Weeknotes: 19 April 2024 Apr 19 2024April 19, 2024 For a flavour of this week’s notes: it’s everything from historical rail travel to the Bechdel test, by way of music licensing, localgov patterns and tasty pastries. – 3 articles I worked on: ‘Moral rights’, on ‘Websites, social media and copyright’, and on ‘What’s possible with DACS image licensing?’ are now live on the new DACS website. It also has a fast and accurate search – kudos to John at Ten4 Design.– Thrilled to craft content relating to one of my favourite music groups, The Chemical Brothers. DACS has set up licensing agreements for their singles and albums artwork. And am very glad DACS and ALCS are making creatives aware of their moral rights, which are completely separate from intellectual property (IP).– LocalGov patterns – a massive update on this, and a continued celebratory mood – as someone has already managed to get them live again, 8 months ago.– So, enjoy policy, research, design and, some, code documentation and demos on onrendor.com for 2 pretty universal local gov services: parking permit and older person’s bus pass! Martin Jordan and Ben Cheetham both said very nice things about the project.– Also now live, for the first time, is the Rail history timeline I drafted for the 200 year celebration website: railway200.co.uk/timeline. Whoop! Or rather, choo choo!– Have just checked and the VisionPlus24 conference website in Vienna, on 20 and 21 June 2024 from the International Institute for Information Design now mentions we will be able to obtain tickets soon, lovely.– Enjoying a new coworking space La Jonquière in Clichy – and shout out to spacebase.com. I also had the nicest almond triangle pastry on the very street of the co-working, and their free coffee is Very Good – leading to imbibance of 4 espressos yesterday! – Thought nostalgically about the Fetch dog of iWeb designs to server upload fame, after someone on Bluesky quoted Celeste Ng speaking on AI: “Literally no one is asking for the stuff AI is being pushed for right now (which is everything). It’s the tech company version of fetch, and they’re determined to make it happen.”– Also on Bluesky, had interesting chats about dyscalculia, Autism and ADHD.– Got fired up about the need for non-digital paths, a petition to discourage short-haul flights, workplace machismo, and the fact that the actual address – the flat number – is wrong on my new property contract. I mean, come on. This follows the vendor’s name being misspelt, or more kindly typo-ed, by Land Registry. I guess people are more distracted than ever nowadays.– Watched Drive-Away Dolls, and all of new iPlayer comedy Dinosaur. Both pass the Bechdel test, though the former more than the latter.– Tried again to learn when to use ‘which’ and when ‘that’. In English. Was also astounded about some stats that say you can learn a language in 40 weeks. I thought it was a continuous, never-ending task. But passersby do continue to ask me directions in French, and much to my surprise I answer in French, with no ensuing panic on either side. Au revoir!
