Till we have faces

Here, I choose my face for the Ranmoor gig (Trois Tetes would need a special deal here). Fortunately, I was recognisable. I could, of course, find out more about myself with Face Analyzer, although as this blogger humorously illustrates, it's not always too reliable. 'Till we have faces' is a C.S. Lewis myth, now cunningly re-cycled by San Diego emo-punks Noise Ratchet. Here's the lyrics. Off now to look into face transplants!

Accidents and mistakes
I'm so impressed by this guy who texts in his sleep, he must be well on the way to becoming a seamlessly-blended cyborg! If he is accidentally sending text messages, what is it like to be accidently reading text messages, like these (or was it planned?). Elsewhere, I notice that we can form 'accidental online communities' by linking i-messaging to our frequently-visited blogs (!). Thank goodness for good management advice on how to avoid accidents/mistakes in emailing. I think I just broke every rule in the book in half an hour. Good.

Watch the hack!

This is a modified cashpoint (ATM) on the London tube. A portable cardreader, attached to the machine, clones your personal ID (see below). As you are copied, your hard-earned cash is syphoned away from your account. Trois Tetes thinks a mirror may be handy for checking your identity (how many faces will he see 1,3 or more) but I'd rather play safe.

Watch your back!

As the identity meme mutates through the blogosphere with this on image and identity, and this on self-reflection, Trois Tetes worries about identity theft. The photograph here shows the standard Barclays cashpoint (ATM) on the London tube. Check that nobody sees you pump in your PIN,when you get your cash, because you are a number, after all.

Digitising Dunhuang
I was fortunate to catch an excellent broadcast on the Dunhuang caves today. Having admired the world's oldest known printed book in the British Library's Silk Road exhibition last year, I've become fascinated with the the work of the International Dunhuang Project. Basically, a rich archeological hoard (mostly textual) was found and plundered by Aurel Stein at the beginning of the twentieth century. Others, of various nationalities followed and by the 1920s material was dispersed around the globe. Dedicated scholars working across international boundaries are slowly cataloguing and digitising the material. It's been suggested that no-one has ever seen all the material together, but soon you will be able to see it all (virtually), even though it is dispersed, thanks to new technology. You will be able to do a virtual visit, actually entering the cave, eventually, but there are a few sticking points around intellectual property to negotiate first.

Drab blog
There's so much good use of visual image out there, that I sometimes feel that my short (mainly verbal) blog looks drab! I enjoy looking at photos from round the world like these, and really loved this concept of a visual travelogue - although it took a bit of time to load up. There's also a blog that comes out of a ESRC project on personal photography on the web. Images aside, my favourite hit of the day is Enrique Quintero's vegan recipes for the ipod - now that's what I call lifestyle!

Virtual booksigning
I'm sure I'll never be called upon to do heavy-duty booksigning, so the idea of doing it 'virtually' is only of academic interest. It's interesting, however, to know that we already have the technology. So, whilst I'm a great admirer of Margaret Atwood (I loved Oryx and Crake), her new idea, may not be that original. Interestingly Grockwel (January 22nd) is quite angry and wonders why bloggers are not up in arms. This one is...but for me, it's only of academic interest.

A little Sunday hybridity
Take a little bit of Austin Powers, a little bit of Michael Jackson, quite a lot of Elvis Presley with a sprinkling of Top of the Pops (circa 1967), mix it, stick it in the cultural oven and 'hey presto! ' you get THIS!

Where lies your text?

Reading Paul Auster's beautiful-crafted descriptions of facial expression in silent movies (The Book of Illusions) set me thinking about the face as text. It's a Bardic theme (see this title and "your face is a book") and there's loads written about the importance of the face in studies of human communication. But that's face2face in meatspace. Online it's different; not very many faces on our blogs. Maybe that's changing.

Early mark-making
I often think of the landscape as a palimpsest. We are surrounded by evidence of human tool use and mark-making across space and time. Near 'here' there are those mysterious cup-and-ring rock carvings (on Gardom's Edge), but they also stretch across the country and are found in America and Australia too. Other markings include clear representational work like this ibex.

Reading the article it's interesting that a contribution from the 1940s is graffiti (does that make the ibex 'art' or just older graffiti?) It's probably the everyday marking of a place, like those beautiful handprints in France. But what on earth do we make of a prehistoric painting of a policeman with a gun?

Multimodally yours,
A new blog is born. A blog that will chart progress on the new UKLA/QCA project. It's simply titled Multimodality. Meanwhile other projects continue (Blogtrax) and old ones go public. Find me here (in issue 3), for an example of the latter. Adding it all up, it's been a busy time, maybe some retail therapy's called for...perhaps in the form of this elegant USB drive, who knows?

More than this...

This is the outcome of a fruitful UKLA/QCA project on multimodal texts. A follow-up of this work begins with a meeting in London tomorrow convened by Eve Bearne. We hope to keep interested parties up to date, by opening a new blog. Watch this space for further details! (You can download More than Words here.)

Photos and footprints

Here's Lynda Graham in dialogue at the Hidden Literacies conference. (Who is that hidden just behind her? A spectral form?) A photograph, Susan Sontag tells us, "is a material vestige of its subject in a way that no painting can be...a trace, something directly stenciled off the real, like a footprint or a death mask." A footprint? Nay, lad, that's Barnsley Teachers Centre!

Literacies hidden

Here's Gez Walker from the Showroom Cinema at the UKLA Hidden Literacies conference in Barnsley yesterday. There was a lot of excitement around young children making movies (so that's good), but not so much on graffiti. Ah, well! But here's the UK's new graffiti shop, and here's William Gibson photoblogging graffiti on a doorway in Brick Lane (scroll down to January 20). Anyway, what am I rambling on about, most graffiti isn't hidden, is it?

The web makes me not alone?
OK, so let's start with the remix: here (click on the pic), and then the original/published (?) here, by Justin Hall. So does this have the feeling of the real, the hyper-real or reality TV? I'm not sure any more. Here's Jill Walker talking about it. Is she for real? This is what Jill's reading and we assume that Jill has feelings, too. Actually, I thought I was watching theatre but if, as Justin says, after publishing his life online for so long, people 'don't trust me any more', what then? Well don't trust me, this is just a remix of stories. I walk backwards covering the footprints I left.

Bling Bling - phone ring

This is lovely and really is the logical extension to personalising your phone with nail polish (not that I ever did). Of course, when you change your phone, it may become a collector's item. These designs are unlikely to; but then this is a collector's item. Need a used copy?

Britpop? I don't think so.
But nevertheless we have a vibrant music scene. Check the talent of Raghav, a Canadian artist who came to Liverpool and has made a big impact. He builds on a long tradition of fusion dating back to the Birmingham-based reggae toaster Apache Indian and re-surfacing with Tijinder Singh's homage to Bollywood playback singer Asha Bhosle (Brimful of Asha). If that's to MOR for you, then there's the amazingly talented tabla player Talvin Singh who works with drum 'n' bass and trance or Nitin Sawhney (best on earlier recordings). And it's not all about blokes....ex-Monsoon singer Sheila Chandra has been innovating for years as a voice artist and it's fascinating stuff. Who needs a pop idol?

Kind of Blue (links)
Apparently there’s a new niche market in laptops (OK so mine’s blue but I think my bag could hold ‘items a purse could contain’). Blue really is an OK colour (see Miles Davies), but why, I wondered are links blue? Well, here’s the answer. But wait - here’s where its starts to get really cool – you can tag anywhere (using any media in the real world) with a word written with a blue underline to get your message across. This is grafedia. Kind of cool, kind of linky.

The last click (no link)

This portrait of Keats with an open book staring upwards,his chin resting on his hand, captures a particular kind of literate act. The attitude of the body has always been important in the labour of literacy.
"The fire is at its last click. I am sitting with my back to it with one foot rather askew upon the rug and the other with the heel a little elevated from the carpet."
wrote Keats in his letters. I lean back and stare at the screen. How are the new tools of literacy redefining the work of the body? The mouse is at its last click under the hand of the blogger.

Chip me in ...

'You may feel a little prick', they say as they implant this chip - which is the size of a grain of rice - into your soft tissues, 'but it'll get you in and charge for the drinks you buy, too'. It's VeriChip's RFID used by rich Spanish party-goers at the Baja Beach Club. And while we're still struggling with the concept of the Euro Bar Soba in Glasgow, are well on with the RFID concept. I'm not sure how this can be hacked in identity theft but I'm sure it's possible - the drinks are on me!

Time is running out for the suburbs

Picture_0461
Originally uploaded by edsghm.

In a jam I hear Peter Day on the radio - 'teleworkers of the future won't want to waste time driving' - I know, it's a drag - people will re-locate, it's good news for city-living now fashionably functional, like this new development in Sheffield. 'Time is running out for the suburbs' - yes, and traditional values of 'character and good behaviour are replaced by collaboration and play'. And all this from a visit to William Draves, and his Lern outfit. This is their blog. Time is running out...

I'm keeping an eye on you...
Here's some of the blogs I've been looking at lately. I like reading Kaye Trammell and regularly look at Danah Boyd (ever since getting the apophenia thing). Of course, I'm a big fan of Colin and Michele (despite the fact that's a little quiet). I've just hooked up to the IRA blog, which maybe helpful ( although the literacy and technology archive isn't up to much). Dr Joolz on a daily basis and Sarah's is great - that's just led me to this, which is very interesting indeed.

Bluesnarfing phreakers!
Am I vulnerable? Generally speaking I'm proud of my T610 bluetooth - OK so I don't get bluejacked - but phreakers can hack my phone, steal my address book, read my texts, and turn my phone into a virus carrier. But then I don't have anything to hide (after all you can read my blog!) but information is certianly getting freer... A recent news item shows how it goes. Here's more on bluesnarfing and here's the Wired view. Of course, we all know that while you're watching Big Brother, Big Brother's watching you.

Haircut, sir?
This made me chuckle and set me thinking of male hair, fashion and resistance. Being of a certain age I recall this: long hair as resistance. And then this as resistance to that, hair that is widely ridiculed, and hair with attitude. But on a more serious note we remember compulsory facial hair (for men) in the Taliban era and then the mass-shavings that followed. Disciplining the body, or simply in need of a haircut?

On line but in the body
Working onscreen, I get dry eyes, a sore back and aching hands. But thank God I don’t get the cracked feet! Sensible shoes help, but the choice is bewildering. You could look here or even spot cool shoes and make a copy. Why go to such lengths when you can get these (I like!). So that’s feet taken care of. I already have the eye solution. Then all I need to do is buy in some sound furniture.

Scanner?
Now I just can't think why I ever bought one these - there must be a use. My scanner just clutters up my desk, but this Scanner (Robin Rimaud) is certainly not a waste of space. He is an impressive sound-sculpture-artists who scans mobile phone conversations and puts them into his densely layered digital performance. No idle chit-chat at a Scanner event. Try this as a sample (sound obligatory).

A space to be
Reading Danah Boyd's thoughts on social networks and technology raised some interesting issues for me about networks and affinity spaces. Jim Gee writing about the latter claims that: ‘what people have an affinity with (or for) is not first and foremost the other people using the space, but the endeavour or interest around which the space is organised’. It strikes me that there's a distinction here between a social network established within an affinity space (particularly an online one) and an existing (f2f) network that migrates into virtual space. So, presumably ICQ interest groups are the former rather than the latter.

Marking the place
It's OK to leave your mark if you're an entrepreneur (or even the gas board) but graffiti is, apparently unauthorised...that is un-author-ised. So who is Banksy? He has a new site and also a new book called 'Cut it Out'. He's been described as one of the world's most aggressive and imaginative street artists.

How do I look?
My last post was about place; this about face. I copy the following from Kay Trammell's blog:
"Be a bit narcissistic. Aren't we all? Kidding aside, you should seriously consider posting your picture & a short description about who you are. Readers want to know more about you if you write good posts. What is your occupation? Where do you live? You can be professional (like mine), more playful or somewhere in between like kottke." We really don't want to be faceless. Here's an interesting blog on this theme and, perhaps a little more subtely, here's my haircut (December 22nd and 23rd) : 'How do I look?'

my house
Originally uploaded by edsghm.

Four things to do online
Here's four things to do online. 1. You could play a Flash game to develop your spatial logic like this one. 2. You could look up your favourite recording artist on a data filter like Musicplasma. 3. You could leave a comment on Kaye Trammell's brainstorm blog on developing a high profile blog. 4. You could try and find the Ian Dury lyrics to that song he did based on the names of London tube stations (under the name of Kilburn and the Highroads, I think).

Staring at the future
I've been thinking about how there's an increased integration of technology in people's lives. And how working online can become a 'way of being'. So it's interesting to look at developments in pervasive computing and work (like Urban Tapestries) which looks at how mobile users can interact with location-based information. Then there's the whole area of augmented reality systems. I get the feeling we've only just begun!

Life online
Annette Markham has an interesting-sounding autoethnography published as Life Online. This is her URL with some good freebies. Most of these are drafts, so would presumably need chasing up if used. I've looked at this, and this and recommend her work. Bloggers' autoethnographic fieldnotes are, of course, on Blogtrax.

Gadgets for girls 'n' toys for boys
I was gender-jealous when I saw 'a girl's guide to gadgets' blogged by Dr Joolz yesterday. Then jealously slowly gave way to competitiveness when I saw the chunky-looking MP3 wristwatch (useful if you're into sport) - and I was proud! But later I became confused - was this better than the RF-tuned watch that's accurate to within one second in a million years? It might be in a somber colour, but at least it's tuned to the atomic clock in Rugby. I'd never be late again. (BTW this is Rugby in the UK...OK not on this map but somewhere near Oxford).

Blog on blog
I'm a great admirer of Susan Herring's work, so I was pleased to find this on into the blogosphere. There's up-to-date information here and incisive commentary. She suggest that: "blogs featured in contemporary public discourses about blogging are the exception, rather than the rule: all the available evidence suggests that blogs are more commonly a vehicle of personal expression than a means of filtering content on the Web, for all demographic groups including adult males. It follows that more attention needs to be paid to “typical” blogs and the people who create them in order to understand the real motivations, gratifications, and societal effects of this growing practice." She argues that high profile blogs (usually authored by men) distort the picture of everyday blogging. How typical is typical?

Stopped in my tracks
There's nothing quite like a car breakdown to put you in touch with the stubbornness of meatspace. Burning oil and a cloud of smoke brought our journey to a halt. All I can see on opening the bonnet is CAR ENGINE - like the map of an unknown city . OK, so I make a call on my T610, and thanks to GPS those very nice men from the AA locate us in minutes. So it's all right, and I'm back home in the time it takes to hack an ipod. God bless technology!

Where is the original?
'The presence of the original is the prerequisite of authenticity'
Walter Benjamin
Norwegian police arrest the criminals suspected of stealing The Scream ...but the Guardian reports that Charles Hill of the Met (retired expert) recovered ANOTHER original version of the painting which was stolen in 1994. How many originals are there? And what does it all mean in the digital age - an age in which authenticity may not be anchored to time and place? In fact, where is my blog...and what is it that leaves its trace on your screen?

Supplement
Idling I visit Boing Boing and that leads me to the zoomquilt and the world of dispersed (collaborating artists). Favaria seems to be a singleton but I like his work - particularly the graffiti. There's some interesting music and image work like Torisukoshiro and this. But somehow All Your Base Are Belong To Us (US?) captures something. The visual style reminds me of the BEP video. Like the mask?

Wisdomask

Mysterious footprints
We seem to like the idea of mysterious creatures that leave mysterious footprints. I used to love the Yeti story...remember the photographs? Here's more Yeti stuff! Mystery solved, the Yeti is VIRTUAL and by the time I'd finished my online session with her/him, my mouse was quite grubby: fortunately there's good advice on this too.

Young people today
Roaming around I find Eyebeam with a report on the youngest videoblogger on record. Here's Dylan's blog...its a rambling affair and, I suspect, lovingly supported by a parent. More mature bloggers are to be found navel-gazing here!

On my feet again!
Yes, I'm on my feet again - everybody else has uggs on theirs - and there's a strange surfing connection, I believe. Uggprints in the sand? Anyway, the less said about that the better. I've been worried for some time about keyboard hygiene. Today's technology presents us with a whole new set of cleaning issues. Now this is where iklear singles come in handy. If you're not convinced invest in the super starter kit!

Backchanneling: I think like it!
This is the term being used for the sorts of 'back row' multi-participant chats that happen at conferences with wireless connectivity. So, there's this from mamamusings. I also like to keep up to date with Torill Mortensen and that's how I found out about this and her latest claim to fame (courtesy of those shrewd people at Amazon).

blogthis
Originally uploaded by edsghm.

I made this with a web-based program called typographia (now where did I put that address?)... oh no, it wasn't called typographia, it was called 'Typogenerator' and here's its address. My first attempt was all army colours - dead boring, there's no way I was going to publish that! Anyway this was a good idea, but I completely missed it.

I blog therefore I am
Day 6 of this wretched flu - I would consider trepanation if it was a) legal, b) cheap, and c) painless. But that's just silly, whereas a little functional piercing would be quite a good idea. On the other hand, if I was in full health I'd decorate the house (outside): I've got some great ideas off the internet!

If I dissed
If I dissed the university on my blog, would they sack me? Would they know? I think I'd best be careful though because it's tough out there, as this report shows. Anyway I'm the cautious type and I realise I'd have to be really saucy, and have a photo like this to get the chop.

Why was I reading this?
I thought this sounded pretty cool until I realised I didn't really understand it all! I take comfort in the fact that one day soon I may be able to have something like the SCOTTeVEST - it's the new deal jacket which has flexible, removable solar panels on the back, and a power cell that recharges your gadgets through a USB connection. OK the website’s awful, but I don't care any more: I know I exist because I'm in this (I write therefore I am).

I thought I saw a link...
but it was only apophenia - a chapter in Pattern Recognition but not an entry in the dictionnary. Google apophenia and you get this and Danah Boyd (with an article on blogging) and a link that takes you straight back to William Gibson. There must be a Greek word for this strange cyclical phenomenon or else it's influenza delirium (and that's Latin if you're an etymologist).

Easy fun
I'm in bed with flu, so I just need cheering up. This did it! And then more chav stuff made me chuckle (trackback), until I realised that this sort of thing is actually deeply divisive and really only recycles class prejudice. The word will from now on be regarded with deep suspicion.

And who are you, Stuart?
It was wonderful to hear Stuart Hall on the radio last night, and its free-to-air right now. I particularly liked his elegant musings on identity. I've also bookmarked Hevern's interesting paper 'Threaded Identity in Cyberspace: Weblogs & Positioning in the Dialogical Self' (from a journal I learnt about in the US). Also been reading The Ludologist. The visual design of the blog is great, don't you think....pattern recognition?

On the blog
I read that Kris Cohen has a piece on the photoblog -"What does the photoblog want?" in Media, Culture and Society. I'll be looking out for that. And this is an address for the camphone moblog community (I haven't tried it yet, but it looks pretty good). Finally, a conference paper by Jon Hoem on videoblogs (aka 'the footage' after William Gibson). Cool Hunting!

Traces in the wireless city
They call it public authoring, and it picks up on the idea of leaving your mark in the environment (see previous posts on graffiti). Proboscis illustrate the concept through this and this (they're a bit slow, so you could do something else at the same time!). That leads nicely onto flaneurs and storytellers and their place in the urban tapestry. Also there's a blog and, of course, because I retell this backwards: here's the front page.

Bus blog
A few years back I had the idea of sampling literacy practices along a line drawn on a map of the urban area where I live. I never got round to it, but I often think about recycling the idea as a student project. Recently a friend told me about the No 73 bus blog - check it out! This comes out of research reported a while back on the beeb. It's a great idea, you can learn more here. And if literacy in education is your bag you can read me (and my good friends) in Janet Evans book 'Literacy Moves On'.

Hyperidentity
I haven't yet blogged my blog (like Dr Joolz) or tracked anything as awesome as this, but I've been thinking about my trajectory in the blogosphere. Am I sneaking into a heterotopia or becoming a cyber-flaneur? An answer came when I found this on Sarah's blog - the idea of hyperidentity/ies. The idea in the article is quite straightforward. I think Jim Gee would argue that meaningful learning is about taking on a new identity. Stuart McNaughton puts it slightly differently when he says: 'In the culture of the classroom, children's identities as learners are taking form.'

Keep it clean!
People keep an asking me what I want for Christmas. Well the truth is that all I really want is the Hello Kitty desktop vac, but I don't think it's available over here, so maybe I'll have to make do with the Spherex chair (my third choice).

Play power
Texting, tagging and blogging seem to have one thing in common. They're all ways that technology has been appropriated to serve our everyday/social/playful pursuits. Yes, we all know about play and learning, but the politics of adult play are just as interesting. Maybe it's here that the affordances of technology get changed through the repurposing of tools. Googling technology and play gives fairly predictable results - except for this, which is scary!

From the front to QR codes
USA Today reports on congressmen getting emails from soldier relatives that are more informative than military briefings (are we surprised?). Altogether more optimistic in flavour is the idea of deploying warplanes to drop 120 million origami cranes in Southern Thailand.

And on the shopping front, watch out for Quick Response code technology (QR), which is poised to replace the barcode. QRs carry far more information and can be scanned by mobile phones. The future is here (....or else it's in Japan).

Bootprints
Well, I suppose that my tourist retail thing should include these, but the successor to the i-pod is pretty impressive too (although I'm not sure about the look). In fact, the Rio Carbon is so impressive that hackers are repurposing the hard drive and selling it on at a profit. Cool hunters or digital cowboys? And this is Sarah's blog.

And then there's Miami
Last day of the NRC conference today and I'm still thinking about what Gunther said about the relationships between the worker, the tool and the work. I think he mentioned that the work leaves its trace on the tool that's used, and illustrated this with a print text in which word meanings shifted...mmm!
Joe Tobin was great yesterday, a good late night vital issues session with Michele, Colin and Ilana, and today I heard Shelley Xu... and we're making plans for next year in Miami. That's attractive!

The best of yesterday
It had to be Colin and Michele: I particularly liked the manga stuff that Michele did and the compex interweavings of social practices from Anya's work. It started to make me think that the online/offline binary that we impose may be bit off target. In the example Colin read out cyberspace and meatspace are blended.
Ilana Snyder was very good, too. I thought the way she used Gibson's Mirror World theme was really interesting. Also loved Morrel's work, that really applied Critical Discourse Analysis.

Texas
At the NRC in San Antonio where it's sunny and pleasant. Just been to a good session on blogging with Dana Commack, Sarah Lohnes and Gus Andrews - all from Columbia University. There doing some interesting work.
Stopped and searched several times on the way over...and that shoe things funny too. Why are they so interested in my footwear? Do they think I'm, Manola the shoe-blogger?

Itchy feet?
No, not that foot thing again (people are starting to talk)...I'm off to San Antonio, the place with one of the the worst web designs ever! Maybe I'll have some down time in the Hill Country, who knows. At least I don't have to worry about my blogger friends who are staying at home, listening to the wireless. Carry on blogging!

Making tracks again...
That’s the oldest footprint there, but, actually, I must say that I prefer fresh boot tracks in snow (Westport) or barefoot on a sandy beach. Is that normal? Anyway this is a good-news story.

Did the future arrive yet?
Mark Weiser coined the phrase "ubiquitous computing". He saw the potential for embedding technology in home environments, and in everyday objects. In ubiquitous computing, we could interact with hundreds of computers at a time - each invisibly distributed in our environment and wirelessly connected to each other. This paper looks at intimacy and ubiquitous computing.

Mark making in those liminal spaces
It's the unbounded semiotic of disruption, subvertising and culture jamming...yes it's graffiti time again! Sprays, stencils, stickers are the technologies of other voices. There are some interesting blogs on street art and graffiti and a lovely example of stencil work, here. I like the concept of online graffiti and this animated graffiti is interesting. But the bit of new-tech subvertising that really inspires me is this - if you post a message on this website, he's supposed to get a text-message on his bike. Then he uses a programmable chalk-spray that writes your message on the road. Wow!

Spooooky!
Funny, I didn’t know about the Beeb’s Spook stuff until I read Anya’a blog. The new look’s really cool - and I like her chapter, too. It’s good to see Joolz gets a mention and another call-out for the Manola shoeblog! I shift from my despair about blog-blocking when I read this about blogging in the writing classroom.

UWB - the future?
Like a souped up Bluetooth, UWB (Ultra Wide Band) is poised to grab our cash, provide high speed/lower power wi-fi and lead to more convergence. This article introduces the idea and the Intel site shows that the big players are already lined up. 'All I want for Christmas is .....'

Blog on blogs
Blogs certainly do have the potential for all sorts of knowledge exchange and (sometimes) debate. That’s great, particularly if you’re part of a dispersed community as is argued here. I’m not so sure that they do the same thing as more traditional academic work (eg journal articles). In the current knowledge economy do we have to protect our goods from competitors? Or should we be creating new rules?

More footprints, no shoes
Children’s footprints dating back to the Mesolithic period (10,000-5,500 years ago) have been found in the semi-submerged salt marshes of the Severn Estuary. I’m amazed that we have this record. It makes me think it’s time to make my own record, merging fixed-interval crowd photography using Crowd Compiler. Point, counterpoint.

Blogs blocked
Local ICT advisers are discouraging schools from blogging because they are easily 'hacked'. OK blogs are public, but so what? The only unfortunate incident I'm aware of is Marc Prensky reporting on unwelcome postings. Meanwhile other schools have been introduced to the arcane practice of pencil and paper blogs :sigh:
At the same time, work on intelligent fabrics and wired clothing gathers momentum. Soon you won't need to worry about knotting up your hands-free and your i-pod headphones - all will be one - convergence in your clothing. This website has the latest links on wearable computers.

Digital Prophecy
With the new DAB radio I discover Dhafer Youseff, blending Tunisian oud playing with Scandanavian electro-jazz. What's more he's on tour - I'll be there in meatspace (it's the only way).

Putting your foot in it
Booking on a reef trip in Queensland the other year we were surprised to be told that 'All you need bring is your thongs.' - surprised until we unpicked the local linguistic nuance that suddenly makes footwear and underwear interchangeable! In a laterally connected way the humble flip-flop has acquired a double meaning brought to light in this wonderful site (thanks for the link, Jackie).

Am I a social group, am I?
I think our work on how children and young people use new technology needs to go beyond individual interactions and the texts they produce. We need to look at technology-mediated social groups. For instance I like this sort of stuff on the geekgirl site: does this make me a social group?

Visuals, videoblogging and so on
Reading about videoblogs, I find that this is one of the more oft-quoted ones: Steve Garfield. Mind you, on Saturday night I got just as much out of playing with these little wonders! Back on the conference theme I’m tempted by this- looks like it should be interesting.

Blogging in Bergen
I'm so impressed with Julia's visuals! My own brush with photoblogging went pear-shaped : blush: but I’m uplifted to find that I don’t have to be in meatspace to enjoy the Bergen conference. This is the videoblog you can see and hear Howard Rheingold – almost as good as being there and probably considerably warmer!

Beset by bears
These cuddly little items are the latest infestation in my mailbox. I read, I wish, I forward. This is the phenomenon of the ‘good luck’ email chain message. By forwarding it the text becomes a sort of votive artifact. Pass it on.

Phone tricks and disco bits
I knew I read it somewhere but I've just confirmed that James Trusler is in the Guinness Book of Records for texting at a speed of 160 characters in 1min 7 secs!
Awesome! But has he been bluejacked yet? Well, I'm just getting the hang of picture messaging and that's OK, but nobody's bluejacking me. Still mobiles are really on the move, as I learn from Colin and Michele's blog. This little number is designed for clubbing. (Presumably it reaches parts that the U2 ipod doesn't!)

Elsewhere
This link on academics who blog is borrowed from Vic, who suggests that blogs provide an opportunity for new kinds of participation in intellectual life. I’ve been thinking about what a potent research tool the blog could become allowing user groups, stakeholders, and participants a close-up view of work as it unfolds.
Looks like a good conference in Norway (shame I can’t participate) and Howard Rheingold is guest of honour.

The print (again)
The event that completely disrupts Robinson Crusoe’s world is ‘the print of a man’s naked foot on the shore’. A disruptive sign. Are someone else’s surftrails the same? Footprints are a recurring theme in this blog. Unlike Bunuel I can’t own up to a full-on foot fetish, but yet I’m delighted to discover my first shoe blog!

Passing through
Leicester station used to be noted for its multilingual welcome sign in Gujerati, Hindi, Urdu and English. Now this has been replaced by ‘heritage’ pictures and a weblink that doesn't work (this one does). Is this the slow homogenisation of late modernity or just the sign of the times on the rail network? Time for the inspiration of Mitzuko Ito's Bento Blog!

Religious fanaticism, terrorism and so on…
It’s that time of year again when we go firework crazy. November 5^th was etched on my memory well before September 11^th, but there are some parallels. Anyway I’ll be just doing virtual fireworks – wish I had a voting button, but then what’s the difference between this, this and this?

Are the most interesting insiders outsiders?
I’ve been checking out what Marc Prensky said about Digital Natives in Bristol – his long but interesting slideshow is here. I also like what he has to say about mobile phones: What can you learn from a cell-phone? Please note there's an ethical thing here – he likes you to let him know you’re linking up to his stuff. Contact marc@games2train.com

Writing online
I wonder whether this is a space beyond the reach of international politics? Probably not. Bush's re-election is deeply depressing...and just to think I have to go to a meeting and talk about something good I've read! Maybe I'll choose a serial email narrative, kind-of-edgy kind-of-cool. Here's some links: this and this.

Happy Tree Friends ?
I didn't know quite what to think when my friend's 9 year old showed me this cartoon site. There are free feeds but they take a while to load. Meanwhile this idea (here) is an Australian import and seems like a fine idea to me.

Tuned to a dead channel
Its 20 years since William Gibson brought us the word 'cyberspace' and the adventures of the punk cyborg Chase. The opening line stays with me: The sky above the port was the colour of television tuned to a dead channel.' That's magic. I've been visiting Gibson's blog quite a bit lately - that's interesting, too.
Bashment reaches Sheffield now, in the form of a new hair salon 'Bashment Barbers'. But I see that it's not 'bashment' but 'chav' that's tipped as new word of the year by askoxford.com.

New roles for digital writing
Most new mobile phones purchased in the UK now have picture messaging facility, some do short movie clips. Mizuko Ito charts an interesting development in etiquette with the cameraphone in Japan where users text first to check availablity. Read about it here.

Local knowledge
Graffiti on hoardings around Sheffield claims that God is real. I was pleased to learn, this morning from another writer's addition that God is really Nigel! That explains a lot.
Jack's been talking to me about some of the fascinating work he's been doing over in Rotherham (and elsewhere in cyberspace). This is showcased on his website 'Personal Demons'.

Thinking with my fingers
I love the idea of thinking with your fingers. It builds on some of Frank Wilson’s ideas in his book ‘The Hand’. Torill Mortensen uses this to title her blog (which is full of interesting stuff). Meanwhile back at home, I now have Sonia Livingstone’s survey of UK children online, based on a survey of 1,500 9-19 year olds and 900 parents of 9-17 year olds. The links on the sidebar too!

Making tracks in cyberspace
What will happen when bloggers get easier access to mobile technology? Justin Hall who's looking at trends in the US and Japan writes about the possibilities of moblogging. Meanwhile media debate in Japan is addressing the ethics of news blogs and how blogging is changing the face of journalism. At the same time here's more tracks in cyberspace!

My footprints
Wet footprints are the memory of my appearance at the office. They say that Thoth invented writing after watching the webprints of the marsh Ibis. This reminds me of how Vygotsky described writing as mnemotechnic. Now, in webrings and bloggings we print our footsteps in cyberspace.

Art, music, life...

Just discovered the work of Martin Hill who does minature Golsworthy-like stuff with stones and pebbles. I loved the film Rivers and Tides which features Andy's work at Eden. You can see other stuff here.

French jazz has often been good, perhaps at its best with Cameroon-born Manu Dibango, but a new niche in 'world jazz' takes off with the arabesque flavours of Didier Malherbe. Life goes on.

What's news?
Well, first there's official recognition of the rise of news blogs and then our friends at Firebox resurrect the Tamagotchi (here). We must be living in a retro world.

Live links/dead links

Unfortunately, the fabulous hip hop link is now dead :weep: So, to compensate for that I'm now showing a couple of papers on the sidebar. And keeping up with the unofficial literacies subvertising themes here's a gallery of the work of Banksy who operates in Bristol and London. And this is the Banksy site (here).

My birthday and other ephemera

Yes, just a bit older, so I'm keeping up to date with hip-hop (click here: you'll need sound) and thinking of creating a digital archive of all those old cassette tapes in the glove compartment of my car with this.

The art of the flashmob

In the summer the BBC harnessed the power of the flashmob phenomenon to create Flashmob the Opera, a tastefully disruptive event staged at London's Paddington Station. This is now showing on Channel 3.

Remember those little brushes...

Remember those little brushes you used to get to clean typewriter keys? Another part of writing paraphernalia safely consigned to the past. But it's a whole new set of problems when you try to keep new writing tools clean. Remove those snack crumbs and dead skin from your keyboard with this little gem: the keyboard vac.

Then again, maybe that clunky keyboard is just a throw-back to the times of typing. What about a virtual keypad for your PDA - click here

Scandinavian Jazz

Why does all the best new jazz come from Norway and Sweden? In 1989 Miles Davis recorded Palle Mikkelborg's Aura suite in Stockholm...and since then, ECM legend Jan Gabarek, followed by the fantastic Nils Petter Molvaer. And now Eivind Aarset's stunning work on Connected!

Love in a cold climate

Another object of desire is the wearable MP3 player. OK if it's cold, wet or both - but as Ruth points out 'No good if it's hot!'. Have they considered MP3 shorts?

Whatever happened to Fist?

Graffiti has a long history dating back, as far as I know, to comments carved into the paving slabs of Ephesus and the Great Wall of China. The Silk Route exhibition at the British Library also showed interesting 'textual litter' in various languages uncovered by nineteenth and twentieth century archeologists. But the spraycan presented a new technology for unofficial urban literacy and marked a new departure in writing. Fist decorated bridges, billboards and buildings with his distinctive tag until the police caught up with him sometime in the 1990s. He was given a gaol sentence for his labours. What happened to Fist? His spirit lives on.

We're now witnessing the emergence of URL graffiti, where affinity groups and activists use this technique of subvertisement to direct the newly literate to their websites. But what would screen-based graffiti look like? Or could this be a way of describing some writing in the blogosphere?

BLOGGERS' BLOCK?

Am I suffering from bloggers block? No, I just gave it a break. Life got in the way. Now I'm getting some students into the blogosphere. It's going to be a bit wooden at first, but let's see how it unfolds.

I've been away in Turkey and access seems quite hard outside the major towns. I found internet cafes in the tourist places, but they were very hot and sweaty with slow connections. All I was able to do was check my mail a couple of times. That or melt.