Scanning the media
Keeping up to date with items in the news can be a very rich source of ideas. The stories which occur everyday in the ‘broadsheet’ or ‘compact’ newspapers (e.g. The Times, Financial Times, Guardian and the Daily Telegraph), in both traditional print and online versions, may provide ideas which relate directly to the item (e.g. the extent to which items sold by supermarkets contravene the principles of ‘green consumerism’ by involv- ing excessive ‘food miles’ in order import them). The stories may also suggest other ideas which flow from the central story (e.g. the degree to which a company uses its claimed environmental credentials as part of its marketing campaign).