I’ve decided to disable comments on my blog again.
I don’t care that the comment threads often wound up in left field talking about meta-meta-meta-social criticism. Having comments open invites that kind of thing to happen - it’s leaving an open mic plugged into the PA system, and inviting anyone to take it. That’s essentially the whole point of having open comments, to see where things go after hitting “Publish.”
Read MoreDuncan Davidson, a photographer I’ve admired for years (he’s one of the guys behind the dailyshoot project), wrote up a fantastic description of the recent Kind of Bloop/Blue photograph copyright brouhaha. A photographer, Jay Maisel, takes an iconic photograph of Miles Davis. It’s an amazing photograph. It’s used for the cover of Davis’ Kind of Blue album. Wonderful stuff.
[caption id=“attachment_4951” align=“aligncenter” width=“530” caption=“Pixel-art image by Andy Baio. Photograph by Jay Maisel.”]
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This is one of those photos that looks extremely dramatic, but has a boring and mundane backstory. I was doing housework - probably laundry or something equally exciting and glamorous - when I looked out of our bedroom window and saw these clouds. The sun was just about to set (nearly 9pm on a mid-July evening), causing some severe and dramatic lighting, and the storm cell was boiling up over downtown into higher altitude winds. I ran, grabbed my handy XT, slapped on the el cheapo 300mm lens and started messing around to see what I could capture. And then a plane moved into the frame. It was far away from the storm cloud, but the lighting and long focal length made it look like a narrow escape. Often, people think this photo was taken from the air, and that I was shooting down on the cloud. I wasn’t so lucky.
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I’m working on a couple of projects that will involved formalized “stakeholder engagement” processes, so I’m reading up on some of the resources from that field. First up is the United Nations handbook: The Stakeholder Engagement Manual, by the United Nations Division of Technology, Industry and Economics.
It’s describing an engagement process based on the goals of inclusiveness and sustainability, rather than corporate risk management. That approach could come in handy in lots of places.
Read MoreWe rode up Highway 40, over the Highwood Pass. The highest paved highway in Canada. It’s closed for the winter, and doesn’t open to motorized traffic until June 15, so it’s wide open for bicycles for the short period that it’s passable before being open.
The route we chose wasn’t long - total ride was just shy of 34km. Nothing fancy. But the elevation gain was 1850 feet, over the 17km climb to the summit. When we got to the top, there was still several feet of snow on the ground (recently cleared from the highway by road crews).
Read More@noiseprofessor provided an artist’s rendition of next weekend’s planned Highwood Pass ride.
Not sure how fast it’d be, but it’s good to have a backup plan…
Read More> sorry, but there’s no way in hell you’d ever get me to use blackboard again.
>
> - a prof, after switching to wordpress
Awesome. Doesn’t help my MSc thesis research progress much, but the whole blogging platform thing is making a real difference on campus. Love it!
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A blog of funny faux-historical tweets published a book a couple of years ago, and used one of my photos as the background for a twitter account of a caveman. Pretty cool. They’re going to print again, and the photo’s still in there.
The book’s available on Amazon.com. I don’t see a penny of sales, but I wouldn’t have seen a penny for that photo anyway…
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This was taken during a session as part of the Open Education 2009 conference in Vancouver. David Wiley and Stephen Downes were meeting, to prepare a manuscript for a book on open education, and they agreed to conduct the meeting as an open conversation. The venue that was provided set the tone - the meeting took place in an old courtroom, with all of the trappings still visible, abandoned, behind them as they talked.
Read MoreI’ve been experimenting with bits of software to take control of my online content. The functionality is all there for me to run my own stuff, without feeding corporate silos. I can post text, images, photos, videos. I can store files and access them from anywhere. Without having to hand my bits over to any company.
Except when I want to play with others. To do that, I still need to wade into the silos. Flickr isn’t about photo storage or hosting - it’s about seeing what my friends and family are photographing. Twitter isn’t about posting 140char updates - it’s about seeing the flow of activity from the people I care about.
Read MoreAn awesome video/ad by the great Camera Store in Calgary. These guys take photography pretty seriously.
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