Remember the last emerging tech event with Erik Lehmann from the game changer movement.
I’m extremely happy to be a small part of his journey with Graphene in Manchester. Nice Tedx talk and hopefully many more people will see it and get involved.
Tag: #etechmcr
A review of my 2016 resolutions
Its that time of year when I reflect on a frankly pretty crappy 2016 politically but a massively packed one for me personally. Seriously March, May, September, October, November were so full (I still need to write up my own personal Mozfest 2016 experience).
Although I did spend a lot of time in other countries, according to Google I’ve done 39 trips but that includes going to places in the UK. With the most visited first…
London, Nottingham, Bristol, Newcastle, Liverpool, Sheffield, Windermere (Phil’s wedding), Cambridge, Northampton.
And further a field, with the longest time first.
Berlin, Amsterdam, Lagos/Faro (1st time I’ve been to Portugal), Bucharest (another first Romania), Stockholm and Hannover.
- I usually do steps but since I switched from Fitbit to the Xiomi band recently, and the steps are quite different from the fitbit, it makes little sense.
- 259mins of sleep deficit over the year, which is down from the previous year.
- Average sleep this year has been 6 hours 50mins.
Trakt.tv added the year in review, and there’s very detailed data points there.
446 hours of film watching, which is 37.1 per month and most watched film is x-men apocalypse.
379 hours of TV watching, which is 31.6 per month and most played TV series is Louie. My highest rated TV were Limitless and 11.22.63 both ended.
- Be taken out of my comfort zone by Kate and take her out of comfort zone
Our challenge has yet to start really. I had plans to take Kate to either Bucharest (shes never been to eastern europe and I only went for the first time last year to Poland). Then I thought about Stockholm (although not really going to push the challenge, its a very cool place). Although Kate has already dropped hints of staying somewhere near Scotland. I did ask if it was a tent and she said it has walls, to which I ask if it has a roof? Of course I got big grin.
- Host film nights and more dinner parties at mine
I put up the projector screen with help from my lovely neighbours and to be honest I’ve not really used the projector much. Mainly as it needs to be setup on the coffee table and I can’t leave it there all the time. Its also XGA meaning things get cut off when sending a widescreen 1080p signal. But I will sort this next year. I did do a showing of undressed too, which counts right?
Dinner parties? Well I’ve had a few but they generally end up as cheese and wine evenings. Someone recently pushed me to do a dinner for her, so the challenge is on. Time to pull out the Japanese food spark I think I have.
- Head further a field with the scooter
This one is frustrating as I had grand plans to drive into Northern Ireland. However the scooter is getting old now and I have plans to replace it with another scooter. So maybe when I get the new one, that will be the chance to go for a long journey? My scooter is still ok but there is so much body damage and to be fair its done over 70000 miles and I’ve had since 2005!
- Improve my circus skills
At last this has been greatly improved. The much mentioned vertax are still as difficult to do as always but I’m getting closer and tend to get too excited when close. I’m also picking up other tricks and getting far more confident about my suicides. More room for improvement! - Stay better in touch with old friends
I realise I’ve been a little poor with this one, I need to spend some time reading what my old friends are up to in their lives. I’ve been shocked to learn things about old friends which I can’t believe I didn’t know about. This shouldn’t be just about reading their facebook walls but generally keeping in touch.
- Redecorate the flat
Last year I still had the old sofas and old stuff, now I have a proper corner sofa and changed a few things. I still have bigger plans but paining the walls isn’t really one of them. - Ride a roller coaster in another country
Didn’t happen, but will next year for sure. Heck I don’t think I even rode a rollercoaster all year! Sad times, although I almost did renew my Alton Towers pass now the smiler is now open again. Still really like to see a new coaster before I renew it properly. - Work on the book/serialised blog
I started datingyarns.com but I’ve been so busy. Modifying the entries to make it as unrelated as possible to the date/person(s), but isn’t as simple as it may seem. Anyhow, I will keep putting them up, although I do maintain it would be better as a group blog with some incredible yarns from some of the women I’ve had the pleasure of dating.
- See the Aurora (Northern lights)
This should have happened, I missed going to Iceland then when I got the go ahead for Sweden. I was thinking about taking the overnight train up to Lapland to see it and stay over. However due to clashes with the Christmas partys etc, I couldn’t stay long enough to make the trip up there. But I guess my research has shown how easy it would be if I did want to go via Stockholm, although Iceland is still number one choice.
- Make some bold moves with my love life
Bold moves with my love life. Well this certainly was the right year! Where do I even start?
I already knew I was going to be taking part in the Horizon dating experiment but it was shown much later than I thought. In between I took to the stage for TedXManchester4 to tell it as it is about dating services/apps. This all before Jane sent me the email encouraging me to put my body/money where my thoughts were in a new dating show – Undressed. Ok ok I hear you ask, what’s actually changed in your love life? I would suggest although quite confident about myself, all 3 of these things have really made me even more confident in myself, surroundings and love life. Its quite difficult to explain but every experience really brings new insight.
- Kick start the emerging technology event
I did kick start the #etechmcr event, first event with a new VR Manchester meetup and then second one with Erik Lehmann. There hasn’t been another one for a while, although there’s plenty of opportunities but I’ve not been around to do anything about it. My hope is next year will mean more time for this and other events.
- Think humanity
I feel this is a solid tick…
Wealth of networks with Erik Lehmann
Yesterday the stage was set for the second Emerging Tech Manchester event (#etechmcr). After much bouncing emails back and forth with some skype calls inbetween. Erik Lehmann came to Manchester all the way from the states.
I can’t express how amazing this actually happened, especially since I was only introduced to Erik in a last few months.
His talk and the questions and answers went on for a while but everybody was super engaged and fascinated by such a passionate and heartfelt talk. Erik is such a warm and joyful person and I loved the little nuggets of thoughts he threw out as he talked. Luckily Ethar caught some of them.
That's an interesting phrase "With" organisation instead of "For" organisation #etechmcr
— Ethar Alali (@EtharUK) March 21, 2016
Mentioned while Erik was talking about sponsorship and support from big business. Which led to the idea of a hypocrisy index… Radical transparancy?
Loving the idea of a "hypocrisy index" #etechmcr
— Ethar Alali (@EtharUK) March 21, 2016
I especially loved the idea of what would the occupy movement do with something like Graphene.
"Occupy Movement plus #Graphene" interesting idea 🙂 #etechmcr
— Ethar Alali (@EtharUK) March 21, 2016
We did stream the whole thing over periscope thanks to Adam.
Thanks to everybody who came to #etechmcr, @DreamCatalyst_ was great and inspirational.
— Ian Forrester (@cubicgarden) March 21, 2016
But the like most things, the best parts were the discussion which happened afterwards in the bar over food and drink which Erik very generously paid for. We had talked before about sponsorship options but we were both agreed that we wanted people there because they wanted to be there, even if it reduced the audience. This came up in the bar afterwards too, as someone else made the point about people expecting/wanting free drinks.
London Geekdinners was mainly a paid for event, meaning people paid to go! The same person afterwards said a similar thing about her event.
I don’t have a problem with sponsorship (as long as it makes sense and they don’t try and take over) but lets get real a lot of events are community/non-profit run events. If the reason you are going is because of the free pizza or drink… Its not fair on the people who work hard to make it happen and the speakers who are most likely not getting paid and giving up their time for the joy of it too.
Erik for example was not paid and came a long long way because he believes in the wealth of networks and wants to connect with people who may want to help…
It's not about convincing, it's about modeling the change #ETechMCR
— Ian Forrester (@cubicgarden) March 21, 2016
The conversations were wide ranging and as Erik had said in his talk, the strength and ultimately the wealth of the network was why he was there and why the game-changer movement will be a success. In years to come, it will be great to look back and say we were able to connect him with more people who help.
Yes its a shame we got a smaller turn out but Rise Manchester was a great venue to host the event and we thank Rise for the loan of a great space. Its also a shame I couldn’t connect Erik with the Graphene institute, MadlabUK, Open Data Manchester and many others great people in the Manchester area.
Thank you again to everybody who came and Erik for travelling so far for the event. I will be sure to send people Eriks way forever more.
#Etechmcr #2 with Erik Lehmann tomorrow
Its the second Etech Manchester event and as talked about previously, we have the pleasure of Erik Lehmann talking about the game changing movement. Not only will he talk about it but also the reasons why he set it up, how and what he has in the roadmap for the future.
You can join us from 7pm at Rise Manchester, which is inside the Great Northern Warehouse on Deansgate, Manchester. The event is Free, and you can invite people along as we have plenty of space thanks to Rise Manchester for giving us the space for free.
Its also worth noting Erik Lehmann is interested in meeting key people in and around Manchester and London who are also setting up projects for good of community and society. Just tweet directly at him as he’s only in the country for a short while.
Hope to see you tomorrow… Its going to be a good one!
Emerging Tech Manchester #2: Games for good with Erik Lehmann
After the great success of the First Emerging Tech Manchester a joint event with VR Manchester. Photos are up here on meetup.com.
We have the second #Etechmcr. This time we have the pleasure of hosting Erik Lehmann who is pioneering the game changer movement. I become aware of Erik and what he’s doing via Alex DS who introduced us.
We are looking at the wider future narrative of games for good through the work Erik has completed and doing at the game changer movement.
Its a free event thanks to the great hosts which are Rise Manchester, this time around. As we make use of the great spaces we have around Manchester.
Get it booked into your calendar for Monday March 21st between 7pm and 9pm and subscribe to the meetup group for more information around Eriks work and further events in the future.
Emerging tech and Future narratives Manchester – #etechmcr
I love living in Manchester but recently I noticed there is something missing.
Looking into the future…
I don’t mean tomorrow or even next year but 5-10 years out.
There’s a lot of initiatives like the recently won smart cities fund, graphene institute, quantified self, perceptive media, things/iot startups, open data, LoRa, 5G dev, crypto currencies and even DIYbio, etc… but you need to be in the right circles to hear about them.
So I started a event – Emerging Tech and Future Narratives meetup to highlight them and bring them to a wider audience. The name I will gladly admit comes partly from the amazing Oreilly Emerging Tech conferences.
Every event will be interesting and worthy of your time with special guests and fascinating topics.Not running on a regular schedule, it will be different but will fit around great speakers schedules.
This fits with what I do in BBC R&D and hope to combine some of our thoughts with the wider digital community in the North west and beyond.
I want to thank Jennifer O’Grady for clarifying my thoughts on this in a Friday lunchtime conversation in the northern quarter.