agreement to much that he wrote.

As a two year old website, we are very reliant on Google News as we know it is a launching pad for stories to get hits and find readers who wouldn’t normally come to our site by themselves.

Today’s an example - I wrote a follow up story to the Dutch Oyster Hack, with news that it was going to be revealed to the public.

Now the thing about online journalism is that it doesn’t pay to be the first to have it. It’s a complete opposite to newspaper journalism where the first to have the story out wins.

No, now you have to get it Googled and be picked up on Google News. If you notice my story and the first paragraph, I have links to all the main websites (London underground, Oyster etc) - I’ve written it short and concise and also dotted around some words which I know the bots would pick up.

I also put ‘free travel’ in the headline because its the sort of thing Google picks up.

Yes its very cynical.

But that’s online journalism. Or journalism in itself. Its not necessarily what you have in there, but sometimes just the way you present it. (Although I put some good stuff in there, as well as a statement from NXP which many of the sites didn’t get hold of - I’m hoping the Google bots take that into account.)

The thing is - it worked, and is one of the most popular stories today.

However unlike Charlie, I understand it perfectly because this is the way I was trained… Rather than having to change my way of thinking I’ve been brought up with doing things this way.

But that’s Google. Its dominance means there’s not much point fighting against it. And its no great secret anything I’ve said.

But how come I feel a bit dirty for attracting the Google love?

Oh the perks of being an IT journalist.

Look what I have sitting on my desk at the moment…

It’s very cute - Although he makes a lot of noise, which I was tempted to post up as a YouTube video, but I’m frightened somebody in the office might smack me.

It’s out tomorrow - Apart from the Dark Knight its the film I have been looking forward to this year.

And before you say it - it’s a trash compactor that turns into a robot. So obviously IT related right?

I don’t care either way - its too cute.

Seven months in working as a Staff Writer at IT PRO… What can i say? Probably the best thing to do is in what my editor does - write a list based thing about what I’ve learned.

1 Journalists always complain about pay (especially me)

2 Some IT journalists are very strange. It’s a very incestious bunch.

3 IT journalists love getting free stuff - and won’t give it back unless prompted by the PR about fifty times.

4 Once you get a reputation in IT journalism, it’s very difficult to lose it.

5  You’re never sure if a PR is being friendly because they want you to write a story, or because they genuinely like you. I’m hoping they like me.

6 You only get back what you give.

7 Arrogance gets you nowhere.

8 I’m awful at podcasting, but I’m trying to get better.

9 I place a lot of importance in readers looking at my stories - hence I try to write good ones rather than rehashed press releases (as much as I can anyway).

10 If you give me free pints, I will drink as many as I can before the bar shuts.

11 I think IT PRO has a lot of potential, but we’re young and we’re still learning.

12 Lists are a good way of saying something if you’ve got nothing to say.

13 Facebook is the best social network and I’ve got too many drunk pics on it (that’s not directly related to IT PRO, but it seems to have happened more in the last six months).

14 I’m a reasonably decent journalist - This is pretty much my chosen career.

15 I’m really not geeky. I like tech like normal people - after a while I get bored and want to talk about something like movies or what club to go to.

16  Cycling to work is fun, and I’m glad Dennis got me a discounted bike.

17 Las Vegas is one of the maddest places I’ve ever been to. It’s like a cartoon world, but there’s no soul underneath.

18 I like writing about security, but I’m not exactly the best in practising what I preach.

19 I like free lunches.

20 I think I’ll be in tech journalism a long while yet.