Alternative London Summit (Press Release)

March 31, 2009 at 10:05 pm · Filed under politics

Apparently the management of the University of East London have been trying to prevent an alternative to the London G20 Summit from going ahead (the University is in fact closed for 2 days).  But the event will go ahead as planned. Here is a Press Release from the Summit’s web site. Some of the speakers include Ken Livingston, Sally Hunt (the General Secretary of the University and College Lecturers’ Union), and Paul Mason (BBC Newsnight Economics editor talking about his new book ‘Meltdown the End of the Age of Greed)’ (link).

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Despite management efforts to shut down the Alternative London Summit on Wednesday 1st April organisers and speakers are committed to making sure the event goes ahead at the University of East London as planned.

Occupation commences at 4pm. At 6pm there will be a press conference held at University of East London in the East Building, room 1.12. Speeches commence at 6pm across two lecture theatres.

Organisers are appealing to the public to join academics, union representatives and students in the occupation of the university in order to ensure that prominent political, scientific, academic and activist speakers who have remained committed to the event will be free and able to speak as planned.

It is vital at this pivotal moment in British and world history that we, the people have a public platform to understand and act on alternative ideas and strategies for our political, environmental and economic future….

Here is the address:

Docklands Campus
University Way
London E16 2RD


View Larger Map

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Where do I go if I want to protest at the G20?

March 31, 2009 at 8:59 pm · Filed under politics

Most of tomorrows activities will converge on the Bank of England.  However there are lots of activities planned for all over London.  There are the four simutaneous marches that will leave at various spots at 11.ooAM.  Plus, there is a climate camp that will be set up in Bishopsgate.  Some of the details can be found here (link).

Also, try this web site: http://www.g-20meltdown.org/

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Communication Power in the Network Society

March 31, 2009 at 12:11 pm · Filed under internet, media, pod casts

Manual Castells, who has a new book out in July called ‘Communication Power’ gave a lecture at the OII (Oxford Internet Institute), in October last year. Those kind folks at OII have provided a web-cast of it online.  There are also a number of other noterieties with web-cast-lectures. Most notable Ted Nelson, Jimmy Wales, Steven Colemen. Check it oot…(link)

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Destroy the computer…

March 31, 2009 at 9:53 am · Filed under gadfly, politics

I think that this must be an ironic picture…

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BUND: The British Universities Newsreel Database

March 30, 2009 at 2:51 pm · Filed under digitisation, video

The British Universities Newsreel Database (BUND) is another innovative service offered by the British Universities Film and Video Council (BUFVC). Other important projects include BoB (Box of Broadcasts) and NFO (Newsfilm Online). The later contains more than 3000 hours of news stories available online (partly funded by JISC and available to subscribing Universities).

The BUND project contains 180,000 stories of newsreels covering the period from 1910-1983. It also contextualises many of the newsreels through 1000 biographies of the people who worked on them.  The BUND project started in 1969 and its resources may be searched online.

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From the official White House channel

March 28, 2009 at 11:30 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing, pod casts, political communication, politics, social media, video, web2.0

The White House is active in the use of social media through setting up official channels on a number of popular social media sites. This is Vimeo, that has 1.3 million users, and of course there is YouTube, which also has an official White House channel (link).


3/28/09: Your Weekly Address from White House on Vimeo.

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Living socially online…

March 28, 2009 at 10:01 pm · Filed under social media, video, web2.0

I found this wonderful movie on a system I hadn’t yet used called Vimeo. Thanks to my friend Brian in Chicago for introducing me to it.


Memory Bank 120394a from Karen Abad loves Dinosaurs. on Vimeo.

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I used to do a segment on Youtube in the morning…

March 27, 2009 at 4:55 pm · Filed under video, video diary, web2.0

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G20: And a very English Revolution…

March 27, 2009 at 11:38 am · Filed under gadfly, politics

Details of the protest on April 1st can be found on the ‘G20 Meltdown in the City’ web site (link)

Full circle back to 1649? ‘A very English revolution!’

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse will lead themed processions starting at 11 a.m. from the following rail stations:

• Moorgate
  Red horse against War;
• Liverpool St
  Green horse against Climate chaos
• London Bridge
  Silver horse against Financial crimes
• Cannon Street
  Black horse against land enclosures and borders in honour of the 360th full circle anniversary of the Diggers

(image from Caoimhghin Croidheáin in Kritokos: an international and interdisciplinary journal of postmodern cultural sound, text and image Volume 3, October 2006, ISSN 1552-5112)

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Peer review and evaluation of digital resources for the arts and humanities

March 26, 2009 at 4:59 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

The mechanisms for the evaluation and peer review of the traditional print outputs of scholarly research in the arts and humanities are well established, but no equivalent exists for assessing the value of digital resources and of the scholarly work which leads to their creation. This project proposes to establish a framework for evaluating the quality, sustainability and impact over time of digital resources for the arts and humanities, using History, in its broadest sense, as a case study (link)

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InterFace 2009: 1st National Symposium for Humanities and Technology

March 26, 2009 at 3:38 pm · Filed under conferences, digital humanities, humanities computing

9-10 July, University of Southampton, UK.

http://www.interface09.org.uk

InterFace is a new type of annual event. Part conference, part
workshop, part networking opportunity, it will bring together
postdocs, early career academics and postgraduate researchers from the
fields of Information Technology and the Humanities in order to foster
cutting-edge collaboration. As well as having a focus on Digital
Humanities, it will also be an important forum for Humanities
contributions to Computer Science. The event will furthermore provide
a permanent web presence for communication between delegates both
during, and following, the conference.
Read the rest of this entry »

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HEFCE launches strategy for technology-enhanced learning

March 26, 2009 at 2:32 pm · Filed under education

Press Release:

HEFCE has today (March 26, 2009) published ‘Enhancing learning and teaching
through the use of technology – a revised approach to HEFCE’s strategy for
e-learning’ (HEFCE 2009/12). This revised approach follows an independent
review of the strategy and is designed to provide further support to higher
education institutions as they develop their own e-learning strategies.
Read the rest of this entry »

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Alternative G20 summit at the University of East London’s Docklands Campus on 1 April

March 25, 2009 at 10:55 am · Filed under gadfly, politics

An alternative G20 summit is planned for next Wednesday 1st April during the G20 summit here in London. There will be some good speakers there including the previous Mayor of London, Ken Livingston, the film maker, Ken Loach, and the historian Tariq Ali. It starts at 4PM and finished at 9PM. Directions below (link).

University of East London
Docklands Campus
4-6 University Way
London E16 2RD

Docklands Campus is easily accessible from mainline rail stations. From King’s Cross/St Pancras, take the Northern Line to Bank, then change for the Docklands Light Railway (DLR) to Cyprus Station, which is at the entrance to UEL.

• From Liverpool Street and Paddington, take the Circle Line to Tower Hill then walk to Tower gateway to change for the DLR to Cyprus.
• From Fenchurch Street, the nearest tube station is Tower gateway, from where you can take the DLR to Cyprus.
• From Waterloo, take the Jubilee Line to Canning Town, and change there for the DLR to Cyprus.
• You can also catch the DLR direct from Stratford Station.

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Oxford vs Cambridge Goat Race…

March 24, 2009 at 5:13 pm · Filed under gadfly

As a wonderful spoof of the Oxford vs. Cambridge Boat Race, Spitalfields City Farm will be hosting the first ever Oxford VS Cambridge Goat race.

This involves racing two rather dashing goats, one representing Oxford, one representing Cambridge, through a tough meandering course, to raise money for their lovely little city farm.

There will be an Official Goat Race Bookie and Sweepstake for those of you who like a flutter and even Goat Wrestling – which has got to be worth a look.

But that’s not all. As part of this unique event Spitalfields City Farm will be holding a Goatee Knitting Race. We are not sure if this is the first event of its kind but we certainly haven’t heard of it before!

This will be a fun and hilarious race to knit a goatee beard as fast as your needles will carry you with a crowd cheering you on.

The race will take place at 3pm and if you would like to take part all you need to do is contact Goat (and Goatee) Race organiser Anne Hopkins at getannehopkins@hotmail.com for more details (link)

SUNDAY 29^TH MARCH

Venue: Spitalfields City Farm, E1 Near Brick Lane

Entrance fee: £3 (all proceeds from the day will go to the farm.)

Map

Nearest Tube: Whitechapel, Aldgate East or Bethnal Green

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What is BoB: Box of Broadcast?

March 24, 2009 at 10:12 am · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing, video, web2.0

Bob or Box of Broadcast is being launched at the JISC conference in Edinburgh this week. Here is a blurb from the JISC press release.

the British Universities Film and Video Council (BUFVC) will be launching
BoB – Box of Broadcast. Similar to the BBC’s iPlayer, it will make broadcast
and video content available indefinitely to thousands of students and
researchers for the first time.

It allows users to record forthcoming programmes or missed programmes in the last week. However, unlike iPlayer, these programmes do not expire and areavailable indefinitely, making it invaluable for lecturers and students requiring constant access (link).

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