P E O P L E P O I N T S

Is the ICT profession ready for the 18th Century?

2010-05-19T17:19:00.008+12:00

Catching Up
This post is by way of a pit stop for regular visitors to PeoplePoints - of which - to my blushing astonishment there seems to be more and more. In any event, this last fortnight has been a bit of a whistle stop tour of New Zealand, and I have been conscious that my visits here have been a little episodic. So call this the catch up.

NZ Computer Society - lecture/presentation series.
First up, I have been on on one of NZCS national series when they invite people to come and share their thoughts with NZCS regional branches. I chose to offer some thoughts on Open Data - and its potential, especially from an ICT perspective.

And so, this last 10 days I have been in Dunedin, Christchurch, Hamilton, Auckland, closing off in Wellington last night.

Is the ICT profession ready for the 18th Century?
The presentation opened with a speculative challenge as to whether we - that's anyone involved in boot-strapping the next phase of the Internet as an open digital public space - are in touch with the historical parallels of the 18th Enlightenment and of how the subsequent gold seams of science and technology came about in part by, in addition to the long march to democracy, embedding public education and literacy as a key public good?

Developing 21st century digital public literacy
Turning to current challenges, my thesis was/is that the current definition/policy frameworks around open data - especially around government owned or managed data sets - needs to radically expand to include all the cultural/heritage data assets contained in the myriad of cultural institutions - libraries - galleries - archives - museums, which in turn are one of the great products of, and containers for, the inheritance of the 18th century Enlightenment.

And that, not only were these rich cornucopias of assets and opportunities key ingredients to the development of a 19th and 20th century public literacy, in turn they are key contributors to the development of 21st century digital public space, and its mystic twin - public digital literacy.

Tool Boxes
Moreover, I was/am strongly of the belief that - if we are serious about picking up the challenges to 21st century digital literacy - then tucked inside the search /find/share/transform/co-create mantras of various national and international digital content strategies - we need a whole bunch of additional tools than are currently showcased in storehouses/archives coming into view from the likes of Open Data USA or UK Open Data.

Should this interest, be advised there is an audio file of the presentation - and of course the obligatory slide deck. When I put the two things together, I will post them here.

Social Media Junction.
I also presented at the Social Media Junction event in Sky City here in Auckland on Monday. My brief was to offer 10 public/nor for profit examples of people using social media/ social networking tools/behavior as part of their core activities.

BBC - History of the World
And yes, as the image above suggests, I used the seminal British Museum History of the World Project as an example. And for the record, be advised that the second parallel BBC series just launched.

The audience, though primarily from the private sector corporate world seemed receptive. There was a very active Twitter tag #smj If this subject interests, then check it out.

Playing at House
Somewhere along the way I have re-grown a beard. Now I have sciatica in my left leg, and am limping along. So somewhere along the way, and if I give into the temptation to buy a cane tomorrow, my transformation into House is complete

Tamati Kruger says return of Te Urewera pivotal to Tuhoe settlement with NZ Crown

2010-05-15T12:31:00.005+12:00

The issue
For those who need context, you need to be aware that here in New Zealand Ngāi Tūhoe, have been in active negotiations with the New Zealand Crown for the last 18 months over their claim under the Treaty of Waitangi for a fair and lasting settlement of the raupatu , or confiscation, of their lands by the NZ crown. This is a long and vexed issue, which the NZ Herald Maori correspondent Yvonne Tahana neatly summarises this morning, here.

Te Urewera
Suffice to say, after 18 months of negotiation. both Tuhoe and the other parties, including many crown agencies, believed a draft heads of an agreement was in place with signature and ratification due this week. A key part of the settlement would be the return of the Tuhoe lands in Te Urewera, their tribal homeland in the Urewera Mountains on the East Coast of New Zealand. Currently, much of this area is included in the Te Urewera National Park.

At the 11th hour - last Monday Prime Minister John Key unilaterally declared the return of the Te Urewera to Tuhoe had been taken out of the draft settlement. This move, which also took John Keys co-alition partner, the Maori Party by surprise, continues to provoke fierce debate here in New Zealand. And as the video above shows, events are still very much in play.

Other voices.
Earlier this week, Tariana Turia , the co-leader of the NZ Maori party wrote a moving piece in the NZ Herald on the deep connection Tuhoe have with their ancestral land - here.

Minister Chris Finlayson at Auckland Writers Festival
The New Zealand minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations, [OTS] is Chris Finlayson. He is also Attorney General and Minster for the Arts. On Thursday night, in the latter portfolio, he opened the Auckland Writers and Readers Festival.

It was a slightly awkward affair. First, he took a clumsy swipe at the political affiliations of elder statesman to the NZ literary scene, Karl Stead. Secondly, and to my surprise, he made reference to the pleasure he once had listening to the NZ historian Dame Judith Binney give the Michael King Memorial Lecture in 2008.

I was, and remain totally bemused by this reference. I also was at this lecture. In it Dame Judith Binney gave an account of her current research among the Ngai Tuhoe, and couldn't have made it clearer where her sympathies lay.

Moreover, her recent work Encircled Lands: Te Urewera, 1820-1921 - also speaks forcefully and at length as to the many and often betrayals of trust between the New Zealand Crown and Tuhoe. For more on this see this excellent review by Catherine Masters, here

Dog Whistle?
I'm still trying to work this out - was the Minster giving a long coded dog whistle that he disagreed with his Prime Minister - or was it just crass insensitivity on a stick? Hopefully the former - but could we please maybe have a bit more clarity to his intention and his position?

Web 3.0 - a 15 minute documentary by Kate Ray

2010-05-13T15:13:00.003+12:00

Web 3.0 from Kate Ray on Vimeo.

source
This came via OpenCalais, who call it a ' dynamic and thought-provoking video that breaks down core concepts of the so-called 'Web 3.0' and Semantic Web movements, featuring interviews with Tim Berners-Lee, David Weinberger, Clay Shirky and more.

On cabbages and kings with Jim Mora today

2010-05-12T14:26:00.001+12:00

Afternoons with Jim Mora - Radio NZ National
This afternoon Jim Mora and discussed the news around the items below, including the late insertion of a the web site for the Tuhoe people whose negotiations with the NZ Crown for the return of their ancestral lands is a current hot news topic. See here for a sample from the NZ Herald, as well as the recommended web site above.

The audio
The notes are below, and the audio is here Ogg Vorbis MP3 - or click the wee player:

1. The iPad and the competition The Slate from HP .
Last week I touched and used, however briefly, an iPad and I am underwhelmed.
I was so looking forward to this - BUT - not in love - maybe not even bothered about asking for a date. It just doesn't feel ready for the revolution it is claimed to kick start

That said New Zealand has a launch date -July as does Australia - and yes they get it before us. - May 28th. Good coverage on the options coming up with the SMH, Sydney Morning Herald, here

Competition from HP
More seriously we went on to compare the iPad strategy with the apparent rethink of HP's device The Slate which used Windows 7. HP just bought Palm and the rumo mill is alive with speculation that they will go head to head with Apple with a new device
See this story from CNET News for context

2. XT - Report on the XT failure released by Telecom
UK-based Analysys Mason Report shows XT network not ready for the amount of traffic it was asked to handle and that immature management practices failed to catch the problems in time.

Useful Summary on Kiwi Blog
The network failed because the network and supporting operations were not ready to manage the levels of traffic it experienced
Software issues contributed to network instability
Although the XT network was designed to initially provide planned coverage that matched the CDMA network the initial configuration of the XT network and, some network build issues, led to coverage variability
Some aspects of the network architecture are overly complex meaning that any faults are difficult to find and rectify
Immature operational management systems and process failures contributed to the impact of network issues.
Plus summary and full report from Telecom , here

3. Australian Gov 2.0 TaskForce.
The Australian Government have come out in favour of the key recommendations of the Australian Gov 2.0 TaskForce. Details here.

Creative Commons
The endorsement include the recommendation that all Australian government data /information should be open for reuse - with minimal copyright restrictions and should, by default , unless there is a proper reason not to - use the Creative Commons License.

This is a very big deal - opens up shed loads of Australian knowledge assets into the market - mapping data - and puts to rest the notion that Governments should make money out of their information .

This issue of open data goes to NZ Cabinet in July.

New Zealand Creative Commons
http://www.creativecommons.org.nz/

4. TED
Some brilliant new sessions/talks on TED from the 2010 conference February, including this one from Stephen Wolfram and his quest to make all knowledge computational -- able to be searched, processed and manipulated. - See TED, here

5. NGAI TUHOE
Last but not least, as per the opening comment to the post, the Tuhoe Establishment Trust have a very good web site which explains their plans for the development of the Tuhoe people. See especially the section on their vision - which, among other things, explores the centrality of regaining control of their lost lands.

National Digital Forum 2010 Conference Linking data, linking people

2010-05-10T13:25:00.000+12:00

New Zealand National Digital Forum
The NDF in New Zealand, Aotearoa is a collection of 150 organisations, including museums, libraries, galleries, archives, and their partner organisations It's probably one of the best conference spots in the the local cultural/heritage web - mostly because the people involved are both active learners and participants. In short, most of the people in the room - usually around 300 - have either got something to learn - and something to say - often both. See the web site here, and the Ning site for more, here

The next conference is in October, 2010. The organisers have just released the following - and have asked that it get circulated as widely as possible. So here we go!

National Digital Forum 2010 Conference
Linking data, linking people
Monday 18 – Tuesday 19 October 2010
Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington
The 9th annual National Digital Forum conference will be held in Wellington Monday 18 – Tuesday 19 October 2010 at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa.

The National Digital Forum (NDF) is a coalition of museums, archives, art galleries, libraries and government departments with more than 150 member organisations committed to collectively building New Zealand’s culture and heritage online.

Linking data, linking people will raise discussion and explore opportunities for the creative and cultural sectors to link and make available digital content to the benefit of New Zealanders and the rest of the world.

The interactive format of the programme will encourage delegates to take part in open knowledge sharing, discussion and debate.

The 2010 conference programme will include stimulating keynote speakers, discussion sessions, practical workshops and demonstrations.
Key Dates
Mark these dates in your diary now!
7 May 2010              Call for contributors opens
24 May 2010             Early Bird registration opens
24 May 2010             Sponsorship opens
14 June 2010            Call for contributors closes
12 July 2010            Conference programme available
3 September 2010        Early bird registration closes
18 October 2010 NDF 2010 conference opens

Call for Contributors / Presenters
Interested in presenting at NDF 2010?
We are looking for speakers to participate in expert forums on key topics around linking data and linking people. There is also an opportunity for you to share stories of your project with other attendees, describing what you have been up to, what you have achieved and share the lessons you have learned from successes as well as failures in demonstration sessions.

Proposals must be submitted by completing the online Submission Form

Derrida - the father of Deconstruction

2010-05-09T08:49:00.002+12:00

Save Middlesex Philosophy

2010-05-08T14:23:00.006+12:00

Save Middlesex University Philosophy School
Staff and students, both current and former are occupying Mansion House on Trent Park campus, part of Middlesex University, in protest at the planned closure of the philosophy department. More on this , here.

Today there 9,902 on the Facebook campaign, here- and a parallel 12554 signatures on the online petition, here

This gets personal
I should say this gets very personal for me. I did a BA in The History of Ideas at Middlesex in 1984-87 when it was still good old Middlesex Polytechnic. I loved every day there. To do post graduate work you had to head on down to the likes of Brighton to the University of Sussex, and freeze in the tiny bedsits on East Slope to take the much more prosaic MA in Social and Political Thought. Even now, the sounds of a group of Chinese voices chattering next door can take me straight to that narrow little study, the little built in desk and the tiny sixties minimalist single bed.

Since since, after the change to Middlesex University, the North London Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy is now one of the main focal points to the study of the European or continental philosophy. Despite this, management at Middlesex University have decided to cut all philosophy programs, including their MA and PhD degrees.

This essentially means the end of the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy, a hub for internationally scholarship and the best RAE rated research department in the University. Current supporters include some of the most prestigious names in international philosophic scholarship. Thirty of the same recently wrote to the THE to say:

"We the undersigned deplore the recent decision of Middlesex University to close its Philosophy programmes, including its prestigious and successful MAs. The abrupt closure of these programmes is a matter of national and indeed international concern. Not only does it contradict the stated commitment of Middlesex University to promote ‘research excellence’, it represents a startling stage in the impoverishment of Philosophy provision in the UK.

We have participated in events organised by the Philosophy group at Middlesex and we can testify to its unique combination of strengths, and to the significant and distinctive contribution it makes to philosophy in the UK. Its set of MA programmes is currently the largest in the UK. Philosophy is the highest research-rated subject at Middlesex University. In RAE 2008 Middlesex was rated first in philosophy among post-1992 universities, with 65% of its research activity judged “world-leading” or “internationally excellent”.

It is widely recognised as one of the most important centres for the study of modern European philosophy anywhere in the English-speaking world. It is one of only a handful of Philosophy departments left in the UK that provides both research-driven and inclusive post-graduate teaching and supervision aimed at a wide range of students, specialist and non-specialist.

We call on Middlesex University to reverse this damaging and ill-judged decision to close its Philosophy programmes, and to renew its commitment to widening participation in education and to excellence in research.

Keith Ansell-Pearson, Professor of Philosophy, University of Warwick
Alain Badiou, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, École Normale Supérieure,
Paris
Etienne Balibar, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, Université de Paris-Nanterre & Distinguished Professor of Humanities, University of California Irvine
Miguel Beistegui, Professor of Philosophy, University of Warwick
Andrew Benjamin, Professor of Critical Theory and Philosophical Aesthetics, Monash University
Andrew Bowie, Professor of Philosophy and German, Royal Holloway, University of London
Judith Butler, Maxine Elliot Professor of Rhetoric and Comparative Literature, University of California at Berkeley
Susan Buck-Morss, Jan Rock Zubrow ’77 Professor of Government Cornell University,
New York
Barbara Cassin, Directeur de Recherches, Centre National de la Recherche
Scientifique, Paris
Simon Critchley, Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Philosophy Department, New School for Social Research, New York
Christopher Fynsk, Professor of Comparative Literature and Modern Thought and Director of the Centre for Modern Thought, University of Aberdeen
Simon Glendinning, Reader in European Philosophy, London School of Economics & Director of the Forum for European Philosophy
Boris Groys, Professor of Slavic and Russian Studies, New York University
Michael Hardt, Professor of Literature, Duke University, NC
Harry Harootunian Emeritus Professor of History, Chicago and New York Universities
Joanna Hodge, Professor of Philosophy, Manchester Metropolitan University
Claude Imbert, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, École Normale Supérieure, Paris
Mandy Merck, Professor of Media Arts, Royal Holloway, University of London
Dermot Moran, Professor of Philosophy, University College Dublin
Michael Moriarty FBA, Centenary Professor of French Literature and Thought, Queen Mary, University of London
Antonio Negri, philosopher and political scientist
Jacques Rancière, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, Université de Paris VIII
Kristin Ross, Professor of Comparative Literature, New York University
Lynne Segal, Anniversary Professor, Psychosocial Studies, Birkbeck College, University of London
Peter Sloterdijk, Rektor der Staatlichen Hochschule für Gestaltung, Karlsruhe
Gayatri Spivak, University Professor in the Humanities, Columbia University, New York
Isabelle Stengers, Professor of Philosophy, Université Libre de Bruxelles
Peter Weibel, Chairman and CEO, ZKM/Center for Art and Media, Karlsruhe
James Williams, Professor of European Philosophy, University of Dundee
Slavoj Zizek, Co-Director of the International Centre for Humanities, School of Law, Birkbeck College, University of London.

People to email
As well as joining the FaceBook page, signing the petition et al, you might also care to write to:

Michael Driscoll, vice-chancellor of the university – m.driscoll@mdx.ac.uk
Waqar Ahmad, deputy vice-chancellor, research and enterprise – w.ahmad@mdx.ac.uk
Margaret House, deputy vice-chancellor, academic – m.house@mdx.ac.uk
Ed Esche, dean of the School of Arts & Education – e.esche@mdx.ac.uk

Friday moment: TEDxNYED: Education is all about Openness - Prof David Wiley -

2010-05-07T08:00:00.001+12:00

France adopts law allowing return of Toi Moko

2010-05-05T10:06:00.005+12:00

From The New Zealanders Illustrated - George Angas - 1847- this image sourced form Te Ara, here.
Auckland City Library digitsiation of The New Zealanders Illustrated - here

Tukuna mai he kapunga oneone ki a au hei tangi

Send me a handful of soil so I may weep over it
reference

Toi moko
The vexed issue of when, or under what conditions, a national or universal museum can or should return artifacts to their origin, comes into fore this morning with the news that the French Parliament has approved the return of more than a dozen toi moko, or preserved Maori heads, to New Zealand.

The story goes back to 2007 when the Rouen Natural History Museum decided to repatriate a head in its collection. It was blocked by the French Ministry of Culture, and it has taken until now to get the legislative framework and the cross party support to create a national policy which will allow all toi moko in French collections to be repatriated.

Note - repatriated does not necessarily mean reunited with the subjects whanau [family]. Given the complex histories of war, conquest, and subsequent trading practices, there are huge issues within Maoridom here in New Zealand around identifying the point of origin of a toi moko, and who in turn has the responsibility of looking after the head, and accepting it for burial.

In recent times, Museums are the last candidates for any long term care and custodianship of toi moko. Indeed in many instances local Maori groups - especially hapu [sub-tribe] consider any storage of human remains not just an insensitivity; it creates a condition whereby people won't go to the Museum because it is seen as a cemetery, and the human remains, and by extension the whole building, tapu.

That said, many New Zealand museums have very sensitive protocols around handling human remains, including policies which actively seek repatriation and de-accession. See for example, Auckland Museum, here.

Moreover, in regard to toi moko in particular, Te Papa, the NZ National Museum, act as negotiators and conduits to the eventual homecoming and burial of toi moko. See here for more on this from Te Papa.

So, one more step in the long chain of discourse and practicalities around a topic which can only be approached with respect.

Source
As a measure of the importance of this issue here in New Zealand this morning, Te Papa, [Museum of New Zealand - Te Papa Tongarewa] acting chief executive Michelle Hippolite spoke on Radio NZ National Morning Report

Download: Ogg Vorbis MP3

A 2.5 Year-Old Has A First Encounter with An iPad

2010-05-04T09:45:00.000+12:00

Thanks to Bindy B

OLPC Oceania - Team One Beep and the Microsoft Imagine Cup

2010-05-03T12:22:00.005+12:00

Mitiaro High School Mitiaro, Cook Islands

Imagine Cup NZ winners hooks into OLPC
Monday morning just got a whole lot more interesting courtesy of this three leg story which connects a remote island school in the Cook Islands and their One Laptop Per Child, OLPC, project with Auckland University engineering students and Microsoft New Zealand.

First up the Auckland University engineering students. Known as Team One Beep, they are the winning team at last Fridays Microsoft NZ Imagine Cup, who now go onto the worldwide final in Poland in June - with more on that, here

Team One Beep
The Team One Beep,project, in a lovely twist, deliberately focuses on the One Laptop Per Child programme and its 1.4 million deployed laptops,

Their software solution packages a file of educational data as audio to be sent via radio waves. This can be received on any cheap AM/FM radio which passes it on to the laptop. The file is then converted back to its original form once it has been received on the childrens' laptops, ready to be viewed.

AM/FM Radio? For sure, sounds a little esoteric in the age of digital. But that's the point - by stripping it down to transport over radio frequencies, it allows text, and hopefully soon, audio/video and eventually code to be picked up by any old radio and then onto a OLPC mesh.

Mitiaro, Cook Islands
And so to the photo above and the Cook Islands. The kids in the photo are from Mitiaro High School. Mitiaro is a small remote island in the Cook Islands, which in turn sits bang in the middle of the vast Pacific Ocean. The OLPC Oceania project is working with 17 island countries, including the Cook Islands and these guys are one of the latest schools to get with the programme.

And yes its more than interesting to see Microsoft NZ getting behind an open source programme like OLPC, although it should be noted that according to the OLPC Road map, the OX 1.5. will run both Linux and Windows. Haven t seen this in action yet - but hopefully soon.

Sources
In any event - not a bad Monday morning story - more on the Imagine Cup end from Computerworld, here . OLPC Oceania blog is here. And for balance, a bit of a step back and re-think on the OLPC roadmap is here.

Funny old world
Lastly, I just asked myself, would I rather go and visit Poland for the final, or Mitiaro? Answer, Mitiaro any time. You have no idea how blessed the welcome is in Pasifika.

Speaking with Jim Mora on Radio New Zealand National - Afternoons

2010-04-28T12:51:00.003+12:00

source

Jim Mora
These are the notes for this afternoons programme with Jim Mora on Radio New Zealand National. There are two ways to get the audio. Download: Ogg Vorbis MP3 Or - click the wee player:

1 Facebook - if Google = Search - Facebook wants to be Facebook = social .
They will do this by encouraging web site makers and developers to use new tools they unveiled at their developer conference F8 last week.

see
http://www.macworld.com/article/150801/2010/04/facebook.html
http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/21/facebook/
http://www.pcworld.com/article/194770/how_facebook_plans_to_dominate_the_web.html

2. Great web sites - principles/practice - from Webby Nominees
Using three examples from Webby 2010 Nominees, - we ask , 'what can they teach us about the four main principles of great web projects: design - content - collaboration - community.

3. Quick Hits
3.1. Pew Report on Institutions
Reference and the header to the study - here

3.2. The Daily Mail 100 cancer stories
Got this via Twitter and then Facebook - so its a bit like the social web in action.
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=269512464297

3.3 Nessie!
No less than the Chief Constable of Inverness believed in Nessie, the Loch Ness Monster, and wanted him protected according to secret memoirs just released by Archives at Scottish Archives.

See UK Telegraph for the bones of the story, here.

Plus National Archives Scotland site
http://www.nas.gov.uk/

Preserving the British Library’s C19 Newspaper Collection

2010-04-27T08:13:00.002+12:00

"In 2004, the British Library secured £2 million funding from JISC to digitise its fragile C19 newspaper collection and make it available online. The collection is one of the top ten in the world and is used by journalists, historians and researchers world-wide.

The British Library has digitised two million pages amounting to 80 terabytes of data. This film looks at the challenges the Library has faced to preserve the collection for the future and the decisions it has taken."

Source: Planets

Planets
'Planets is a four-year project co-funded by the European Union under Framework Programme Six. It is coordinated by the British Library and delivered by 16 national libraries, archives, technology and research institutions. The project has developed a suite of software tools and services to help organisations preserve digital content for the long-term'
http://museumscomputergroup.org.uk/

Auckland Writers and Readers Festival - 12th- 16th May, 2010

2010-04-26T10:39:00.004+12:00

The Auckland Writers Festival
When bumping into friends colleagues and acquaintances of late I'm noticing we are starting to talk about the Auckland Readers and Writers Festival coming up on the 12th - 16th May, 2010.

I love these 5 days - for sure McGovern Online is a sponsor - and for sure - I'm always proud of the web work we do: but there is also a real community of practice running around this gig.

Patrons and sponsors have, by in large, been there for ever; the organisers, budget and distance notwithstanding, continue to want to push the envelope; writers on the festival circuit come away glad they did this one; and audiences just keep on rocking up every year.

And every one a reader! Things ain't over yet! See you there.

Programme - tickets - news - etc- here

Auckland Writers and Readers Festival 2010 from Paul Reynolds on Vimeo.

The Impact of the Internet on institutions in the future - Pew Internet and American Life

2010-04-24T09:37:00.003+12:00

The Impact of the Internet on Institutions in the Future
Pew Internet & American Life Project

" By an overwhelming margin, technology experts and stakeholders participating in a survey fielded by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project and Elon University’s Imagining the Internet Center believe that innovative forms of online cooperation could result in more efficient and responsive for-profit firms, non-profit organizations, and government agencies by the year 2020.
While their overall assessment anticipates that humans’ use of the internet will prompt institutional change, many elaborated with written explanations that expressed significant concerns over organisation’s resistance to change. They cited fears that bureaucracies of all stripes – especially government agencies – can resist outside encouragement to evolve. Some wrote that the level of change will affect different kinds of institutions at different times. The consensus among them was that businesses will transform themselves much more quickly than public and non-profit agencies... '

report summary and pdf link, here

Source/context
I sourced this from the ever excellent series, The Source from the NZNL. Reading it, in part, as preparation for an upcoming series of conversations/seminars I am involved in with the NZ Computer Society, Details, here .

NZ On Screen - Country Lads - from ANZAC Collection, April, 21010

2010-04-23T07:54:00.005+12:00

ANZAC Day - Sunday, 25th April, 2010

2010-04-22T12:13:00.001+12:00

ANZAC Day - Sunday,
This coming Sunday, 25th April 2010, is ANZAC Day here in New Zealand and Australia, when the people of each country commemorate their joint heritage from the 1st World War and other conflict zones. There will be many online points of presence for this annual day of memory, including institutional ones. These in turn will be flanked by a myriad of ceremonies of remembrance up and down the rural and urban pathways of both countries.

The Auckland War Memorial Museum
One of the key pillars of the Auckland Museum - embedded in its proper title, AWWM, The Auckland War Memorial Museum, is as the place for remembrance to the fallen here in New Zealand, with the dawn service in particular a place where the generations - especially the younger - meet to honour their grandparents and great grandparents.

The Cenotaph Database
And on that note - 'tis well to pause to reference the excellent Cenotaph Database a biographical database of New Zealanders who have died in the 19th century, from the New Zealand Wars and South Africa, through the First and Second World Wars to Korea, Malaya and Vietnam.

ANZAC, 2010: Online Book of Remembrance
To mark the 2010 anniversary, the AWWM has put up online a Book of Remembrance, as well as a some rare archival photographs in their collection plus a small but sensitive feature to four of the NZ men who served in the 2nd World War Theaters.

Heroes of Gallipoli
Friday 23, Saturday 24, Sunday 25 April
7.30pm - 10pm
Northern Façade

Also this year the Museum will repeat it's projection of Anzac soldiers in Gallipoli footage which was digitally restored by director Peter Jackson. The Museum will also project a collection of rare footage from New Zealand Film Archive’s After the War was Over. This includes:

Arrival of New Zealand Troops at Cologne, 1919
With jaunty stride the New Zealand Division crosses the German frontier into Cologne where they formed part of the Allied Occupation Forces after the Armistice on 11 November 1918. The Division crossed the frontier at Herbesthal-Euphen, and reached Cologne on 26 December 1918 after a 23 days trek from the start point at Beauvois.
Maori Contingent Home, 1919

“Welcome Home to the Maori Pioneer Battalion from the front”.
The return at Auckland wharves and powhiri in the Domain to the veterans of the Maori Pioneer Battalion Te Hokowhitu A Tu.

Governor General Attends Consecration of Colours Auckland, New Zealand, 1933
The presentation of the colours of the Auckland Regiment to the Auckland War Memorial Museum by the Regiment's senior officers, including Gallipoli veteran Colonel A Plugge CMG.

ANZAC Day - Sunday the 25th
The ANZAC Day service at the AWWM begins with the dawn service at the Cenotaph, at 6am. The Auckland War Memorial Museum is open to all immediately after the service at 6:45. There is a full programme of events, here

ANZAC Resources
I will try and reference other sources as they come to hand. Firstly, the RSA has an excellent site including maps of country wide ANZAC ceremonies, here. See also A Guide to ANZAC Day, and also the excellent NZ On Screen ANZAC Collection. And don't miss the essays by Jock Phillips, et al, here.

ANZAC Search from DNZ

Search: Anzac Day

Can LIANZA , et al, have a look at Melina Merchetta talking to Penguin TV?

2010-04-21T10:11:00.009+12:00

How mornings start.
I started this morning with a bunch of emails, some of which agreed with my comment in the previous post that LIANZA - even if they should have waited a bit longer to iron out the bugs on their new site - would indeed be better served now by concentrating on their content editorial plan.

Outside of a Dog.
Then the post brought a review copy of Rick Gekoski's Outside of A Dog. Gekoski is appearing at the Auckland Writers Festival, so I'm keen to read this account of 'the intricate relationship between reading and his life'.

Naturally he acknowledges [on the inside cover] that his title is a riff from the famous Groucho March quote - 'Outside of a dog, a book is a mans best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read.'

Inside a Dog - SLV
This quote is also the riff for the State Library of Victoria, Inside a Dog - their web site on reading - writing et al, for YA's .So I decided to boogie on over for a catch up - and guess what - squaring the circle - I found gold - courtesy of this brilliant interview with Australian YA author, Melina Marchetta.

Melina MarchettaLIANZA
This is a beautiful interview. I love the Sydney inner city back garden - her attitude - the honesty - the writing the city texture- and of course the sun. It's Australia on a stick! Love it to bits. And made by Penguin TV. See above - or go here to see it in situ.

Penguin TV
Penguin TV? I had no idea Penguin Australia were remotely as cool as this - bringing readers to writers - books out on the screen. Total respect to you. This is a lovely piece of work, and if LIANZA, or indeed the public libraries of NZ/Australia want a benchmark for their content/editorial plan - they have to watch this now.

Then they might ask the local publishers how they can help?

NZ LIANZA web site

2010-04-20T14:50:00.003+12:00

LIANZA, The Library and Information Association of New Zealand, Aotearoa, has a new web site. Critiquing collegiate web sites can cause lots of problems - people get hurt - sensitivities are provoked. Nevertheless, it is to be hoped the NZ library community can both benefit from, and be able to participate in, some robust internal and external debate on what will be their primary online home for a couple of years at least.

Look and feel
On the local library list serve the criticism has hitherto been all about colour - look and feel - including comments on the nitty gritty detail of the contact button - spelling mistakes et al. And fair enough - people will do just that - but 'tis to be hoped we can move quickly towards a deeper debate on the content and editorial plan, both current and to come. On that note, I have the following suggestions I'd like to offer for debate:

1. The library/professional focus
There seems to be a big emphasis on the profession - its members and concerns et al. I would like to see this extended to include key supporters and users of libraries - especially public libraries.

I would also love to see a lot more on how libraries serve this wider stakeholder constituency - via case studies - key facts on economic value - in short - as the Brits once had it - build the evidence base for the economic and cultural value of libraries.

This could be done as a dashboard - a bit like the Indianapolis Art Gallery Dashboard

2. People Using libraries
There are great war stories on just how important libraries - especially public libraries- are to people, most recently Rolling Stone,Keith Richards, and his secret librarian life, here. Inside this article is this marvelous quote from his autobiography:

“When you are growing up there are two institutional places that affect you most powerfully: the church, which belongs to God, and the public library, which belongs to you. The public library is a great equaliser.”
Also to hand is the wonderful interview with Junot Diaz with the Christchurch City Library web team at the 2008 Writers Festival in Auckland, when he says that 'libraries saved my life' That story also reveals that the public library can be a bit of a news star in its own right - i.e. Christchurch City Libraries web team went to the Auckland Writers Fesitval - got the story - wrote it - published it. See here

3. LIANZA Conference
Here in NZ, the LIANZA library conference in October is one of the great meeting points for cultural/heritage/arts people, especially online.

There are literally dozens of great LIANZA conference sessions on record over the last 5/10 years - including the seminal presentations from the likes of Larry Lessig in Auckland 2008. Why cant we have a selection of these videos up on line?

I know the automatic response is rights - but that must be under control now? After all the sessions are for sale within an hour of the presentation at the conference , and I don't know of any speaker who gets a royalty from these.

So please can we have a video wall up and running now - whether via a You Tube or Vimeo Channel - this stuff is just so achievable.

4. Friday moments
The NZ Libs list serve has the occasional Friday moment - I have offered more than a few myself - why not this feature here? There must be a mile of interesting ways to create the community effect the site is aspiring to.

5. Reading Diaries/Journals
Can we have a composite one - i.e. what are people reading? Would make a great tag cloud? Would also make a great Twitter feed?

6. Guest Blog
Can we have a guest blog feature? The UK Museum Computer Community do a great job of this here:

Summary
In summary I would love to see a really robust debate from within the profession - and, dare I say, the outside world - on the content and editorial plans for the site, and leave the debate on colours, and micro-managing the information architecture for another day.

Museum Commons: A Professional Interaction - MW 2010, Michael Edson & Rich Cherry

2010-04-17T10:13:00.002+12:00

Museum Commons: A professional interaction (Museums and the Web 2010, Michael Edson and Rich Cherry)

View more documents from Michael Edson.

ABC Australia: Media Watch. Channel Nine Cameraman Incident

2010-04-16T13:57:00.000+12:00

Comment
There is precious little need for comment, other than to say, this could just as easily have happened in NZ or the UK, or the USA. The recent news is that the cameraman has been sacked. But as Brian Edwards points out , he wasn't alone - the retribution should equally apply to the Director and the news editor. This stuff just smells!

Source/Context
First alerted to this story via an excellent blog post from Dr Brian Edwards, here

Sir George Grey - Wikipedia and NZ Papers Past

2010-04-16T07:08:00.006+12:00

NZ Papers Past

Sir George Grey, governor, premier and collector.
For various reasons which will emerge in due course, I am deeply interested in the life and times [and collecting habits] of Sir George Grey, the 19th century two time Governor plus Premier of New Zealand, who also managed to build three marvelous libraries of books/manuscripts, each of which he gave away- with one of them forming the original foundation to collection to the Auckland City Library, itself a child of the Auckland Mechanics Institute. With more on that, here

Wikipedia at Museums on the Web
I am also aware that this is the week for the MW2010, Museums on the Web 2010 Conference, and that some folks from Wikipedia are leading a workshop on how the collection sector in general, and the museum sector in particular might better collaborate with Wikipedia

George Grey - Wikipedia and Papers Past
All that in place, I can now recount that 20 minutes ago I was happily poodling about in the Wikipedia entry on Sir George Grey and then discovered that - in the last week or so - some truly bright eyed petal of a darling has sorted through Papers Past, the NZ National Library collection of 19th Century. Newspapers, and embedded them into Wikipedia as contextual footnotes to parts of the entry.
Here's some examples:

^ The Colonial New Zealand Wars, Tim Ryan and Bill Parham, pg28
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Sinclair, Keith (7 April 2006). "Grey, George 1812–1898". Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. http://www.dnzb.govt.nz/dnzb/default.asp?Find_Quick.asp?PersonEssay=1G21. Retrieved 2007-07-03.
^ ^a ^b The Penguin History of New Zealand, p. 203.
^ "(By Telegraph). Auckland. Dec. 22.". North Otago Times. Volume XXIII, Issue 1159, 23 December 1875. pp. 2. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=NOT18751223.2.14.2. Retrieved 11 April 2010.
^ "THE ELECTIONS". Daily Southern Cross. Volume XXXII, Issue 5708, 8 January 1876. pp. 3. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=DSC18760108.2.16. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "The Thames election : petition against sir George Grey's election.". Daily Southern Cross. Volume XXXII, Issue 5724, 1 February 1876. pp. 3. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=DSC18760201.2.23. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "Sir George Grey and the seats for the Thames and City West.". Daily Southern Cross. Volume XXXII, Issue 5205, 17 June 1876. pp. 3. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=DSC18760617.2.12.4. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "New Zealand Parliament". Taranaki Herald. Volume XXIV, Issue 2427, 12 July 1876. pp. 3. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=TH18760712.2.22. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "Parliamentary". Bay Of Plenty Times. Volume IV, Issue 401, 15 July 1876. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=BOPT18760715.2.13. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "General Election News". Wanganui Herald. Volume XII, Issue 9511, 11 September 1879. pp. 2. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=WH18790911.2.10. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
^ "The Remainder of the Colony". The Star. Issue 4255, 10 December 1881. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=TS18811210.2.15. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "The New Parliament". Wanganui Herald. Volume XIX, Issue 5378, 29 July 1884. pp. 2. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=WH18840729.2.13.1. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "THE GENERAL ELECTION.". Hawke's Bay Herald. Volume XXII, Issue 7859, 28 September 1887. pp. 3. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=HBH18870928.2.14. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "RESIGNATION OF MR GOLDIE, M.H.R". Poverty Bay Herald. Volume XVIII, Issue 6001, 23 February 1891. pp. 2. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=PBH18910223.2.13. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "The Newton Seat.". Wanganui Chronicle. Volume XXXIII, Issue 11205, 27 February 1891. pp. 2. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=WC18910227.2.12. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "Telegrams". Inangahua Times. Volume XVI, Issue 20216, 27 March 1891. pp. 2. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=IT18910327.2.9. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ "NEW ZEALAND". Marlborough Express. Volume XXVII, Issue 79, 6 April 1891. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=MEX18910406.2.18. Retrieved 13 April 2010.
^ Barnes, Roger (1994), New Zealand Armorist, 52, pp. 18

Other sources - NZETC and NZDB
Also worth noting are the external linkages to Sir George Grey's works on the NZETC, NZ Electronic Text Centre, here, and the NZDNZ

It's Friday
Some times the clouds clear and the sun comes out! And whoever you are, thanks!

UK elections, Bebo, Public ACTA and the Webby Awards with Jim Mora

2010-04-15T10:50:00.003+12:00

image source

Jim Mora on Radio New Zealand National, Afternoons.
Herewith the links and background notes to my fortnightly chat with Jim Mora on National Radio. Had some interesting feedback on the UK Internet campaigns. Looking forward to covering this more. and on that note, I forgot to mention that the BBC seem to be gearing up for a major Internet newsroom on the election. Check here for a start.

Radio NZ Audio with thanks
The audio with Jim and I, is here, Ogg Vorbis MP3 , or click the wee player.

1. Bebo
The social networking site Bebo - owned by AOL is rumored to be closing down.
We review the story - the AOL takeover - investment - lack of traction with audience, and the lessons learned for other social networking sites. Should Facebook be worried?
[Note: Bebo never took off in the USA - but it did in the UK and at one time was the biggest kid on the block in NZ]
Question: what happens to your stuff? Family memories - photos - videos etc?
http://beebo.org/

2. UK Election - social media
We discuss the role of the Internet in the upcoming UK election.
UK Hansard Society.

Have published a study on digital campaigning, which includes an international review of past elections, including New Zealand, as well as offering some considered views on how the Internet will impact on the 2010 UK Election.

Their conclusion is that though the Internet will offer some useful, and on occasion, important tools, especially for single issue campaigns and party activists, this won't be the year of the big UK breakthrough for Internet campaigning.

We also looked at the main political party sites:
Conservatives - MyConservatives
Labour Party plus Labour Manifesto site
Liberal Democrats

Plus the spoof site on the UK Labour Party - here

3. Public ACTA
Wellington Declaration
In a world first for Internet democracy the organisers and participants of the Public ACTA conference in Wellington last Saturday have had their recommendations acknowledged by the NZ team who are tasked to represent NZ's interest inside this secret inter- country treaty negotiating process on new copyright frameworks.
The declarations and the principles are here:
http://publicacta.org.nz/

4 Webby Awards
On the cool site front, nothing comes cooler for sites than the Webby Awards
This years opening nominations are going up today. Plus the People Nominations are open here.
www.webbyawards.com

[Note: apologies to on air listeners - I gave webby awards . org - not .com. ]

Detroit Disassembled - Andrew Moore : Sunday moment from New York Review of Books Blog

2010-04-11T18:54:00.003+12:00

click image to move through slide show of 12 images

"...Known for his large-scale photographs of dilapidated buildings in places like Cuba, Russia, and Times Square, Andrew Moore has now turned his attention to Detroit. These images are from his new collection, Detroit Disassembled, published by Damiani and the Akron Art Museum, where an exhibition of his work will be on view from June 5 to October 10.... "

Source: New York Review of Books Blog

Malcolm Mclaren - buffalo gals - the tribute thing

2010-04-10T06:26:00.000+12:00

NZ On Screen - March’s Top 10

2010-04-09T12:43:00.002+12:00

NZ On Screen - March’s Top 10
This is the top 10 clips watched by local NZ audiences from NZ On Screen:

This Is New Zealand
Short Film, 1970, Excerpt
Hugh MacDonald’s three-screen celebration of NZ was seen by two million people at the 1970 Osaka Expo, and by over 350,000 NZers on its homecoming theatrical release. Rarely seen since, this excerpt, screening on a specially commissioned player, is the first three minutes of the film.

Walkshort
Short Film, 1987, Full Length
This classic short sees Don McGlashan and Harry Sinclair goof around Karangahape Road in various guises in a hilarious baton relay-style narrative. It charts via a mention on Spareroom, “yes, they do wear those polyester walk shorts that NZ civil servants and geography teachers used to love.”

On The Mat
Television, 1980, 2 Full Length Episodes
Steve Rickard’s cult pro-wrestling TV show On the Mat continues to attract punters looking for a sweaty nostalgic taste of larger-than-life characters like King Curtis, Samoan Joe, Aussie Larry O'Day, and Sweet William and Brute Miller (soon famous in the US as The Bushwackers).

Beyond A Joke
Television, 1995, Full Length
Leading our collection celebrating Kiwi comedy on TV, is this doco about NZ humour. It features dollops of classic TV comedy moments from Fred Dagg, Barry Crump, McPhail and Gadsby, Billy T James, Pete and Pio, the Topp Twins, Gliding On, Lyn of Tawa, Funny Business, and more.

Boy
Film, 2010, Trailer, Excerpts, Interviews
Taika Waititi’s second feature evolved from Oscar-nominated short Two Cars One Night and similarly mines the 80s styles of his East Coast Crazy Horse childhood. Since Boy’s NZ theatrical release it has broken box office records. Check out the promo and exclusive behind the scenes clips.

Patu!
Film, 1983, Full Length
Merata Mita’s landmark doco Patu! is a startling record of the mass civil disobedience that took place throughout NZ during the winter of 1981, in protest against a South African rugby tour. Required citizenship viewing, it staunchly contradicts claims that Kiwis are “a passionless people”.

Love, Speed and Loss
Television, 2005, Full Length
Motor-powered subjects are enduringly popular on the site and this award-winning doco about motor-racer Kim Newcombe, is waving the flag in March. Newcombe turned heads on a self-made König bike, but was killed racing in 1973 and posthumously came second in that year's World 500cc Grand Prix.

Tama Tu
Short Film, 2004, Full Length
Taika Waititi’s second chart entry is his acclaimed short about a group of Māori Battalion soldiers camped in Italian ruins waiting for night to fall. In the silence the bros-in-arms distract themselves with jokes, before a tohu (sign) brings them back to reality and they return to the fray.

The Best of Billy T James Collection
Television, 1992, Full Length Episode
This compilation of skits from the much loved laureate of laughter’s popular 80s TV shows is a consistent winner. It includes Te News (black singlet, yellow towel), Turangi Vice, and classic spoofs of Pixie Caramel’s “last requests” and Lands For Bags’ “where’d you get your bag” ads.

Nothing's Going To Happen
Music Video, 1981, Tall Dwarfs
Chris Knox mines his 1981 surroundings for this stop-motion Tall Dwarfs' clip, including setting fire to his lounge. A full two decades before Final Cut Pro made homespun hip, and directors like Michel Gondry popularised the craft aesthetic. An NYC Knox benefit concert takes place on May 6th

source - NZ ON Screen - for more details and links.

Bad Ideas - Robert Winston

2010-04-08T10:46:00.003+12:00

Robert Winston
Given his worldwide reputation as a scientist, teacher and broadcaster, the wonderfully bushy eyed Robert Winston needs no introduction from the likes of me. However, it is worth noting his current job description – Professor of Science and Society at Imperial college, London.

This title is a brilliant trope to the emerging need for science to come down off the mountain of authority and specialisation, and begin taking part in the necessary political and cultural debates around where the best and worst of the human imagination is taking us.

In short, though science may indeed be built on universal principles: nevertheless its priorities, and its outcomes go to the heart of how we treat our common inheritance – whether physical, social, economic, or intellectual – both in the present and for future generations.

Or as Robert Winston would have it – though science creates knowledge, how we use it, whether for good or ill, is far from a given.

Bad Ideas
In his latest book, Bad Ideas, he examines all of the above by taking us on a wonderfully eclectic tour of five broad swathes of scientific inquiry and discovery.

Firstly agriculture, and of how human imagination took flight when food was a planned and guaranteed activity.

Second, how writing – born as an accountancy tool - for example measuring the granaries of ancient Egypt – leapt over its origins and became the de facto medium of intellectual progress.

Third how fossil fuels emerged as the defining framework for economic transformation? And, finally how medicine and genetics takes us to the heart of what being human is and might become.

In all of this he claims a downside – that writing is used for bigotry and persecution – that fossil fuel polices are ruining the earth – that genetics is heading out of control: in short, bad ideas are just as fertile as good, and it's time we all started taking more notice of the political impact of this paradox.

As a project to help frame this debate the book is a great success. However, he does pack a lot in, and inevitably his treatment of specific themes - e.g. the potential of the Internet, feels at worse superficial, and at best a useful building block to his overall thesis that things could all turn pear shaped if we are not careful.

As an approach to popularising science and the issues they raise this isn't necessarily a bad thing, even if, on occasion, it comes across a tad too tidy. Nevertheless, he writes well and the issues he raises essential to our future.

Creative Spaces - Winston Roberts - Natural History Museum

Also worth sharing is Prof Winston's engaging memories, insights, et al into The London Natural History Museum, courtesy of the Creative Spaces project.

Robert Winston - Natural History Museum from Creative Spaces on Vimeo.

UK election - how will digital play as an election issue?

2010-04-06T22:06:00.000+12:00

Building Britain's Digital Future
Can't be a total co-incidence that Gordan Brown chose to speak about Building Britain's Digital future in the last week or so. Wonder what the other parties have to say about this issue.Transcript, here

Playing with Tweet Cloud

2010-04-06T20:27:00.000+12:00

Tweetcloud

David Puttnam on Educating for the Digital Society

2010-04-01T08:00:00.001+13:00

"IIEA's Digital Future Group

".. Lord Puttnam addressed a breakfast meeting of the IIEA's Digital Future Group on the topic of Education in the Digital Society. Introducing his keynote with a short clip from his latest film, We are the people we are waiting for, the Oscar-winning film producer highlighted the crucial role of the education system in preparing young people of today for the emerging Digital society of tomorrow.

He emphasised the need for the education system to embrace technology and foster digital literacy at an early stage to create the next generation of informed and responsible digital participants. He called on Government to prioritise education spending and provide the resources necessary to meet this challenge .."
source, and more here

Three Jim Mora moments on National Radio

2010-03-31T16:58:00.007+13:00

image credit

Jim Mora - NZ National Radio
I am beginning to relax into my fortnightly chat with Jim Mora on National Radio. Hope it tells - and is, accordingly of interest to folks. The audio wee player is below:

1. Facebook A telling tale of sleeplessness - or what happens when your partners Facebook account is hijacked!

2. BBC news
BBC to delay building iPhone /iPad applications because of concerns from commercial publishers - read Murdoch - that they are too big a force and are inhibiting the market for paid news. I think this is a hugely interesting issue.

Story here
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8593206.stm
and here
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/mar/29/bbc-digital-media

3. Web and the Cloud
Is big and and centralised still the way to go in the age of the always on distributed web?

Two examples

3.1. Auckland City Council
The Auckland Transition Agency, ATA, is working on a bunch of big projects which will centralise the IT systems of the upcoming single city authority for Auckland due to go live in October. The notion, as in the good old days, is that centralisation of IT systems will give efficiencies.
Is this approach still the way to go in the new world of online data etc?
Isn't the promise of the web all about being small and nimble - sharing data, services, and expertise?

3.2. National Library - and Archives
What's the rational in folding the NZ National Library and NZ Archives into the Department of Internal Affairs, DIA?
The argument goes that this will produce more efficiencies - but as in the Auckland City example is this still the case?

See NZ Cabinet paper on the proposal is here - The paper speaks to having consulted with key stakeholders. A whole swag of groups, including LIANZA, Society of Archivists, Historians etc say they have not been consulted. Neither have LIAC, the statutory advisory group to the Minister to the National Library.

4. Web site
Virtual Museum of the Pacific - here

Living and Learning in the Cloud - my valedictory lecture to the National Library, New Zealand

2010-03-30T15:47:00.001+13:00

The Adjunct Director role - New Zealand National Library
Last week in Wellington at the Soundings Theater, Te Papa I gave my valedictory lecture to the role of Adjunct Director, National Digital Library, National Library, New Zealand. This role has been hugely engaging, allowing me the chance to participate, comment and on occasion contribute to a bunch of projects and thinking inside the NLNZ.

Living and Learning in the cloud
In the lecture, among other points, I ask three questions. Where are the online spaces for reflective thinking? Second, what is the role of a cultural institution in the cloud? And last, can we connect the two?

The slides and the audio
The slides are offered below. At the foot of the Slide Share presentation is a small audio player, which on click gives you the lecture. We - the NLNZ and I - decided separating the two was the best option - allowing people to move through the slides at their own pace while listening to the audio. And of course - I would totally love some comments.

National Library New Zealand -Adjunct Valedictory

UK Conservative party show how not to use Twitter in a campaign

2010-03-28T02:34:00.002+13:00

bigger image here

Image Non-Commercial-Share Alike License from Meg Pickard

FluffyKittens.com, explains both the context and the timeline:

"On Sunday March the 21^st The Conservatives launched the Cash-Gordon website. A site that included (unmoderated) tweets with the hashtag #cashgordon.
On the 22^nd it all went a bit wrong. Here’s a timeline of tweet events from the first site “defacing” to the site being taken down 26 minutes later. Not all tweets are here, some people decided to delete their tweets before they could be plucked out of the API. These are the images and sites shown and redirected to … " more

Wellington moments - Seraphine Pick , Francis Upritchard, Shane Cotton and Paratene Matchitt

2010-03-27T20:41:00.012+13:00

Four Wellington moments
I was in Wellington for the week just past, and more on this in due course: however, I did take some time out to go look at some of the art in the Wellington City Art Gallery installed for the New Zealand Arts Festival. I also took the chance to look at the two NZ installations from Venice Biennale currently on show at Te Papa.

Seraphine Pick
The big ticket exhibition at the City Gallery stretches over both the North and the South Gallery the better to show a long arc of development around Seraphine Pick's art practice. She has been one of NZ's arts favorite daughters for some time now, but its the first time I have had the chance to walk round such a big collection of her work.

The curator, Felicity Milburn, from Christchurch Art Gallery, has organised the works in big slabs of consecutive time/series - from Private Universes, Fantasy Forests, Secret Gardens, and a more generic wall - the Image Bank - takes a bunch of works, many on paper, and conceptualises them as Pick's store of future imaginaries.

The approach - especially the big slabs of time - very quickly draw you into a conversation with the works as a series of episodes to the artist's life - re-enforced by labeling which adds a lot of personal colour and intimacy from the artists history - relationships - break-up etc.

I found some of this a little predictable, but it definitely served to make such a large parcel of works come alive as a coherent series of consecutive moments, as well as offering a healthy domesticity to some of the more startling images on display, especially the self portraits boldly working through the pain of loss and abandonment.

But it was the most recent, more cheerful, and fantastical works I liked the best, especially the deep blue broodiness of Wandering Rose, the image above, and the earlier Hunters with Wallflowers, 2004. and He (disappeared into silence) . I also loved Burning the Furniture, where the heroine sorts out her life, watched by a deferential Celtic guy in lovely grass kilt.

Go girl
Summing up , and without over-examining the symbolism, in these later works, I just loved the big strong mixture of Victorian fairie - hippy chic, and nz girl.

[Notes: more Seraphine Pick work images at Michael Lett Gallery, Auckland, and Hamish McKay, Wellington. Plus see more on Felicity Milburn at the Imaginary Museum project]

Francis Upritchard, Save Yourself, 2009
Currently showing on the fifth floor of Te Papa, are the totally amazing small sculpture works, Save Yourself, which Francis Upritchard created for the Venice Biennale , where she and Judy Millar were the NZ representatives

Although I was suitable captured by the scale, texture and intellectual curiosity of the Judy Millar works next door, I adored each of these tiny figures from Francis Upritchard, Save Yourself installation, and was grateful to see them installed in Te Papa at a level where I could gaze at them on an equal footing.

The balance of size, emotion, colour and grace in these figures is just beautiful. They start an emotional dance in your head/heart, while all the time stand silent and small. Big big stuff going on here. The video has the artist talking about the works, as well as showing them in situ in Venice.

Shane Cotton
I adore Shane Cotton's work. He continually entrances me, especially his big leaps into new areas of work, each of which seems so self contained and of itself, leaving the past moments as episodes on his own journey exploring the dynamic of being Maori, or maybe just being Shane Cotton thinking about being Maori - the history, and the landscape of dispossession and reassertion.

Or keeping it much more simple - I just love standing in front of one of his works, and asking it to unpack its story.

Nineteen Ninety Three
Currently on view in the main foyer of the City Gallery is one of his early works, Nineteen Ninety Three, now in the collection of the Wellington City Council.

It is a long narrow work which shows a waka [canoe] shape - which might also be a long vessel sitting amidst a intense brown landscape. The deck of the vessel , or the rim of the vessel, also serves as a landscape showing small flagpoles and uprights, each of which is traversed by the sign 1-8 -6- 5 - this being the date 1865, when the Maori Land court was established which in turn converted communally owned tribal land into individual title.

Te Ara has more on this here - for Cotton, the establishment of the Maori Land Court marked the start of the dispossession, and the marker to the long march of cultural and economic reassertion. It's a stunning work.

Paratene Matchitt
Paratene Matchitt is another contemporary Maori artist and sculptor who just stops you in your tracks. Also on view in the City Gallery, and on loan from the main Wellington Public Library next door is his wonderful Waharoa [gateway] doorways, 1990, which serve as the entrance to the Maori section of the central library. Positioned here in the art gallery, its conceptual power is intensified courtesy of the reflective space around it.

No images
I can't find images of either of these works to share with you, which feels a pity. Both works are in a public collection, and both artists have many images elsewhere. For example, apart from the big institutions, check Hamish McKay or Gow Langsford for Shane Cotton, or Judith Anderson, for Paratene Matchitt

Mercifully, Te Papa has a lovely image of Shane Cotton's Whakapiri atu te whenua, It hangs in Te Papa, and I saw it once again on my way through to the Francis Uppritchard.

It gives you a parallel track to the motions I was touching on above. Again, it speaks to Maori displacement and renewal.

Image Source plus context - Te Papa

Four moments - thanks!
So - four separate quiet, contemplative art moments as I navigated an intense week of Wellington which was all about engaging, talking collaborating, thinking out loud. You have no idea how welcome they were. Thanks!

From Collection Trust: 10 principles for linked data in the cultural sector

2010-03-26T11:23:00.000+13:00

image source

10 PRINCIPLES FOR LINKED DATA IN THE CULTURE SECTOR

This is a huge week for me - lots to report and reflect on. and then, later, a space to have a think through these 10 principles from a session organised by the UK Collection Trust. Below is a piece of their report from a session, including the 10 principles:

1. Data is rich, and includes Data created by Users
Data includes all forms of digital asset, including those generated in collaboration with our users. We must guard against information silos in our organisations, and promote openness as widely as possible.

2. Linked Data serves both the sector and its audiences
Linked data has the power both to improve our service to the public and the management of our Collections. Connecting the data we hold and curate is the best way to achieve Public Value.

3. Linked Data connects the culture sector to a collaborative effort across the Public Sector
Linked Data connects the culture sector to the broader context of Public Sector delivery. It also enables the sector to benefit from investment and innovation in other industry sectors.

4. Linked Data can help us achieve more efficient practice
Providing and consuming Linked Data can reduce inefficiency, and add value to existing content creation. It helps us improve workflows, reduce duplication of effort and foster a culture of cooperation within organisations.

5. Linked Data can help us deliver on our commitment to Public Access
Services based on Linked Data provide a channel through which Culture-sector content can be enjoyed and used by a wider, more diverse public. Linked data carries an implicit right of reuse for our audiences.

6. Linked Data is the next phase in our adaptation to the Web
Linking Data is the next logical step in the evolution of cultural services from curation to digitisation to the delivery of rich, integrated and personal online services.

7. Linked Data should become an embedded function of the software we use
Linked Data will only achieve critical mass in the Culture sector when it becomes an out-of-the-box function of the systems and software we use.

8. We must communicate the benefits of Linked Data throughout the sector
Embracing Linked Data across the sector will not happen by itself. The benefits of Linked Data must be championed proactively throughout the sector by strategic and political agencies, funders, managers and policymakers.

9. We must commit to commissioning Open Data, not Open Source
Open Source systems do not guarantee that the data they contain will be openly available. As a sector, we must ensure that all funding programmes, commissioning and procurement include a requirement to make publicly-funded data openly-available using open and established industry standards.

10. We must support a commercial market of providers and suppliers to support Linked Data
There must be a viable business case to support a long-term transition towards providing Linked Data as an established function of the sector. We must ensure that the broader marketplace is aware of the range of data that museums, archives and libraries can provide.

See Collection Council blog for more detail and more context, here

Media7 TVNZ - New Zealand and the Internet , et al

2010-03-25T16:57:00.003+13:00

NZ and the Internet
Russell Brown of Media7 devoted episode 6 of his current series to talking about the Internet in New Zealand, the new Pacific Fibre project, the state of Telecom NZ, and the impact of the NZ government internet filter. He invited me on the panel to take part. This is the embed - the second part follows.

Gerald Scarfe - V&A Museum from Creative Spaces

2010-03-21T07:59:00.001+13:00

Gerald Scarfe - V&A Museum from Creative Spaces on Vimeo.

Future of Publishing

2010-03-19T07:59:00.001+13:00

Friday Moment
I like this. Made by DK, here. Based on this Argentinian poltical ad - here - not sure about the emphasis on brand - but totally worth a Friday moment.

Acknowledgment
Got it through Hamish MacEwan on Twitter. He has his own Radio NZ conversation spot with Jim Mora , here

Tim Berners-Lee: The year open data went worldwide

2010-03-18T10:07:00.001+13:00

Tim Berners- Lee the year open data went worldwide
At TED2009, Tim Berners-Lee called for "raw data now" -- for governments, scientists and institutions to make their data openly available on the web. At TED University in 2010, he shows a few of the interesting results when the data gets linked up.

TED original, here. You Tube version, here Curiously, there is no embed option on YouTube [ that I could find] but there is one on TED.

Haiti
See especially his commnets/illustrations on Haiti.

Jim Mora - NZ World Internet Project - BBC Internet survey - Pacific Fibre and British Museum and Wikipedia

2010-03-17T14:33:00.007+13:00

BBC - visualising the Internet

Afternoons with Jim Mora
I had my fortnightly conversation with Jim Mora on National Radio, this afternoon. See here for the programme and the context

The conversation
The chat with Jim is available here - just click the wee player, or go for download: Ogg Vorbis MP3

The links and comments are:

1. NZ World Internet Project 2009  
The second full survey was conducted in August - September 2009. It questioned a sample of 1250 New Zealanders about their usage of, and attitudes towards, the Internet. Analysis focused on the social, political and economic impact of the Internet in New Zealand.
see post below for detail. The report is here

 2. BBC Survey on the Internet  
Is Internet Access a human right  Survey commissioned by BBC has 27,000 across 26 countries. says yes

"...Almost four in five people around the world believe that access to the Internet is a fundamental right, a poll for the BBC World Service suggests..."
Lovely image map feature on the history of the Internet. Story at the BBC is here . Click the image at the top to go to the interactive.

3. Pacific Fibre  
Pacific Fibre is looking to build another fiber optic cable for NZ to the USA  This is a fantastic story  Currently the NZ backbone up onto the rest of the world consists of the Southern Cross cable, and another link over the Tasman for redundancy. This new cable is needed both for competition and to enhance the broadband speeds currently on offer here in NZ. For example, on a good night at home - central Auckland - I would rarely get above 1M/bps.

In context, the UK is calling for a minimum 2Mbps standard for basic internet use by 2010

4. Wikipedian in Residence  British Museum
If you cant beat them - join them  British Museum has announced the first in house Wipedian in residence. The first Wikipedian is Liam Wyatt - he is from Sydney - very interesting move by the British Museum . 

Goes to the heart of the issue of the credibility of Wikipedia - it's growing authority - and how mainstream organisations like the British Museum are starting to take its presence very seriously -  Liam Wyatt blog on why and how is here

World Internet Project NZ - the latest findings from late 2009 survey

2010-03-17T12:33:00.002+13:00

World Internet Project NZ
The second World Internet Project NZ survey was conducted in August – September 2009. A
sample of 1250 New Zealanders has been analysed for their use of and attitudes to the Internet.
Usage.

The sample was interviewed by telephone [land-line] and were asked a series of questions each of which follow the agreed pattern of the World Internet Project. The WIP have their own The World Internet Project Report 2010, here

ICDC
The NZ version of this ongoing longitudinal study is conducted by the Institute of Culture, Discourse & Communication , ICDC, at AUT . They have funding from the NZ National Library, and Internet New Zealand. PDF of the full report, here

Summary of Findings

Usage
Five sixths of New Zealanders use the Internet. Of the remainder, a third are ex‐users and two thirds have never used the Internet. One fifth of users are online at home for at least 20 hours a week, but three fifths for less than 10 hours a week.

Digital divide
Five sixths of users with a connection at home have broadband, while the rest have dial‐up. In general, the younger, wealthier and more urban people are, the more they tend to have broadband access. Younger people are more likely to belong to social networking sites such as Facebook. They also rate the Internet more highly as a source of information, entertainment and in overall importance for their everyday lives. Similarly, the more people earn, the more highly they rate their own ability to use the Internet. City dwellers are more likely than rural dwellers to have broadband, to rate their Internet ability highly and to belong to a social networking site.

There is little difference between male and female usage of the Internet, for example in hours spent online, frequency of playing online games and user ability.

Rating the Internet
The Internet has become integral to the lives of many New Zealanders. Two thirds of users say it is important to their everyday lives and think it would be a problem if they lost access. Nearly two thirds of respondents rate the Internet as an important source of information, compared with half who so rate television, newspapers or other people. However, more users rate television as an important source of entertainment than rate the Internet.

Activities online
New Zealand users’ involvement in the web is dynamic and multifaceted. About half post online messages, images or videos, while one in ten earn income from such activities. Other popular online activities are downloading music or videos, and playing games. A sixth of users are scanning for jobs on the Internet at least weekly. The Internet is also used frequently for transactions. At least weekly, over a half of users do online banking and a quarter pay bills online. At least monthly, a third of users buy something online and a sixth sell something. Half of students say the Internet is used as a teaching tool in their classes at least weekly.

Socialising
The Internet plays an important role in the social lives of New Zealanders. Four fifths of users check their email at least daily. Half the users are members of social networking sites (mostly Facebook and Bebo), and of those, nearly half participate at least daily. Just on a third use instant messaging and a quarter participate in multiplayer online games at least weekly. Nearly half of users report that the Internet has increased their contact with other New Zealanders, and more say it has increased their overall contact with family and friends. On the other hand, a quarter say it has decreased face‐to‐face family time. A quarter of users have made friends online, and more than half of those have gone on to meet such friends in person. For people with under‐18s in their household, four fifths have rules governing online activities.

source - here

Wikipedia study on First Monday - inclusionists versus deletionists - Vasilis Kostakis.

2010-03-16T08:00:00.000+13:00

Abstract

"Wikipedia has been hailed as one of the most prominent peer projects that led to the rise of the concept of peer governance. However, criticism has been levelled against Wikipedia’s mode of governance. This paper, using the Wikipedia case as a point of departure and building upon the conflict between inclusionists and deletionists, tries to identify and draw some conclusions on the problematic issue of peer governance."
Contents
Introduction
Main characteristics of peer governance
Leadership and benevolent dictatorships
A summary of criticism on Wikipedia’s governance
Case study: Inclusionists versus deletionists
The governance process, inclusionists and deletionists
Reflections
Lessons for peer governance
Conclusions
Proposal

First Monday
Full article First Monday , here
###
Citation
Identifying and understanding the problems of Wikipedia’s peer governance: The case of inclusionists versus deletionists
by Vasilis Kostakis.
First Monday, Volume 15, Number 3 - 1 March 2010
http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewArticle/2613/2479

Tea Revives You

2010-03-16T07:51:00.000+13:00

source

Giday the UK - Auckland calling - Te Ara and the new black of linked data

2010-03-13T05:54:00.003+13:00

This post was written as a guest blogger to the UK Museum Group - and a big thanks for the invite - original here. Re-posting it here because I want the Te Ara thoughts to circulate in NZ as well. Curiously, Helen Clark, see post, popped up as Friday's guest lecturer at the LSE in London , here.

Te Ara - The economy and the city
Thursday night the rain drummed its way down Queen Street in Auckland, making a small in-road into the humidity of this last week. But that's Auckland for you - as soon as it has any visitors, especially from Wellington, the rain pours down, the better to confirm their prejudices that it never stops raining here.

The Wellington visitors were a distinguished lot - including Steven Joyce, Minister for Communications and Information Technology, Transport, and Tertiary Education , Louis Holden, the CEO of MCH, the Ministry of Culture and Heritage, and, would you credit, Sir Don McKinnon, the former Secretary to the Commonwealth, 2000-2008,

They were here to help celebrate the next theme of Te Ara , The Economy and the City, from the New Zealand Online Encyclopedia.

Actually, I'm cheating on the last one. although he is/was a long term statesman, both nationally and internationally, last night Sir Don was there as whanau/family - being literally big brother to Malcolm McKinnon, historian, and Te Ara editor of the Places theme.

He is also co-editor of this theme - the Econmoy and the City, the 6th main theme to this extraordinary piece of cultural practice. The other published topic themes are :

Māori New Zealanders
New Zealand Peoples – the arrival and settlement of the people.
Earth, Sea and Sky – marine life, people and the sea, natural resources, and shaping forces such as geology and climate.
The Bush – New Zealand’s landforms, fauna and flora.
The Settled Landscape – farming, rural life, and people’s impact on the land..

Still to come are : Social Connections – social groups, families and communities : Nation– systems of government and symbols of national identity. : Daily Life – the customs, leisure activities and beliefs that make New Zealand unique – and lastly, Arts, culture, invention and innovation.

Each issue, and the combined product represents months of work from the writers, illustrators and designers, as well as a mountain of collaboration with NZ and other museums, galleries and heritage library collections.

Issues and objects of conjecture
I've been an admirer of Te Ara since it's inception, as would anyone who is remotely interested in the life and times of this first class online cultural practice.

This doesnt mean I am either an uncritical friend, or unconscious of how the direction it took has influenced where it might end up. And how, it might even be time for some radical changes in direction.

Thus way back when it was first mooted as an idea, it would have been lunacy on a stick for Jock Phillips, its Editor and mid-wife - to say to any politician, far less a Prime Minister of Helen Clark's quality - now head of the UNDP - that if you buy into this idea Minister, you might want to also know we have very little idea of what the online landscape will look like in the next few years, far less the 10 year life of the project, and its entirely probably that we might have to rebuilt the whole thing to keep up with new and emerging online practice.

Are we nearly there yet?
And of course - when we actually get online it will change everything, and there will be little point in asking are we nearly there yet - there is no there - the journey is the destination, and it will be for some time yet.

And even if he had said as much to her, its definitely unlikely he would have foreseen how quickly some passengers have started asking if they can drive the bus, or at least have a go at the map reading.

The critique
So what needs attention? Well for example, in the current site, apart from a good use of RSS feeds, Te Ara has no collaboration tools whatsoever. You can't make a personalisation folder, and by internal policy fiat there are very few hyper-links links to outside sources. Moreover, you will search in vain for a co-lab rights framework like Creative Commons, or any substantive links to the outside world of social networks.

This lack of an external linking policy has come in for debate in the past. However, I predict there will be a fresh airing of this lack in the weeks to come.

I say this because I believe that creative linking, and enhanced metadata behind the scenes, is now a mandatory part of the linked universe of cultural data.

Linked data - the expectation
Moreover, in the forthcoming semantic web, it will be a commonplace to expect that primary and secondary sources cited in objects like Te Ara - and see any page for brilliant unlinked examples of these - to be machine readable to the digitised primary and secondary sources which it cites. And some of these - see for example the graphs on economic activity, will be live.

As to what kinds of sources are on offer right now, have a look at the excellent work being done by the NZ Electronic Text Centre in digitsing NZ primary sources - or the McLean Papers on the NZ National Library of NZ , or indeed over in Australian , see the TROVE gateway to the Australian National Library as an outstanding example of a federated discovery layer, which in turn will take you to digitised copies of the James Cook and Joseph Banks journals, And out in the offing is the prospect of much more to come, including deep linkages to museum collections.

The GLAM thing down under
And just in case you think that the above examples, are a tad library and non museum focussed, its well to remember that down here in the Antipodes there is a much tighter connection between museums, galleries and museums - e.g. TROVE sources from , inter alia, Picture Australia which in turn has a mine of sources from Australian museums.

Similarly museum collection metadata is not only expected, but a common place pillar to the likes of Digital New Zealand, and its older sister Matapihi. Moreover, the likes of The Powerhouse Museum isn't so much leading the way in discovery and presentation, in the likes of its experiments with Open Calais, its way over the horizon out of sight and sound of the rest of us.

All of which brings us back to my central point that Te Ara not only needs to offer more tools and toys for its visitors to play with - simply told - like so many other online cultural entities - it needs to get out more!

Wikipedia
That said, Te Ara does have a bit of relationship with Wikipedia. Not only will you see Te Ara links in there, its fair to say this is one area in which they could and would do a lot more provided the Wikipedia community started to talk out loud as to how they wanted to frame new kinds of relationships. It would also be great if some of the Wikipedia guys relearned that a conversation works best with at least two sides.

MW2010
Like others, I'm aware of progress in that direction - for example, the Wikipedia guys are heading up and over to the MW2010, Museums and the Web 2010 conference for a session on extending the conversation they started in Canberra last year at the GLAM wiki session.

And on that note, I'd also love to commend the British Museum news that in June this year, they are to host Liam Wyatt as their first volunteer Wikipedian in residence. I think this is a great development.
[Update: Liam has a great blog post on this announcement and what he/they are hoping to achieve, here ]

Creative Commons
Talk about Wikipedia, and you start talking IP rights. Back on Te Ara, there is another huge conversation to be had on their current rights framework.

Basically, like a lot of museums, galleries, etc, they dont have one. Sure they might think they do - i.e. a re-written analog policy posted on the web site. But as yet - as do almost all the museum sector worldwide - they have still to work out their relationship with the read write generation.

That the Creative Commons framework is a key tool-set in this new realtionship is I believe, a given. On that note, here in NZ life for the CC community just got a little interesting.

Royal Society NZ
In an unusual move to say the least, Creative Commons International has endorsed the moving of the NZ CC head licence away from the now defunct NZ Humanitites Network into the slightly startled arms of the NZ Royal Society with whom the NZ Humanities Council has now merged.

Local misgivings on the move, mostly from the creative open source community of NZ , have been largely put at rest, not least by the Royal Society's willingness to set up a new external advisory board which they hope will help them work out how to manage this interesting development.

As someone who was involved in setting up the original framework I was a little dubious as to how sensible it was to send something as fragile as the CC into the stern arms of scientific rigour without at least a basket and a note to be gentile with the baby. But it looks like we should be fine.

The Pacific thing - Pasifika!
Finally, as I tap, its Friday night. I'm heading out tomorrow for Pasfika the annual cultural- arts - and community festival for the Pacific community here in Auckland and beyond. You have no idea how blessed I feel by access to the Pacific way. And as for Pasifika, believe me Notting Hill aint got nothing on this.

It runs all weekend. Every island nation has a piece of a local park. Trust me, this is totally the real thing - something that the person who thinks a Samoan tattoo is a good idea will find out tomorrow. And on the kava thing - just how difficult is the concept of a mild narcotic!

Virtual Museum of the Pacific
As for the virtual Pacific - there is a lot more to tell - and maybe next time - if I'm asked back. For the moment - have a look at this You Tube video frrom The Virtual Museum of the Pacific, here. The site itself is here.

It is one of the most interesting things to cross my desk in a 12 month. Linked data - the new black!

NZ On Screen feature on Flying Nun Music Video Collection

2010-03-12T16:19:00.001+13:00

" NZ On Screen has today launched a collection of classic Flying Nun music videos, curated by the label’s founder Roger Shepherd.

The clips are accompanied by an inside story from Shepherd and written tributes from ex-MTV Europe chief Brent Hansen and media commentator and former Rip It Up editor Russell Brown.

The timing of the Flying Nun Collection marks Shepherd’s recent buy-back (from Warner Music) of the record company he founded in Christchurch in 1981.

Flying Nun is synonymous with Kiwi indie music, and with autonomous DIY, bottom-of-the-world creativity. This collection celebrates the label’s ethos as manifested in the music videos. The collection features a choice selection of 21 music videos reflecting their significance to Flying Nun history, and Shepherd’s personal favourites.

Included are label legends such as Chris Knox (Nothing’s Going to Happen, The Brain that Wouldn’t Die, Face of Fashion); The Clean (Beatnik, Anything Could Happen, Getting Older); the Verlaines (Death and the Maiden); Straitjacket Fits (She Speeds); Sneaky Feelings (Husband House); The Bats (North by North); and The Chills (Heavenly Pop Hit)."
Source: NZ On Screen press release

The collection is here

Coming up - two public lectures on science and the world it lives in

2010-03-11T11:01:00.011+13:00

Empty Space weighs something?

Is science too hard?
Curiously, I'm writing this post almost in tandem with the announcement that UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has asked the world's science academies to review work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Like many others I have a growing interest in how science is discussed and understood by non scientists, including me.

I'm also increasingly aware of the need to discuss how science is debated in the media, and indeed how much scientific literacy the bulk of us have at at our disposal, especially when trying to come to grips with some of the big ticket political issues like climate change, environmental degradation, re-newable energy etc.

Two public lectures are coming up in New Zealand which, from different perspectives, and disciplines, will cover this ground in spades.

Professor Lawrence Krauss
First up, Professor Lawrence Krauss is coming to Auckland University - 22 March 2010 6:15pm - 7:15pm

Venue: Large Chemistry Lecture Theatre, Building 301, Faculty of Science, 22 Symonds Street, Auckland

Professor Lawrence Krauss is the award winning scientist, educator, author and Director of the Origins Initiative at Arizona State University. He is the best-selling author of The Physics of Star Trek, Atom: an Odyssey from the Big Bang to Life on Earth and Beyond and Hiding in the Mirror.

In this lecture - free to all - he is planning to 'discuss the distinction between science and fiction and between sense and nonsense'

Science - media - scientific literacy
As part of this, Prof Krauss will also cover the 'challenge that journalists face in presenting science appropriately, not only in a society in which scientific illiteracy is rampant, but also in which the public is exposed to a host of scientific fallacies presented as fact in the media'.

More on the presentation, here.

Exchanges at the Frontier
For a taste of his style, see the video above. It comes as part of the Exchanges at the Frontier series, recorded late 2009 when the Wellcome Collection joined forces with the BBC World Service to host some of the biggest names in world science. The Welcome Insitute have their own web resource on this, here, plus the excellent BBC world Service series is , here

Martin Lord Rees in Wellington 23d March, 2010

Next day, Tuesday 23rd, in Wellington, Martin Lord Rees, current President of the Royal Society of London, is giving the Rutherford Memorial Lecture in Wellington. He is also UK’s Astronomer Royal and Master of Trinity College, Cambridge. He will be speaking, at

7.00pm Tuesday 23 March 2010
Wellington Town Hall, Wakefield Street, Wellington
(entry via Town Hall Foyer, Wakefield Street)

Lecture title: The World in 2050

" As a cosmologist, Lord Rees studies the universe, and tries to understand its evolution on grand timescales of billions of years. But he is also concerned with the much smaller time scale of a human life. In his book Our Final Century, he gave our civilization a 50/50 chance of surviving the 21^st century.

What does he think now, five years on from the publishing of his book and what is his view of how things will stand in 2050? .."
See here , for more

There is no charge but you need to book - tickets are available at www.royalsociety.org.nz

Enquiries to: lectures@royalsociety.org.nz or 04 470 5781

Lord Rees at TED in April, 2005
The alert among you will have figured out the TED video is 5 years old - so the lecture coming up in Wellington follows on from these early thoughts from 5 years ago, the time of the publication of his book, Our Final Century

iPad versus Courier - work or play - can I have both!

2010-03-09T07:21:00.021+13:00

Courier or iPad
The word is the iPad commercial at the Oscars - see above - had them rocking in the isles. and being a happy flappy mac kind of guy I can relate to that.

However, this doesn't mean that Apple is going to have it all its own way this year. Just up on the Twitter wire is a viral to a bunch of videos espouses just what you can do with a Microsoft Courier - their answer to the iPad - even though, apparently, Microsoft is denying this project exists.

What is interesting me more and more though - is not the MAC/PC competition, but the different user frameworks that seem to driving the way these developments are being offered up to us.

Hang loose
The iPad advert, and all the other design and brand collateral, is all about lifestyle - hanging loose - leisure - and a smart kind of Renaissance like style - the 21st century Quattrocento.

Perpetual Journal
Microsoft , as seems inevitable is much more Weber - Protestant ethic with a look back to the Medieval Scriptorium. It's all about - the project - the meeting - and of course - the deal. Check out the video script below to see what I mean.

My reaction
Notwithstanding my ongoing troubles with chippy American accents talking about inspiration et al, I do like the notion of the endless journal. I also like the collaboration tools. In short, I like the idea of a device that helps me create contributions to the digital revolution, as opposed to one which seems to focus on how I can consume them.

Mrs Lenin
So please Apple - can we have a little less cool - and a little more work ethic! And of course, it would be just great if you could get your head round the fact that real revolutions require multi-tasking. Ask Mrs Lenin! As for Microsoft - is this real? Spill!

Nina Simon launches the book, The Participatory Museum

2010-03-08T15:29:00.003+13:00

image source

Nina Simon - legend!
Some days are just made for giving a shout out to interesting people - and none comes more interesting, at least to me, than Nina Simon , the Museum consultant and Museum 2.0 blogger, who electrified the last session of the New Zealand National Digital forum with her thoughts and insights into the Participatory Museum. Who can forget that gong! Liam Wyatt hasn't, for sure

The Gong
And for those who havn't come across it, the gong was on stage waiting for people to come up and bang it to announce they had just found someone to help in a project, or had become that someone and was prepared to help.

Believe me, being a Scotsman of a certain era, I can assure you my first- second and third thought - was no way hosaie - not on yer nellie dug are you getting me up on that stage and anywhere near that gong. But hey ho - as the tape will show for all eternity, never say never. And the project - cant say just yet - but it just started last week.

The Participatory Museum
All of which is a long intro into the welcome news that Nina Simon has a new book out - The Participatory Museum - you can buy it - here - but you can also start reading the first few chapters under the CC licence, here. Or just use the short-cuts below:

The plot
The Participatory Museum is a practical guide to working with community members and visitors to make cultural institutions more dynamic, relevant, essential places, written by Nina Simon, exhibit designer, museum consultant, and the author of the Museum 2.0 blog.

Preface: Why Participate?

Part 1: Design for Participation
Chapter 1: Principles of Participation
Chapter 2: Participation Begins with Me
Chapter 3: From Me to We
Chapter 4: Social Objects

Part 2: Participation in Practice
Chapter 5: Defining Participation at your Institution
Chapter 6: Contributing to Institutions
Chapter 7: Collaborating with Visitors
Chapter 8: Co-creating with Visitors
Chapter 9: Hosting Participants
Chapter 10: Evaluating Participatory Projects
Chapter 11: Managing and Sustaining Participation

Powerhouse Museum
Another reminder - Nina Simon's entire December , 2009 workshop session with The Powerhouse Museum in Sydney is online, here There are also links to the slides. Or just click and watch. Very generous gesture from both parties.

Nina Simon on The Participatory Museum - Dec 2009, Powerhouse Museum, Sydney from Powerhouse Museum on Vimeo.

Sunday books in Aotearoa - The Good Word - speaking truth to power

2010-03-07T13:33:00.005+13:00

no embed - so click image, or here, to go to TVNZ Ondemand

The Good Word
I have just been watching The Good Word hosted by the NZ writer Emily Perkins, a weekly books programme on TVNZ 7, one of the new digital channels on Freeview, and now Sky, It s also available on TVNZ OnDemand, here

TVNZ 7 is one of the new channel outcomes from the governments 2006, $79 million largess to TVNZ to help them, over 6 years, set up and run their digital strategy. Would be nice to see something similar emerging for their cash strapped sister Radio New Zealand. But I digress.

The latest episode
The latest series of The Good Word is broadcast in the twilight zone of Saturday night. However, mercifully, the entire series is up on TVNZ On Demand. Last nights episode, the one I've just watched here, has a lovely spirited panel exchange talking about Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving. Emily Perkins, host and anchor, keeps it all running nicely.

Under the Covers
I also enjoyed Finlay Macdonalds Under the Covers segment. In this episode he talks with Ranginui Walker, the Maori scholar and intellectual who has been ' speaking truth to power' for nearly 50 years. They discuss the ongoing relevance of his 1990 book, Ka Whawhai Tonu Matou - Struggle Without End, There is also some good contextual footage to the issues they traverse - including tv and heritage materiel on Maori history.

Man Alone
I like the Under the Covers idea - it brings out some of the real treasures to the New Zealand literary landscape, and Macdonald, one time editor of the NZ Listener, columist, and one time Sunday Star Times books editor, and now anchor host to the Auckland Msueum LATE series, is in his element here.

See for example one of the early pieces in the first series on John Mulgan's seminal text Man Alone, with its classic terse tale of the returned 1st World War soldier coming back to a New Zealand about to be torn apart by the politics of depression and want.

Penguin classic
Man Alone is also one of the 10 titles chosen by Penguin NZ to mark their own version of the Popular Penguin series.

The others are: Going West, Gee Maurice, Potiki, Patricia Grace - The Skinny Louie Book, Fiona Farrell - Plumb, Maurice Gee - Smith's Dream, C K Stead - Oracles and Miracles, Stevan Eldred-Grigg- The GrandifloraTree, Shonagh Koea- The Whale Rider, Witi Ihimaera- Came A Hot Friday, Ronald Hugh Morrieson

Jason Books
By the by, the establishment shots for the Under the Covers series, take place in Jason's Books , the lovely second hand book store at 3 Lorne Street Auckland. I pass through it every day en route for lunch, or whatever. Great tø see it on the screen.

Friday moment: Sir Ken Robinson, Hammer Lecture - talking about The Element, and other things

2010-03-05T16:07:00.004+13:00

the you tube page is here

The Element
I have to hand a copy of The Element - looking forward to hearing the voice on the page. This lecture is about a year old - March 06, 2009, but it is still worth it. Still waiting on his TED presentation, 2010

The talk
He goes for 58 minutes without a note - or a slide, just himself thinking aloud, and taking the time to engage with the audience. For sure I've heard a couple of the jokes before, but it's a beautiful piece of work, and yet more one liners to take into the week-end and think on

Death Valley, California, flowers, April 2005
He also talks about how, in 2005, after a rain storm, the buried seeds of Death Valley germinated and flowered. So as I listened to him, I went off and looked for some - this is from Wikimedia, here

KPMG report on Radio New Zealand, November 2007, released under OIA

2010-03-04T15:49:00.015+13:00

image source

The KPMG report on Radio New Zealand
The Hon Jonathan Coleman, NZ Minister for Broadcasting, in his reply to my email, and of course, dozens of others who also emailed him - is at pains to point out that he is a supporter of Radio New Zealand and simply wants to help them figure out ways of maintaining and improving services within their current budget.

However, as the KPMG report below points out, this might be a bit harder than we, and he, anticipated. Among a number of other telling comments they baldly state, " we have concluded that RNZ is underfunded in terms of ensuring the sustainability of its current outputs"

Which few did you have in mind, Majesty?
Seems clear as mud to me - RNZ can't do what they are tasked to do within their current budget - so the question Minister is, are you going to change "their outputs" - and make this change public - or are you going to help them achieve their existing outputs with additional resources?

And if the former - they have to do less - then can you make it real clear to them - and indeed the rest of us, just what less means. Or as Mozart - via IMDB - famously had it:

Emperor Joseph II My dear young man, don't take it too hard. Your work is ingenious. It's quality work. And there are simply too many notes, that's all. Just cut a few and it will be perfect.
Mozart: Which few did you have in mind, Majesty?

source

The KPMG report
Yesterday, I asked MCH, the NZ Ministry of Culture and Heritage, for the KPMG report - they sent it by email today - thanks - much appreciated.
Here it is - its a a PDF - 83 pages

Jim Mora conversation on Pew Report on Future of the Internet, Onyas, Te Ara, and Picnik

2010-03-03T17:38:00.001+13:00

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes—and ships—and sealing-wax—
Of cabbages—and kings—
And why the sea is boiling hot—
And whether pigs have wings."
- Lewis Carroll

Jim Mora in the Afternoon on Radio NZ
It's that time again - talking to Jim Mora on National Radio about the Internet - and other such cabbages. Click wee player to listen - alternatives are Ogg Vorbis MP3

Future of the Internet - Pew Institute
A Pew Internet survey on the Future of the Internet spoke to nearly 900 Internet stakeholders and revealed new perspectives on the way the Internet is affecting human intelligence - memory - and the way we think,

The web-based survey gathered opinions from prominent scientists, business leaders, consultants, writers and technology developers. This reportcovers the experts responses to:

• Will Google make us stupid?
• Will the internet enhance or detract from reading, writing, and rendering of knowledge?
• Is the next wave of innovation in technology, gadgets, and applications pretty clear now, or will the most interesting developments between now and 2020 come “out of the blue”?
• Will the end-to-end principle of the internet still prevail in 10 years, or will there be more control of access to information?
• Will it be possible to be anonymous online or not by the end of the decade?

The Nicholas Carr article
As noted above, this year they asked a bunch of experts to comment on the challenge thrown out by Nicholas Carr in a cover story for the Atlantic Monthly, Summer of 2008¹: "Is Google Making us Stupid?

2. Onya Awards
The Onyas, the NZ Internet Awards winners and runners up. We discuss the big winner, Xero, and also gave out a hand to Radio NZ.

Most outstanding website – Xero

Best visual design – Springload

Best user experience – Xero

Best web application – Xero

Most innovative – DNA, YouDo and Powershop

Best content (corporate) – Department of Conservation

Best content (personal) – Zef Fugaz

Best HTML & CSS – Radio New Zealand

Best accessibility – Radio New Zealand

Best mobile application – Cactuslab

Best mobile website or web application – Kiwibank and Springload

3, Bits and Bobs

Te Ara - On Line Encyclopedia
Has a new section launching on 11th March, 2010
Economy and the City
www.teara.govt.nz

NZ Eventfinder / NZ Live
www.eventfinder.co.nz
www.nzlive.govt.nz

NZ Event Finder - the big commercial event database is merging with the NZ Live . The later is/was a NZ Ministry of Culture and Heritage venture - cost a fortune to set up - and is now being absorbed by its commercial competitor. Who incidentally, loathed NZ Live with a passion when it was in competition with it.

The argument is that it makes for a brand new public private partnership - others are wondering what went wrong at NZ Live that it could be absorbed and taken away by Event Finder with hardly a murmer from the arts and cultural sector which it was set up to serve?

Picnik
http://www.picnik.com/
Great tool for fixing - cropping - sorting your family fotos etc
Just announced - been bought by Google - interesting move - whats in store?

NZ Minister for Broadcasting, Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman, answers my email re Radio NZ

2010-03-03T12:36:00.003+13:00

2YA radio station under construction, Mt Victoria, Wellington.1927.
Timeframes - NLNZ Read more ...

Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman
Like others who were concerned about stories that Radio NZ is facing a funding crunch, I wrote to Broadcasting Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman urging him to give more support to Radio NZ , rather than less. I also wrote about the story, below. A few moments ago, I received this reply from my email

Dear Paul

Thank you for your email about Radio New Zealand, which I have read. My apologies for not replying to you sooner but I receive a lot of correspondence and I like to ensure everyone gets a reply.

First, I want to make it clear that I am a supporter of Radio New Zealand and a regular listener.

I also want to make it clear that Radio New Zealand does not need “saving,” quite simply because its existence is not under threat.

However, Radio New Zealand is one of the vast majority of state owned operations that are being required to tighten their belts thanks to the recessionary environment this government inherited.

This doesn’t mean the government is requiring cuts to services. I have simply asked Radio New Zealand to come up with a plan for maintaining its present outputs with its present budget.

Again, this scenario isn’t unique to Radio New Zealand.

The government’s spending priorities at this time are law and order, health, and education. For everyone else it’s about maintaining existing services within present budgets for the foreseeable future.

As a fan of Radio New Zealand I am sensitive to its cause; however as a Minister of the Crown in a country with a massive debt burden, I am equally sensitive to seeing the country emerge from its present financial difficulties by doing what’s right.

I look forward to having a reasoned and constructive discussion with Radio New Zealand on its plans for maintaining its operations within its present $38 million annual budget.

Yours sincerely,

Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman
Minister of Broadcasting

Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman
MP for Northcote
Minister of Immigration, Minister of Broadcasting

Associate Minister of Health, Associate Minister of Tourism

John Markinson , CEO Penguin defines company's future as software - application developer - not publisher

2010-03-03T12:26:00.000+13:00

The e-book market and the business opportunities tø come for both platform providers, and publishers continues to morph into view. It is a fast moving space, and I miss stuff - not least this from John Markinson, CEO, Penguin from earlier in Feburary, 2010.

In this three minute video extract, he seems to have re framed Penguin as a software content company -application developer - not a book publisher?

e-Pub
He also seems to be saying that Penguin isnt all that interested in the ePub standard because it won't give him what he wants - audio - video - gaming - as well as text and graphics.

At the least, his dismissal of the ePub standard as not currently capable to take care for their requirements is worth our attention.

Virtual Museum of the Pacific

2010-03-01T20:08:00.001+13:00

"The Virtual Museum of the Pacific is an experimental social media platform that is developed in collaboration between the Australian Museum and the University of Wollongong. The Virtual Museum of the Pacific contains 427 objects from the Australian Museum's Pacific cultural collections. Users can explore, tag and annotate these objects with rich media. In this video, we introduce its background, motivations and user experience, and also lead into its future research direction and technology platform..."

To see for yourself, visit here

Virtual Museum of the Pacific
The Virtual Museum of the Pacific interests for a swag of reasons - semantic/social web - digital repatriation - creating cultural frameworks to potential virtual worlds , et al.

However, I had no idea this project was so interesting, and that there was such a great presentation on the way it is being structured. Suspect I will have lots more to say on this project once I manage to get a login to see inside. In the meantime, I wanted to share the video.

OLPC
There also seems to be a OLPC Oceania connection in the making - see here for a hint.

Radio NZ campaign meets Martyn "Bomber" Bradbury - Triangle/Stratos-1

2010-02-28T11:40:00.011+13:00

Bomber Bradbury
What a find. I have never caught this show before. Sure I know the station - Triangle/Stratos TV is a bit if New Zealand treasure - basically community television with a bit of an edge sitting on one of the more obscure corners of the New Zealand UHF spectrum. But I had not come across Bomber before, although I'm told he has an impressive track record - ex Craccum, ex Channel Z, ex Alt TV and ex Rip It Up editor. Love him to bits! Especially the no nonsense bias. Much more Bomber here.

For those needing more context - believe me, despite the lean to a combined Grey Lynn/Cuba St possie of left/liberalism, this is a totally spot on skit on NZ politics in the last week - MMP review - Auckland Super City logo competition - Christian doctors and abortion - Radio NZ - and of course Prime Minister John Key's relentless and apparently never ending teflon coated relaxed patronage/popularity.

Radio NZ - Auckland protest
I came across it via various blog posts -like this one from Ethical Martini - on the Save the Radio NZ campaign begun on Facebook. I'm also been asked via Twitter to spread the word on the Auckland version of the Radio NZ protest. More Facebook details , here

Date Time
Monday March 1 2010
12.30 to 1.30 pm
171 Hobson Street Auckland

Google Map

View Larger Map

LATE 01: Innovate Science at Auckland Museum

2010-02-27T08:52:00.006+13:00

see auckland museum for full details plus video

Innovation - theme for the year
This year's season of LATE at the Auckland Museum events welcomes a year-long investigation into the theme of innovation – featuring panel discussions with leading innovators from NZ as well as local music.

LATE 01
Coming up this Thursday, 4th March, Late 01 Innovate Science, investigates "the way science drives the economy and underpins our everyday life. The panel will discuss how science has helped grow NZ , from early ‘Number Eight Wire’ innovations in agriculture, through to atom-splitting and current biotech projects.

It will then turn its attention toward where the next real innovation is needed, and hopefully, in the process communicating a greater understanding and passion for science throughout New Zealand.

The Panel
The panel features Dr Helen Anderson alongside inventor, social entrepreneur and ‘New Zealander of the Year’, Ray Avery.

Dr Helen Anderson is chief executive of MORST, The NZ Ministry of Research Science and Technology. She sees her role as helping research, science and technology improve New Zealand. She is credited with playing ' a central role in determining high level science priorities, enhancing New Zealand's research infrastructure, and encouraging greater private sector research and development"

Ray Avery was recently announced as ‘New Zealander of the Year’by Prime Minister John Key, recognising his contribution to the nation through science and technology. Avery is the founder of independent development agency Medicine Mondiale, which creates low-cost solutions to health issues in the developing world.

More detail on the panelists, here

The Music
Music on the evening features Auckland band An Emerald City, the Mana Maoli Collective of Hawaiian performers, and DJ Stinky Jim. More on artists, here

The HP Slate - look feel - pitch

2010-02-26T08:13:00.004+13:00

The Pink and White Terraces - the Tarawera erruption - doco from 2000 on NZ On Screen

2010-02-25T13:59:00.008+13:00

Serendipity
It would appear that serendipity over my last few posts - on Trollope - BL 19th century writing - New Zealand early texts and the fate of the people and places destroyed by the Tarawera disruption - just goes on.

Tarawera
Just up in 5 parts on NZ On Screen is this brilliant documentary from 2000 - produced and directed by Richard Riddiford. NZ On Screen has this to say by way of synopsis:

"In June 1886 Mt Tarawera spectacularly and disastrously erupted, and this documentary tells the story of the people who were caught in the catastrophic events. Around 120 people lost their lives, and the internationally famous Pink and White Terraces were destroyed. The documentary features an animated re-creation of the eruption, archival images, interviews with descendants of those involved, and readings from written eyewitness accounts. The author of the book Tarawera, Ron Keam, is also interviewed..."
source - here

Ian Mune - narrator
New Zealanders will recognize the narrative voice of veteran director Ian Mune who, years ago, at the height of his exposure around the End of the Golden Weather once sent me a three page critique of a unsolicited movie idea I sent him. Lovely lovely man whose generosity of spirit totally inspired me. Still does!

British Library announces 65,000 free texts for the Kindle

2010-02-25T11:38:00.002+13:00

image source

Got room for 65,000 19th century classics?
The British Library has taken the welcome step of making their archive of 65,000 19th century classics available as free downloads on the Amazon Kindle.

Originally digitised in partnership with Microsoft Livesearch, the British Library’s new deal with Amazon will unlock 65,000 editions of 19th century philosophy, history, poetry and literature – over 25 million pages of content. The arrangement covers Amazon's sites in US, the UK, France and Germany.

The BL says of the initiative, "covering the likes of Dickens, Austen, and Conan Doyle, the 65,000 titles also include a range of lesser know Victorian classics such as, A Strange Story by Edward Lytton, one of the period's most popular novelists - now largely neglected, and The Story of a Modern Woman by Ella Hepworth Dixon, described as 'the greatest unread novel of female struggle'. "

More on this, here

Kindle in New Zealand
This of course will only be of marginal interest to people in New Zealand - because, unlike the likes of their tiny neighbours in the Pacific, Kiribati, Fiji, New Caledonia, Tuvalu, and even the Cook Islands, the Kindle is not available here. And, there doesn't seem to be any plans to change that?

Kindle for Blackberry - buffering
As I tap, I am also a confused owner of the Kindle for Blackberry. I downloaded it okay, here - despite being told it was only available for US customers. It seem to install just fine - but watch this space for news as to whether I actually manage to download and install any texts. Right now - it is buffering - buffering buffering

I would especailly like to understand how mere mortals in the colonies can get a hold of the BL ones mentioned above? And yes, advice, help, gratefully received.

I AM Making Movies - Auckland Museum

2010-02-24T18:35:00.007+13:00

go to site

Kaizen rules at Auckland Museum
Auckland Museum continues to make measured and iterative steps towards a world class digital footprint which emulates the Smithsonian belief that a Museum web site should go for the same depth of relationship online as they try for in the physical building.

I AM Making Movies
Just launched - I AM Making Movies - a competition which invites Year 5 - 13 students to create a short movie based on exhibits throughout the Museum. The project is as part of the Museums eLearning strategy to support the new Digital Technologies curriculum.

Movies may be conceived as either documentaries or creative story-telling – like those featuring performance artist Mika in their current exhibition, Wonderland: The Magic of the Rose.

Competition finalists will be showcased online and all contestants will be invited to an awards evening on Sunday, 20 June. Entries will be judged and prizes presented on the night by stars of the New Zealand film industry.

More detail, here

Anthony Trollope among the new titles from the ENZB, Early New Zealand Books Project

2010-02-24T12:02:00.003+13:00

Blomfield, Charles 1848-1926. :[The Pink Terraces. 1890?]
image source - alexander turnbull

ENZB
As is its style, the ENZB, Early New Zealand Book project, at Auckland University, has been quietly adding 115 new books over the last year, with 65 of them coming on stream since the end of November, 2009. Their style is definitely no fuss - no big drama - and when they feel like it, making a discrete post to the local web, and/or mailing lists, as in this morning on NZ-Libs.

Their offer is equally discrete - keyword-searchable text of books about New Zealand published in the first two-thirds of the nineteenth century. The project also covers texts of journals and letters from this period, as well as reminiscences of people active in this period, some of which are published outwith the time zone. Among these recent highlights are,

Recent highlights
1940 - Mathew, Felton. The Founding of New Zealand: The Journals of Felton Mathew, First Surveyor-General of New Zealand, and his Wife, 1840-1847.
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2548&p=1

1839 - Darwin, Charles. Journal of Researches into the Geology and Natural History of the Various Countries Visited by H.M.S. Beagle. [Chapter XX only] [ Brussels: Editions Culture et Civilisation, 1969] http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2519&p=1

1839 - Fitzroy, R. Narrative of the Surveying Voyages of His Majesty's ships Adventure and Beagle [New Zealand chapters] [New York: AMS, 1966].
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2665&p=1

1847 - Ross, J. C. A Voyage of Discovery and Research in the Southern and Antarctic Regions [New Zealand Chapters Only].
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2670&p=1

1851 - Shortland, E. The Southern Districts of New Zealand: A Journal, with Passing Notices of the Customs of the Aborigines.
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2869&p=1

1866 - Mitchell and Seffern's Directory of the City and Suburbs of Auckland, for 1866-7. http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2834&p=1

1869 - May, J. Guide to Farming in New Zealand.
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2902&p=1

1873 - Trollope, Anthony. Australia and New Zealand [New Zealand Chapters Only]
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2564&p=1

1875 - Mundy, D. L. Rotomahana and the Boiling Springs of New Zealand: A Photographic Series of Sixteen Views.
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2676&p=1

Some new illustrations:

Hochstetter's map of the Waikato, 1863
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/popup.php?wid=2739&fig=4a.jpg&action=figure

The Pink and White Terraces at Rotomahana, 1875
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2682

Edward Shortland's map of Southland and Otago, 1851
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2870

The Paddle Steamer "Avon" sunk in the Waipa, 1863
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/popup.php?wid=2228&fig=38a.jpg&action=figure

"Bull of Ngati Maniapoto" - Taumarunui? 1861 (Scroll down the PDF - the picture between pages 158 and 159)
http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/document?wid=2378

Serendipity - Trollope!
As luck would definitely have it, my eye immediately caught the Anthony Trollope item. Whether it be age, ot merely an eccentricity, I am currently half way through Trollope's Barchester Chronicles, having already spent most of this southern summer reading the Palliser series.

As I think John Major, the ex UK Prime Minister once opined, he is a bit of an addiction once you get started. He is in good company here.

Yesterday in Wellington, I finished Framley Parsonage, and wondered how I could possible wait until I got back to Auckland to start the next one , A Small House at Allington, which was sitting to hand at home. Musing aloud I thought fool! Clicked onto Project Gutenberg, and downloaded it courtesy of Air New Zealand Koru Coub wifi.

Formats/platforms
Going back to the ENZB , for those who like this kind of detail - most of the new books are searchable PDFs, as well as in the ENZB favoured format, TEI-based XML The long-term goal is to provide these books in TEI-based XML as well as PDF.

Cataloguing records for books in the collection are available from Te Puna. MARC records (UTF-8) are also available for download as a zip file from a link on the ENZB home page.

The project uses b-engine software to convert TEI-compatible xml files to html for web display.

ACTA's Internet Chapter Leaks

2010-02-23T10:24:00.002+13:00

ACTA Acta Digital Chapter-1

Source - here

Commentary
Techdirt

Moeed Ahmad from Al Jazeera on Creative Commons speaking at Media 2010, Sydney

2010-02-21T12:28:00.002+13:00

Moeed Ahmad,
This Friday past saw Moeed Ahmad, head of new media at Al Jazeera, speaking in Sydney at the Media 2010 conference about their network's repository of creative commons licensed content.

ICP Interview with Sir Ken Robinson, et al

2010-02-20T08:44:00.000+13:00

Radio New Zealand has lots of new friends

2010-02-19T12:04:00.012+13:00

image from Dominion Post- here

Radio New Zealand told to tighten its belt
Here in New Zealand, as I write at 11:30 am Friday, the Facebook group Save Radio New Zealand, now has 4,110 fans. The group didn't exist yesterday morning. People are signing up in droves because it has emerged in the last day or so that local broadcasting Minister, Jonathan Coleman has, since at least the November Radio NZ Board meeting, been making increasingly bellicose statements, both in public and in private, that Radio NZ needs to drastically cut its costs.

Just what is being said by whom is becoming increasingly murky - but there is to be no more money in the years to come and the current annual budget of NZ $38 million will need to stretch indefinitely. That means the Board needs to find cost cutting measures, including the option of commercial sponsorship. It might also require the Auckland office to downsize. It could even mean stopping broadcasting at midnight - just like the old days.

Matters went very public yesterday when Radio NZ Board chair, Christine Rice, was interviewed by the NZ Parliamentary broadcasting select committee. It emerged, as reported by some media , that the Board have already made plans to work towards the Ministers objective.

Some select committee members were keen to hear more. The result was almost a slanging match as to whether some of the Minsters suggestions crossed the line into operational matters, as well as judicious quotes as to whether he did or didn't threaten to sack the Board if he didn't get his way.

The media landscape in NZ
The media - especially the news- landscape in NZ is not deep - nor very broad. In terms of the primary players, it consists of the 3 regional newspapers, NZ Herald and The Dominion, The Christchurch Press, as well as the local TV companies, TVNZ and TV3 . All of the latter carry advertising. There are also a myriad of commercial radio stations, each of which competes to bombard you with advertising. Elsewhere, sponsorship is rampant.

Radio NZ - the difference
Radio NZ is different - no ads - no sponsorship - an old style public broadcasting radio station where a fierce, and occasionally leaden, commitment to balance is combined with a series of flagship programmes in the likes of Morning Report, Nine 'Till Noon, Jim Mora in the Afternoon. At the weekends, Saturday morning is still ruled by broadcasting diva, Kim Hill, with young Turks in the likes of Simon Morton jostling in afterwards.

The culture is old school state broadcasting - the job is public radio - the daily grind all about finding the story - and getting people to talk about it. Everything is on the hoof - and all of it - especially Morning Report - annoys the living daylights out of all politicians - no matter what colour, because its the one place in New Zealand where the interviewer just might have read the report they are trying to bury.

As for resourcing - ask anyone who has ever worked there - or walked through the door to give an interview - there is not a shoestring in sight. Indeed the last time I was in there - and sure they know my face - I made my way to Jim Mora's studio by auto pilot - tapped on the glass and walked in when he signaled the mike was off. No goffers - no green room - no production assistants - no nufink.

The web site
They have a reasonable web site, which needs a lot of work to take it to the next phase. In its present iteration it just manages to keep up, but as anyone involved will tell you, it needs a re- design - a whole bunch of new tools to surf the social/semantic tide of web 3.0.

The commitment is there - but again, there is no money, and even worse, very little appreciation at the political and governance layer that, given proper resourcing, there are people inside Radio NZ right now, who could take their web platform to a whole new level of international excellence. And for the record, I say that with absolutely no bias, or personal/professional interest whatsoever.

Message to the Minster - more not less!
Yesterday I joined the FaceBook group because like many I was annoyed that an institution I knew was already struggling to survive on its present budget was being asked to compromise even more on its core business - public broadcasting

Today, I am feeling a little more sanguine and almost grateful to Johnathen Coleman for provoking the debate. Because maybe its time, we started to take a long look at Radio New Zealand - and in the process started asking ourselves do we want to continue to support the last and lonely remnant of public broadcasting in NZ - and if so - isn't it time we signaled to its political masters - less isn't an option - what we want is more!

Jonathan Coleman, the NZ Minister of Broadcasting contact details- including email and phone - can be found - here. The FaceBook group is here.

The alternative - Kentucky Fried Kim Hill
Alternative broadcast models? The video from the BBC below is one - formulaic easy to digest info bytes - junk news - sponsored by junk food - aka Kentucky Fried Kim Hill.

Acknowledgement
Thanks to Judy Callingham for the heads up to the BBC video

Melvyn Bragg's In Our Time from the BBC has a refresh - nice job!

2010-02-18T16:52:00.003+13:00

link

In Our Time
As part of my research for the Royal Society anniversary in the previous post, I discovered that the Melvyn Bragg, In Our Time, radio series from BBC Radio 4, has a new web site - or at least a design and information architecture refresh. It is very classy. Click the image above and have a look. Or go direct, here.

The Archive
If you do you'll find there are all sorts of improvements , including some feature programmes to each of the main categories - Culture, History, Philosophy, Science, Religion. Additionally, there is a lot cleaner comment option, newsletter sign-up - and of course, the prime new feature - a complete search and browse archive to the whole series. This is a significant piece of treasure trove.

For those who have yet to find this broadcasting treasure, In Our Time, is build on the radical idea that there is still an audience, and indeed the expertise, to have expert panel discussions on topics in the fields of culture, history, science, religion, and philosophy, et al.

I'm a total addict.

The importance of an institutional Archive
I am also so leased to see a proper archive of the series.Hitherto, unless you got them onto your iPod or similar, you could never guarantee the audio from a previous programme would be there when you went back to look.

Don't get me wrong iPods etc are very fine things. And given you could always download the MP3, there is every possibility that there are thousands of copies of all the programmes tucked away on hard drives the world over.

That said, I still think there should be a proper archive of this type of material in the institution which created it. It would be even more reassuring to learn that key broadcast series like these were going to be preserved and made available as a cultural asset in perpetuity, as opposed to another set of disposable voices.

And going one step further, I'm looking forward to the day when we can have a BBC open API to these collections so that we can use them within our own contextual learning spaces.

Critique of Search
My only critique would be in the search options, I can't search by contributor. If this sounds a little too much of the inner librarian, bear in mind, like others, I have some favorite contributors who appear in more than one programme. Jonathan Ree, the peripatetic philosopher at larger comes to mind for a start.

But I mither. It's a lovely piece of work!

Another afternoon with Jim Mora, NZ National Radio

2010-02-17T18:22:00.002+13:00

Science - the method - the conversation - the challenge
Today had me, slightly unexpectedly, on air with Jim Mora on NZ National Radio. It was a little rough around the edges - as the audio will attest - but it did give me an instant chance to talk about some of the issues running around my brain since last weekend's Foo Camp - not least of which is how science and scientists can use online media to engage with citizens, as well as make sure the best of the scientific imagination remains front of mind.

The Audio
The notes on the sources mentioned are below. The video above is from the NZ Science Media Centre in Wellington, which we discuss on air. The audio is available via this wee player, or if you refer it on yours, download: Ogg Vorbis MP3

Notes

Citizen Science

"a term used for projects or ongoing program of scientific work in which individual volunteers or networks of volunteers, many of whom may have no specific scientific training, perform or manage research-related tasks such as observation, measurement or computation. The use of citizen-science networks often allows scientists to accomplish research objectives more feasibly than would otherwise be possible. In addition, these projects aim to promote public engagement with the research, as well as with science in general. .."
source - wikipedia

Examples
SETI - the original one - lend your computer to a huge global experiment to find intelligent life in space.

Galaxy Zoo - help map the heavens - much more centered on getting people involved in the experiment.

Great Sunflower Project

UK Herberai at Home

General links about Citizen Science
http://citizensci.com/

New Zealand Science Media Centre
Science Media Centre Great project - the idea is to give media stories and resources on science - both in NZ and offshore. Based on the premise that science doesn't get reported very well in NZ and that journalists and others need help with resources. Good references for both citizens - media and scientists

Royal Society in NZ - and the global big 350th birthday
NZ Royal Society now being enlarged by the inclusion of the Humanities Council.
Means their focus has changed - now includes social and human sciences.

United Kingdom
Royal Society UK
Royal Society, UK is having its 350th birthday.

See also
http://trailblazing.royalsociety.org/

" Welcome to Trailblazing, an interactive timeline for everybody with an interest in science. Compiled by scientists, science communicators and historians – and co-ordinated by Professor Michael Thompson FRS – it celebrates three and a half centuries of scientific endeavour and has been launched to commemorate the Royal Society’s 350th anniversary in 2010.
Trailblazing is a user-friendly, ‘explore-at-your-own-pace’, virtual journey through science. It showcases sixty fascinating and inspiring articles selected from an archive of more than 60,000 published by the Royal Society between 1665 and 2010.

See Further
The Royal Society is launching a big site - See Further - on the 350 year celebrations this coming Friday - see here

Creative Commons in NZ
The State of Victoria in Australia has decided that all government information now be issued under the Creative Commons license. Very big deal for open government and online democracy - innovation etc. What's happening here in NZ? Should we go this way? Why does it matter.
For quick reference to the State of Victoria stroy see my blog, here

NZ Position
The status of the Creative Commons license in NZ as a default recommendation for government data and information is part of a discussion paper which has been widely circulated by the NZ SSC in recent months. The final paper plus cabinet recommendations should be in play in the next month or so, with potentially, some real progress on this by June.

Sources NZ Goal - New Zealand Government Open Access and Licensing Framework - NZ Consultation paper
E-Gov blog - useful place to keep alertCreative Commons NZ,
Open Data NZ

TED 2010 - Blaise Aguera y Arcas demos augmented-reality maps

2010-02-16T07:05:00.011+13:00

TED 2010 - Feb 9th to 13th, 2010
The videos from TED 2010 which went from Feb 9th to the 13th, 2010, are starting to surface.

Blaise Aguera y Arcas
This demo by Blaise Aguera y Arcas demos new augmented-reality mapping technology from Microsoft is currently trending on Twitter. Definitively worth a peak.

Ron Mueck at NGV - National Gallery Victoria, Melbourne

2010-02-15T14:12:00.006+13:00

image source - here

Melbourne to Foo Camp
Still catching up from a huge last seven days. Monday, a week ago had me in Melbourne catching up with people including Angelina Russo from Museums 3.0, as well as a quick visit to NGV the National Gallery of Victoria.

Then came three days at VALA , then back to Auckland on the Friday and so up to Warkworth just north of Auckland for Kiwi Foo - the annual meet-up of technologists - software architects/creators - scientists - media types - policy wonks and politicians from the NZ and international networks of Nat Torkington and Russell Brown.

All of which needs sifted and separated - and just might provoke a couple of more measured pieces once I get time to process all of the inputs.

Ron Mueck at National Gallery Victoria
But one incident/accident needs attention right now - and that's a huge shout out to the National Gallery Victoria for putting on the exhibition from one of Australia's long time own, Ron Mueck .

Now based in London, and with a practice that goes back years, the exhibition show cases many of his classic hyper-real sculptures of the human figure, some of which are life size - some giants - and some almost miniature. Selections of these types are on all on view in this truly stunning and engaging exhibition currently running until 18th April. It then switches to Queensland until 1st August, before crossing the ditch to Christchurch Art Gallery from 30th September to 23rd January 2011.

My Picks
I spent a totally perfect three quarters of an hour in the exhibition. This doesn't sound much - but I have rarely felt such a sense of personal engagement from a set of art works. You just want to store it up and take it home. and then return for another visit the next day - and the next - and the next ...

This sense of a community of emotions is heightened by the reaction of the people around you - who just like you did - bounce between the different works - then stand to one side - head to odd angles the better to see the works and hear them speak.

For the record my favorites were , Wild Man - Baby and Two Women. As for Dead Dad - well what can I say - he looks so like I feel sometimes!

You Tube
You can get a flavour of many of the works on show from You Tube. There are lots of others on You Tube - just keyword Robert Mueck.

Sources
Below is one of the You Tube videos. Many of the works in here are on show in Melbourne. More details on that at the excellent VGA web site , here - while Wikipedia has this to say about the artist, here.

Jamie Oliver at TED 2010: Teach every child about food!

2010-02-14T17:22:00.002+13:00

LSE Literary Weekend - How Would a Robot Read a Novel?

2010-02-12T16:58:00.002+13:00

This is interesting - I am a big fan of the LSE podcast strategy - could do with a nicer user experience/interface - but the content is great - see/hear this one as an example - or look at the archive, here

LSE Literary Weekend - How Would a Robot Read a Novel?
Speakers: Dr Kavita Abraham, Dr Jon Adams, Dr Robert Hudson
Chair: Dr Tom Chatfield
This event was recorded on 11 February 2010 in Sheikh Zayed Theatre, New Academic Building
Don't judge a book by its cover? Don't be ridiculous. We constantly make judgements on books – from where it appears in a shop, its pretty cover, its heft or subject matter, the praise and criticism we hear about it. Reviewers are even more prejudiced. They know the author, or hate the publisher or, even worse, are a meticulous and lucid expert on the subject. All human readings are subjective. Is there another way? Would an objective reading - some preconceptionless robotic analysis, for instance - be preferable? Is it even possible? And what questions might a robot help us answer?
Available as: mp3 (20 MB; approx 86 minutes)
Event Posting: LSE Literary Weekend - How Would a Robot Read a Novel?

More on LSE Literary Weekend
There is a page explaining more on the weekend, here: it includes this quote:

"Half a century after C. P. Snow's two cultures, the arts and sciences remain distinct domains. While the social sciences might have built bridges, they each continue to occupy a space of their own. This festival aims to push those boundaries, exploring the edges of social science and asking what can be learnt in the borderlands between social science, natural science and the humanities about mind, self and society. "

See wikipedia entry on C.P Snow Two Cultures

VALA Day 3 - Paul Sutherland Christchurch City Libraries has a bit of a think outloud

2010-02-11T14:03:00.009+13:00

Paul Sutherland has a think out loud
Paul Sutherland, digital thinker at Christchurch City Library gave a great presentation at VALA Day 3 on how libraries are not about books - they are about ideas - plus other gems - including musing on // Christchurch Library blog // Christchurch Library on Flickr. // Kete Christchurch //and last Digital NZ

He was brilliant - even if his jokes didn't load. Apparently there is a paper somewhere? Perhaps? Or maybe its still with the VALA lawyers?

Conclusion? Evey library needs a Paul Sutherland - but I doubt if you could fork him - at least not without consequences for the space time/continuum. See - its contagious!

Update - 23ed Feb 2010
The paper is at the Vala site http://www.vala.org.au/vala2010/papers2010/VALA2010_118_Sutherland_Final.pdf and the presenation is on Slideshare

VALA Day 3 - Lib 2.0 Research results from Michael Stephens, Richard Sayers, Warren Cheetham

2010-02-11T13:30:00.002+13:00

Lib 2.0
This is interesting. Sitting in a session on Lib 2.0 from Michael Stephens, Dominican University, USA, Richard Sayers, CAVAL Ltd, and Warren Cheetham, CityLibraries Townsville, Qld on the results of a big Australian survey on the Lib 2.0 programme - aka 23 Things.

Tech that works!
First up - big ups to the tech, because in contrast to yesterday, it works - we are listening /watching Michael Stephens on Skype and watching a shared Powerpoint session.

The research
There is also a web site which is worth checking out- which includes this video and a whole bunch of stuff on the research.

More later - perhaps - but finally I am engaged around the story of Lib 2.0

Vala Day 2 - Linked Data - the new black for librarians

2010-02-10T16:59:00.004+13:00

Roy Tennant - OCLC
The inimitable Roy Tennant from OCLC has just finished a really good presentation on - API's , Linked Data, and the Cloud.

This session follows neatly on from Tom Taque yesterday talking about Open Calais and the wonderful world of linked data. The new black for librarians?

I help things along I thought it might be useful to put up this classic his masters voice - aka known as Tim Berners Lee on linked data.

The emerging linked data cloud
Also, this image on linked data is starting to pop up on a bunch of presentations. I predict it will have the same ubiquity as the some of the images that came to define web 2.0 . See here for one of the originals from Tim O Reilly. click the image for a bigger version. Or try the Open Calais version, here

open calais image source

VALA 2010 - Day One - from World Cat to Open Calais

2010-02-10T12:50:00.007+13:00

image source

VALA 2010
The first day of VALA 2010 was a lovely combination of the familiar - and look what's coming over the horizon - and are you ready to play.

OCLC and WorldCat
In the first category, Karen Calhoun of OCLC gave a really good benchmark session on where the global library world is in terms of sharing and extending their participation with the emerging learning and local web.

She concentrated in the main on current OCLC products and plans - with an extended pit stop to explore the growing range of World Cat as a global gateway to the worlds library collections.

One Search to rule them all and in the results you'll find them
[source -John Garraway]
I like World Cat - or should I say I totally adore the idea behind World Cat - to bring onto the users contextual desktop the combined holdings of library land - especially public library land.

Among the many use cases for such a tool, potentially, it offers the web searcher a straight line to their local public library shelf. Need more? Imagine making a search on a topic on Google, Bing, et al, and among the results you get are links to books in your local public library, which when clicked takes you to the library record page and, if you are a member, the option to take the book out and have it sitting waiting on the shelf for you to come and get it.

World Cat does this - or almost. It does it by having relationships with library holdings in 112 countries. Some of these - like New Zealand - have formal contracts with the National Library, and so direct routes to the national holding catlalougue. In short - this puppy can scale. It also has a potential to be the world library catalougue for global library land.

Right now
Right now it's fair to say most of the effort is still in the plumbing - with the user experience playing catch up. Take this example - I went there and searched for Anne Salmonds recent and downright brilliant Aphrodite's Island.

Pick me!
WorldCat knows about it for sure - here - but it doesn't know where I live so I have to tell it - saying Auckland doesn't work - it wants New Zealand - but there is no way you can know that - whereas a simple world map image- like changing the time zone in a MacBook - would sort that in seconds.

When it does catch up with where I am , its great - it shows me the public and university New Zealand libraries which hold the book. Picking Auckland City Library I can get there - but again, I've got to log in and then make my request for a hold.

So it all works - sort of - which is why I said I love the idea of World Cat - but it still feels like a long way to go before it feels easy - seamless - and proper web like. And I doubt it wee Abbey - see yesterdays post below, would be all that impressed by all the stuffing around.

Direct search for Aphrodite's Island on Google
Going the other way direct from Google or Bing needs even more work - which is a polite way of saying that World Cat is invisible using this route.

Thus a search on Google for Aphrodite's Island offers heaps of sources - but only one library result on the first screen - the Australian National Library, here .

NLA and me
Apart from a fantastic tour of the building by NLA s Director, the gift of a Picture Australia USB stick [always declare an interest, especially in Australia] - and being hosted to a meeting containing a brilliant vegetable curry- I have no relationship with the NLA - so the reference is no use to me as a way of getting my mits on the book.

However, it does get me some context to the subject - and be still my beating heart - links to items in their collection about Tahiti - see this example of a heritage map, as an instance of this kind of serendipity, here. However, curiously, it didn't give me a reference to one of the NLA's star collection pieces, the Journal of Joseph Banks. They have even digitised it and make it available as a PDF here

TROVE - context in motion
But wait - switching to Trove - their all singing dancing new federated search tool - TROVE - brings back a wonderful set of sources, here .Which begs the question how come Google knows about the catalougue entry and not the Trove page? That said, Trove is a brilliant example of context in motion.

Open Calias -Context - the challenge of the semantic web
All of which is a neat switch to Tom Taques presentation on Open Calais and the challenge and opportunities around building the semantic web - or as he puts it , the contextual plumbing to sorting the wonderful vibrant but essentially unusable current web.

In a stormer of a session were non techies didn't need oxygen once, he took the audience on a tour of the history of Open Calais - its current intents, and perhaps a sneak preview of its future plans to mine the relationships in the submitted data for opportunities

These opportunities are of course around content and context - i.e. creating metadata software which makes instant rich and extensible concept maps of information showing linkages and conceptual contours.

The pitch
Open Calais is one of these tools. It is a free to use includes an open API] and when you give it some of your content, categorises it, returns name entities, and attempts to construct a facts and event framework. You can use a version of the software on the site, here, as well as start thinking about how you can use it to enhance and extend the depth and reach of the metadata in a collection.

And on that note - the good Mr Taque made a point of giving a shout out to the Powerhouse Museum who have already been playing in this space.

For those looking for more on Open Calais, try here. And for sure, it is not for the faint hearted - but that's okay there are some wonderfully capable people at VALA who can cope and carry their own oxygen !

Tom Taque - libraries and Worldcat
Curiously, and in a wonderful moment of transparency, Mr TT happily admitted that up to this point he knew very little about what libraries were doing in the semantic web space. He even more cheerfully opined he had until today never heard of either OCLC and World Cat.

Join dots - sharpen pencils
Among all the lovely quotes and insights from this first day at VALA - this is the one I am remembering - sounds like there is a lot of joining the dots to do - perhaps its time for library land to sharpen pencils!

Update - day two VALA
Well here's an interesting couple of dots - Karen Calhoun in her own blog reports from VALA and speculates on a suggestion that World Cat be uploaded into Open Calais.

Update - Day three VALA
On the declaration of interest with NLA - now I come to think on, I have two USB sticks from Picture Australia. Also, and I am totally chuffed by this, I am now the proud owner of a TROVE T shirt! Rocking. Going to wear it to Foo Camp NZ this weekend!

Abbey at VALA 2010

2010-02-09T11:28:00.001+13:00

VALA 2010, the big Australasian bi-annual conference has just started in the brand new Melbourne Convention Centre. The old one is next door, mothballed and silent, while the new one blushes in red paint and carpet. It reminds me of the Seoul convention centre without the basement city of shops.

Hatton Hotel
Melbourne is putting on a brilliant show. The weather is perfect - albeit a hot 35C. I arrived yesterday. I'm staying at the Hatton. Definitly worth your attention - boutique hotel in South Yarra - a tram ride to the arts precinct and Federation Square.

Abbey
The video above comes from the opening showcase. Great messages. Will be interesting to hear what the conference audience thinks about them. And, crucially, whose job it is to make them happen?

Gil Scott-Heron - Me And The Devil

2010-02-07T21:57:00.000+13:00

The maestro is back - see UK Sunday Observer interview

State of Victoria in Australia goes Creative Commons by default

2010-02-05T15:37:00.000+13:00

Parliament of Victoria by Brian Giesen

Have just received a welcome Friday afternoon note from Jessica Coates of the Australian Creative Commons, who notes in a downright chirpy summary that :

The Victorian Government has become the first Australian government to commit to using Creative Commons as the default licensing system for its public sector information.
The commitment is part of the Government's response to its Economic Development and Infrastructure Committee’s Inquiry into Improving Access to Victorian Public Sector Information and Data, which recommended that the Victorian Government adopt a “hybrid public sector information licensing model comprising Creative Commons and a tailored suite of licences for restricted materials.”

Specifically, the response (which is under CC BY-NC-ND) states at p.8 that:
The Victorian Government endorses the committee’s overarching recommendation that the default position for the management of PSI should be open access. The Victorian Government further commits to the development of a whole-of-government Information Management Framework (IMF) whereby PSI is made available under Creative Commons licensing by default with a tailored suite of licences for restricted materials.

As far as we are aware, this is the strongest commitment to Creative Commons implementation made by any Australian government.

While there have been a number of excellent CC-friendly recommendations coming out of recent government inquiries - notably the Government 2.0 and Venturous Australia reports - these are yet to be officially adopted.

And while there are some excellent implementation projects - the Victorian Government specifically mentions the Australian Bureau of Statistics and Queensland’s Government Information Licensing Framework - these are still limited to individual agencies..."
Source - CC Australia

In from the Cold - orphan works in digital collections

2010-02-05T14:58:00.001+13:00

In From The Cold

The Collections Trust and the Strategic Content Alliance from the UK have published 'In From The Cold' - a report into the impact of 'orphan works' on public service delivery. Though focused on the UK, it is of real interest to the rest of the sector, specailly down here in Australasia. So what's the fuss?

Orphan works - or works still in copyright but with no known rights holder on record - are one of the banes of any collection institution - library, or indeed publishers. And as is know, it is one of the key issues which will eventually make or break the Google Book deal.

Scale of problem startling
As to scale of the problem - I was startled to learn via various Twitter posts that accompanied the report's launch, that fully 40% of the national collections in the UK are orphan works! And as Nick Poole from the Collections Trust in a Twitter post has it, all too often , 'orphans aren't born, they're made through poor documentation practice'

I have no idea what the New Zealand or Australian figures are, but I suspect they are no better.

The effect of the problem
Turning to the effect - the report is clear - " access to over 50 million items held in trust by publicly funded agencies such as libraries, museums, archives and universities are being prevented from being available online due to current copyright laws"

This means that millions of so-called ‘orphan works' - photographs, recordings, texts and other ephemera from the last 100 years - risk becoming invisible because rights holders are not known or easy to trace.

In From The Cold report (PDF)

IT after Three- with Jim Mora, NZ National Radio

2010-02-04T13:56:00.003+13:00

Cabbages and kings with Jim Mora
I had my first session of the year on the radio with Jim Mora at National Radio. The audio is above - its around 22 minutes. We covered a lot of ground. Herewith the running order and the links. These should also appear on the Radio New Zealand web site in due course. If you want a clean audio file, try these, Ogg Vorbis MP3, or go here.

1, Webstock
15th - 19th Feburary
http://www.webstock.org.nz/
New Zealand web conference - recognised as the best conference in New Zealand for web - web design - and web projects . They bring in 25 of the best speakers on web in the world. Hugely popular with the NZ web digerati.
Onyas
Also features the first year of the Onyas - NZ Web Awards
http://www.onyas.org.nz/

2. Buddy Press
http://buddypress.org/
New addition to WordPress - the open source blogging tool which also has a mile of independent developers and designers contributing new tools, designs and services to the common pool of 'plugins' to the main build. Some of which you pay for.

Buddy Press gives groups a tool to make multiple blogs. Very good tool for organisations - and community groups. Needs a bit of know how to set up but not too much. So find a teenager who still knows everything. I have a mind to create a site and play with the idea of offering people a place to keep a Reading Journal.

Buddy Press
http://buddypress.org/
WordPress [includes links to developer/design community]
http://wordpress.org/

3. Library Thing
http://www.librarything.com
Library Thing is a great place to share your library collection - like a virtual book shelf. Then you can see what other people have on their shelves - share ideas etc.

Legacy Library
This week saw the first New Zealand contribution to this part of Librarything which lets people/institutions make a digital library of historical figures. Librarything blog says:

" Legacy Library, that of Pei te Hurinui Jones (1898-1976). Jones joins Alfred Deakin (the second Prime Minister of Australia) in our Antipodean Legacies collection. Mr. Jones was a leading Māori scholar and translator (he's known for translating three volumes of Māori chants and song-poetry into English, and three Shakespeare plays into Māori). You can read a more complete biographical sketch on his profile page. ..."

Library Thing Blog - the story plus links to collection
http://www.librarything.com/blog/2010/02/our-first-new-zealand-legacy-library.php

Books from the Library of Charles Brasch
Note: The University of Otago Library did a lovely exhibition last year featuring the library of Charles Brasch. It would be good to see Brasch's library become one of the legacy libraries on Library Thing.
See the original online exhibition
http://library.otago.ac.nz/exhibitions/brasch/index.html

4. Britain Loves Wikipedia
http://britainloveswikipedia.org/
Great project that involves 20 UK Museums and Wikipedia.
Running for whole of February 2010
Involves the likes of Victoria and Albert and the Preston Grange Museum which is in Prestonpans, my home town.
People go to the Museum - take photographs of their favorite things - or at least the ones which it is okay to photograph - and then post them to Wikipedia.

Great example of crowd sourcing. Similar idea in the USA called Wikipedia loves Art was hugely popular.
Links
Britain Loves Wikipedia
http://britainloveswikipedia.org/

Wikipedia Loves Art
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Loves_Art
5. Digital Literacy
NZCS report
Report from New Zealand Computer Society claims that "A computer-savvy New Zealand could increase workforce productivity by $1.7 billion per year "

Links
NZ Computer Society Report
http://www.nzcs.org.nz/news/blog.php?/archives/90-.html

NZ Herald story, here

APNK
The session mentions the APNK - Aotearoa Peoples Network Kaharoa, a couple of times - especially as a place to extend digital literacy.
http://www.aotearoapeoplesnetwork.org/

Chrome OS Tablet Concept Vid

2010-02-03T08:15:00.000+13:00

Smoke?
Is this real? No idea. But definitively interesting. Chrome feels like Google's long term game plan.

National Library Australia Newspaper Project in D-Lib via Roy Tennant/Current Cities

2010-02-01T14:41:00.006+13:00

site link

It is the Auckland Anniversary holiday here, and I am not supposed to be anywhere near a keyboard - work/life balance and all that - but I can't help but give a shout out to Roy Tennant/Current Citites for picking up on the excellent paper in D-Lib from Rose Holley at the National Library Australia on the success of crowd sourcing at the Australian Newspapers project. The inimitable Mr Tennant, has this to say:

Holley, Rose. "[17]Tagging Full Text Searchable Articles: An Overview of Social Tagging Activity in Historic Australian Newspapers

August 2008 -- August 2009" [18]D-Lib Magazine 16(1/2)(January/February 2010 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january10/holley/01holley.html.

".. Holley reports on the experience of the Australian Newspaper project with regards to user tagging. The project also includes the ability to correct OCR'd text, but this article focuses on the tagging aspect.

The article includes a great deal of data on user tagging over a 15-month period, as well as interesting insights into how users tag full text collections. Of particular interest to me was when the National Library of Australia did not impose any tagging rules or guidelines "they clearly developed their own unwritten rules."

In summary, Holley writes, "The experience of the National Library of Australia shows that tagging is a good thing, users want it, and it adds more information to data. It costs little to nothing and is relatively easy to implement; therefore, more libraries and archives should just implement it across their entire collections."

Highly recommended for anyone interested in tagging, or indeed any type of user-contributed content. - [19]RT ..."

One Year On - John Martyn - Living on Solid Air

2010-01-29T06:00:00.000+13:00

The iPad - details still coming in

2010-01-28T11:34:00.004+13:00

iPad launches
The detail on the iPad is still still coming in, especially around NZ availability. However, there will be two versions - one with wifi - the other with wifi plus 3G. These are the NZ prices from the press release. As to availability, I am still checking.

My two questions
My two questions are all around the eBook function and the accompanying new Bookstore. and that's will I be able to download and play e-books from say the NZETC, NZ Electronic Text Centre, who already use the ePub format without having to go near the Apple Bookstore.

And secondly, when the likes of the 1000 NZ ebooks project goes live, again will I be able to buy and perhaps borrow from a public library ePub versions of the same and play them on my iPad?
In short how open is this puppy?

When available in NZ
Global launch including New Zealand is late March for the wifi version, and sometime in April, 2010 for the wifi/3G version. Latter restricted to USA and selected countries. Is NZ in there. No idea at this stage.

NZ prices to hand

wifi only
16GB $708
32GB $848
64Gb $989

3G plus wifi version
16 GB $890
32GB $1032
64GB $1173

These prices based on US prices converted to NZ dollars at todays rate. This will change. So please don't sue me if this isnt the price in the shop when they arrive..

Newspapers
Still nothing to hand on the fabled deals that are being cooked for magazine and newspaper content. But this is a changing space.

Jim Mora NZ National Radio
Just had a call asking if I would come on The Panel with Jim Mora and guests on his Afternoon Show on National Radio to talk about the iPad. Nothing like the prospect of not knowing what you are talking about to get you doing your homework!

Update
Kelly Gregor from NBR has written an excellent round up of the pros and cons of the iRad for New Zealand, including noting that:

- no iBookstore for New Zealand yet - and no word when it will have access
- no deals struck with local mobile telcos todate
- no newspaper / magazine publishing deals
- no flash player on the device
- no camera

Apart from all that s/he seems quite impressed:-) See here

Censordyne - Internet Censorship in Australia

2010-01-27T07:13:00.001+13:00

Te Ara - Encyclopedia of NZ has new look and revised IA

2010-01-26T11:00:00.004+13:00

Te Ara - Encyclopedia of NZ
Te Ara - the seminal online encyclopedia of NZ, and one of my favorite reference tools, has a nice new look which includes a tweak to their information architecture. This gives them a lot more options in bringing features and topical content to the fore. In short, a definite move to a more useful editorial policy. Other improvements are explained on their blog, here.

I think it looks lovely!

On the blog, they are keen to point out that their theme/keyword based search/browse tool - they call it the browser- is still to hand. You just have to click the option and 'it jauntily slides down'

White gloves under manners
Jaunty it may be - I just like the notion that it is is finally under manners. I always thought it was such a pushy - in your face - little bugger and I hated the way it took up so much real estate while acting like some kind of 'move along' entrance commissionaire with epaulets and white gloves.