Tag: work

Weeknote 26/2023

Posted on July 3, 2023July 3, 2023 by Doug Belshaw

Well here we are, halfway through the year! I’m composing this at lunchtime on Monday, as Hannah and I went away last night after our son’s debut for his new basketball team. They absolutely destroyed the other team in a friendly, and he scored a 3-pointer on the final buzzer, which was pretty special.

The reason we went away was ostensibly it being 21 years tomorrow since I proposed to her on Prince Edward Island in Canada. That was half a lifetime ago for both of us, and we have fond memories. It’s also two years tomorrow since her mum died, so there’s sadness mixed in there too.

The kids stayed with my parents for the first time in a year. Our son doesn’t really need babysitting as he’s 16, but it’s only fair that he goes along with our 12 year-old daughter. It seems they had a good time. Hannah and I certainly did, basically replicating what we did last time we went away: getting an upgrade at the Crowne Plaza and going for dinner and cocktails at Khai Khai.

Last week, my son started doing some work for WAO, ensuring that we have transcripts for all of our podcast episodes. He’s doing a good job so far. We’re recording another couple of episodes today for Season 7, with Laura currently releasing episodes of Season 6 we recorded over the last couple of months.

I started doing some user research for the workers.coop around Member Learning group. We’re following-up on responses to a survey which asked people for their learning preferences, etc. so that we can create targeted, relevant offerings. In related news, I updated a consent form for Bonfire user research, taking into account Hannah’s feedback (she’s a user researcher for NHS England).

WEAll, one of our clients, decided against using Hylo after testing it in May. This was mainly based on our recommendation due to the lack of effective moderation tools. Now, they’re planning to test Discourse, which is a much better option. So John and I were scoping that out.

Anne’s still finishing off her dissertation and final year of uni work, but she’s rejoined us for a couple of days per week. This is good as she’s very organised (not that the rest of us aren’t!) and brings a different angle and energy to our work, particularly with Participate.

In other news, we’ve had more house viewings but no offers yet. Everyone’s expressed how lovely they think it is, but I guess the housing market is a little slow at the moment. I just hope we don’t miss out on the place we want to move to.

This week is the last one of a crazy few weeks of football trials for my daughter. She was offered a place at Sunderland’s ETC with the final trial for Newcastle’s ETC being on Friday. It’s her choice, but I’m keen for her to join the former as she’ll be mixed with girls a year up, and it’s a more established setup. She was in Newcastle’s ETC this last season, and if she’s offered a place and opts to stay there it’s no bad thing.

So this week I’ll be continuing with client work, doing a bit of business development for September, and considering whether to respond to UNESCO’s call for contributions r.e. the definition of algorithm literacy and data literacy. It’s a tight deadline, but Ian O’Byrne and Tom Salmon have expressed an interest in collaborating, so we’ll see. Ideally, I would have read Kate Crawford’s Atlas of AI this weekend, but… I didn’t.

Weeknote 25/2023

Posted on June 25, 2023June 25, 2023 by Doug Belshaw

I was in Amsterdam from Monday to Friday this week, for MozFest House and a WAO meetup. We ran a session entitled ‘Fostering Transparency and Building a Cooperative Economy’. I also lied about my personal details and preferences to get free iced coffee, hung out on a boat, and melted in the heat.

The end of MozFest House where it was announced that the next one will be in Kenya.

Our house went on the market while I was away, as things moved more quickly than I envisaged. This is a good thing, as we had five viewings booked in yesterday. I was out with my daughter, who was at a Future Lioness event and then represented East Northumberland in the discus at the area athletics championships. She had to run from that even to take part in the relay, and then pretty much kept on running to do the first leg!

I’m keeping this short as we’re about to go and view a house that would potentially be a backup plan to the one we really want. I published a single blog post this week, other than this one, which I called On the paucity of ‘raising awareness’.

Next week it’s back to work in my home office. I hope it’s not too hot, as the lack of sleep from late nights and being in a really hot room with no openable windows while in Amsterdam really took it out of me.

Weeknote 24/2023

Posted on June 19, 2023June 19, 2023 by Doug Belshaw

Temperature sensor showing 25.2 degrees C and 57% humidity

I’m composing this from Newcastle Airport on Monday morning. It’s been a busy weekend, so let’s get that out of the way first.

Saturday morning, I went for a run and then spent most of the day with my wife and daughter at a football tournament for the latter’s new team. They expected to win it, and almost did, had it not been for a penalty given against them during extra time in the final. Back home, shower and change. Out to Wagamama, a family favourite, before our son’s football presentation evening at St James Park, home of Newcastle United. He won Player of the Season, which was not at all expected, although he is awesome (even if I do say so myself).

We were tired enough after the events of Saturday, but on Sunday we had to get the house ready for the estate agent’s photographer, who is coming today (Monday). As anyone who has sold a house in the age of Rightmove will know, the photos are effectively what sell it. So it was a bit of a mission to get everything ready. I was dripping with sweat after gardening, cleaning, painting, etc. So much so that I was thankful for the torrential rain that started in the evening.

It was Fathers Day in the UK yesterday, so we went over to my parents. I’d taken my dad and two kids to see Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse on Friday evening (amazing!) but also bought him a book I’d heard being recommended on a podcast. When I left the family this morning, with my son now finished his GCSE exams, my daughter still recovering from the tournament (she picked up a slight injury), and my wife preparing for a potentially tricky week of user research interviews at work, everyone looked knackered.

I almost can’t remember what I did before this last weekend. Laura’s been away, so it’s been a weird week at work. I published a couple of blog posts in different places:

Other than that, the majority of my work seemed to revolve around community platforms and setting up user research. For example:

Helping WEAll (with John) come to a decision not to adopt Hylo but instead trial Discourse. I think they’ll be happy with it, even if it is a bit less shiny.
Meeting with Participate to discuss our ongoing work and their new platform which we’ll be migrating the existing KBW community to over the coming weeks/months.
Finishing up some of the initial workers.coop projects I’ve been leading. Now that we’re self-hosting Cal.com, not only can we run Co-op Conversations (for people interested in setting up worker co-ops) but we can use it to book user research interviews for the Member Learning group. The How to set up a worker co-op email course which I mentioned last week is now live, as well.
Updating the privacy policy for Dynamic Skillset to include in a user research form for Bonfire.

I realised this week need to write a post about the difference between social networks, chat apps, and forums. People tend to conflate them, which is unhelpful, as they serve different purposes.

There’s plenty of other things I did this week, including deciding not to respond to an RfP after attending the Q&A, preparing for an interview for some other potential work, and just generally getting ready for my upcoming trip.

This coming week, I’ll be in Amsterdam to meet up with my WAO colleagues and for us to run a session at MozFest House. I’m back on Thursday afternoon and will almost immediately take my daughter to her second trial for Sunderland’s academy. She’s also going to the Newcastle trials, but being a Sunderland fan, and knowing it’s a better setup, I’m rooting for her switching from one to the other.

Photo of new temperature and humidity sensor in my home office. It ended up going up to 28.8 C so I bought an evaporative cooler, which increased the humidity but meant I could work in there! The awesome TRYING patch is bright orange in real life and came via Dan Sinker.