Last week I had the pleasure of catching up with a former colleague G. He and I, some twenty one years ago, were involved in a project that delivered the very first Data Warehouse into the BBC. It was a project that had oversight from John Birt, the then Director General, and a manager with … Continue reading A decade of bad IT?
Category: Themes
This week I have learned: That I am really not cut out for skiingLaw firm offices really are hilariously interchangeableOnce you get over the initial silliness of talking about gnomes, you find that they’re a great way to explore interesting problemsThe gulf between wallpapering over the cracks and knocking down the whole damn building is … Continue reading Weeknote 471: sore toes
For the past couple of decades, I've found myself, for one reason or another, in front of groups of people asking them to identify brands that, for them, sum up really great or really bad customer service. In the latter category, the types of brands have remained remarkably stable, even if some of the names … Continue reading Mind the Pizza Gap
This week I have learned: how beautiful a roof there is on the Leeds Corn Exchange that the future is Internet Gnomes when we think of connected devices, we need to think peer to peer as much as hub and spoke maybe Minimum Viable should be the objective? getting a 9-year-old to do violin scales … Continue reading Weeknote 469: The Internet of Gnomes
Today I'm going to be spending some time with folk from different housing organisations talking about concepts of Digital Maturity. The contrary way in which I tend to look at things gives me a natural aversion to such a concept - indeed in the past I have written about the idea of Digital Immaturity. Maybe … Continue reading Faster Horses
Maybe it's just the undue influence of De La Soul in my youth, but there's something about the Rule of Three that I find compelling. Ideas that come in threes just seem... right(er). I've been thinking very hard in the last few weeks about how to bring together an approach that can take us into … Continue reading Technology, change and the rule of three
It's not often I get properly excited about new software. Maybe that's a function of age. Maybe a function of a cynical outlook. But when I started up the PostIt app yesterday, I was genuinely excited about the new feature that the app (which is free) has added - handwriting transcription. If you aren't familiar, … Continue reading Transcribing workshop outputs – the PostIt App
Over the Christmas break, one of the many things I read was Hannah Fry's book about algorithms, Hello World. It's a cracking exploration in non-technical terms about the world of algorithms, artificial intelligence and machine learning. Early on in the book, Hannah describes how all algorithms do one or more of the following things: Prioritization … Continue reading What are your algorithms?
This week I have learned: the callous, psychopathic nature of the way in which multi-national corporates can drop their relationship with a long-term member of staff on a whim. that my interest in UK politics has now basically come to an end, if only to protect my own sanity. that cumulative "quick fixes" can exponentially … Continue reading Weeknote 464: End of the line
None of these early 1970s albums are ones that I actually remember from the time. If I know my mum, most of what I would have been hearing would have been Radio 1. I came across Nick Drake on a compilation album I picked up in the late 1990s and became somewhat captivated by his … Continue reading 51 for 51 – 1972
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