Geeky August

This was the first Geeky event that I’ve attended (I think it was the second one so far…). I found it intriguing and inspiring — there were no massively new ideas, but just people celebrating the ideas that interested and excited them.

The venue helped too — Forward Technology have very impressive offices with a bar that almost rivalled the Brewdog round the corner.

detached heads and the practice of empathy

Evgenia Grinblo, @grinblo

• how to design error messages…
• don’t do it like this: http://errorwallofshame.tumblr.com
• Talk human
• Don’t blame the user — users already assume they messed up!
• Tell the user what to do next

Little Printer

Alice Bartlett, @alicebartlett

• Little Printer from BERG — http://bergcloud.com/littleprinter/
• More personal than an email — a physical message arrives in your space
• First units available to the public in October
• Lots of publications available
  • BBC Worldwide: foods in season this week
  • Lanyrd, guardian, instagram, etc
• Daily feeds / stories in parts / collections
• API takes HTML and prints at 200.3 dpi
• Also running “after school clubs” at BERG to test out the printers

when zeppelins ruled the earth

Simon Willison, @simonw

• Norge: Italian zeppelin flew over the North pole
• British Airship R100 had a smoking room… lined with asbestos to be safe!
• USS Akron had a biplane inside it
  • They could launch — and be picked up later while the zeppelin was still flying
  • The “landing” was by matching speeds and being hoisted in from below
• Hangar One “Hangar One (Mountain View, California) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia”) near San Francisco is a beautiful Art Deco building

crochet & pixels

Ruth Jones, @rumyra

• comparing crocheting and pixel design
• both done using squares of equal size but different colours
• crochet can be done at different gauges, going down to really fine thread
• crocheting starts with a 4” square swatch: allows you to measure before you start
• crocheting has a limit of the smallest thread you can manipulate — do pixels have the same?

See how dense you are with Rumyra’s test page

Internet of Things Saves the Day

Jessi Baker, @jessibaker

• Using internet of things (IoT) to help us make better choices
• choosing to be selfish or selfless?
• we’re becoming a society of quantified selves
• Jessi worked with the people who made http://sourcemap.com/: open source map of supply chains
• She then went on to design Open Object: digital shadows of real things
• when we get to out-sourcing part of your mind… (creating your digital daemon?)
• …how would you calibrate it with your morals?

Jessi gave a similar presentation at mLove: see it here.

5 Lessons from the ZX Spectrum

Meri Williams, Geek_Manager, http://blog.geekmanager.co.uk

• learning is fun
• creating is even more fun
• creating it together is awesome
• making stuff and sharing it with your friends is something we should all experience as children
• break something apart, mess with it and make it cooler than it was

Meri’s notes give a lot more detail on her talk