Thoughts and ideas of a dyslexic designer/developer
Day 3: Little more advance trick, the hand grind. Always love this trick and quite like switching position with the fingers (maybe for another day). If you are wondering if it hurts, no because the axel is a bearing keeping it only running in one direction. However if you are not careful, when your finger does rub against the side by accident it does burn and hurt.
Day 2: Little more intermediate trick, the stick grind. Always love this trick and quite like switching sticks (maybe for another day). I remember when I used wooden sticks with fixed axel diabolos. Those were tricky days.
We live in incredible times with such possibilities that is clear. Although its easily dismissed, watching people shaming others for not working extra hard during the pandemic, employers spying on their employees and our continuing reliance on centralised servers.
To quote Buckminster Fuller “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.”
You are seeing aspects of this happening with Google implementing Signal’s open source E2EE protocol and Google loosening control of the Chromium project
Ian thinks: Yes this is a bit meta but its great to deep dive into the cutting edge research of BBC R&D’s lab. Remember its all for the benefit of the citizens of the UK and far wider. Worth also listening to the Human Values podcast series if you want to know more about what Lianne talks about.
Ian thinks: Following BBC R&D’s new forms of value, one of the key research aims is using personal data stores. Solid is one such personal data store and its hit a mile stone with a number of different partners.
Ian thinks: Bruce Schneier’s talk from Tech Open Air is well worth 20mins of your time. Its a combinations of what goes into these notes. Security, privacy, hacking, dis-information, policy and the internet.
Ian thinks: In this sobering Tedx talk, Seth makes clear we are running low on shared water. Seth talks about a rethink of our policy, technology and cooperation around this space.
Ian thinks: Jessica and Douglas talk about how black communities already developed circular economic mechanisms and how effective they have been.
Ian thinks: Juan’s thoughts are important to take in, he touches on so many points from ethics to politics. All framed within alongside technology disruption. I did find it strange he never used Brexit in his last reply about example of breaking up a nation.
Ian thinks: Wired magazine creates a quick and dirty test looking at Youtube’s recommendation algorithm. Plus that classic notion that your phone is listening to you.
Both are crude but if the social dilemma has taught me anything these actually help convince people
Ian thinks: Found via Simon Lumb, a real in-depth look at the challenges around IP in a world of game engines. There is also a podcast if like me you prefer audio
Ian thinks: Hip-hop artists talk about their reality and Nerdcore is no different. Its impressive and fascinating to hear how integrated internet & hacking culture has become in these artists life.
Day 1: Starting with one simple throw, the first trick most people learn quickly while learning the diabolo. Still like doing these while I think about what trick to do next, although higher gives more time.
Back last year when we could go to conferences and festivals without fear of the covd19 pandemic. BBC R&D, Mozilla and Publicspaces put on a conference during the Mozilla Festival week.
It was a great conference but unfortunately it never was written up. Its a real shame but you can understand with all the build up to the coming pandemic. So I thought it would be worth writing something short at least because it was enjoyable and full of great speakers.
We started with a keynote from Rachel Coldicutt – Doteveryone – previously CEO of Doteveryone
Rachel talked about the importance of public value, what’s at stake if we leave it to the market and the notion of just enough internet, which I mentioned previously. It was great keynote and really kicked off the day of panel talks in the right manor. Its still a shame doteveryone is no more.
Rhianne started the session with a look at the new forms of value work in R&D before Jeni and Katja followed in discussion with a look at the challenges facing the industry in which public controlled data can be ethically and unethically used.
Bill kicked off the conversation looking at the important issue of inequality with Laura and Isobel looking at it from their points of view. All very enlightening with the different views coming together into we can all do better.
Solana started things with a look at what makes up the internet heath report with Miles and Tim talking about the looking further and deep into what we mean by healthy and society
Paulien kicked off the last session with a look at Publicspaces,net and their projects including the badges project. Ira followed up by exploring the notion of publicservice networking through the Redecentralize organisation. Alexandra then followed with her experience looking at the internet of things with a more ethical lens.
The whole event was very well attended and served as good follow on from the previous year. So what about this year? Well as you know Mozilla have moved the festival to Amsterdam but the pandemic has shifted things to a mainly virtual festival next year in March. Plans are a foot to follow up with something in collaboration with Publicspaces.
It was during a slack conversation with colleagues, that the concept of a kind of advent calendar came to mind. A diabolo advent calendar, 1 trick per day mentioned on my blog with a brief description.
I will try and record something new everyday but I doubt it will be possible with the winter season. I have recorded some bits in advance just in-case.
So look out for them…
Scotland becomes first nation to provide free period products for all
Lennon said: “This will make a massive difference to the lives of women and girls and everyone who menstruates. There has already been great progress at a community level and through local authorities in giving everyone the chance of period dignity.
“There has been a massive change in the way that periods are discussed in public life. A few years ago there had never been an open discussion of menstruation in the Holyrood chamber and now it is mainstream. MSPs have enjoyed being a part of that, and it has encompassed the menopause, endometriosis, as well as the types of products we use and their sustainability.”
Period poverty – the struggle to pay for basic sanitary products on a monthly basis – has surged during the coronavirus pandemic, according to charities
Its about time…! Massive throw down to the rest of the nations around the world. How much do you want to bet Finland, Iceland and New Zealand are next?
Little note, who on earth votes this down on Youtube?
The end of free movement between Europe and the UK was signed and passed recently. To make things clear I found this video helped explain what I imagined 4+ years ago before the vote.
There is a lot to say but I’m just too tired…
I was very happy to hear Biden and Harris’s speeches trying to unite right and left in America. Likewise I was impressed with Bill Maher’s restraints on hearing the democrats win, but they are both right. Civil war is the worst outcome for all. There was a lot worries this was inevitable (it might still be)
Its time to heal the nation and you can’t do that by shout down people. Bill’s comparison of leaving a cult is actually apt. Reminds me a long time ago when I tried to talk around a Scientologist called huggs. I tried to get her to think for herself not simply recite what shes been told to think. Of course it was just a late evening in London but with care, understanding and patience it really can help. All the things needed right now.
A little while ago I mentioned the work myself and colleague Lianne have been conducting around the BBC R&D Human Values project.
I can happily say they are all uploaded to the BBC’s 2LO Soundcloud account, thanks to Bill. All of them are a good listen.
Episode 1: Human value discussion
What is the human value framework, and what are the intentions behind it?
Episode 2: Applying the human value framework
How is the human value framework used?
Episode 3: Exploring the underlying philosophy
A discussion of the philosophical model that underpins the framework
Episode 4: Measuring success using the framework
Are human values the new way to measure success and value in a digital age?
Episode 5: The impact of Covid-19 on the Human Values Framework
Considering human values in the current pandemic, and in the longer term
The BBC R&D blog post has updated details for each episode and who is in each episode. But I wanted to thank again our guests.
You may have seen the previous blogs and the summer follow up.
This week we got the above PDF email/letter from Waterside places.
It seems there was a lot of support for the latent defect work but not enough to make it so. Although the actual figures don’t seem to add up or they were looking for 100% of residents to get in touch?
As you can imagine this has caused a lot of distressed. I made my position clear.
I said No to access to my flat before I got the answers back from Waterside places. They had planned to use the shared garden as workers yard for 2 years. Because of that I stuck to the original date sent off my reply 5 days before the original deadline to make sure its was registered.
Waterside places did push the deadline back and I engaged with them over email saying I will change my vote to yes if they can insure garden access throughout the 2 years. They never confirmed this over the multiple emails and because of this I had no real choice.
I had a lot of problems with the whole thing but Waterside places never made clear the garden position. The committee also made clear that if they could confirm the garden, most residents would change their position.
The engagement with the residents I feel has been mishandled (maybe deliberately?). The options on the table were poor then follow ups have been slow and brief.
Of course I do honestly feel for all the flats which are heavily affected by the latent defects. Its awful news, but something else will happen as the latent defects are clearly there and the court case with Laing o’rourke did end in a settlement. Still love to know how much?
My last pebble 2 smartwatch suffered a number of button problems. Luckily I was able to fix it with Sugru moldable glue. The pebble is showing a lot of wear and tear.
I’m still looking for an alternative to Pebble smartwatches, but the there is simply nothing close, even the new Fitbit is LCD based. Although I’m considering maybe now I have the Oura ring, maybe I could rely less on the health and tracking parts?
Ummmm right…
I get Apple are more private about data than others like Google (which pings Android phones so much people are suing for data charges) but there is something about misplaced trust with Apple which always bugs me. These latest adverts and recent news stories say it all.
Downloads outage down issues which is all around Apples Gatekeeper privacy and Apple’s latest OS update Big sur network traffic bypass.
Of course this is all clear reasons why I’m very much in the open source camp. Maybe I won’t understand the code, but someone will and can inspect it or track down the issue without signing an NDA. I urge for people to not blindly trust. Always look out for open code, zero-knowledge security, no logging, transparency, etc
Just enough internet…
I have been listening to a lot of audiobooks recently and my latest one being the inner level. While I heard the mention of the Swedish word Lagom.
The direct translation of the word lagom is actually moderate but it also roughly its used to say, just enough/right. A reminded of the great Rachel Coldicutt’s (OBE!) keynote speech during Mozhouse last year.
Still a real shame we never wrote up that event…
I heard the true story of the Mangrove Nine but to see it play out over a 2 hour TV show is just amazing. I wasn’t sure what to expect but with the great director Steve McQueen, I had a sneaky suspicion it was going to be (8/10) great. Its almost so great to see UK black history on the screen, as its usually displaced by American black history.
Really looking forward to the other episodes.