Ed Mitchell: Platform neutral

Half web producer, half group facilitator. Groups support: online and in the physical world.

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Knowledge Cafe Report: Reslience

September 22nd, 2009 · Events, Facilitation

This is a brief report on our Bristol Knowledge Cafe on ‘Reslience’, kindly introduced by Phillipa Bayley, keenly discussed by about 30 of us, space kindly lent by the ever effervescent Pervasive Media Studio.

Ciaran, Tim, Michael and Philippa kindly wrote up some of their reflections which I include along with my own.

Phillipa gave an excellent presentation on the subject, considering some different definitions, the context (from personal to eco-system), whether we can ‘build’ it, what the properties of a resilient system could be, and a few further thoughts.

You can see the presentation here:

Write up from Phillipa:

Ciaran on the tension between building resilient systems that have redundancy, and “efficient” systems – e.g. for power generation.  The argument goes that although micro-generating, distributed systems might be more resilient, they cost twice as much.  But is the real question how you cost these things appropriately?  As with the banking crisis, the cost of fixing everything after the disaster is absolutely enormous.  There’s also the question of the real environmental costs of building massive power plants, as well as the toll on people’s lives who live near them etc.

K-cafe group

K-cafe group

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Gurteen Knowledge Cafe: Resilience: dealing with an uncertain future

August 20th, 2009 · Events, Facilitation

The next Gurteen Bristol Knowledge Cafe is going to be held in the uber-resilient Pervasive Media Studio, Bristol, on Thursday September  17th, from 18:30. The cafe proper will begin at 19:00 prompt as usual.

Our introductory speaker is Philipa Bayley, acting head of the Centre for Public Engagement, Bristol University (and full on neuro-science doctor geek but don’t tell her I told you that).

Our subject is ‘resilience’; we will be hearing a lot of this word soon, that’s a guarantee.

Here’s the blurb:

None of us knows what the future holds (not even Mystic Meg) but chances are there are some not-too-nice things up ahead.

Whether we’re thinking about the challenges that individuals, communities or nations face, resilience is about how we deal with those challenges and not only bounce back, but ‘bounce up’.

Come and discuss what makes people and organisations resilient, and how we might build that capacity in from the start.

As usual, please come along and enjoy while meeting and deepening your understanding of this topic, and book yourself in using the event booking page below.

If you want to stay up to date via the email distribution list, the link follows, and if you’re a facebook kind of person, Michael Corbett is the man behind the Bristol K-cafe group and is usually around for a good conversation…

Event booking and venue information link

Bristol Gurteen Knowledge Cafe mailing list link

Bristol Gurteen Knowledge Cafe Facebook group

Some other handy links:

Definition of resilience on wikipedia

Interesting piece from Dave Pollard on resilience

jellyfish on flickr

jellyfish on flickr

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Running local Transition events: some suggestions and questions

July 17th, 2009 · Events, Facilitation

We’re getting our local Transition initiative, Transition Montpelier, off the ground (have a look at the Transition Towns website or Rob Hopkins blog for an idea about the movement).

We have had two open meetings to date, several small projects under our belts, a range of new ideas and related groups emerging; it’s all good. We have learnt a lot from these events and wanted to share some suggestions; these aren’t neccesarily Transition specific, mind; nor are they meant to be comprehensive so if you have other ideas, let me know.


(A bit of ‘speed networking’ usually goes down very well)

Things we would suggest to bear in mind for holding meetings:

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Bristol Bioblitz blog: the secret was in the content

July 9th, 2009 · Events, Technology

I recently helped out Berry Goddard and Savita Custead of the Bristol Natural History Consortium team by setting up and explaining how to use a WordPress blog, flickr id, and youtube channel for their Bristol Bioblitz event.

Bioblitz is a new model; think: nature watch meets science engagement meets family fun and geeky naturalist kind of affair:

The BioBlitz is a 30-hour race again the clock event where scientists, naturalists, students, members of public, schools and community groups work together to find and identify as much wildlife as possible in the Ashton Court Estate. (About page)

The technologies were deployed in order to extend the reach of the engagement exercise across the web, explore how to use different media for this new model, offer visitors more opportunities for interaction, and a quick updating mechanism.

The blog was a great success while the flickr group attracted some great photos.


(screengrab of free WordPress Bristo Bioblitz Blog)

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BBC Learning Unplugged: event report

July 2nd, 2009 · Events, Facilitation, Technology

This is a report on the BBC Learning Unplugged event in Bristol, 26 June 2009.

James Richards (BBC Learning Development) and Myles Runham (BBC Learning) co-hosted the event with Clare Reddington (Ished); I designed and facilitated it with help from Jack Martin Leith. There were approximately 65 attendees, made up of 15 BBC folk and 50 creative (and) technology types from around the country.

This report is split into the following:

  • Event purpose
  • Event outcomes
  • Event design
  • Event report
  • Event documents for download

Event purpose:

  • To profile the work and properties of BBC Learning to a community of pervasive media practitioners
  • To communicate BBC Learning’s thoughts and ambitions in the area of creating new pervasive media projects with the BBC’s properties
  • To work collaboratively over the day to create a range of high concept propositions
  • To provide a networking opportunity for attendees to meet and interact

For the attendees it was a chance to:

  • Meet and interact with others working in this field
  • Gain unique access to BBC Learning commissioners
  • Surface and discuss proposition ideas with BBC Learning staff as a group in an innovation lab format

Event outcomes:

At the end of the event, out of as many ideas as surfaced during the day, the three most suitable ideas (for BBC Learning) were identified by the BBC crew. These ‘idea holders’ would then work them over a bit more after the event, negotiate and discuss with BBC Learning and iShed, before one final idea will be chosen. This idea will then receive financial and organisational support by BBC Learning and iShed in order to put together a formal pitch to the Beeb.

In line with iShed’s keen dedication to brokering relevant and constructive relationships between different actors in the world of creative technology, an important underlying theme for the event design was to afford as many productive conversations between the different groups in the room. This was primarily to get the BBC folk to meet and work with non-BBC folk;  so a lot of attention was paid to ensuring that happened.

Event design:

I was very keen to introduce some (apparently) more informal, emotional stuff into this event. Our previous events for Media Sandbox have had a rather rational ‘knowledge’ edge to them – quite cerebral and purposeful – these have been sucessful, but after working with some of the Transition facilitators I wanted to explore some of the more unknown elements of human networking and decision making, and encourage the attendees to explore their responses to ‘ideas’ at different levels (head, heart and gut).


(event designing sheet)

Hence the event was structured to be relatively loose and informal in the morning, with a lot of movement and activity, no tables, lots of networking, some role play, different teams forming and discussing stuff. After lunch we got down to the serious business of brainstorming at tables, introducing a more formal, cerebral atmosphere.

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Transition Montpelier presence at Bristol Art Fringe

April 22nd, 2009 · Events, Facilitation

Transition Montpelier is a new-ish Transition initiative in my neighbourhood. I am involved and excited.

These things are challenging to get off the ground, but Dan Weisselberg and the other early members are putting a lot of effort and inspiration into it, having already organised a neighbourhood clean up (particularly fine thank you poster), found some excellent community space in a local (old) school, building local networks of interested neighbhours etc.

A bunch of us will all be in the old Fairfield School for both days, explaining what it’s all about, having some fun putting a community timeline together, and other stuff.

Here’s the flyer:

Come along.

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Gurteen Knowledge Cafe: The purpose and limits of KM

April 9th, 2009 · Uncategorized

The next Gurteen Bristol Knowledge Cafe is going to be held in the ever-purposeful Pervasive Media Studio, Bristol, on Thursday  June 11th, from 18:30. The cafe proper will begin at 19:00 prompt.

Local wise guy, innovation catalyst, and font of much knowledge Chris Dean has kindly agreed to share his thoughts on ‘The Purpose and limits of Knowledge Management (KM)’ with us, which I can pretty much guarantee will be a very thought provoking intro to this excellent choice of subject. Here’s the blurb:

Since “KM” and “The Universe” are not synonyms it follows that KM is some subset of the latter, but which? Similarly, there is a purpose to KM – well there is isn’t there! (please let there be a purpose!!!).

It’s not really as abstract as it sounds, though it will provoke discussion…

As usual, please come along and enjoy while meeting and deepening your understanding of this topic, and book yourself in using the event booking page below.

If you want to stay up to date via the email distribution list, the link follows, and if you’re a facebook kind of person, Michael Corbett is the man behind the Bristol K-cafe group and is usually around for a good conversation…

Event booking and venue information link

Bristol Gurteen Knowledge Cafe mailing list link

Bristol Gurteen Knowledge Cafe Facebook group

(thanks flickr)

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My Grandparents’ letters

April 8th, 2009 · Uncategorized

For some time, we have been carting around a few suitcases of old family letters between various family homes. They are between my grandmother and grandfather and cover their courting (across the Atlantic – he in UK, she in US), their marriage (in UK) and the second world war (grandad in the navy).

My mum gave them to a researcher from The Victoria and Albert Museum recently. She recently had an update:

Dear Mrs Mitchell

As it is some months since I was last in touch, I thought that you might appreciate a progress report.  Your parents’ correspondence has been sorted chronologically, starting with the very first letters in July 1930 and ending with a scattering of letters from the late 1940s.  The collection fills ten archive boxes!

Your mother was a particularly devoted correspondent, writing dutifully each day and spending several hours on her self appointed task.  Your father tried very hard but could not quite match her either in the frequency of his letters or in their length!

I have particularly enjoyed reading about Boston, which evokes for me so many happy memories of my family holiday last August, and have also been fascinated by the references to the financial crises of the early 1930s.

The collapse of two of the banks with which your grandfather Page was associated is of course echoed by the recent demise of various banks and building societies in 2009…

Well I never.

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Gurteen K-cafe report: Generosity, 04/02/09

February 10th, 2009 · Events, Facilitation

February’s Bristol Gurteen Knowledge cafe was a heart warming eye in the storm of some very exciting UK winter weather.

Steve Bridger gave us a great presentation around and about the subject of Generosity which left us with plenty to think about, personally, publicly and professionally. And Jesus’ social network, but that’s another story…

After a whistle stop tour ranging from big brands to personal sharing, religion to altruism, giving to taking, he left us with six things to think about:

  1. Start with people
  2. We are what we share
  3. Is the social web making weak ties stronger than blood ties?
  4. Successful brands are exceptionally generous
  5. Create experiences that mirror people’s aspirations
  6. Do we need new metrics for generosity?

There was a lot of discussion about society and culture, sharing in general and our expectations of selves and other. Maslow’s hierachy of needs came up along with some clarity about the term ‘survival of the fittest‘ (whereby it could be said that the Capitalist hegemony related the term ‘fittest’ to a blindly competitive theme rather than ‘that which is most suitable to its context’, which gives it a very different feel:

What’s more, although the phrase conjures up an image of a violent struggle for survival, in reality the word “fittest” seldom means the strongest or the most aggressive. On the contrary, it can mean anything from the best camouflaged or the most fecund to the cleverest or the most cooperative. Forget Rambo, think Einstein or Gandhi.
(New Scientist article: Evolution myths)

We thought about why we give to charity, the implications of dis-intermediatory bodies like Kiva, Freecycle, Swop, School of Everything etc., whether big corporations actually can give, why, and what that means.

[Read more →]

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Gurteen Knowledge Cafe Bristol: Generosity: 4 February

January 9th, 2009 · Events

Gurteen logo

The next Gurteen Bristol Knowledge Cafe is going to be held in the ever-generous Pervasive Media Studio, Bristol, on Wednesday 4th February, from 18:30. The cafe proper will begin at 19:00 prompt.

Steve Bridger, local k-cafe member and ‘Chief Generosity Officer’ (with almost 20 years of work within and consulting to the charity sector) will be sharing his thoughts on the subject with us before we get into discussion.

As usual, please come along and enjoy while meeting and deepening your understanding of this topic, and book yourself in using the event booking page below:

Event booking and venue information link

Bristol Gurteen Knowledge Cafe mailing list link

Bristol Gurteen Knowledge Cafe Facebook group

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