Thoughts and ideas of a dyslexic designer/developer
A while ago, Brock & Fernette announced they were working on an update to the Dyslexic advantage. As the book had such a profound effect, I pre-ordered it and it came a couple of days ago.
Of course I’ll be seeking out the audiobook but judging by the books side by side, there is quite a lot more in the new edition. I look forward to listening to it in full again real soon.
Also a big thumbs up on the new cover!
I have the joy of speaking at The Podcast Show on the 24 – 25 May in London.
I’m going to be talking about Adaptive podcasting and object based media. I’ll be joined with a couple more people discussing the possibilities for the future of podcasting. You won’t want to miss this…
You can book your Day Passes now and save 25% (£55 Day/ £99 2-Day) to this major International festival for the business of podcasting. .
I’m very happy to say 4 of my proposals were accepted for the virtual Mozilla Festival 2023. Worth noting the tickets are available now for a pay what you can.
in Allies in Practice on Thursday 23rd March – 18:30–20:00 GMT
A designer view on what the Fediverse could be for many people. Everything from the site, apps, platforms and beyond will be up for redesign.
in Tech & Biodiversity: Legado 2060 on Monday 20th – 13:45–14:45 GMT
A critical look at how people of colour, LGBT and others were targeted by the crypto pushers selling the dream of intergenerational wealth. Learning the techniques to prevent it in the future.
in Education & Access: You’re The Product Of Data on Monday 20th March – 21:30–22:30 GMT
Understanding what the public service internet could be and who else is doing similar, in what spaces and to what degree? We will together map for the benefit of everyone
in the Youth Zone on Tuesday 21st March – 17:00–18:00 GMT
Myself and Penny from Forest of imagination are going to run quickly through the rabbit holes collective launching in June. Then have a freestyle jam session with the Adaptive podcasting editor and the young people who attend.
I know a lot of people are fed up with virtual festivals but the Mozilla virtual Festival is something very different. How different? Have a read of my review of 2021 Mozfest. Well worth the ticket price and don’t forget it gives you access to the festival till September allow you to catch up with sessions you missed and that incredible community
Hope to see you at the Mozilla Festival at some points.
We live in incredible times with such possibilities that is clear. Although its easily dismissed seeing last pass scramble, the royal mail cyber attack and apple’s data use.
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 with the new range of biobatteries, Mozilla planning their own instance of Mastodon and the drop in ransomware payouts.
Ian thinks: Channel 4 survives the governments privatisation plans for now, but I do wonder for how long till the plans change again?
Ian thinks: A really good summary of the debate which has gone mainly quiet since the pandemic put the whole thing on pause. There hasn’t been much discussion since and Paris highlights the need for society
Ian thinks: Its great to hear Bunnie talking, as its been a long time since the xbox hacking and the controversy at the time. Its also a good relaunch of the EFF podcast which is always full of good ideas.
Ian thinks: There is a lot of great privacy laws from the EU but as this wired post with Andy Yen points out. There is a lot of tension around encryption, which could under-mind the privacy laws created by the EU.
Ian thinks: So many people think Tiktok is magic but as explained in this post, its relatively high emphasis on exploration is higher than others and likely fooling people. However the point about the user interface is critical to its success and something to remember.
Ian thinks: The link between Twitter and China propaganda is quite striking, as talked about in this video. What happens next is a good question, Its also worth reading through the New York Times piece if you prefer text.
Ian thinks: Nobel laureate Maria Ressa recently cleared of tax evasion in Philippines, has a lot to say about social media and even more to say to Mark Zuckerberg.
Ian thinks: Its not common I mention a film in the notes but the bank of dave is actually quite a good watch. More importantly is the true story and the banking business model which has been distorted beyond its original roots.
See the archive here
I really like Google maps and used it since 2005. I means whats not to like from offline support to step by step directions.
However… driving directions which most people use a lot has bias.
I drive around on a maxi-scooter (600cc Silverwing) with a headset in my helmet. I can not see my phone while driving around and rely on google maps to tell me where to go (only if I don’t know where I am going).
There are some annoyances which I have mentioned elsewhere, but yesterday while trying to drive to a friends house via the Pennines it became super clear some of the bias of google maps. Bias towards car drivers who care about fuel and not the wellbeing of the driver.
I’m sure there are many more but this are ones which come to mind since yesterday. Its clear google maps isn’t ideal for non screen viewing.
In my latest mix the interdimensional transmission mix, I went to mixcloud to find, I’ve reached my limit for published shows. So been thinking about what mixcloud does do for me. Mainly distribution and a bit of charting.
On the distribution side, it seems like the fediverse could easily do a better job. Originally I would love to use funkwhale but from previous experience it doesn’t really support mixes well compared to single tunes. Which is why I setup my own webmixgarden.
Currently I’m using a static site generator (pubili) which is great because I could add webmonitisation. Although I’m wondering if I should switch to one which supports activitypub? However I feel there is a way which combines both and its likely another platform on the fediverse? I can’t be the only one who is putting out mixes right?
I tooted and had some suggestions. But decided to look at peertube to see if that could work. After finding a instance, which had rules which worked for what I was doing. I starter experimenting here but i’m waiting for my mix to be moderated (its a one man instance, so expect it might take some time). If things work out I might just install peertube on my server.
Update
My mix is now up on peertube via rankett.net, thats the big news.
However I wanted to talk through what happened.
William who runs the rankett instance of peertube messaged me via email asking about copyright details of the mix. This was a surprise because we are all use to faceless entities moderating via machine learning. We had a little chat over email and I explained what I was doing and shared this blog post. Happy with the explanation, my mix was unblacklisted and its now available for all to play.
I’m currently looking at ways to add chapters markers to the mix, by slightly abusing the captions feature. I can’t really see another way to do it.
Another update
LPS messaged me on mastodon and pointing out a undocumented feature of peertube.
I can easily add time points in the description and with the correct formatting will automatically turn into jump points into the mix.
We also talked about setting up peertube using yunohost, which I’m already using. So theres little excuse now for me to just set it up one day soon.
Its a tricky one to remember because of the changes over the last few years but the Mozilla Festival will be back in March 2023 as a virtual festival complete with a number of in person events during the same year.
Because of the March virtual festival, the call for proposals is live and waiting.
I’m thinking about 2 or 3 proposals right now.
Sure more will come along but the community spotlight around transparency has me thinking even more, how these can benefit from transparency.
Following the talk I did at the Bright Ideas recently.
I also recently spoke with the Responsible Tech Collective, which is mainly out of Manchester.
The collective is a community of cross-sector organisations and community representatives, working to (first) establish Greater Manchester as an equitable, inclusive and sustainable examplar for responsible tech, through putting people first in its creation.
The collective has been one of those interesting groups which has been doing a lot around what I’m calling the public service internet ecosystem. Another group out of Manchester is Open Data Manchester.
You can read the whole piece on Medium below.
Its a good read and I especially like how it links different pieces of work together. Mainly the Adaptive podcasting, Personal Data Stores and Living room of the future in with the ethos of a Public Service Internet. The list of podcasts was a surprise question and hopefully will be of interest to others.
This all reminds me clearly why I moved to Manchester.
I have been pretty busy recently and had not as much time to do much blogging. To be fair my mastodon microblogging has increased quite a bit, can’t think why…
During the busy last few months, I gave a talk at Durham’s Bright ideas gathering. It was a really good event which felt like a TEDx with a number of different topics and speakers.
Originally I was going to give a talk about the recently launched Adaptive podcasting but gave it more context with why its a important project. Along the way we stop at the big changes coming to the BBC looking at my own personal view of moving to Manchester.
Thank to Herb and the team which delivered another excellent conference even in the middle of train strikes.
I shared the slides on slideshare (which is still a thing it seems)
With the Android app/player you can listen to adaptive podcasts. With the app/player installed, you can load and listen to your own made podcasts. There is of course RSS support, providing the ability to load in a series of adaptive podcasts (replacing the default feed from BBC R&D).
With access to the web editor on BBC Makerbox, you can visually create adaptive podcasts in a few minutes. Its node like interface is running completely client side, meaning there is no server side processing. Just like the app/player, which does zero server callbacks to the BBC. Pure Javascript/HTML/CSS.
