Dennis Howlett enquires:

Is ICAEW failing?

Well, one could simply answer "no" and be done with blogging for the weekend.  At least, I'm pretty sure the answer is "no".  Chartered accountants are still fairly well respected, even if people aren't quite sure what we are, and we are proud enough of being chartered accountants that we continue to cough up our subscriptions every year.  Heck, loads of us continue to pay our subscriptions even when we're retired, just because we like our letters.

Dennis is, as you might expect, being characteristically grumpy.  This time, it's about IT Counts, the little community set up by the ICAEW to talk about techy things affecting accountants, such as Excel and XBRL.  It would seem that he's complaining that only paid contributors and axe-grinders will be posting on IT Counts going forward, and he won't be, which suggests they've stopped his payday.  It's a shame to see that he's resorted to sniping at IT Counts from the sidelines, which is most unbecoming.

Dennis is like Marmite - you either love him or hate him (Richard Murphy loves him).  He has engendered a curious fan-following in @fakedahowlett, a Twitter account and website dedicated to taking the piss out of the real Dennis Howlett through the cunning use of retweets and requotes of his own material.  I find real DH's material to be rather boring and shambolic (although admirably opinionated).  Fake DH takes all the worst bits and sews it together into artwork and is infinitely more entertaining.  It's true - imitation is indeed the sincerest form of flattery.

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Filed under: Institutes, Other blogs, Technology with tags dennis howlett, fakedahowlett, icaew, richard murphy, twitter, xbrl