FromMelbin

2011 Music (post 2 of 4)

2012-01-10T21:57:00.000+11:00

Cut Copy: Zonoscope.
****

Death Cab for Cutie: Codes And Keys.
****

Digitalism: I Love You, Dude.
***

Fleet Foxes: Helplessness Blues.
*****

Gotye: Like Drawing Blood.
*

So, the second post ...

Cut Copy: This is nearly a *****. Just off it really. I was lucky enough to see them live in June and I think they're brilliant. As soon as they started playing nearly everyone at the Sydney Opera House was out of their seats dancing. The album is great, but if I stick strictly with my rating system there are a couple of annoying tracks, so it becomes a ****. I was so glad that they are fantastic live and good entertainers as well as good in the studio. My highlights are Dan Whitford (especially the way he moves on stage), Need You Now and Where I'm Going.
Dance. Electronics. Design. Escape. Movement.

Death Cab For Cutie: Another good album panned on Pitchfork. I hadn't really been a fan, but I bout this album for the single You Are a Tourist which I thought had a stunning music video. It was shot live in one take using multiple camera and without any editing or re-takes. I love it. I shoved a few of the tracks onto an iPod that I use when walking, running or at the gym and it has really grown on me as an album. Unobstructed Views is probably too long for release as a single, but I really like the way it gently introduces you to its theme and how Ben Gibbard's echo-ey vocals come in late. They hold back. It is good. There is some great guitar band work on many tracks too. There are some parallels with Cut Copy here and I see Cut Copy have remixed the track Doors Unlocked and Open on the remixed EP.
Experience. Guitars. Unique vocals.

Digitalism: Unfairly dismissed as a "rehash" by Pitchfork, this is a good album. If you like Electronica, the album has more than a few tracks that soon grow on you like Circles, Blitz and Stratosphere, but my fave is Two Hearts.
Germany. New media. Youth. Gay.

Fleet Foxes: I don't know why it has taken me so long to get into Fleet Foxes, but I love them. They remind me of The Middle East, but it should be the reverse. I like Robin Pecknold's lyrics and his vocals, I like the stomping beat on Battery Kinzle and I like the gentle and the strumming guitar, the harmonies, the fiddle, the mandolin and the lap steel. Helplessness Blues is an instantly loveable track. The composition is genius. The transition in tempo and feeling just after half-way is beautiful and breath-taking. They are another band that remind me of all of the best things about the US. Another really beautiful track is Lorelai and I love the different infectious feel and rhythmic pulse of Great Ocean. They have a big and devoted following, but it seems to me that they play music that they love playing together regardless of what anyone else thinks. And that is a good thing.
The US. Grass. Roots. Country. Life.

Gotye: I have no idea what everyone raves about. It is one for my sister I'm afraid. To me it seems like he is trying to prove how versatile and talented he is in many genres. Maybe he thinks he is another Rufus Wainwright?
Nothing nice springs to mind.

2011 Music (post 1 of 4)

2012-01-04T21:24:00.000+11:00

Bag Raiders.
***

Bat for Lashes: Two suns.
***

Bon Iver: Bon Iver.
*****

Boy & Bear: Moonfire.
***

Coldplay: Mylo Xyloto.
*****

My semi-annual review of the musics that I bought in the previous year. They were not all released in 2011, I just bought the CDs in 2011. Yes.

Bag Raiders: I was obsessed with the single Shooting Stars in 2009. I loved the way it held a lot back and the way they built up the keyboard riff. I still think it is brilliant. I bought this album because of Way Back Home and that too is brilliant. Sunlight is another excellent track.
Dancing. Marieke Hardy. Running. Sydney. Triple J. 2009.

Bat for Lashes: I am a bit late to the party here, but I went to see them/her at the Opera House in June 2011 because of the album Two Suns and wasn't disappointed. A brilliant show and it really was fantastic live music. The highlight songs for me are Sleep Alone, Moon and Moon and Daniel.
Red. Heart. Haunting. Sometimes sad. Art.

Bon Iver: I didn't want to buy this album. Everyone was raving about it. Now I know why. I think it is one of my faves now. Virtually every track is wonderful, if a teeny bit similar. I like Justin Vernon's vocals but they may be not everyone's taste. I hear echoes and strains of Peter Broderick, Sufjan Stevens and Bruce Hornsby (particularly on Beth/Rest) here. The music does remind me of America, particularly of the first time I flew across the Rockies and the Grand Canyon in the 1980s, listening to Bruce Hornsby on a Walkman. It is pretty rare when I can say that I like every track on an album and I do here.
Soft. Emotions. The US. Rockies. Grand Canyon.

Boy & Bear: This was a late purchase. Maybe I shouldn't be reviewing it yet as I've not listened to it enough. Some tracks are brilliant though and it is obvious that the band is both very talented and modest. I liked the list they put together for Rage one night and what they had to say to introduce some of the artists and songs that inspire them. Feeding Line is an obvious single, but there are other great tracks like Milk & Sticks (which has a great change of tempo) and Lordy May.
Ireland. The bush. Tempo.

Coldplay: I've been a fan since Parachutes. They seem to polarize people and many think it is cool to hate them. I don't know why. Triple J are too cool for Coldplay, but most of their dead-head presenters probably secretly wish they were as cool as Chris Martin. I don't think Chris is up himself at all; I think he is just tired of lame questions from even lamer DJs and VJs. Mylo Xyloto is a brilliant album: the kind of album most professional musicians wish they could put together. It will long be remembered after most contemporary music is simply forgotten. The class of production (by Markus Dravs, Daniel Green and Rik Simpson) is so far above the rest that it reminds me of the brilliance of Phil Spector at the height of his talent. I think the influence of Brian Eno is still evident too. I love Paradise and Every Teardrop is a Waterfall. Both are anthemic, dramatic, beautifully composed and typically Coldplay. Once again I like every track and with Coldplay, there is a little surprise on each track that is a joy to unpack. I don't know how they do it.
Lights. Drama. Genius. Completeness. Entertainment. English rock. Music.

Oh, just to explain my five * rating system:
***** rare, love the whole album, genius or bordering on genius, never tire of it.
**** mostly loved, only have to skip a few tracks, nearly great.
*** has a few great tracks that I love.
** either disappointing or not to my taste.
* wish I didn't buy it; may give it to my sister.

Another new/old bike

2011-12-21T10:21:00.003+11:00

Latest addition. It’s a 26 year old Hillman road bike with Reynolds 531 tubes rebuilt as a single speed at Deus Cycleworks. It was my first race bike.

It is kinda an eclectic mix. The big White Industries hubs provide a lot of bling, so it isn’t all black. And they nicely match the breaking surface of the Mavic rims. I am struggling up steep hills in Sydney from a standing start, so either they have too big a gear on it or I’ve been spoilt recently by all the gears on my Bianchi & Pinarello road bikes. If I get the old Allsopp fixed I’ll almost have a different bike to ride every day of the working week. It has a gold chain because they didn’t have a decent black chain in stock. Looks OK. And it still seems like a nice fit to ride.

I just have to ride with a pump, even if it is only a few km. All those years on long rides I guess. Not that I can remember them at all really. Must have been someone else …

FasterChef DEUX

2011-12-15T11:44:00.001+11:00

I am indeed fortunate to work with a number of creative geniuses: David Litting, Jemima McDonald (who needs to go back to cinematography school), Carl Hoschke, Belinda Tiffen and Patrick Tooth.

You need to watch all the way until the end to fully enjoy David's excellent sub-titles.

New library services: why, what, how & so what?

2011-12-06T12:11:00.001+11:00

UTS Library future service model (with notes)

View more documents from Mal Booth

More images from Ironman Hawaii

2011-10-14T15:51:00.000+11:00

These are all from the marathon run. I still have more to add from the closing stages of the run.

Ironman Hawaii images

2011-10-12T03:19:00.000+11:00

These are a few from the swim and bike. More to follow.

Dangerous ideas for libraries

2011-10-03T19:15:00.000+11:00

Dangerous ideas for libraries: ASLA 2011

View more documents from Mal Booth

This is the keynote presentation I gave to the ASLA 2011 Conference: http://www.asla.org.au/pd/conference/

I had a couple of good questions that went much further than the content of this presentation, perhaps into areas that I've covered in other recent presentations (also on SlideShare). One question, however, was on how we are going to manage all of the changes indicated in this presentation. I don't think I answered that one comprehensively. I said that for some of the new initiatives such as developing a new range of services that will be more appropriate to the role of a new Library within a world-leading university of technology (UTS's aspiration), we are already engaged in active learning programs to improve our understanding of Design Thinking processes as they apply to service design.

What I should have added, however, is that I don't think there is anything in this presentation that presents a major change for us beyond the development of a new range of services. At UTS Library we are already actively exploring or already doing most of the "dangerous ideas" covered here. So none of this really presents a major change in direction for us.

Macquarie University Library

2011-09-28T21:26:00.000+10:00

I toured the new Macquarie University Library in mid-September 2011 finding it bright, porous, welcoming, comfortable looking, spacious and not over-signed. It is already proving to be very popular with the students.I really liked the new areas devoted to post-graduates and higher degree researchers. Many of the internal design features look to be very clever and effective.

The Grove Library, WA

2011-09-28T21:18:00.000+10:00

I visited this Library in mid-September 2011 and was really impressed with the design, sustainability features and the people who work there. It is popular, efficient and a great addition to the community.
I am very grateful to those who arranged this visit for me and those who spent some of their time showing me around.

Change & our future: it's not just about technology

2011-09-19T00:38:00.000+10:00

Presentation to ALIA NLS5 2011

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BikeTank and service design

2011-08-31T14:39:00.005+10:00

As BikeTank approaches its third week I am really impressed with the energy and participation it enjoys as people come together at u.lab to try to encourage the use of bikes, plan better infrastructure and take shared action in ensuring a sustainable future for Sydney city.

Here are some images that hopefully tell some more of the story, i.e. what, where, who, how, when:

So apart from my personal interest in the outcomes from all of this why am I going?

There are several reasons:

I think it is a great initiative by several academics from across a number of faculties within UTS and I think we in UTS Library should be supportive of such steps. (Yes, that is a big hint for some of you reading this.)
I'd like to learn more about the whole Design Thinking process by seeing it in action. I reckon that most adults learn more about a process by being immersed in it than attending a seminar or workshop.
BikeTank is also about Social Innovation and a sustainable future. Those two concepts are critical to our future at UTS Library as we plan a future Library at the heart of our city campus. As well as implementing new technologies including ASRS, RFID and vastly improved online discovery (not just search but true discovery!) and building a grand new modern library that isn't primarily a book storage facility, we need to evolve as an organisation and imagine and develop a new service model. I reckon that we'd be pretty well served by a similarly inclusive and collaborative process. So here is my vision for that:

Blood Wedding

2011-08-17T13:08:00.004+10:00

I saw Blood Wedding last night at Sydney Theatre Co.

It is a credit to Director Iain Sinclair and the cast. The staging of the final act is a superb demonstration of the power that theatre has to being the written word to life. The set design by Rufus Didwiszus just has to be seen. I was amazed. See it before it closes on 11 September.

The mad square: modernity in German art 1910-1937

2011-08-17T10:11:00.003+10:00

I saw this exhibition yesterday at the Art Gallery of NSW and was blown away. It is a wonderful example curatorial excellence (by Dr Jacqueline Strecker) at the highest level. The works illustrate a very creative and influential period of both art and design in Germany between two world wars. They are drawn from cultural institutions and collections across Europe, the US and Australia.

I don’t think such an exhibition could easily be mounted in Germany. It is so beautifully selected and the text is superb. I cannot write highly enough about this exhibition.

Media scandals & responsibility

2011-07-21T10:39:00.000+10:00

Hmmm, so if you’re CEO & Chairman of huge media corporation, nothing is your fault. Of course it isn’t. You’re not to blame. One wonders, however, how your many media outlets would report this situation if it wasn’t about their boss.

What matters in the end is how your share value recovers. As long as your testimony saves the value of your stock all is good. You are an example to us all.

View from lunch today

2011-07-03T14:43:00.001+10:00

Farewell to Dr Alex Byrne (Part 2, the film)

2011-06-30T10:46:00.003+10:00

This very clever animation was produced by Belinda Tiffen and Sharlene Scobie from UTS Library and it was the final item presented in the UTS farewell last night. It can also be found on the UTS Library YouTube Channel.

Farewell to Dr Alex Byrne (Part 1)

2011-06-30T09:38:00.005+10:00

Photo credit: Dianne Garvan, UTS Library.

Last night UTS formally farewelled Alex Byrne as outgoing University Librarian. It was a wonderful function held in the University Chancellery with attendees including former Chancellor Sir Gerard Brennan, Emeritus Professor Brian Low, former Deputy Vice Chancellor (Administration) Robyn Kemmis, Alex's partner Sue Hearn and daughter Kate Byrne.

The function was hosted by Professor Shirley Alexander, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Teaching, Learning & Equity) and Vice President and speeches thanking Alex for his contribution to UTS were delivered by Professor Ross Milbourne, Vice-Chancellor and President of UTS and Professor Jill McKeogh, Dean of the Law Faculty. Professor Theo Van Leeuwen, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences sang an Adieu for Alex to the tune of My Favorite Things.

Given Alex's long and strong commitment to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture it was fitting that the evening was kicked off with an acknowledgement of the traditional owners of the land on which the UTS campus sits by Joan Tranter (Equity and Diversity Coordinator & Manager: Indigenous/Cultural Diversity at UTS).

I spoke on behalf of all staff of the Library and here it is, I think a fitting final post for #blogjune:

All of us in the UTS Library will miss Alex’s integrity, consultative leadership, forward thinking, his commitment to scholarship at UTS and his focus on excellence in library service.

His vision and leadership leaves behind a lasting legacy that has taken UTS Library from mediocrity to extraordinary. We are now recognised as a clear leader in service design, digital library services and e-Scholarship. His inspirational future vision will be realised by the new Library that is now being planned for the centre of the UTS campus, driven by new technologies that open up the library spaces for people and deliver fast and relevant services in both the physical and virtual worlds.

Beyond UTS, Alex is widely respected as one of the most accomplished senior librarians internationally and he has contributed much as both a Board Member and President of the International Federation of Library Associations. Alex has also had strategic leadership with a number of significant national projects such as his role in shaping the direction of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Data Archive and earlier work on developing protocols for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Library and Information Resource Network. He has also contributed substantially to the growth of cooperative/collaborative arrangements to share collections between different universities like Bonus+.

Alex is also recognised by those who have been fortunate enough to work closely with him as a man of multiple talents and wisdom in so many fields, from literature and the arts to politics, history and languages. He is into everything. He makes his own bookends and he is sketching and print-making at the moment. He meets up with someone he studied French with once a month to practice his French conversation skills. He made ‘from Russia with Love’ for our edible books day. He regularly attends plays, operas, and musical performances. He has friends from all walks of life from countries all around the world, including a best friend who is Polish. He is an intellectual who understands deep conversations about philosophy, politics, literature, religion, history, as well as someone you can sit down and have a beer with.

He is a particularly generous leader who genuinely trusts his staff and is not afraid of having some fun at work. He often told us to push our initiatives even further than we had suggested to him: he encouraged us to “push it over the edge”, unlocking our imagination and giving us the freedom to experiment and truly innovate.

His has been a very humane and consultative style of leadership and he is respected as a sound decision maker, but a fair, honest and open judge. Alex is passionately committed to equity, accessibility, fairness for all and an open form of management.

We will miss his intellect, wit and wisdom in so many fields but all of his colleagues in the Library wish him the very best as State Librarian for NSW.

Pinarello Prince slide show

2011-06-27T12:14:00.004+10:00

You really should open this up in Flickr for full effect.

Trainer ride

2011-06-25T16:22:00.001+10:00

On Trust

2011-06-23T09:45:00.003+10:00

Image credit: Paul Hagon on Flickr

I meet with design thinkers, services designers and social innovators every week and we are starting to get them to help us prepare our library for its exciting future model. The model is fueled by the implementation of new technologies like ASRS and RFID, but we also realise that we need to change as an organisation and develop a new service model that fully realises the potential offered by these technologies. We are starting small and our first project to be facilitated by one of these designers (Grant Young from Zumio) will be an in house sustainability initiative. More on that when it gets going.

So Grant tweets the other day about a book he was given. Being the nosey parker that I am, I quickly looked it up on our catalogue and found that we had it here, so now I'm reading it too: Tim Brown's Change by Design. It is an easy read, using story-telling to get across the experience of some case studies, and a couple of things have struck me as particularly relevant so far. One was all about trust in a section of the first chapter called cultures of innovation. Here is the quote and now you'll see why I used the above image from a talk I did way back in 2009:

A culture that believes it is better to ask forgiveness afterward rather than permission before, that rewards people for success but gives them permission to fail, has removed one of the main obstacles to the formation of new ideas.

At UTS I've been lucky enough to work for Dr Alex Byrne for over two years now. That is exactly how he operates and I've enjoyed that culture and tried hard to encourage my unit to work together in the same manner. If you work somewhere that doesn't even allow you to speak up before checking with your boss first or if that is how you manage your own organisation, then something is seriously wrong with that picture.

And more again Trek

2011-06-22T13:10:00.001+10:00

Even more bike pr0n #blogjune

2011-06-22T13:09:00.001+10:00

Sydney Opera House - Vivid Projections

2011-06-22T09:38:00.003+10:00

Customs House - Vivid projections

2011-06-21T10:41:00.001+10:00

Loon Lake

2011-06-20T09:59:00.003+10:00

Another surprise on Saturday night was the support act to Red Riders: Loon Lake. These guys are unreal. They had us from their first song. Three of them are brothers and they obviously really enjoy playing together. They're fantastic!

I downloaded their new EP Not Just Friends from iTunes Store almost as soon as I got home. It features their single In the Summer that is getting some airplay on Triple J now.

Read.More.Here.Now.

The Middle East & Red Riders

2011-06-19T20:46:00.005+10:00

I had a big weekend of music. It started with The Middle East at the Metro on Friday night and finished with Red Riders' last ever concert at the Oxford Art Factory (video above of Ordinary from that performance) on Saturday night. Both events were fantastic and well worth the money.

The Middle East were a complete surprise. I know their music from their self-titled EP and the more recent album I Want That You Are Always Happy, but in concert I think their music is much deeper, heavier and it has so much more energy. They really seem to enjoy playing and performing and right from the first note it was clear that they had a really big sound and stage presence. As with their album there was heaps of variety in the playing with most band members playing several instruments as they wandered through their amazing repertoire. To me it seemed that they had a long background in live performance and after having seen them now it seems their studio recordings, whilst beautiful, just don't capture the energy and richness they display on stage. They're brilliant.

Red Riders also really enjoyed playing their concert. They seemed to treat it all as a celebration of their musical history and they dropped a couple of hints that it isn't all completely over. They will probably do some individual work or reform in another combination. Guitarist Brad Heald is back with The Vines. I hope all that talent just isn't wasted.

I think I mostly enjoyed the music they played in the second half of this gig (from Drown in Colours) when Brad replaced Adrian Deutsch on stage. His guitar work on Tomorrow/Today and Ordinary is very special. Tomorrow/Today was probably my highlight from this performance. I'd rate Drown in Colours as one of the best albums I own. They are (or maybe were now) such an under-rated band.

Red Riders on stage for last time at the OAF

2011-06-18T22:33:00.001+10:00

#blogjune Music Meme

2011-06-17T13:23:00.005+10:00

1. The album/EP/single I'm currently addicted to:

Red Riders: Drown in Colour. I'm off to see their last ever concert at the Oxford Art Factory on Saturday night too!

2. The last live music concert I went to (date too please):

The Falling Joys at the OAF last Saturday night (10 June 2011).

3. The last album I bought (or downloaded):

The Naked & Famous: Passive Me, Aggressive You

4. The next album I want to buy:

Death Cab for Cutie: Codes and Keys. See video above.

5. The next live music concert I will be going to:

The Middle East at the Metro in Sydney tonight.

6. Most memorable live performance I've attended:

The Cure: Reflections at the Sydney Opera House.

7. I would most like to see live in concert:

Jeff Buckley.

The top 15 reasons not to stop at a pedestrian crossing

2011-06-16T15:06:00.001+10:00

(Completely unrelated image.)

“I saw a sad faced, slow moving elderly gentleman as he bounced off the bonnet of my car”.

1. You just don’t like to. (Fair enough really.)
2. You are too important to stop. (Of course you are.)
3. You are far to busy to stop. (Snap.)
4. You were smoking or drinking. (Quite right too.)
5. You were using your phone. (And that is O.K.)
6. This is a very busy road and people should cross elsewhere. (Why didn’t I think of that?)
7. You wear a dark suit (see #2 above).
8. You were simply following the car in front. (One must keep that traffic flowing.)
9. YOU HAVE CHILDREN IN THE CAR! (Bingo: you win this beautiful lounge suite.)
10. You have a pet on your lap. (How did that get in there?)
11. You were listening to music or the radio. (Lalalalalah)
12. You needed to adjust your hair. (I flick my hair back and forth.)
13. You really don’t like to use the clutch and the brakes. (We must all be environmentally responsible.)
14. The pedestrian wasn’t directly in front of your car. (Face palm.)
15. You don’t like pedestrians, runners, bike riders, people who don’t drive cars, etc. (Double face palm.)

@flexnib's five books meme #blogjune

2011-06-14T13:53:00.010+10:00

http://www.rouleur.cc/2010-annual

1. The book I’m currently reading:

Isherwood by Peter Parker

http://www.librarything.com/work/book/69410371

2. The last book I finished:

Beneath Hill 60 by Will Davies

http://www.librarything.com/work/book/60804780

3. The next book I want to read:

Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years by David Talbot

http://www.librarything.com/work/2871361/book/51820222

4. The last book I bought:
Rouleur Photography Annual 2010 (Vol 4) Edited by Guy Andrews (See image above.)

http://www.librarything.com/work/book/74499503

5. The last book I was given:

Donna Hay's Fast, Fresh Simple. Does a cook book count?

http://www.librarything.com/work/10681692/74498275

Blueberry muffins

2011-06-12T19:47:00.001+10:00

Falling Joys at the Oxford Art Factory

2011-06-10T23:25:00.002+10:00

The Falling Joys played an amazing show at the OAF last night. It followed their first live gig for 15 years earlier this year at the National Museum of Australia. It was almost a full house at the OAF and just about everyone seemed to be a dedicated and loyal fan if you can judge that by how many times they felt the need to sing the lyrics.

The indie band seemed to have lost none of their feel for their music and their talent for playing live. Age certainly hasn't wearied them. The guitar work was just as unique and recognisable as ever and they played with heaps of energy. Lock It (1990) has always been my favourite of all of their songs (image above during Lock It performance), but Jennifer (also from the 1990 album Wish List) was certainly another highlight of the show. They also played some new songs that also were received very well.

I was so glad I managed to get to this show!

What is a discovery layer?

2011-06-10T12:37:00.004+10:00

Storytime. Last year a few of us from UTS Library were invited to go and talk with students and then help to assess their augmented reality (AR) application concepts that could be applied to the UTS campus. They were advanced Visual Communications students working with some pretty clever and inspiring academics, including a visiting lecturer (Dr Keir Winesmith) who is normally the technical lead for SBS Digital Media. From memory, nearly all of the concepts they came up with were influenced in some way by the students’ use of and experience with social media. One of the concepts was tightly focussed on the Library and based on mobile service including mobile search and discovery and mobile check out.

The student library application included many features that they expected to see and use to search and discover our library’s collections: a basic item record; tags; ratings; reviews; comments; AND the item’s history of use. The history was represented graphically to show frequency and periods of use and even whether the item had been the subject of a fine for late return. We have taken their suggestions very seriously and it has confirmed our belief that we needed to add a basic social media layer to our “discovery layer” with new features such as folksonomic tags, ratings and reviews or comments. We are also looking into the feasibility of adding the item’s history of use.

This experience started me thinking about a number of things. Are we really offering true “discovery”, i.e. the chance of uncovering something accidentally or serendipitously that you may not have been specifically searching for in our online search interfaces? I don’t think so, not yet. They are mostly enhanced search, federated search or unified index based searching. Are we offering our clients, or users, or readers (or whatever you want me to call them Kathryn!) the kinds of services they are expecting to find online now based on their use of social media and various online services and applications that enable profile sharing and which deliver a more personal or shared experience online? No again I’m afraid. To do that I think we need to find out what our clients are doing, observe their behaviours and also talk to people from outside the library world to find out how we might leap ahead of what the predictable, slow-moving crowd that sells us library management systems and so-called discovery layers has to offer. In short, we need to stop walking like Egyptians and learn some new dance steps.

Now, in case you still don’t get it, here are some suggestions that might lead to enhanced serendipitous discovery. They are taken from my own experience with social media and other online services that I think are a long way ahead of our offerings. They enhance your ability to discover new things accidentally through your network of contacts or friends or through the “muddy foot prints” of others who have gone before you and altruistically shared their experience. For me I think it all comes from understanding the power of connections and sharing that is now offered by the web.

For a start, we definitely must start offering these features for our catalogues and search layers: comments (e.g. Flickr); folksonomic tagging (Flickr, Twitter); easy to use ratings (iTunes, LibraryThing); virtual browsing using Cover Flow (I know some libraries are already offering this); and reviews (Amazon, Expedia, iTunes Store).

And now a listing of the other features I like to use and would like to see some of us playing with:

Little icons that quickly allow you to share a link to what you are viewing on Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook or a blog (Flickr does this very well now). I was also going to suggest little icons to social bookmarking services like Delicious and Diigo, but maybe the toolbar icons that are now added so easily in browsers like Google’s Chrome account for that?
“Like” icons (Facebook, Tumblr).
Reblog, retweet or re-post options (Twitter and Tumblr again, and yes Kathryn, I think we have much to learn from the pr0n industry online).
The optional ability to establish, customise and share online profiles (last.fm) for “your library” that then facilitates the use of favourites (Flickr), “following” (Tumblr, Twitter), asking (Tumblr, Twitter) and things like wishlists (Amazon) which for libraries could mean things like planned reading lists stored for later and shared with friends or colleagues. I see this kind of thing being really useful in facilitating peer-to-peer help or advice that would be helpful to those using our databases or journals.
Online profiles would also enable features like “scrobbling” your reading, use, borrowing history (last.fm). These profiles allow us to explore through the eyes of others. It works for music because people can easily find music they might like that is well beyond the boring and repetitive play lists of most radio stations.
A check-in or currently reading/viewing service that might operate something like FourSquare. So, instead of locating yourself geographically, you are sharing where your headspace currently is in the library.
Randomly exploring what you already know but have forgotten (Apple's Genius) related items (iTunes Store Genius recommendations).
"Looking within" or sampling from a catalogue entry (Amazon & iTunes: e.g. listening or getting sample of an e-book before you buy).
Is anyone offering an “I’m Feeling Lucky” button yet (Google)?
Item use history (UTS students), including the application of late fees!
Stumbling (StumbleUpon) another opt-in service that tracks your searching, browsing, use or borrowing history and then feeds you other items you might also find interesting or relevant.

I realise that doing all of the above isn’t feasible, nor would it be wise. We do, however, need to try a few of those features and when we set them up we must make them really easy and simple to use. I’ve probably missed a few things, so please let me know what you think.

This post also appears over here:

http://aliasydney.blogspot.com/2011/06/what-is-discovery-layer.html

Seven things meme

2011-06-07T03:58:00.001+10:00

Seven Things that Scare Me

Sharks
Snakes
City traffic (when I'm riding my bike)
City traffic (when I'm driving my car)
Tony Abbott
Extreme heights
Speeding

Seven Things I Like

Plain chocolate
Music
Abstract impressionism
Calligraphy & illumination
Friends
Family
Champagne

Seven Random Facts About Me

I get on well with most of my ex-partners (let's not try counting them all now
I worked in London for a while doing intelligence analysis
I've rafted the Franklin River in Tasmania twice in an individual raft
I never miss a vampire series on TV
I now own a Pinarello Prince (bike)
I painted an Australian coat of arms that was signed by HM The Queen (and dated by the DoE)
I own rather a lot of shoes (maybe it is a gay thing?)

Seven Things I want to Do Before I Die

Visit NYC
Visit Italy
Return to Sweden & visit Norway
More painting, calligraphy & photography
Develop better bike handling skills
More surfing
Read more and see more movies and live music

Seven Things I Can Do Well

Swim
Run (well, I used to)
Cook fruit cakes (like Xmas cakes)
Coach swimmers and triathletes
Get on with a lot of animals
Quickly digest and analyse complex data or facts
Shop

Seven Things I Can’t Do But Wish I Could

Play a musical instrument
Fly an aircraft
Gymnastics
Ride a track bike
Juggle
Graphic design
Be more tolerant of idiots

Seven Phrases I’m Known to Use

Okay (& okey dokey)
Hang on . . .
For s*** sake!
What?
Look . . .
Hey . . .
You d*** head

Future Smarts: Education for the 21st Century

2011-06-03T10:35:00.005+10:00

I went to this event last night as part of Vivid Creative Sydney (#VCS). With me were: Jemima McDonald (change agent, @jemimaeve special subject: Shark Island), Sophie McDonald (Jemima's mother, @misssophiemac special subject: workplace disruption) and Dr Belinda Tiffen (intellectual, @bella1609 special subject: big words). I was invited to tag along because they felt sorry for me and because they thoight it would be good for me to hang around with some smart people.

It was an after hours event so in the spirit of "life-long learning" (the subject of one of the questions asked of the panel) we will all be submitting forms for overtime, time-in-lieu and for exposure to hazardous risks (ideas coming from outside the library and university world).

I was not expecting to get much from this event and had already thought up an excuse to leave early, but I was surprised by how stimulating some of the plainly-spoken issues raised by the panel were. We couldn't Tweet live because inside the Playhouse there was hardly any mobile phone coverage, so I took a few notes and they form the basis of this post.

After the moderator finished talking about himself the first panelist Raju Varanasi told us about what is currently happening in NSW schools. It was good to hear and see him illustrate co-creation, fun, interactive game-based learning, the use of multimedia, collaboration and cross-curricular learning. He recognised the enormous challenge in keeping teachers up to date with technology, but I don't think we had the time to fully explore any real answers.

Philip Cronin from Intel talked about the fast pace of change and showed an interesting Wordle about what mattered in education (now) in which music and video were writ large. I could see "mobile", but books and text were not readily evident. As I've said before most libraries are still locked into a text-based universe and that along with their failure to embrace technological change is probably why many are now under threat. Philip stressed the importance and growing development of connections.

Christopher Nicholls the founder of Sistema Australia was up next and spoke of the power of unlocking imagination through culture and technology. His initiative with Sistema brings to Australia a program started in Venezuela that transforms the learning and development of disadvantaged students through the power of music. He says it develops their ability to imagine and that is lacking in our current learning structures, possibly because of too many boundaries, rules, measures that do not value creativity and competition between institutions.

Finally Sharon Clerke from the Foundation for Young Australians/NAB Schools First program spoke of the benefits of deeper community involvement and partnerships in school education programs.

The discussions after their short presentations stressed the importance of social connections, sharing and a future in which personal and learning connections extend well beyond physical and institutional boundaries. The panelists saw great benefit in immersive sharing and the use of social capital if it is accessible as well as blurred boundaries between school, community, home and work. There was some talk about performance measurement and assessment in schools and how that fails to properly recognise the humanities and creative skills.

When asked to quickly sum up their key points for the future these were their final messages:

We must unpack all of our current assumptions about education;
We should embrace change now because it is only going to become more rapid;
We must understand our humanity; and
We need to increase our openness to community & our willingness to share.

For me I was reminded of the power and importance of connections and community and the importance of altruism for the future. I think that if these key points are ignored institutions will be locked into a world of isolation, defending their own selfishness.

How to select a hashtag

2011-06-01T12:00:00.010+10:00

I couple of days ago I suggested a shorter hashtag for #blogeverydayofjune to @flexnib. I suggested #bedoj for obvious reasons and so then it was on (& still is) for young and old. You see, some see this as a metadata debate and as most of us work in libraries (I resisted saying we are librarians for I am a shambrarian), it could carry on for several centuries before consensus is achieved.

So here is my suggestion for the process we should follow now, with thanks again to Perian Sully who first suggested it. It comes from a slide I used at ALIA InfoOnline in a keynote a couple of years back:

Oh, and just in case you are interested, for this month I'm going to use several different platforms (including this blog) just to add a further layer of confusion and chaos. These platforms include, but are not limited to:

ForDariusJedberg Tumblr
Malbooth on Flickr
And maybe my YouTube channel if I feel really inspired

So be sure to tell everyone to avoid all of this content because it will be randomly more obscene than the #RipNRoll ad.

Pinarello Prince

2011-05-23T10:17:00.002+10:00

My black Pina Prince, a photo by Mal Booth on Flickr.

Please read the story behind this bike in the Flickr description field.

UTS Library Planning Day 2 / 2011

2011-05-09T10:01:00.002+10:00

UTS Library Planning Day 2

Sister's cupcakes for our mother

2011-05-08T14:58:00.001+10:00

Please sign this petition!

2011-05-05T09:27:00.003+10:00

Tell HarperCollins: Limited Checkouts on eBooks is Wrong for Libraries

Service Design 2011

2011-05-03T09:31:00.001+10:00

Service Design 2011

Commodore Bruce Kafer, RAN

2011-04-12T12:08:00.005+10:00

I had the honour to meet Commodore Bruce Kafer in the Northern Arabian Gulf in late 2008. He was commanding a multi-national naval force that was protecting Iraq's off shore oil terminals. I was visiting his (Australian-staffed) headquarters and the RAN frigate that was under his command as a curator/archivist from the Australian War Memorial. Both had a mix of male and female service personnel and they successfully and happily endured a fairly stressful and dangerous environment. I recorded a decent number of oral history interviews with personnel in his command.

He struck me as a very well respected, intelligent and thoughtful leader. It would be a complete shame for his career to be destroyed and for his qualities to be lost to the Australian Defence Force as a result of the scandal at ADFA.

Wordle from tweets - UTS Library Planning Day #1 2011

2011-04-12T09:36:00.006+10:00

A quick Wordle from the tweets in the previous post looks like this:

UTS Library Planning Day 2011

2011-04-11T09:08:00.000+10:00

&amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.coveritlive.com/mobile.php/option=com_mobile/task=viewaltcast/altcast_code=93ce8bf9b4" &amp;amp;amp;gt;UTS Library Planning Day 2011&amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;gt;

My niece's portrait of my mum!

2011-04-09T18:23:00.001+10:00

UTS: Designing our Future Library

2011-04-06T08:50:00.005+10:00

UTS Future Library - CCA Educause

View more documents from Mal Booth

I gave this presentation yesterday at CCA Educause 2011 in Sydney. We are still designing and planning, so his isn't about the result, it is more about how we are getting there. From the abstract:

The game has changed. It is no longer just about text or about us (as librarians) and how we see the world being organised or classified. To some extent we need to catch up with students and assist them, the same applies to researchers and academics though in other ways. We can only do this if we understand them, know what they want and know how they’d like us to help. We also need to understand the new landscape and environment ourselves and my guess is that most in the library and educational world do not.

In this presentation I’d like to discuss some of the elements I see as necessary in a more inclusive, participatory approach to planning our future library. I hope to illustrate an approach that isn’t just about the technologies we will use, but also the way we select them and how we will deploy them. I will cover the following points as I illustrate that approach:

We need to learn (again) how to be active, creative, innovative and inclusive contributors in order to fully understand and utilise fully some of the new technologies we are deploying. Most cannot fully be understood by observation alone nor by reading about them in books. We also need to re-learn how to see possibilities, not problems and to be brave enough to have a go. Any form of innovation has almost been sidelined by an obsession with risk management that has become risk avoidance at all costs.
We need to learn how to take responsibility for our own future and do things for ourselves, not wait for a consultant to design a matrix to contract out the risk, experience, learning, responsibility and activity. Nor should we simply wait for our masters or government to invest in our future. Yes, there are hard decisions to make, but if we were really pressed by an emergency or disaster such decisions about what really matters and what doesn’t would be made efficiently and quickly, so why not try to do it without that imperative? Do we really need adversity to inspire action?
We must also understand the power and benefits of randomness and chaos. Freedom from yesterday’s policy barriers, useless governance structures, risk aversion, committee bureaucracy; and freedom to explore new ways and new methods is vital. Creative innovation is almost completely ruled out and its sharp edges are dulled by a comprehensive and bureaucratic set of rules, procedures, guidelines and policies covering everything we might do. We should not rule out the unknown so completely because we fear it. Sometimes the unknown contains the answers.
Liaison needs to be extended both within our own communities and networks and also outside our communities because there is a great deal we can build on. There are valuable partnerships to be made from that liaison and external collaboration. Not all the answers and inspiration will come from within or the familiar.
Can we crowd-source and co-design better ideas, services and solutions to some of our challenges and even provide much-needed infrastructure more effectively using social media technology? Has anyone really tried? We must understand the power and influence of communities and living networks and how connections are best made and facilitated within these.
Do we listen to what our users are saying and how can we do that better these days? Can we set up convenient, intuitive and more engaging ways for users to communicate with us (e.g. encouraging conversations instead of complaints through the use of Wallwisher feedback software). When our users or students express interest in academic services like libraries, do we listen and respond accordingly, i.e. seriously consider taking up their ideas and making them real (examples here include our work with Designining Out Crime students, taking up student ideas for the Augmented Campus, regular displays of student art and design work in the Library, and our Digi-stories competition).

We are not modelling our future library on someone else’s blue-print. Some major technologies that we will incorporate in it (i.e. ASRS & RFID) will allow us to deliver different services and to provide new spaces within the library itself. They will also require us to incorporate enhanced search and discovery tools online and students are already indicating what else they’d like to see in that respect on portable platforms. Our solution is evolving “organically” from within and from our research, the UTS community and our networks. It has grown and changed as a result of some “experimentation” and play, even over the last 12 months. It is also being combined with encouragement from senior managers to explore the use of new web and mobile technologies and shared attitudinal change from within including a more inclusive, trusting, motivated and less hierarchical approach to strategic planning. In that respect I will discuss how are we giving library staff at UTS more autonomy, mastery and purpose.

Leading in Libraries

2011-03-29T14:38:00.001+11:00

Talk for ALIA Sydney on library leadership

View more documents from Mal Booth

A quick presentation from a short talk I did last week for ALIA in Sydney. It isn't terribly serious.

In defence of weeding

2011-03-08T14:24:00.004+11:00

This is a silly beat-up: Books get the shove as uni students go online

It is poorly written and makes a number of awful errors and assumptions:

Most libraries have weeding programs. We do at UTS. With collaborative collection sharing programs like our Bonus+, there is no longer a need to each and every library to hold at least one copy of every book. Where would we put them even if we could afford them?

In many cases books are disposed of because they are worn out, beyond repair, or we cannot maintain multiple copies of texts which have been superseded by subsequent editions.

Newspapers are not always valuable or rare just because they are old. Copies are generally held by the state and national libraries and they are busy digitising them now for improved access. They are a right pain to store and preserve as they were not produced for long term maintenance. Very few academic libraries have the resources to maintain old newspaper collections. By their very nature they are ephemeral in their original form. I disposed of a large newspaper cuttings collections in the collection of the Australian War Memorial for exactly these reasons. All were held by the National Library.

A lot of those encyclopaedias, dictionaries, journals and books contain information and knowledge that has been superseded. They become redundant. This also relates to the point attributed to Professor Miller at the end of the article.

Weeding programs are carefully managed by professional staff and books are written off only after careful determination of their continued usefulness. They are not simply dumped in skips without consultation.

It is outrageous for anyone to claim they are all extremely good books without seeing them, nor assessing them in light of other collections held.

The “former library assistant” is probably not the most reliable source to quote on whether a certain library sees its function as an archive. In fact, most academic libraries do not function as archives. (I have managed both an archive and a library.)

The Starbucks claim is a complete emotional beat up and easy mud to sling. Libraries are to be about people, not just books. Time marches on and so too should the professor. Books are no longer chained up in libraries and controlled by monks.

Serendipitous discovery is still possible without all books on the shelves and in open access. Most European academic libraries operate like this. UTS will be providing serendipitous discovery to our collections in an underground Library Retrieval System, in different ways online. They may well be more effective means of browsing for something useful than someone browsing shelves, mostly at eye height, for books that stand out because of decorations on their spines. We have been talking to academics within UTS to explore this kind of assisted and extended serendipitous online discovery since 2010 and I am going to talk to some students tomorrow afternoon regarding a project to address issues such as this.

Looking beyond the metrics and towards our future (Part 1 of 2)

2011-03-04T12:36:00.015+11:00

TWITTER v. ZZZZZZ

I'd been trying to get some thoughts together for a few presentations that I have to give soon about the future of libraries (ours in particular) and a friend (@zaana) advised me late last night to take a look at the Twitter stream (#edge2011) from the Edge 2011 conference in Edinburgh, Scotland. At least the first of the two days looked to be very library-centric. A lot of the tweets seemed to be a bit too much like navel-gazing without any helpful suggestions, but there were a couple of positive and provocative ideas thrown in from some (service) design thinkers. A few ideas really helped me with my own thinking, even though it was all very late at night. More about that in a moment.

SOCIAL MEDIA METRICS

Already in my head was a little bit of a debate about some basic metrics that a colleague at work presented us with recently relating to our use of and progress with social media and social networks. They were OK, but nothing amazing, apart from a few interesting blips where certain content had really taken off. I think there are other more useful measures we could include as well such as referrals to our more traditional web content, but essentially, the point I want to make here is that for me at least I think our experience in this academic library with social media goes beyond what any metrics can actually measure. And it is in my opinion critically and positively related to the preparations we are making for our future library. That building isn't going to be designed on metrics alone and it will just be a building. It could be all about books and transactions relating to books.

UTS FUTURE LIBRARY: ASRS & RFID

So, to explain now: before we get to designing our future library, we've decided to jump in and implement two other major technology initiatives that take the focus away from books and transactions. Currently we are busy with a large team of designers working on an underground Library Retrieval System that will store and retrieve for our clients about 80% of our collections of books and journals. That will squarely refocus the library itself on PEOPLE. (Refocusing libraries on people was something I saw that was suggested at Edge 2011.) We are also busy implementing RFID technology that will assist us to take our focus away from transactions and onto the provision of more value-added services (e.g. improved and extended services for our researchers). These two initiatives will be implemented between 2011 and 2014, but there is also much to do to reshape the library and our services so that we can maximise the potential of those technologies and that is where social media comes in.

UTS LIBRARY & SOCIAL MEDIA/NETWORKS

At UTS Library we started playing around (literally playing around) with social media in 2009. Staff at all levels were encouraged to try some new platforms and to produce content for them. We also started setting up a presence and creating a sense of community in a few selected social networks. These things take a while. They don't happen overnight and I think you can make the mistake of killing it all off too soon by over analysing it before it has had the chance to grow and evolve. We've been patient.

THE REAL BENEFITS

In my view, however, the real benefit of encouraging these relatively new initiatives has been internal. Dipping our toes into social media has been a bit of a cultural fire-starter for us. We cannot hope to move into a brave new library world without some drastic changes in our own culture and our attitudes towards exploring new ideas and services. Social media has helped us with both. It has also helped reposition our "persona" from a corporate voice to a more personal voice (which is another thing I saw mentioned at Edge 2011 last night) and that is necessary because we cannot be all about people if that is just on the outside. The focus on people also has to happen on the inside.

Playing with social media has encouraged our people to learn about new platforms and about creating content for them. Those skills in both exploration of new or emerging technologies and content production are invaluable. They've also gained confidence in their writing and presentation skills and learned how to "network" more effectively (which is critical for liaison on campus). All of this has helped us promote our services and our people and now more than ever we are in demand on campus and elsewhere.

Our social media experiments have already led to the development of improved and new services for students and researchers at UTS all through establishing a culture of fun, playfulness and a willingness to try new things. They have really helped our people in the ways they use and help others to use our discovery layer and our website and that has also helped us to understand how we should improve that layer with the addition of new features and services. There is a real momentum of openness, sharing and experimentation that has developed accordingly.

THE IMPORTANCE OF TRUST

Underlying this has been a strong culture of trust at all levels of management and leadership in this library. We didn't issue a 27 page set of principles and rules for the use of social media. We simply referred to the existing UTS code of conduct for all staff and explained that for practical reasons we would concentrate our efforts on an agreed set of platforms: all the usual suspects. Everyone was treated like an adult and trusted to get on with it.

That's it for Part 1. In Part 2 I will explore a few more specific ideas about how we did this and what worked for us. (Oh, this is all straight off the top of my head after a late night following #edge2011, so I reserve the right to edit, add & change the content above over the next couple of days.)

Design Thinking

2011-02-16T12:36:00.003+11:00

I took some photos at a recent (Sydney) Design Thinking Drinks event at Digital Eskimo. This Flickr set brings together a few thoughts of mine with deeper content created by many others and linked throughout the set in the text beneath the images. Take a look (on Flickr, so you can see the links and read all the text).

Social media for academic researchers

2011-02-11T09:55:00.005+11:00

Social media for academic researchersPresentation for UTS Library Research Week 2011.

View more documents from Mal Booth.

UTS Library Research Week

2011-02-07T09:37:00.003+11:00

&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.coveritlive.com/mobile.php/option=com_mobile/task=viewaltcast/altcast_code=46b4123954" &amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;UTS Library Research Week&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;

Almost daily images: January 2010

2011-01-31T22:04:00.001+11:00

UTS Library of the Future Symposium

2011-01-31T09:19:00.001+11:00

UTS Library of the Future Symposium

Sufjan: so amazement!

2011-01-30T07:05:00.002+11:00

Sufjan Stevens' music must be seen as well as heard. @MissSophieMac said I'd be blown away and I was. He had a 10 piece orchestra on stage at times including two drum kits, four keyboards (maybe more), assorted guitars, a two-man brass section and two female backing vocalists who danced all night. They played mostly new music from The Age of Adz after a beautiful supporting show from one of their own: DM Stith.

It was full-on creativity surrounding the brilliant music with images, video, dance, costume, glitter, smoke and lighting. They are truly star people. The highlights for me were probably Vesuvius and the final song of the encore, the really wonderful Chicago.

Part of the way through he revealed that he was Steiner-schooled and I doubt that this came as a surprise to anyone who was revelling in his genius. It was an amazing show and a really memorable experience.

Thanks Jemima.

Sydney Cove & Walsh Bay images

2011-01-16T18:08:00.001+11:00

Spectrum by Liana Thorpe

2011-01-15T17:48:00.001+11:00

From a new exhibition at Gaffa www.gaffa.com.au

I was taking a visitor around Sydney today and we went to one of my favourite galleries. They had a new exhibition by glass artists. Sometimes I should not walk into exhibitions like this. I just could not control myself. Who knows where I will put it!

Expensive semi-freddo

2011-01-07T12:42:00.001+11:00

Making this burnt out my old Bamix. Even if the recipe destructions say you must beat over heat for 4-5 minutes and then for a further 5-6 minutes away from heat, this still doesn't over-ride the Bamix manufacturer's destructions that you must not use it continuously for over 5 minutes. If you do, the magic smoke comes out and it is impossible to get it back in (thanks @greengecko29).

Peter Pan for my niece Alexis

2011-01-06T16:33:00.001+11:00

I bought my niece Alexis an illustrated copy of Peter and Wendy for her birthday and will give it to her tonight. I've written an abridged version of this inside the book for her:

In 2006, I visited the house where J.M. Barrie wrote Peter and Wendy (image above). I was trying to borrow a dagger once owned by T. E. Lawrence that was given to Kathleen Scott who was a sculptor. Her son, Wayland Hilton Young, second Baron Kennett owned the dagger and the house and had known Barrie when he was a small boy. He told me that Barrie had looked after Kathleen and Wayland’s older brother Peter in the house after the death of their father Captain Robert Falcon Scott in the Antarctic. Baron Kennett told me that Barrie had written Peter and Wendy in the house and as I looked out towards their backyard I could almost see fairies buzzing about in their trees.

Baron Kennet didn't lend me the dagger for an exhibition in Australia as he thought it was too far away. My visit to the house and the stories I heard there I will never forget.

Rouleur magazine

2011-01-05T21:22:00.001+11:00

I mentioned buying two issues of Rouleur yesterday. I read more today and fell in love with this magazine.

It is probably the best magazine I've bought in ages. I must have been hiding under a rock for the last several years while most of the first 20 issues became collectors' items. The features, images, typography, paper and layout are magnificent. This issue has a beautiful feature on cycling photographer Bernard Thompson.

Out & about

2011-01-04T17:59:00.001+11:00

I was out a lot today. Well, not as much as the Australian cricket team, but a lot nevertheless.

I started back at the gym. It has been closed for the last two weeks so the weights can have a rest. As someone once said, all gyms are gay, but some are yet to admit it. As soon as I went in to the change room to put my things in a locker I was confronted by a naked man who seemed to be waiting for a comment from me about how well hung he is. I didn't, it was too early for that.

After that I just wandered around at the shops, first in the city and then in Newtown and Annandale. I did find a cover for my baby BBQ, but he still doesn't have a gas bottle as there seems to have been a run on them recently. The city seemed full of shoppers, so who knows why the retailers are complaining about people shopping online. In some parts you could not move. I tried to get some foods at Broadway after walking back to my car from the city, but it was so full I drove into the carpark and straight out again.

I'm a magazine addict and purchased three today: the November 2010 issue of Wallpaper; and issues nineteen and twenty of Rouleur, a very stylish quarterly cycling magazine. Rouleur is a truly beautiful magazine. I love the layout, images and content. Wallpaper had a feature on the top 20 reasons to be in Australia and a very cute young man on the cover (Ben Waddell from The Men's Division). The "reasons" were an odd mix: cosmetics containers (of course); designer tables; sandwiches, a bar, vintage bike hire and dessert degustation from Melbin; Tasmanian things (four in all); some fairly dull-looking clothes(!); jewellery (sadly, not designed by Ian Thorpe); modernist furniture; beers (of course); the Chrysler Valiant VG (oh FFS!); urban art projets; a Sidknee hair salon; wearehunted.com (at last a real reason!); and a fashion designer (zzzzzzzzz).

Travels

2011-01-03T21:55:00.001+11:00

So @katejf has done it again and found me another out for this 12 day blog challenge. Here is my world travels map. Doesn't look that exciting does it? There are a lot of repeat visits represented here too. Maybe I need to get out more.

create your own visited country map

And here is my USA map. DC is in there but you can hardly see it. Lots of repeat visits here too and I'm heading back to Hawaii in mid-2011 for a holiday for about my squillionth time. I love it and would live there tomorrow if someone offered me a job there.

create your own personalized map of the USA

Movie meme

2011-01-03T17:20:00.002+11:00

Image from the last Deus swap meet, by me.

Today a meme from @katejf.

According to IMBD the top 25 grossing films of 2010 are:

Top 25 Box Office of 2010

(as of December 13, 2010)

Toy Story 3 ($415M)
Alice in Wonderland ($334.2M)
Iron Man 2 ($312.1M)
Eclipse ($300.5M) seen (over-rated)
Inception ($292.5M) not seen yet, but I will, I um, seem to have um, 'acquired' a copy on my 'puter
Deathly Hallows Part 1 ($259.2M)
Despicable Me ($250.3.7M)
Shrek Forever After ($238.4M)
How to Train Your Dragon ($217.6M)
The Karate Kid ($176.6M)
Clash of the Titans ($163.2M)
Grown Ups ($162M)
Megamind ($140.6M)
The Last Airbender ($131.6M)
Shutter Island ($128M)
The Other Guys ($119.2M)
Salt ($118.3M)
Tangled ($117.2M)
Jackass 3-D ($116.8M)
Valentine’s Day ($110.5M)
Robin Hood ($105.3M) seen, on an aircraft (OK but they tried to make the story too historically relevant)
The Expendables ($103.1M)
Date Night ($98.7M)
Due Date ($95.4M)
Sex and the City 2 ($95.3M) I would struggle to think of a worse way to waste my time than seeing this

I have seen only two and may only see another couple. How many have you seen?

Of those I have not seen, the ones I want to are: not on this awfullist. And can I just add that after seeing Hugh Jackman's annoying Lipton Ice tea ads that I probably won't ever want to see another movie with him in it. They may well be worse than the whole McOprah "tourism" to MacCafe campaign.

If you want to see the whole list of 228 titles click here

Thanks again Kate.

Music: my top 14 albums of 2010 (Part 2)

2011-01-01T08:34:00.001+11:00

Here they are. The second lot. All released and purchased in 2010. There were a few albums that I wanted, but just didn't get around to purchasing like Fleet Foxes Fleet Foxes (2009 and therefore not eligible anyway) and LCD Soundsystem This is Happening. I also tried to buy Gorrillaz Plastic Beach, but when I went into the big store, I forgot the album name and could not read the fine print (i.e. the release date) and came away with Demon Days which is not as good. So let's just get on with it Dorothy:

Miami Horror: Illumination. Dance & House. I wasn't sure that I'd enjoy this album so much. I heard the strong influence of New Order on Sometimes and was immediately comforted. The G.L.O.V.E.S. extended mix of sometimes is also great. Melbin has so many talented peoples. 12/14

Midnight Juggernauts: Crystal Axis. Electronica/Dance. Another under-rated Melbin band that defies classification. Brilliant musics. I became obsessed with Vital Signs but the whole album is good and really showcases their enormous talent. 12/14

The National: High Violet. Indie Rock. This is critically acclaimed by those who know these things. It is a good album, but I doubt it is any better than most on my Top 14. Mature, dark, thinking person's rock. I'd have liked more happiness. It is the kid of album you can always admit to owning because it impresses your friends that you have such great taste. Bloodbuzz Ohio is a great single. 12/14

Children Collide: Theory of Everything. Indie Rock. I bought this because Jelly Legs fascinated me. I don't know why. Maybe the strong base line. I was surprised at how many tracks I liked on the album. They're a Melbin band and have a very Australian sound. Almost punk-like vocals. Arrows is probably my fave, but I also love My Eagle. 13/14.

Cloud Control: Bliss Release. Alternative & Punk. This band is the only Australian band not from Melbin. They hail from the Blew Mountayns near Sidknee and this is their "dee-butt" album (I didn't watch the award show where dee-butt became famous, but I heard about it the next day on Triple J). Anywho, back to Cloud Control now. Meditation Song #2 is probably my fave song of 2010. I just love all of it: the vocals, the distorted guitar, the change of pace and tempo, everything! So excitement. I hope they do many more albums. 13/14

Jinja Safari: Jinja Safari (EP). Alternative & Punk. Your reviewer has almost as much excitement about Peter Pan as Cloud Control. And like Cloud Control, they are also the only Australian band not based in Melbin. You work that out. Their music makes me want to buy a Morris Dancing outfit and some sticks and dance around a pole at a fair. I can't wait for the full album. 13/14

Birds of Tokyo: Birds of Tokyo. Alternative & Punk. A very mature world class album that has been very well produced. It has many good tracks like Plans (my fave) and Wild at Heart. Nothing on the album that I don't like. 13/14.

Music: my top 14 albums of 2010 (Part 1)

2010-12-30T13:53:00.001+11:00

A quick survey reveals 14 albums that I bought in 2010 that were released this year. So here is my quick review with scores out of 14 and my favourite tracks. The first seven in no particular order (genres from iTunes):

Arcade Fire: The Suburbs. Rock. This album has 16 tracks and all but a few are memorable. Some are almost "anthemic". I wasn't sure I'd like it and was surprised to be familiar with so many of the tracks, not knowing they were from this album. There are 16 tracks for those more interested in quality. On some tracks you can almost hear Bruce Springsteen. The Suburbs and Ready to Start are great tracks but I prefer the drama of Rococo and the classic rock sound of City With No Children. 13/14

Hot Chip: One Life Stand. Alternative & punk. This is a brilliant album. I bought it for the track One Life Stand, but there are many great tracks. It makes even a non-dancer like me want to move. Other fave tracks include I Feel Better & Take It In. 13/14

Vampire Weekend: Contra. Alternative & punk. Cousins was played too much and is now annoying. I like some of the vocals. Well produced. Fave track probably Horchata. 9/14.

Bag Raiders (self titled). Electronica. Shooting Stars was probably one of my fave songs for 2009 (a pre-released single), so I eagerly awaited this album. It is still a stand out that I've not tired of hearing. I used to imagine Marieke Josephine Hardy dancing around the Triple J studios when they played it on the old breakfast show. There is a sameness to a few of the tracks. Way Back Home was a great pick as the second single release. It is a wonderful track and I love the length at 9:15. 11/14.

Yeasayer: Odd Blood. Pop. Another really good album with several stunning tracks. I liked the video for Ambling Alp but I think my fave track is now Madder Red by a long way. There is a good deal of variety on the album, but I doubt that the quality is so inconsistent to deserve the harsh review it got on Pitchfork. 12/14

Two Door Cinema Club: Tourist History. Alternative & punk. I love this album. I saw them live at Sydney Uni's Manning Bar earlier this year and they played amazingly well. They are so young and so talented. They have so much energy that it is impossible not to get carried away. I bought the album for I Can Talk, but there are so many great tracks like Do You Want It All that it is hard to pick a fave. For a while now it has probably been This Is The Life. I love the way they change pace within tracks. Exciting energetic music. 13/14

Angus & Julia Stone: down the way. Pop. Another group that I saw live - at the Enmore Theatre and another album I eagerly anticipated. They are really impressive live: much more so than I expected and they put on a fantastic show that surprised and delighted. There are wonderful ballads and some beautiful folk tunes. Julia's voice and stage manner remind me of Martha Wainright. A lot. They both enjoy their music so much that they seem to disappear into it. I also hear influences like Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Aimee Mann. Walk It Off is very evocative and beautifully produced. I think And The Boys is still my fave track though. 13/14

Edges of Darkness

2010-12-29T09:50:00.001+11:00

Original image on Flickr.

The other night I took a DVD of the 2010 film Edge of Darkness out to watch with Mum after visiting Dad in hospital. She thinks I am a lousy picker, so I defended and justified my choice by referring to the mid-80s TV series of the same name that has recently been rebroadcast in Australia by the ABC.

I've probably watched the TV series three times, including its first broadcast in Australia. It is superb TV. A work of art that mixes great writing with haunting imagery, brilliant acting, a wonderful cast, darkly atmospheric music and a complex and thrilling plot line that reflected its time (Thatcher's England) but still retains contemporary relevance. The dialogue in the film was simply stunning, especially that which Joe Don Baker delivered as the CIA's eccentric Darius Jedberg. I am sure that I looked forward to each episode as much in late 2010 as I did when they were initially screened in the mid/late 1980s.

One of the great things about the series was that hardly anyone, even the almost saintly Ronnie Craven (played by Bob Peck), was all good or all bad. The superb cast assembled for the series really helped with that impression. Each episode something about the plot surprised me or made me question who was really "right". You were never spoon fed, nor given much assistance or any reminders about all of the seemingly insignificant but nonetheless important clues that were dropped everywhere.

Bob Peck thoroughly deserved his 1986 BAFTA best actor award for the series. His character was a magnetic but flawed hero and he had such an intoxicating voice. I was sad to read that he died of cancer at only 53 in 1999.

The TV series pulled two big strings for me.

Around the same time I was on exchange in England working as an intelligence analyst in a UK agency. It was an odd time and computers were not as dominant as they are today. In fact you hardly saw them. It was all a bit more like Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister. I can still remember writing out (by hand) a report on the arms trade and some conflict that I was not able to present in person because after I had written it I had to classify it at a level that was I was not cleared to read (because I was not a UK national). So the intelligence characters and references and the obsession with nuclear energy and weapons in the series were of particular interest to me and I reckon they got it all pretty right for a TV drama.

The other string came in the form of an item of Darius Jedberg's clothing. In the mid-1980s I developed an obsession with the Hawaii Ironman triathlon. As a sport it was really still in its infancy and hardly anyone in England would have known about it. In two scenes, however, Jedberg is clearly shown wearing a prized finisher's t-shirt. Who knows where that idea came from? I can remember phoning friends as soon as I saw it in sheer excitement. It says a heap about his character and at that stage a lot of those competing in that crazy event were people like Jedberg. I don't think Joe Don Baker ever completed Ironman Hawaii, but I guess he may have. (I began racing Ironman triathlon in Australia in 1985, but didn't qualify to race in Hawaii until 1988 and didn't race there until 1989.)

So, to get back to the 2010 film now. The film had none of the above. Even though it runs for over two hours, they left so much out that even Ray Winstone could not save it. Amazingly, it has the same director as the series, Martin Campbell. 2/10.

FasterChef - Xmas Fairy Bread

2010-12-27T14:47:00.001+11:00

OK, so this is my attempt at spreading (pardon the pun) Xmas cheer this year. No boring newsletter about what I did, but a useful visual feats for your eyes and stomachs. Everyone loves a cooking show on the TV these days, in fact on most stations that is all there is to watch, so I've decided to clutter up YouTube with even more mindless rubbish about food preparation. And it comes with bonus hygiene tips!

So, here we go, mind the step . . .

Boxing Day

2010-12-27T10:13:00.002+11:00

For Boxing Day, Mum, Mez and I went down to see my sister-in-law and her kids for Christmas. Uncle Phil was working again - saving lives and rescuing drunks with the Ambulance service.

Here my amazing Lego assembly super powers came in handy. I had to build Mum's gift to my nephew - a full on Star Wars jet fighter. Although my six year old nephew knows more about Star Wars than George Lucas, even he doubted our ability to ever finish it. This toy is so complex that I hear nobody has successfully assembled it in under three months and I did it in under one evening and with only two glasses of Piper-Heidsieck.

This minor miracle was performed despite my sister's cruel, faithless and constant taunts that Uncle Phil (her can-do husband) was needed during the scary bits. I am awesome. I will no longer fear bringing home a box from Ikea.

Excitement came in the form of the storm that blue up quickly. My sister-in-law and sister were preparing foods, I was building a jet fighter and the kids are only six and four, so it was left to my mother to rescue everything left on the tabel outside after the giant umbrella tipped over in the gale force winds. Erecting the umbrella was another "where is Uncle Phil when you need him because Uncle Mal is hopeless" moment, but saving the rear wall of the house from the destruction it was about to bring was left to my dear old mother. She is nearly as awesome as me.

Sometimes even my nephew lost faith in my Lego assembly super powers, but their new young kitten Jeffrey (pictured above with the box) didn't. He was quite helpful inside the box when we both tried to find a small grey slopey bit with a round thingy on it. He is probably four months old now and simply adorable. He races around like a crazy cut snake and is always playing games with himself or anyone else who wants to offer some naked skin to his gaming tools (sharp teeth and claws).

As I mentioned in the previous post, this was a daunting time for all of us so soon after the los of my brother, but it was great to see the kids happy and playing. They miss their father, but they are doing really well.

Post for #blog12daysxmas : Christmas Day

2010-12-27T09:18:00.002+11:00

I'm late with this, but I will catch up. Despite all of the food, presents and heaps of Moët, this is a difficult Christmas for my family. It is the first without my brother Murray who died in a car accident earlier this year. That has been really hard on my mother but if that wasn't enough to deal with my father collapsed the night before Christmas Eve and we spent 24 December in a hospital emergency ward waiting to see what caused it all. The fall damaged a knee and he hit his head and he already had some broken ribs and a shoulder injury from his last fall, so he is still in a lot of pain. Nobody really seems to be able to identify the cause apart from old age and his body just wearing out. It is very sad, but I guess this sort of thing eventually comes to most of us.

My brother in law Phil is a wonderful man and also an underpaid slave of the NSW Ambulance service. He was the local acting station manager on the day Dad collapsed (and also Christmas Day!) and arrived with the ambulance on Christmas Eve to look after him and take him to hospital. He even called in again to check on him later at the end of his shift. That is him in the image above, putting up the Christmas tree at my parents' home. I provided invaluable deconstructive criticism and reintegrated shaming (from a safe distance).

So on Christmas Day Mum, my sister Mez and I we went back to the hospital to check on Dad and give him some Christmas cheer. He'd been moved to a ward, but they were still doing tests. He reads a lot so I gave him Howard Jacobson's Man Booker Prize winning The Finkler Question.

Christmas lunch was just Mum, Mez, me and three dogs. We did fish this year, tonnes of fish: Atlantic salmon, prawns, lobster, scallops and Balmain bugs. WE didn't get to the bugs and took them and what was left of the prawns to a bigger family dinner later on with all the cousins, aunts and uncles.

It was a long day that many of us were dreading, but in the end it was saved by many caring family members, some amazing dogs and a couple of bottles of Moët.

Posts for #blog12daysxmas

2010-12-27T09:10:00.004+11:00

I'm trying to keep up with the #blog12daysxmas guys over at my Posterous blog this time. I'll set up auto-posting so they should all link in here too.

How to fly in the USA

2010-12-22T09:49:00.006+11:00

In response to this article from The Huffington Post, I'm sharing my observations for boarding domestic flights in the USA:

There is no need to check any baggage. Just bring it all with you as you board. Try not to leave anything you own at home.
NEVER use the overhead locker nearest your own seat.
What you cannot squeeze into an overhead locker can be left in the seat next to you (whether occupied or not), under all of the seats in front of you on either side (keeping the one directly in front free for stretching out your legs), or given to an air steward (or one of the pilots if you cannot find a steward).
Nobody behind you will mind if you take as long as you need to store all of your personal possessions before moving towards your own seat.
Sit wherever you feel most comfortable. The chances are that nobody else really needs that seat anyway.
If moved to a seat you don't like, it is time to speak to the stewards or pilots again. There are many valid reasons you can use for getting a better seat: you are too fat; you are too tall; your back hurts; you need to supervise your children; you need to get away from your children; you need to sit closer to all or some of your luggage; you will be sick without a window view; you told the girl on the phone that you wanted an exit row; you are a frequent flyer; you are incontinent and your fast food will eventually disagree with your bowell; etc. Tears are good too.
Make sure you buy enough hot fast food to last you for at least several months, even if it is only a 30 minute flight. If you do manage to eat it and have to dispose of the rubbish, or if you lose interest in it, see #3., above.
Bring all of your small children with you. After all, the flight will be full of people with nothing else to do than look after them for you. Children should not be forced to leave any of their toys at home.
You can just ignore all of the warnings to switch off mobile devices until an air steward threatens you with physical violence. Then you need to take their name and their photo.
As soon as possible, recline your seat fully and leave it that way for the entire flight. If anyone wants to know why, say it is broken. You may as well relax.
On landing, should your flight actually manage to take off, it is OK to jump straight up and then rush to wherever you stored your heaviest possessions. No need to wait for lights to go off or announcements to be made. That would be foolish. There is a prize for the first person to stand up in the aisle. And there is a bonus for the first person off the plane.

Happy flying.

FasterChef - Xmas Fairy Bread

2010-12-15T14:30:00.002+11:00

So, here we go, mind the step . . .

It Gets Better

2010-12-10T10:29:00.005+11:00

I was reminded of the very worthwhile It Gets Better project and cause by a retweet that @mstephens7 did earlier today on Twitter. There was a fair bit of publicity around World Aids Day, but it is a project that deserves ongoing support and attention. It seems to be pretty much US-focussed, but I believe there is probably still a significant challenge in Australia for many LGBT youth, especially in remote and isolated areas where they may well feel like they are from another planet.

So I did take the pledge and I'll consider uploading a dull video of my rather ordinary story. Will you take the pledge?

Oh, the retweet from Michael was a tweet by @JustinLibrarian who was telling us how Portland Public Library is doing something about this in their library:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/portlandplteens/5247712358/

So, I'll discuss the possibilities for us to do something in the UTS Library with our Equity and Diversity unit.

PDC 2010: Participation Frameworks in Service Design & Delivery

2010-12-09T12:44:00.005+11:00

Industry Day Panel discussion (notes)

Panel: Faruk Avdi (FA), Peter Wright (PW), Anelie Ekelin (AE) & Jeremy Walker (JW)

FA: (full transcript available here) And to entice you to view the full transcript, here are my selected highlights from Faruk's short presentation:

Customers or end-users are the people I have been working for. The “user” is an esoteric concept and my desire to get to know who they are has always been tempered by less esoteric, practical constraints.
I believe clearly defined roles in projects involving design are important, along with hierarchies for decision making – such is our cultural custom. But I’m also fond of a rhizomatic notion of design in this context – where the end product – be it a service or otherwise – is actually the fruit of the entire ever emergent ‘organism’ of a project over time. UCD + Agile development helps with this enormously.
. . . one cannot design something new for customers other than by, in some way, getting into their skin and seeing the world from their perspective. (I really liked that remark. MMB)
It isn’t just about users: The people who should be involved in service design are the owners and sponsors of a project, design, technical, delivery and support specialists, end-users, key stakeholders (eg. representative organisations of end users) and other specialists in terms of skill or interest as may be required. But above all the imagination of the overarching designer of the service.
. . . design must embody the contexts and work that people seek or wish to do, and extend them as appropriate to organizational needs.
. . . we very deliberately sought to provide a service that people could walk up to and start using, without any prior technical knowledge, . . .
I am an acute idealist and pain-in-the-arse evangelist when it comes to UCD. In my mind, UCD broadly embodies humanitarian values. When it comes to joint negotiation of project goals, my main experience on this front is with sponsoring individuals and influentially significant stakeholders at the early stages of a project.
User participation in design is but one of many considerations that must be dealt with along the way.
End products and services must be a result of entire organic process involving users and designers.
User-participation is but one of many considerations along the way to service design.

JW (first part is his journey):

He went from not listening to people to frustration to development of sharper tools - via working with colleagues & customers -> (BA) concepts to detail -> went to Live|work and worked on prototype development, but still missed experience prototyping - proposition development to experience prototyping (he talked about Google Maps vice UK Ordnance Survey mapping - an old and established business model became invalid because for most people GMaps is OK & free - this seems to be something like what is happening to some libraries).
You can only really learn how a service works by giving it to people and let them use it. Design to Beta.
It isn’t about wowing a VP, it is about instigating change.
Let the design team and customer evolve the brief for implementation.

AE:

She is interested in the co-creation of e-services (if there is a distinction).
Anelie said she went from being a practitioner to an “academic fortress” (i.e a university – now I know how she feels)!
She is driven to bringing all forces together democratically and flexibly.
Sustainability comes through a local perspective, need and within one’s given capacity.

PW:

Products differ from services (as far as design is concerned).
User experience is key to unlocking the complexity of a user’s end-to-end experience.
A key participation driver is ethics and this is also a need in health services.
There are also important financial drivers.
Bring users and staff together leads to shared learning and co-design improvements. Then this can be followed up with shared evaluation.
Journeys can be mapped through touch-points revealing rich stories.
Challenges: keeping people engaged; crucial to have insiders; people in the middle; campaigning that change is worthwhile; participant requests cannot always be met; & design expertise needs are v.diverse.

Questions/discussion:

FA:

The role of service design in large urban environments (vice small communities)?
You should not hand-over all responsibilities to specialists (this creates silos).

PW:

Simple UK services that hand over public data to the public have allowed for sharing of information. (E.g.s include transport updates, location of potholes, etc.)

FA:

An accountability framework = ownership by another person (this is important).

PW (I think):

Should politicians or systems always be responsible - or people? (Drs, nurses, etc have motivation, but they too are victims of the system)

FA:

Desiging to, with and for people is important.

Audience member:

Community connections are very important and often result in the sharing of knowledge that may not otherwise be shared.
Primary empathy is a critical factor in creating services.
There are many side-benefits from collaboration in co-creation processes.

JW:

Wikimedicine - a good or bad place? (Drs have no time and some concerns about contributing, so nurses are mediating in a bit of a vacuum.)

This was a thought provoking panel session and the panelists offered a wide variety of views. I doubt my notes are very comprehensive as quite a bit of the discussion was very distracting from note taking. I'll happily correct or add clarification to anything I've written above.

Even more from PDC 2010: Release early: Release often strategy

2010-12-08T13:36:00.005+11:00

Diana Mounter & Dave Gravina, Digital Eskimo (DE)

DE's Tools: human-centred design, PD, agile & ethnographic research.

Amongst other tactics they:

ask questions & challenge assumptions!
Break-up problems into small chunks
encourage risk taking & celebrate mistakes

Immersion Phase

workshops include co-design for shared understanding, helps bring all perspectives together
synthesize outcomes to define scope
desk research (some is usually already done)
observe research & interviews
workshop ideas with communications teams
they gave out packs for people to record diaries in their homes (incl cameras, diaries)
co-design activities brought people together, so insights were gained & shared (I think this is extremely beneficial and therefore very important for libraries in educational institutions to recognise)

User Experience Strategy

working with community (not just a Council)
synthesising findings & keeping users at centre of process
develop personas (to represent different user perspectives)
iterative approach to features (tested & feedback built in)
branding was a challenge - simple terms are important (not jargon) – and this changed brand “personality”
testing the first release with small group of users also “seeds” the product & they were surveyed
ambassadors become champions (checking posts, etc.)
statistics were given about the difference a small change can make
iterated on design & site architecture also (addition of events & tags stretched design in a final stage)
agile & participatory approach worked very well with this process delivering transparency
they released often got feedback & improved services
the client was happy, good results came, and a new platform was born

Some debate followed about whether “agile” design is good method to use for conservative/cautious clients.

People like to trial and see how things go.

How to engage skeptics or the uninterested? People segment on values, so there is a range and some people are going to be desensitised to the green message. Feeling of being part of a social norm really helps - being part of something, a growing movement. Not just preaching to converted, but giving voice to those who want to get involved. In this project it was not about (do this ) “because” but about “how to” (do something), so when ready, people could consult.

DE are doing some great work around town and in the social innovation and web-design spaces. They were one of the sponsors for Industry Day and are a company to watch in Sydney for sure.

More notes from PDC 2010: Composing Collaborative Communities

2010-12-08T11:34:00.006+11:00

Mark Elliot, Collabforge www.collabforge.com

Collabforge work mainly for the government sector and they've made a lot of progress re gov2.0 and in stakeholder engagement. In fact I think they've made more progress in that respect than any bureaucracy that I've ever experienced or could imagine. In only a brief presentation he illustrated his principles with just a few amazing examples of their work that almost blew my mind.

Collabforge has three design principles:

1. Lifecycle management

All communities have a lifecycle: establishment (creating initial conditions), maintenance (keeping people involved) and transition (they could be shut-down or ongoing).
E.g. Future Melbourne (a 10 yr planning process). It grew community around the development of a plan using a wiki-based platform and is possibly the world’s first collaborative city plan (all users/contributors have add, edit, delete rights!); it is open 24/7; it facilitates city planners working with public; and there has been no spam or off-topic offensive contribution (it worked much like Wikipedia) because it takes more energy to disrupt process.
Post-implementation review is online.
He said that life-cycle management was critical for a design process.

2. Community as investment

This relates directly to digital literacy.
There aim is to reduce the number of those who are disconnected and to reuse & recycling community members.
Apparently they moved from a blog to a wiki.
See wePlan Alpine

3. Community Management

This means working with community to get good outcomes.
They used Facebook for Vital Valued Victorians (c21k fans) for the CFA as it stuck with those concerned & seemed most effective.
It allowed for a personal level of engagement.
Also, for EPA Victoria they developed a web2.0 framework to assist in internal engagement of EPA staff in a 5 yr planning process.

Mark's was probably one of the most impressive short talks that I heard on Industry Day.

In response to a question : He had made some use of mapping technologies in the Parks plans too. This meant people could drop/sharing photos on points in parks using maps.

Libraries: Change and our Future

2010-12-07T13:32:00.003+11:00

Libraries: Change and our Future

View more documents from Mal Booth.

Participatory service design

2010-12-03T17:22:00.010+11:00

These are some notes from some sessions at Industry Day of the Participatory Design Conference, held for the first time ever in the Southern Hemisphere at UTS 28 November to 3 December 2010. From the conference website:

Participation is the complex, contested, changing, creative and celebratory core of participatory design. The theme calls us to explore the current and emerging equivalents to the pioneering Participatory Design focus on involving people in the introduction of technology into their work. This PDC will take up the challenge of extending the design approaches and understandings of participation that informed the first 20 years of Participatory Design towards those that were needed to enable the field to continue to generate major innovations in design in the future.

Shaping Practice - Mariesa Nicholas, Inspire Foundation (Industry Day keynote)

http://www.inspire.org.au/ A youth suicide prevention program.

They built their service by having youth design it themselves. Participation is used there to promote mental health & wellbeing. Involvement of youth is seen as critical to the success of the service.

How Inspire’s practice is shaped (principles):

1. Being flexible and responsive

· Completed a year long evaluation on impact, service development & health/well-being

· Diversity of youth reflected to increase engagement

· ROMP (reach out to an MP) uses social networks

· RO has youth reporters telling stories.

· Hard to reach groups are specifically targetted.

· Using social technology to take message to youth (they use Habbo http://www.habbo.com/?migrate_from=AU). Face-to-face workshops proved unpopular, but Habbo was! People waited up to an hour to get access to a 15 minute facilitated online discussion in Habbo.

2. Communicate openly & often

· Very important & often forgotten

· Youth are OK not to be involved in all decisions, but want to understand reasoning, and need to know their role (else they get frustrated and cynical). Also want to know who else is involved & they want updates. Process must be transparent.

· Empowerment is important for youth or they become cynical

· Must be clear and open! Tokenism is to be avoided at all costs

· Mistakes: roles were not clear/checked; participants not kept updated; mistakes not addressed publicly (this is seen as a good thing).

· Conversion of one-of participants to engaged participants is important & then they become involved longer term.

· Frank & personal communications are important to build trust & genuine relationships.

3. Building a foundation for sustainable participation

· This offers opportunities for professional development is important for young leaders

· Barriers were removed to (to becoming a Youth Ambassador) in order to increase diversity & improve participation but it didn’t translate to much long term participation . . .

· The emphasis on just letting users take the initiative (alone) was wrong. Inspire found they had to provide structure & direction

· Formal staff-led programs were important

· Being a youth ambassador (YA) was seen as a privilege (so opening it up to all took away status)

· There is potential for some YAs to become over-commitment/invested and this isn't healthy - staff needed to manage these challenges

4. Participation is properly resourced

· Not a hobby or something to do in your spare time

· It needs the resources it deserves

· Initially they underestimated what was needed including time

· Participation is difficult, does not come naturally, is costly and it is complex. But the benefits are potentially great.

· Staff training was very necessary & the appreciation of time to engage youth were underestimated.

· Effective participation isn’t spontaneous or a natural process (something that just happens of its own accord)

5. Fostering a culture that values participation

· This is the secret to their success

· Inclusiveness is an organisation value

· Everyone participates in this including the CEO and they enjoy that part of their work.

· Leading by example is very important and valued by colleagues

· They include a youth rep on interview panels - to identify people (staff) who relate to, and work well with youth. (Maybe we could at least try that too with students on panels for reference librarians?)

· They have surveyed stakeholders: and the YA program is central to meaningful participation

· Staff & youth seek opportunities and improve their work

Concluding remarks

The leading mental health service in Australia is ReachOut now.

Inspire now has program, research & policy and consulting arms.

Staff get an extra week annual leave called “reflection leave” - how can it be introduced into other not-for-profit organisations?

They are now also consulting to the NFP sector & Government

They have an “exit strategy” for young people post 25 & they’re developing an alumni program (as advocates) - “setting them free” is seen as critical.

What is Social Media?

2010-11-23T09:04:00.006+11:00

This is a presentation I gave on 22 November to the Kur-ing-gai Rotary Club.

What is Social Media

View more presentations from Mal Booth.

OK, so some of the people who attended this talk (including my parents) are relatively new at the interwebs, so I decided to list the websites I referred to in case they are too hard to find. Here we go, in the order they were used, mind the step:

commoncraft video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpIOClX1jPE

Gary Hayes" Social Media Count http://www.personalizemedia.com/garys-social-media-count/

Twitter http://twitter.com/

LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/

Kongregate http://www.kongregate.com/

iTunes U via http://www.apple.com/au/itunes/

Flickr http://www.flickr.com/

Creative Commons http://creativecommons.org/about/licenses/

Last.fm http://www.last.fm/

52 Suburbs Blog http://www.52suburbs.com/

LibraryThing http://www.librarything.com/

Delicious (social bookmarks) http://www.delicious.com/

UTS Library's YouTube Channel http://www.youtube.com/user/UTSLibrary#p/a/u/2/iLelhZHb3G8

My Blog "FromMelbin" http://www.frommelbin.blogspot.com/

Facebook http://www.facebook.com/ & Bob Brown http://www.facebook.com/Senator.Bob.Brown

craigslist (Sydney) http://sydney.craigslist.com.au/

foursquare (for smart phones) via http://foursquare.com/

Expedia (for travel) https://www.expedia.com.au/

Brooklyn Museum community exhibition page for "Click" http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/click/

British Libraries BIPC http://www.bl.uk/bipc/ & Growing Knowledge exhibition http://www.growingknowledge.bl.uk/

Flickr Commons http://www.flickr.com/commons/ & the Library of Congress http://www.flickr.com/photos/library_of_congress/sets/ & the Australian War Memorial's handsome man image http://www.flickr.com/photos/australian-war-memorial/2863670139/in/set-72157607335488831/

Deus Cycle Swap Meet, November 2010

2010-11-14T16:33:00.002+11:00

Sculpture by the Sea, Bronte-Bondi, 2010

2010-11-14T16:29:00.004+11:00

I wandered around with a friend just after dawn on a week day to get a better view of some of these amazing installations. And recently I've been going through all of the images and adding the titles and artists' names. I'm nearly finished.

Sydney Open (architecture tour)

2010-11-14T16:26:00.002+11:00

This tour was organised by the Historic Houses Trust of NSW. I'm very grateful to them for encouraging us to get out and see these buildings and stunning views.

Google's (free) Staff Cafe

2010-11-14T16:23:00.002+11:00

Cafe
Originally uploaded by Mal Booth

My thoughts on Google's staff cafe. Open up the image in Flickr to read more.

I will be lobbying for something like this in our new Library for UTS, but already I can hear the nay-sayers.

Images from London & Berlin

2010-10-27T10:51:00.010+11:00

I returned to work earlier this week after a rather hectic two weeks in both London and Berlin. Initially I had a workshop and a short presentation about our future library at the Internet Librarian International conference in London, and I made a lot of side-visits to some libraries and other recent buildings, some of which were recommended by our Library Retrieval System building architects, Hassell.

My visits in London included:

The London School of Economics and Politics (LSE) Library (a Norman Foster rebuild)
The British Library (in particular the inspirational Business & IP Centre and the Growing Knowledge exhibition)
The Natural History Museum (in particular the new Darwin Centre "Cocoon" structure)
The Victoria & Albert Museum
The National Gallery (no interior photography allowed)
The National Portrait Gallery (no interior photography allowed)
The Tate Modern
The British Museum (particularly Norman Foster's Great Court enclosure)
The Serpentine Gallery Pavillion 2010 (just before it closed) and
Norman Foster's 30 St Mary Axe building (twice because it is so awesome)

I then spent three nights in Berlin around visits to three relatively new academic libraries that my boss had identified as being of interest to us: the Philological Library of the Free University, the VW-Haus of the Technical University and the central University Library of Humboldt University in Berlin "Jacob-und-Wilhelm-Grimm-Zentrum". In addition, I managed to visit the following sites:

The Memorial to German Resistance
The Bauhaus Archive
The Berlin (Modern Art) Gallery
The external areas of the Jewish Museum and
The Topography of Terror Museum & Library

I will present my findings to staff at some stage and also write a couple of blog posts about what I saw and learnt, but in the meantime, you may like to take a look at the images I've uploaded to Flickr (last ten sets): http://www.flickr.com/photos/malbooth/sets/

Some musings post ILI2010

2010-10-25T15:48:00.009+11:00

Bean Bags at LSE Library.

ILI2010 is now a week and hemisphere away, so here are a few thoughts it provoked from me:

At some stage someone tweeted that our #ILI2010 hastag was picked up by a non-librarian who investigated and then reported that it was just some dull library conference and of no interest to anyone else. Some of us laughed that off, but doesn't it tell us something more serious about our profession and how we are regarded by others? Are we happy with or accepting of that view?
I think that too often we just talk about us and our value (i.e. as "librarians") and this has virtually no, or very little focus on what we are doing to provide better services for our clients. Mostly we are preaching to the converted (us) and nobody else is much interested. Meanwhile, our online competition keeps developing or going around us. Stop being so library-centric, it won't work and isn't appropriate.
Using more social media and completing online learning programs isn't the answer, nor the end point. And I think that an anonymous presence on social media is next to useless for a librarian. We need to start using these channels to provide valuable content or services and to make real and ongoing human connections with our communities. Creating content and providing those services isn't always easy and it takes much energy, patience, effort, and creativity. Start now. Seek permission and write your policy documents later. Forget a cost-benefit analysis and measuring ROI.
Get out and find what your core community business or interest is (if you don't already know, or if you are locked into providing services to meet what it used to be 30 years ago). Then get involved in it. Digitise stuff, help facilitate much-needed services, help local community businesses or industry, educate, entertain or help researchers.
Don't just sit around waiting for someone to ask you a question - get out and offer your help and assistance.
Make yourself and your library more interesting and relevant to your community, whatever it is. Be active in collecting and developing a deeper interest in new media and games. Expose yourself as a real person. If you're dull you are asking to be left out. Sorry, but that is life's harsh reality.
As a profession we were more active in multi-media pre-Guttenberg. Illuminated manuscripts facilitated or produced by "librarians" contained art, music, calligraphy, laws, science, worship, text, etc. We can learn from that and start again.
I for one don't ever need to be reminded of Ranganathan's five laws of library science again. Let's move on now.
We need to listen more to what our clients, patrons or users are saying and respond accordingly: better search and discovery tools (vice unfriendly ontologies); more useful applications; customisable services; personalised service; less library jargon; etc.
Learn how to quickly and regularly scan the contemporary web and how to curate, create and collect content more actively.
Amassing blog statistics and metrics won't save us either. Nor will publishing more theory about "library science" in academic journals.
Learn how to take some risks: your own future is at stake here.
I may well be wrong, but I think you can have a library without librarians. You can at least have one without irrelevant librarians. And as for librarians without libraries: oh please! Get real. That little discussion was all a bit precious for me.

Images of the State Library of Queensland

2010-09-29T12:24:00.001+10:00

Images of the State Library of Queensland and The Edge.
I found the whole place very inspiring. The architecture is really appropriate to both the environment and the role of this library. The design of the different spaces is captivating and outstanding. The Edge as a facility for newer media technologies is most impressive.

NMC Horizon ANZ Emerging Technologies Summit 2010

2010-09-27T09:43:00.008+10:00

Over 26-27 September 2010 I attended the Brisbane 2010 Strategic Technology Summit at the Edge within the State Library of Queensland. It was generously sponsored by the Centre for Educational Innovation and Technology (CEIT), the University of Queensland, the State Library of Queensland, and the New Media Consortium (NMC).

The goal for the 30 or so participants was to create an action plan to advance a better understanding of the place for ICTs in Australian education and society at large; and a clearer sense of the urgency with which national, state-level, and sector-focused initiatives should be moving forward.

You can view some of the tweets in the CoverItLive window below.

This set of images on Flickr maps out what we did over the course of the summit in a visual sense. You can read more about each of the images on Flickr.

NMC Horizon ANZ Summit 2010

A draft communiqué is now being agreed by the participants that will form the outcome of the summit and I will include a reference to it when it is released in early October.