Thursday, 30th March, 2006

Reggie is Twenty

video cat

...and a spritely twenty at that

(Sorry about all these random little movies — the novelty of being able to do this will wear off soon, I bet.)

TN Rep Says Gay People Adopt to Molest (morons.org)

link

The mind boggles

How I Know It's Spring

random weather

Weather's a bit odd today — pissy rain this morning, the odd patch of sunshine here and there — usual End Of March™ type stuff. But I can say, with the upmost authority and conviction, that it is indeed Spring, despite all the evidence to the contrary.

How? Well...

Downstairs, in the coffee bar on campus, some bright spark has decided to foist the notion that blue skies are here on all and sundry by projecting a PowerPoint presentation of flowers and the word "Spring" over everyone's heads.

Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but it feels like some Orwellian-type progpaganda, like "the Powers That Be have decreed that you will all be happy and joyful and cheerful — or there will be consequences".

To anthropomorphise the situation...

uni: "It's Spring!"

me: "Um, have you looked out the window?"

uni: /fingers in ears "La la la"

Journey Thoughts

random

Just a couple of things that occurred to me today, and got dwelt on a bit in my head on the drive home.

(1) What the hell has happened to Abbey National?

This is old news, obviously, and it's been furtling around my head for a while now — but I saw a truck that kinda reminded me of their new logo in front of me in a queue, and it brought it back to the front of my tired thinking-head.

Abbey (née Abbey National) seem to not be able to decide on a logo. Or at least they have, but after a very quick-and-brief image overhaul. I distinctly remember them trying to wear the "we're a fun and friendly bank" hat a wee while ago, when they started calling themselves "abbey" and changed their logotype to a funky colourful blobby pseudo-typeface.

But (I might be wrong here) less than a year later, they're still called "Abbey", but now a somber, white-serif-typeface-on-red Abbey.

I quite liked the funky one What happened?

(2) Do I know a taxi driver in Harrogate?

This morning, whilst walking to the bus stop in Harrogate, a taxi went past me, flashed his lights, and waved cheerfully at me. Or at least I think it was at me — there was an old guy behind me, who looked as equally perplexed as myself.

I didn't recognise the driver at all And I'm pretty sure that the only person I know in Harrogate is Marion — except for an old trannie-friend of mine that (a) I've never met in person, and (b) haven't seen for ages.

This is not of earth-shattering importance ... I'm just curious.

(3) Dwelt or dwelled?

In the first paragraph of this post. Up there ↑. Should it be "dwelt on" or "dwelled on"?

(4) My job

Something Ms Everson said yesterday made me think a lot. It sparked a large conversation in my head about certain self-defining ideas and principles.

I am about to try and write something very long and in-depth about what it is that I think I do...

Um Loz ... aren't those ads the ones for Nat West?

When do we get the "Preview" button back?

As soon as I have three weeks to spare. Like now! (I am so on vacation )

Lecture Notes

teaching computers

In which Siobhan's Weblog becomes a vauge jotter in which she tries to get to the bottom of some ideas she has at the moment.

However, you are their teacher, and they're paying to have you show them things right? Maybe a wholesome mix of "this is how you do it" and "this is where you can find out more about how to do it, so RTFM dammit!" is in order?

So, um, here's the thing Ignoring the "they're paying you" part of that (and the hideous leap into a large rant about consumeristic values encroahing into Academia, and all that I think is Wrong And Bad™ about such a thing), the difficulty I always have is pinning down the "things" that I should be showing my students.

On the face of it, because I mainly deal in 'artistic' activities that invariably involve the use of computers, there's an almost unavoidable perception that what I'm all about is a very technical, and procedural form of teaching.

"Siobhan uses computers in her work. Therefore Siobhans teaching should be centred around how to use computers"

I'm pretty sure that this sort of thing exists within other specialities — I imagine that a lot of photographers, for example, probably get a little sick of explaining how a camera works and how to use one, rather than discussing the merits of individual photographs.

But for some reason — possibly because they're the 'big thing' at the moment — computers seem to have an extra element of skills-based teaching associated with them.

It seems that the important thing — from the students' point of view at least — is to be able to tick off various bits of software from some imaginary check-list, and Big Marks In Degrees™ and Job Satsfaction For Life™ will ensue.

...

I'd like to throw in a bit of a vague analogy at this point, if I may.

Everyone, whilst not perhaps actually having an "Uncle Geoff" (I don't, for a start), will most likely know someone just like him. He's the uncle that's a Bit Into Computers™ — the uncle that's read iTunes For Dummies and spends every family event armed with his Latest New Toy™ and the weeks afterwards mailing DVDs that he made himself out to all and sundry.

These DVDs will, without fail, be ghastly adaptations of stock templates — punctuated and differentiated only by random FLASH moments of clip-art and gumpf — but the fact that they look awful will never be commented on.

The important fact — or at least to Uncle Geoff that is — is that he made it himself.

Ha ha! These designer and techy types talk out of their arses! Uncle Geoff is dead clever because he made it himself.

...

You see, there is, I believe, a global idea that it's the making of things that is important — not what those things are actually like. The number of pieces of crud that you come across on your daily internet wanderings is quite astounding — and behind each one of them, you can be sure that there's an Uncle Geoff who's really rather proud of himself for pressing the right buttons in Word.

And I think, somehow, that this idea has pervaded its way into education. The instant-gratification a student can have from being able to follow through a simple set of steps and burn their first DVD is the start of a slippery slope down some kind of imadethisaholic nightmare.

"I need to make a DVD, I must learn how to use DVD Studio Pro."

"I have some film footage that needs editing, I must learn Final Cut Pro"

"I want a website, I must learn Dreamweaver"

This afternoon, during a communal fag-break, I was talking to one of the Third Years, who I knew was trying to get a website made. In fact, I'd lent her my "CSS Bible" that I refer to all the time, just so she had a good starting point.

"I figured" she said, "that actually I really didn't have time to learn how to go about the whole process just for one website. So I've got a friend to help me with it"

Bingo. Perfect.

I then spent a bit of time talking to her about how I feel that it's much more important to learn how to communicate ideas to people who are helping you, than it is to be able to do something yourself.

...

But, Im sorry. I'm straying completely from the point that was in my head earlier, and going down a well-trodden path of rantage that I seem to return to over and over again.

The point that I was thinking about last night, and on the journey home, is just what is it that I'm supposed to teach?

It's not how to use Photoshop. It's not how to use Final Cut Pro, or Dreamweaver, or After Effects, or DVD Studio Pro ... it's why you'd use them.

Actually, it's not even that. It's something completely different — something that I'm going to have to buck the trend of a lifetime and actually start blowing my own trumpet a little bit here.

It's about at what level you engage with Digital Media.

...

Let's turn the clock back for a moment here — back to 1979, when I was about seven.

I grew up in a family dominated by mathematics — it's what my father does, and it's what my mother used to do too. My brother is some kind of statistical whizz-kid, and my sister spends almost as much time staring at code as she does staring into a pint glass.

Going back to my father though — and I realise I don't write about him very often — the man is technically a genius. He got into Oxford when he was fifteen, and had a PhD by the age of 21. As a young lecturer in Belfast (about the age I am now, come to think of it) he was naturally involved with the blossoming computer scnene — and I remember distinctly going to play with the punch cards in his department as a kid.

I like to think, that for a certain proportion of people of my age, we have a unique perspective on computers. It amazes me sometimes that the people I teach were born after 1984 — the year that the Macintosh first came out.

For some of us, we grew up with command-lines, and BASIC, and FORTRAN, and that weird freaky turtle that we could get to draw stuff on the floor. We grew up exploring this strange world of MODE 7 (remember the chunkiness of MODE 2 on a BBC Micro? But oh those colours!)

We experienced computers as raw things. We understood that if you wanted them to do something, you had to explain to them in clear and precise language what it was that you wanted them to do.

But it's different now. With the advent of the WIMP environment, and the WYSIWYG reliance that everyone has on the machines these days, the User is drawn further and further away from what's actually going on inside our shiny aluminium boxes.

WHen you had to type, you were connected somehow with what was going on — you could work out why things weren't happening the way you expected them. Now, computers work (or at least it appears that this is what the perception is) by some mystical voodoo.

...

On of the phrases that annoys the shit out of me, is "I'm not very good with computers, me". How can that be the case? How can it possibly be that for some people things work, and for others they don't?

Over and over again, I experience my little IT Crowd moments — hours of user-frustration because a Mac doesn't seem to be behaving, only to be punctuated by it working the moment I turn up and press one button.

And the perception (which, admittedly, I wouldn't want to lose for a second ) is that I have some kind of Mac Mojo — that the minute they see me approaching they decided that it's about time they started behaving themselves.

But I was thinking ... why is it that computers (mainly, admittedly, Macs) behave for me and not others? Why is it that I can get them to do things effortlessly, whereas others struggle? What is it that makes me special in regards to computers?

And a little thought struck me on the drive home this evening — just outside of Bramhope...

I engage with computers and digital media natively.

...

You know when you drag a file from one volume to another, and it copies it rather than moves it? I know why, because I understand what a filesystem is.

You know when you save an JPEG a few times, and the quality gets all yukky? I know why, because I understand what JPEG Compression is.

You know how hard it is to make a DVD, and how impossible it is to turn a DVD back into editable footage? I know why, because I know what an MPEG is, and what a VOB is, and what multiplexing is.

You know how that piece of sharware you got crashes every now and again? I know why, because I know what a programme is, and what memory is, and (more specifically) what memory leaks are.

I'm not saying that I'm some kind of expert on any of these things, but I know the concepts behind them. I understand what computers are — because of how I learnt to use them.

And I was thinking, last night, that my job isn't to teach people how to use computers — it's how to engage with them in the same way that I do.

...

But I was naturally also thinking about just what it is that makes the way that I engage with All Things Digital™ different to how my students engage with them — and how I could turn that difference into some kind of lecture programme that would benefit them.

So I thought I might just take a bit of time to set out exactly what it is that I do these days to keep abreast of things.

(Ha! Siobhan said "breast"!)

I do, honestly, believe that there's a sizable chunk of the population of the world who are in their mid-thirties right now, in a wonderful position to be able to share what they know about — and their experiences of — computers, to a wider section of the population, so that we don't end up with a sea of illiterate fools all bobbing around clutching "For Dummies" books and drowing in technical support.

And I think it all comes down to what you read...

(1) Historical context

One of my favourite things to read on the internet, is The Jargon File. Not because it's some kind of glossary to be referred to when you don't understand a word, but because it's a wonderful starting point to find out how we've ended up with what we have right now.

The tales and anecdotes contained within a lot of the definitions — even the tone in which they're written — tells you an awful lot about the kinds of mentalities that went into creating this online (and offline) space which we're all so keen to inhabit nowadays.

The appendices are what I reccomend, personally — especially this section from "Tom Knight and the LISP Machine...

A novice was trying to fix a broken Lisp machine by turning the power off and on.
Knight, seeing what the student was doing, spoke sternly: "You cannot fix a machine by just power-cycling it with no understanding of what is going wrong."
Knight turned the machine off and on.
The machine worked.

It's only, I believe, by understanding how we've arrived at where we are, that you can ever hope to have an incling about where we're going.

(2) Current trends

In 1982, I could have written you a top-notch programme in BASIC that would have done pretty much anything you'd want it to (albeit quite slowly). In 2006, I can't. Not because I don't know BASIC anymore, but because BASIC is obselete.

Everything becomes obselete — to an extent. Everything gets replace by something NEW! and EXCITING! and MODERN!

Earlier today, I was internally lamenting at a conversation between two students (not mine) who were discussing just how good they were in Flash.

"Yeah, well I pretty much know it all now. There's not much else I think I need to know"

"What are you going to do when Adobe release the next version?" ... is what I should have said.

I subscribe to a lot of things. I read MacUser religiously. I have RSS feeds coming out of my ears. I try to take note of every single buzzword that gets floated around the Net.

I worry, sometimes, that maybe I should be spending more of my time reading about things going on in the Art world — but then I figure that that's what my colleagues do, not what I do.

Because if I didn't keep up with things, then we wouldn't have a seriously fucking great website with more bells and whistles that you can shake a stick at, and that as soon as I iron out the creases, every single art course in the country is going to want a piece of.

(3) Manuals

At work, I have a favourite mug. We all know my mug — it was one that I was very chuffed that I bought off Think Geek

I'm quite possesive about my mug — I lock it away in a cupboard every night. But (in my defence) people have a habit of nicking things from my little Mac Empire — and the thing I'd hate to lose more than anything else is my mug.

Students often ask me, just what the letters on my mug mean...

"Just what do the letters on your mug mean Siobhan?" they ask.

And I take great delight in telling them.

Because, sometimes, I feel like I'm some kind of shortcut. The rantage that was building up inside of me yesterday — that "I am a resource" thing — it's all about me being some kind of shortcut to knowledge.

True, I'm a teacher tutor — but what I should be tutoring is methods, rather than techniques.

I read computer manuals. For the fun of it. But it's because I rad them that I know how to make things happen. The reason I know Adobe After Effects inside out, is because I read the manual inside out.

Twice.

I consume manuals — they're deep pits of knowledge and interest. Today (for example), I spent about sisxty quid on Amazon buying manuals for Bash scripting, sed and awk, PHP (because I realised just how bodgy my scripting is), and, um, something else that I forget.

I could just post a query in some BBS or something, demanding someone tell me everything I need to know about each and every one of those — but I want to find out for myself.

...

Don't, please, take anything of the above as Firm And Solid Thoughts™ — I'm just trying to work something out at the moment. The only Firm And Solid Thought™ is that I believe that I (and people like me — Of A Certain Age™) are in a unique position to be able to talk to others about the underlying concepts of what's going on at the moment.

We're the bridge between the double-clicky-madness that exists in the minds of the under-twenties, and the luddite refusniks of The Elderly™.

But I think we need to establish — quite rapidly — exactly where we sit in the grand scheme of things, before we get washed out of history by hoardes of Myspacers and their unstoppable consumation of everything that we've achieved.

(That last line makes no sense. This is what happens when you drink whilst writing)

Heh RTFM hon

you teach them to read anything, so they can handle both books that have not yet been written, and books from years ago.

Good analogy — and one not disimilar to my rant about Phonetics (which I'm too drunk too look up)

My question (to myself) right now though, is how do I do that. What is it about myself that is unique, and how do I diseminate that to other people?

My problem is I buy loads of them.. and only ever read the first few chapters

Damm, and I was just about to order phpBB For Dummies for you and all.