Teraknor

Cooking lunch today I was listening to the ‘food programme’ on BBC Radio 4 (see http://bit.ly/aF7o63 apparently podcasts are available). Those who know me, know my fascination with unique food. But this blog entry is not about my gastronomic interests, instead the main gist of the radio programme discussing the use of social media in the promotion of artisan foods. Wow! Listening to educators struggle and ‘not get it’, we have the foodies already out there Tweeting and Facebooking, building communities of followers, enthusiasts and interest groups to promote their wares as well as form a community of interest. Time to learn from a chef me thinks. Andrew Smith Follow me on Twitter: @teraknor

Following on from an earlier blog entry and a news story gaining momentum in the UK Twittersphere http://teraknorblogs.blogspot.com/2010/03/government-gone-mad.html A thought wandered into my mind (this is occasionally allowed) ... “in an edge connected system, how could any government police the additional of underground dark nets?” There are many who have the skill and resource to accommodate this, in turn there are many who will willingly turn a blind eye. There are others capable of tapping into systems to make the connection and many systems with suitable weaknesses to allow this. So, this then begs the question, there must already be some out there (speculation has been that this has been the case for some time). It also raises the issue, that a legislative thump from the UK government will encourage more illicit activity and will move from mere file sharing onto other unsavoury activities. What are your thoughts? Andrew Smith Follow me on Twitter: @terakn...

Having played with Twitter for at least a year, I have slowly formed the notion that it could be a means by which academic centres of many flavours, disciplines and levels could enhance the delivery of their teaching and therefore assist learning. Without giving away the initiative, I have more than one idea and the motivation in seeing how it may be accomplished. Now for the clinch, I am looking for partners in crime, self motivated, able to generate new ideas and open to new ways of thinking. If you are interested, you will work out how to encourage me.

Being a bit “mutton jeff”, also known as deaf or hard of hearing; brings many entertaining challenges. To set the record straight: I don’t suffer from hearing loss, you can’t lose something you never had Yes, I can hear you, but not always It does have a scientific name, apparently its unilateral sensorineural hearing loss (not that I personally agree with the last part of the title) Noisy environments are very difficult I do struggle with some accents if you are quiet or not clear in your speech, I am NOT a racist white man, I simply cannot hear you Phone calls are often hard work Bluetooth headsets, forget it, they don’t work for me No I cannot lip read Yes I do get tinnitus, for me it’s a high pitch squeal and it is an agonizing thirty seconds. Stereo headphones are a nightmare With age and natural loss of hearing, it is slowly getting worse - I am already losing upper frequency range. I just love it when someone approaches me on my deaf side and speaks to me, especi...

For various valid administrative reasons the bureaucracy at my University, delayed the inclusion of “T155 Linux: an introduction” onto our courses and qualifications system (the public website) on the 25th of January 2010. Only 13 weeks before the course starts. With many courses enjoying at least a six month lead on promotion and recruitment, panic stations (mental image of flashing lights and sirens). Now, with, 6 weeks to go, we have over 200 students, having pulled all the stops to recruit students. Question : is it the presence of the Open University Answer : it could be, but that would rely on customers finding the course by accident Question : did a mass mailing help Answer : most likely, it at least was a way of preaching to the converted Question : now you are beginning to rank (13th) in a Google search for ‘Linux course’ ( http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&rls=en&q=linux+course&start=10&sa=N ) Answer : we cannot say, with...

Sitting in a pub, near the heart of one of England's oldest Cities, St Albans is named after the first martyr to Christendom in the days of the roman occupation of all that is south of Hadrian's Wall. Jason Smith (no relation) currently works for Cisco Systems in the UK as a Systems Engineer; his current area of technical expertise is Unified Computing Systems. As a student, he was with the academy programme in the 'early days' remembering version 1 of the course and the change to version 2. Why did you choose to study ICT? Following in my father's footsteps, my interest was always around computers and what I could accomplish with them. Whilst my father works in a technical role, it is considerably different from what I have done since leaving university. I did originally start A level's [in the UK, if you school grades are good, you have the choice of taking A{dvanced} level, academic qualifications] , unfortunately at the school near by childhood hom...

By no means a current news story in the UK, I feel inclined to share this in the bloggersphere as a cautionary tale of the shape of things to come as well as a statement on when government and politicians don’t get it. File sharing, piracy and illegal downloads is an issue, one is not going to comment on the rights or wrongs, but instead on current government policy (see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8569750.stm ). Being passed in the UK House of Lords (has some equivalence to an upper house in other legislative assemblies), there is some cunning on the part of the personalities involved as the House of Commons has limited time and space for any new legislation due to the expected election this year. Based on a three strikes and you are out principle, the law has not considered: How easy it is for someone with technical expertise to masquerade as another The open availability of pay as you go internet, especially in the 3G domain Therefore, who are the criminals ...