I recently finished reading "How to Do Nothing" by Jenny Odell. It's a great, thought-provoking read. Despite the title the book isn't a treatise on disconnecting or a guide to mindfulness. It's an exploration of attention: what is it? how do we direct it? can it be trained? And how is it hijacked by social … Continue reading Reflecting on “How to Do Nothing”
Category: Books
Downloading magazines from the Internet Archive (and making gifs from their covers)
I like reading old magazines and books over at the Internet Archive. They've got a great online reader that works just fine in the browser. But sometimes I want a local copy I can put on my tablet or other device. And reading locally saves them some bandwidth. Downloading individual items is simple, but it … Continue reading Downloading magazines from the Internet Archive (and making gifs from their covers)
What is collaborative maintenance of data? A short talk at the Royal Society
Following the publication of their report on data governance in the 21st century, the Royal Society are running a number of workshops to explore data governance in different sectors. In October 2019 year they ran one exploring data governance in the auto insurance sector. Last week they held a workshop looking at data governance in … Continue reading What is collaborative maintenance of data? A short talk at the Royal Society
Creating better checklists, a short review of the Checklist Manifesto
I've just finished reading The Checklist Manifesto by Atul Gawande (Cancer Research UK affiliate link). It's been on my reading list for a while. In my work I've written quite a few checklists to help capture best practice or to provide advice. So I was curious about whether I could learn something about creating better checklists. I … Continue reading Creating better checklists, a short review of the Checklist Manifesto
Book Mooching
I recently signed up to BookMooch which is a little community site whose goal is to enable you to "give away books you no longer need in exchange for books you really want". You can read more about the site, its goals and activities for yourself. Essentially you use the service as a means to … Continue reading Book Mooching
Judging Books by Their Covers
Geoff has written up a nice article about what he's dubbed Early Social Bookmarking: cues he used to help him choose/select books from his school library. I used to use a cue to help me find books too. But in my case there wasn't a social element it was a simple visual cue. The technique … Continue reading Judging Books by Their Covers
The Library of Unwritten Books
I just saw a piece about The Library of Unwritten Books in the Book Show on BBC 4. Couldn't resist digging up more information. This BBC News story "The art of not writing books" is a good introduction, with some more details here. Such a cool idea. Hope the books get collected into a published … Continue reading The Library of Unwritten Books
We’re All Harmonies
Attempting to bring the teetering pile of books in my "to read" pile under control I've banned myself from Waterstones and the local library so I don't get tempted to buy any others. So far it's been mostly successful: I've strayed in, but not actually bought anything. In typically anal retentive fashion I've adopted a … Continue reading We’re All Harmonies
The Fifth Sentence
Passing on a meme I caught from Norman Walsh. The fifth sentence on page 23 of The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson is: But while Lord Finkle-McGraw was not the sort to express feelings promiscuously, he gave the impression of being nearly satisfied with the way the conversation was going. This isn't the book I'm … Continue reading The Fifth Sentence
My Light Cone
I just noticed on Interconnected that Matt Web has created a little utility to generate your own personal light cone as an RSS feed. I've only just recently heard of the concept of a light cone, one of many interesting facts I've learnt whilst reading Impossibility by John Barrow. You can visualise it as a … Continue reading My Light Cone
Lost Boy 