Flickr December 31, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : internet , 2comments
During the holidays I found some time to play in Flickr and learned a bit more about it. Up until now, I had only really used it as a place to upload a few photos and have them displayed at the bottom of the side bar in this blog. The social aspect of this much acclaimed web service hadn’t grabbed me, I couldn’t really see the point, and I’m still not certain that ultimately, it’s not just an entertaining distraction, but that’s OK too.
This is what I’ve learned so far:
* Common tags and RSS provide one mechanism ( similar to deli.cio.us) by which people who share an interest in a topic, style, location or whatever can keep in touch with the latest relevant uploads, but if you really want to see the social side of Flickr you need to join groups - active groups.
* Active groups have a discussion page and a group pool of photos, both of which can be subscribed to with RSS. By submitting one of your uploaded photos to a group, more people are likely to view it, add a comment or bookmark.
I probably wouldn’t have found a reason to blog the image below, but on Flikr I added it to “parallax view” and “colour fields - green” groups
* Some groups have informative discussions, with disclosure of technique and other useful stuff. I found an odd group called “cutouts” where the theme is to highlight a coloured subject against a black and white background. Discussion revealed that people have found different ways of achieving this effect, so I decided to have a go. Looking back through my archive I found a suitable picture, and the result entitled “potato” I feel is an improvement on the original.
* Contacts, friends and favourites tend to be reciprocal, so go ahead and add some.
* There’s a Flash based synchronous chat facility - called FlickrLive ( accessible from the sitemap) , but very few people have started using it yet.
The free account has an upload limit of 10 Mb a month and this will go a lot further if you resize photos from hi-res to typical web size first. There’s also a limit of 100 photos total displayed in the free account, so if you get used to using flickr a lot, you could end up needing to shell out $41.77 for an annual pro account, which at current exchange rates is what - under £2 a month?
What else?
I started a group called “scanned objects”
Images created by placing objects on a flatbed scanner. No camera is needed for this group, and the depth of field can be several centimetres depending on scanner. Great magnification is also possible. The purpose of the group is to scan unusual objects and create intriguing images.
Will upload some examples when my January quota comes onstream, soon….oh.
Happy New Year to one and all.
Fire Station December 28, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : hi res photos, London , 1 comment so far
It is possible to walk past or even inside this supermarket many times before noticing that it occupies a grand old London Fire Brigade building, opposite Liverpool St Station.
Ice December 26, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : movie clips, London , 1 comment so farMachine clears ice. Man clears snow.
People skating, always anti-clockwise.
Girl shows how to
Boy falls over.
Playing with Fire December 25, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : movie clips, London , 2commentsAlso in Greenwich, in the market, a fire juggler entertains.
Ice Skaters December 25, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : hi res photos, London , 2commentsChristmas Eve at the Old Royal Naval College, Greenwich where a temporary ice skating rink has been erected for the public.
Outdoor ice skating is also available this year at Kew Gardens, Hampton Court and Somerset House, and every winter at Broadgate, near Liverpool St Station.
Winter Sunset December 21, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : hi res photos, wildlife, London , 1 comment so farlast Sunday it was clear and cold, and I ventured out to make the most of the daylight, noticing that the sun was already low on the horizon. At this time of year, instead of setting in the West somewhere near the twin towers, it surprised me how much further South it was. I wondered if the planet may have finally spun off it’s proper axis, perhaps through 3billion people in the East all jumping up and down at the same time.
Here’s a selection of photos from the last half hour of the day, spent walking around the duckpond on Wansted Flats, the nearest place with any approximation to natural beauty within walking distance.
( also published on Manor Park Blog )
Independent Learning December 16, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : ultraversity, learning , 2commentsI haven’t written much about my degree course for a while so here goes. The next assignment is an Independent Learning Module ( ILM), which sort of means I can do whatever I like or need. First a bit about the course. I was lucky enough to have found myself amongst the first cohort in a new kind of degree course called Ultraversity
Three things about this make it highly unconventional:
So next, I have an Independent Learning Module.
In order to cope with the workload, I’ve been advised to try and use something which I’m doing anyway - makes sense. I’m a thinking person with decades of experience doing all sorts of different things, some of them quite highly analytical. They ought to just give me a degree really 
But the way it would have to be explained and written up would be just as much work as quickly cramming up on French literature or geology, attending a few lectures and dossing about in the union bar for 6 months of the year.
In fact I’ve chosen to use some work that I did last summer, attending a course and writing a proto-business plan. But to what extent will I be able to just “cash in” what I’ve already done, and collect the 20 credits without expending additional hours? That will be the interesing question as far as researching the effect of number 3 is concerned.
In order to meet the assessment criteria I will need to demonstrate certain things which may not be evident in the existing documentation, so I’ll have to provide an accompanying narrative. If this gets out of hand, and there will be strong encouragement to analyse and reflect on the work, and then reflect on the reflections - so I could end up with the already done work reduced to being little more than an artefact about which I have to produce a 4,000 word essay, in which case I might just as well have chosen something of more current interest. The reality no doubt, will turn out to be somewhere between those two extreme positions, so - we shall see.
Oh, and if you’ve actually read this far and don’t have a degree yourself, you’d probably be interested in finding out whether Ultraversity might be the thing for you too. There’s a new intake being registered now, for a start date at the end of February 2005 and if you should happen to be a stay-at-home father or mother or know anyone who is, then there’s even a contingent designed specially for those circumstances as well as for waged workers. Just click below for more details:
Hors d’Oeuvres (Roy Harper) December 15, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : Music , 1 comment so farFrom Aaro’s site
Hors d’Oeuvres (Roy Harper)
The judge sits on his great assize
Twelve men wise with swollen thighs
Who never ever told no lies
Whose minds were ever such a size
Whose lives were ever such a prize
Whose brains bred answers just like flies
Whose answers stalked their thoughts like spies
Whose lead ball through the courtroom flies
To rip a hole clean between two eyes
That never ever wore disguise
And never ever saw blue skies
Who quickly lived now slowly dies
Who closed unopened otherwise
Well you can lead a horse to water
But you’re never gonna make him drink
And you can lead a man to slaughter
But you’re never gonna make him think
The critic rubs his tired arse
Scrapes his poor brains, strains and farts
And wields a pen that stops and starts
And thinks in terms of booze and tarts
And sits there playing with his parts
He says I’m much too crude and far too course
And he says this singer’s just a farce
He’s got no healing formulas
He’s got no cure-all for our scars
He’s got no bra-strap for our bras
And our sagging tits no longer hold a full house of hearts
And you know what? I don’t think this little song’s gonna make the charts
Well you can lead a horse to water
But you’re never gonna make him drink
And you can lead a man to slaughter
But you’re never gonna make him think
London Bridge at night December 12, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : hi res photos, London , 12comments
And here’s that famous picture of the millau bridge which was opened last week.
Podcasting Hype December 11, 2004
Posted by Andy Roberts in : internet , add a commentI posted this one about ‘Podcasting Hype’ on the Grumpy Old People blog, where I’ve made myself at home already.
( I quite like the typepad interface for authoring, as the WYSIWYG editing works in Firefox )
is an online professional who initiated DARnet 
