toby's blog

to nottingham for the ‘dtc summer school’, a meet-up of all the doctoral training centres that fall under the digital economy initiative. hosted by horizon, it meant the theme was right up my street: the lifelong contextual footprint, ie. the act of living is generating all this data/media, so what are we going to do with it?

given it was a meet-up and we’re the first generation, networking and sharing of research interests was built-in to the programme. show-and-tell, however, would have just been too conventional, so there were we with t-shirts, pens and 80 sheepish expressions. and yes, thats my shirt above, excuse the terrible photoshop shlepping of back and front. bonus twitter comment from jeremy morley: “seeing the different dtc student groups rather like the bit in shaun of the dead where shaun’s group meet an alternate group.”

lots of interesting stuff, including cool talks from matt adams of blast theory and aleks krotoski of the guardian and much more. it was a shame not to be able to participate in the “life stories” workshop, which was my interest almost verbatim, but the reason was good: my DTC MAT were hosting their own, and it was a little bit crazy: what if data were the fifth dimension? a thought experiment and some design fiction. there’s a kind of slides-made-through-the-workshop pdf attached, including the diminished-reality-3000™.

the marvels of the internet and the crowd there being what they are, there is already a series of blog posts that outlines the various talks and activities there: props to liz valentine.

this is the view out the back of cardiff central station. in its own way, you couldn’t better it. the beer’s good too.

to cardiff for a day of meetings. intrigued by the architecture of the senedd when it opened and having an open return, ducked off from the station for an explore. the senedd is really quite a building - not so big or imposing, but amazing that you really can go in and watch the business of the assembly happen around you. and hearing a debate about broadband in rural areas unfold with members switching between welsh and english does drive the point home somewhat. although i suspect it would fall apart without the UN-style translators and earpieces.

the waterfront development as a whole doesn’t hang together so well, but this facade of the millenium centre is great, and i can imagine how impressive it must look lit from a bustling inside after dark. also good for funfair-mirror-esque self portraits.

to thatcamp london, an “unconference” ahead of the juggernaut that apparently is digital humanities 2010. loved the fact that for a conference organised on-line and firmly embedded in a world of twitter hashtags and multi-channel ADHD, the actual schedule was organised on the day using a giant chalkboard and people putting up their arms.

i was there for the semantic narrative / semantic web work i’m doing with the BBC, which has a lot of serious implications and opportunities for historians and whatnot, but these tweets are much more fun:
- dancohen not to adore #thatcamp too much, but what other conference has academics, the BBC “future media” group, and comic book junkies in one room?
- mbtimney more #doctorwho at #thatcamp! now we’re onto spitfires in space (an apt metaphor for our TEI / comic book / fanfic / narrative discussion)?

after the out-and-out of glastonbury, balance through a quiet weekend of simple pleasures. making stuff, using your hands, thinking-through-doing; strawberries and cream. aaah.

…should always be epic, with snoop in the sun, or stevie at sunset. and people stretching to infinity.

for a proper photo review of glastonbury, check the amazing big picture site

…should always be made to this standard, drum’n’bass crystal clear with a funktion-one rig in the surround, or there should be twenty other people in a tiny tent busting moves and playing the fool.

…should always have funktion one sound systems, or failing that, be a boat on wheels with a battered piano on the back and a whirring propeller above, complete with suitably rough-hewn crew.

…should always be this glorious. the crew camping should always have a perfect space by mat, pictured, shaded under a great oak. the rota should always have your vj shifts grouped together on the same night, and not that first night. there should be friends, new and old…

as a child in bristol, the ss great britain was one of the things that defined the place. going back there with a young’un, a generation’s worth of restoration has transformed it. most spectacularly, it looks like it is floating in its dock but the steel hull is actually sealed in with a glass ceilling just a few inches below the waterline: gives a magic atmosphere down there.