tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-90742845091108627492012-01-05T05:41:04.703-08:00Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.comBlogger871100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-53884076800714421352011-06-19T10:08:00.000-07:002011-08-16T05:11:49.007-07:00

There is something wrong about Camelot, the new TV telling of the Arthurian Legend.  It could be the stilted acting, it might be the anachronistic language of the script, perhaps it is the fact that Eva Green always makes me feel a little ill (I swear that woman has a touch of the fey about her), or horror or horrors could it be that the whole Arthurian Legend is now a bit tired? After all, we've

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-8475309972422479972011-02-23T13:57:00.000-08:002011-02-23T14:09:57.882-08:00

So the government is shocked and surprised that Universities want to use the new fees system to recover all the money they lost through the HE funding cuts. Most V-Cs seem to think that a charge of 7.5k to 8k would allow them to balance the books again, and many of the UKs stronger Unis think that its an opportunity to charge a prestigious 9k and effectively get an extra 1k per student to improve

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-20000039248111648622011-02-20T05:36:00.000-08:002011-02-21T04:59:24.211-08:00

The last five years or so has been an incredible time to be involved in e-learning. We've seen the rise and demise of the Digital Native, the flight and delight of students and academics to Web 2.0 systems, and the attempted murder of the VLE (we now know that reports of its death have been greatly exaggerated). In our work in the Learning Societies Lab we've played our own small part in that

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-46128951894292977792011-01-22T15:20:00.000-08:002011-01-24T13:57:05.658-08:00

So later this year the UK will go to the polls for a referendum on changing our voting system. It will be the first national referendum since 1975. It will also be a massive waste of time and money. Now if we were proposing changing the voting system to something with real constitutional bite - like the Single Transferable Vote (STV, a form of proportional representation) - we should have a

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-46842694734308098842010-12-30T12:44:00.000-08:002010-12-30T14:42:05.420-08:00

Given that we are no longer to spend public money on higher education the new deal for students is progressive and better than their current financial arrangements - but goodness that misses the point! The thing that we all seem to have forgotten is that there is no given and that the privatisation of higher education is not the only way forward. I've seen to much energy over the last few weeks

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-31333899640508459082010-11-25T13:46:00.000-08:002010-11-25T14:05:35.553-08:00

Isn't the Web great? Isn't it crazy and anarchic, vibrant and wild, unpredictable, awesome and thoroughly marvelous? Well it has been, but there is no guarantee that it will stay that way. I've been working with and researching Hypertext for nearly fifteen years. The Hypertext systems that I studied for my PhD were alternative contemporaries of the early Web - based on a desktop model and

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-53977136901264711002010-09-24T13:36:00.000-07:002010-09-24T13:42:01.934-07:00

About a fortnight ago I managed to wrestle a shiny new iPhone 4 out of the University. It's a long and frankly uninteresting story full of needless hoop jumping and energy-sapping effort. Suffice to say that I fought hard for this little device.Two years ago I wrote about why the iPhone 3G was so enormously important. This was a device that wasn't just great to own and use, it redefined the

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-33860401439273965152010-09-17T16:14:00.000-07:002010-09-18T07:18:51.861-07:00

This blog post is an abridged version of a guest editorial I co-wrote for the New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia, Special Issue on Web Science. The full editorial can be found in EPrints.Hypertext and the WebWhat is Hypertext? It is well known in our community that the word Hypertext was coined by Nelson in 1965 to describe his vision of an intertwingled world of transcluded electronic texts

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-56237076414512189942010-05-07T03:46:00.000-07:002011-01-22T15:46:31.264-08:00

A weird night for UK politics. The people have spoken, and they said "Erm..." Not only have we ended up with a hung parliament, but it is so precariously balanced that no obvious power bloc has enough votes to stake a convincing claim to government (BBC estimates 320 vs 315 seats, with 326 needed for a genuine majority). The only obvious outcome this morning is that we will all be doing this

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-54116100685476584732009-11-18T16:30:00.001-08:002009-11-18T16:40:32.191-08:00

For the last few years I've been involved in research and development projects where the goal has been to design, build and evaluate useful and useable knowledge and information interfaces. But I've always had a problem articulating this as a research challenge. It's related to Human Computer Interaction (HCI) but isn't so much concerned with surface details or visual interfaces, but seems an

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-73613822917309779022009-10-02T11:22:00.000-07:002009-10-02T11:31:45.160-07:00

This week I was at ECTEL - The European Conference on Technology Enhanced Learning. The main event for me was actually the workshop for Semantic Technology in Higher Education (SEMHE), where I was on a discussion panel at the end of the day considering potential roadmaps for semantic technology adoption in HE. The atmosphere was unusually pragmatic for this type of event, with real open

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-60053996947338856742009-09-05T15:42:00.000-07:002009-09-05T15:56:29.576-07:00

District 9, the new film directed by Neill Blomkamp and produced by Peter Jackson, is getting a lot of good press. Critics like the vision of the young director:"District 9 proves that genre films, besides being a hell of a lot of fun, can say things you hadn't considered and show stuff you haven't seen." Time.comThey like the quality of the acting, and the special effects:"District 9 is the rare

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-39653517716953786542009-09-04T14:34:00.000-07:002009-09-04T14:49:15.297-07:00

It was about two and half years ago that I belatedly jumped on the blog bandwagon. I had resisted for a few years because I already had a perfectly serviceable website, but by the beginning of 2007 it was increasing apparent that if I wanted to continue to teach and research people's relationship with digital media and online content then I really should be one of the guinea pigs.I've got a

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-91616091777472025752009-08-26T15:01:00.000-07:002009-08-26T15:09:45.951-07:00

Two years ago I wrote how the arrival of a bouncy baby Wii for my birthday had caused me to revert to childhood, well my birthday has rolled around again and this year I received a much more mature and responsible present: an XBox 360.I know, I know (holds head in hands), I'm just so late to the party. However, there comes a time when a man must put away childish things, set aside his Wii-motes,

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-57585973353509414412009-07-30T14:26:00.000-07:002009-07-30T16:06:02.150-07:00

For over two years now we have been able to download music online - and by music I of course mean music that you have rights to, music that you own, music with no Digital Rights Management (DRM). In fact the trickle of real music download sites became a flood when Amazon stepped in, and this year even iTunes decided to let you buy music online.This is great news. DRM technology was the result of

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-59821007174264605792009-07-11T04:15:00.000-07:002009-07-11T04:20:01.169-07:00

The BBC have just screened the final episode of the five night Torchwood season three, Children of Earth, and already the fan sites are exploding with debate about characters lost, plot holes, and open endings.I don't normally watch Torchwood, but I was pleasantly surprised by the mini-series. It was well-made, intelligent sci-fi.There were flaws, mainly in the actions of the government, which

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-64854588155755231482009-06-10T01:54:00.000-07:002009-06-10T02:12:16.666-07:00

A few years ago I created a UK board for Ticket To Ride, the excellent board game from Days of Wonder. Since then the board has been downloaded thousands of times, and I've received loads of kind comments from players around the world who have tried it out.Earlier this year I was contacted by Ken Meyers, an American who fancied having a go at updating the board. I'm pleased to say that Ken has

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-51784547145029695172009-05-01T02:26:00.000-07:002009-05-01T03:25:40.637-07:00

Back in November I wrote a blog article on the momentum that was building behind Open Educational Resources (OER) and I have just published a similar essay in the Language and Linguistics Area Studies (LLAS) Liaison magazine.When I was writing the article I was hoping to address many of the concerns that teachers and lecturers raise over OER, such as worries over copyright and competitive

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-66024756576363961732009-04-07T04:15:00.000-07:002009-04-07T04:22:31.216-07:00

How do modern students study, and how good are they at it? That's the question posed by the emerging topic of digital literacy. Last week I attended the Shock of the Old event in Oxford that addressed this question.The topic of digital literacy is particular interesting to me because for the past year or two I've been trying to make sense of the new attitude that learners seem to have towards

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-39139082484421461242009-03-21T04:40:00.001-07:002009-03-21T04:48:29.974-07:00

When I was a student one of my neighbors in my University halls of residence popped in with a 3.5inch floppy disk, and told me that on it was a file in a new format called MP3. At the time audio compression was pretty abysmal, and a 3 min song made around a 30MB file. Given that my hard disk at the time was 200MB this didn't make for very feasible digital music. As I listened to that 1.3MB MP3

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-16418033761976710462009-03-04T10:29:00.000-08:002009-03-04T10:35:51.691-08:00

The Prodigy make angry music for calm minds. I've been a fan since a friend lent me Music for the Jilted Generation some time around '95, and since then the Prodigy's music has got angrier and louder, and thumped and twisted its way to the edges of genius.Fat of the Land was a heavier album, and deliciously furious. Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned lacked much of the vocal talent, but was

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-3507168562746093932009-02-01T11:09:00.000-08:002009-02-01T11:14:58.390-08:00

Stephen Fry continues on his merry rise to sainthood with his latest podcast about Language and Linguistics. In fact it's more of a love poem to words, but it's so sprinkled with wry commentary on structuralism, etymology and modern day pedantry that you could use it directly as a student primer on all three.My early research work was on hypertext systems (I did my PhD around the time the Web

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-79685693014534002012009-01-19T10:51:00.000-08:002009-01-19T11:07:21.350-08:00

Today I've been at a workshop organised by the JISC SemTech project (which I am a part of, but which is being led by my colleague Thanassis Tiropanis). The aim of the workshop was to discuss the possible role of semantic technologies in HE and FE, reflect on which semantic technologies are being used already, and to identify future use cases and challenges that might be targeted by JISC.There was

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-50512829539074213342009-01-07T15:12:00.000-08:002009-01-07T15:41:28.206-08:00

We all know that it was the railroads that built America, which might explain the happy and nostalgic feel for them in Ticket To Ride. However in the UK it was the Romans that built everything and frankly the railroads just cut dirty great lines across all their great stuff.In 2007 I received an unofficial expansion to my unofficial UK Ticket To Ride board that celebrated the slightly more

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-16448002400843490792009-01-07T10:51:00.000-08:002009-01-07T15:54:17.775-08:00

One of the first updates for my Ticket to Ride UK Board was this Tunnels and Ferries version (based on the Europe edition of the game) sent to me by Rob in May 2007.Or you can download the map as eight separate A4 (or US Letter) sheets:R1C1 - R1C2R2C1 - R2C2R3C1 - R3C2R4C1 - R4C2Rob also made a few other amendments to balance the colours more evenly. He also recommends reducing the number of

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-81695095427843618672009-01-07T09:59:00.000-08:002009-06-10T02:14:19.425-07:00

Back in 2006 I created a UK board for the Ticket to Ride game published by Days of Wonder. I posted the map on the BoardGameGeek website and to date the page has been viewed over twenty thousand times. In the Summer when I redesigned my website the Ticket to Ride page was orphaned, but in an effort to reconnect it I've decided to add the board (and the related extensions) to this blog.You can

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-24233795469414920372008-12-14T14:26:00.000-08:002008-12-14T14:32:04.515-08:00

I'm a sucker for a good Tower Defense game (with or without FMV), and this week I've been playing Tap Defense on the iPhone, a great free example of the genre.Tap Defense is a simple (but very addictive) game, based on three maps and six tower types, all of which work pretty nicely together. What makes it so good though is that fact that you earn interest on any gold that you save (rather than

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-13674109314027869682008-11-30T03:31:00.000-08:002008-11-30T04:00:11.714-08:00

At Southampton we have a history of Open Access Research, and a number of my colleagues (in particular Les Carr and Stevan Harnad) are heavily involved with the Open Access movement. At its heart Open Access Research holds the principle that publicly funded research should be available for free. It challenges the existing publishing model, where researchers sign away the rights to their work to

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-92088244045617278762008-11-05T02:23:00.000-08:002008-11-05T02:30:55.976-08:00

Americans like to style their president as the Leader of the Free World, and in many ways this is not a bad description. America is the most powerful of the democratic nations that respects freedom of religious, political and intellectual expression. The free world is an informal billion-person family of nations, and as a fully paid up citizen in one of the oldest countries in that family, I

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-30185634848452830472008-10-16T12:53:00.001-07:002008-10-16T12:58:53.013-07:00

I've been involved in mobile and pervasive learning research for around six years, but this year was the first time that I've attended two of the leading events in the field: IADIS m-learning (held back in April), and m-learn (which I attended last week).I enjoyed both events - not least because of the interesting locations (especially the Cold War museum in Shropshire with its ominous collection

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-73286984540237670752008-10-06T09:13:00.000-07:002008-10-06T09:20:12.750-07:00

Last week I got myself a copy of the latest Metallica album (Death Magnetic). I've been following Metallica since the Autumn of 1991. That was a good year for rock; Nirvana's Nevermind, G'n'R's Use Your Illusions (I and II), and Metallica's Black Album stabbed a flag in the eye of 80's rock, and defined the genre for my generation (and launched Grunge and Thrash into the mainstream as well).The

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-81975712123190650412008-09-16T15:56:00.000-07:002008-09-16T16:03:38.392-07:00

Will history be kind to Open Hypermedia? The other day I gave a presentation on the Evolution of the Web to our new Masters students (part of their pre-sessional programme at Southampton) and I was forced to face an awkward thought. Open Hypermedia was an interesting side road of the Information Superhighway, but it wasn't a proper lane, or even a sliproad. Its something that you look wonderingly

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-36726624459572530022008-09-10T08:55:00.000-07:002008-09-10T08:57:41.092-07:00

I'm currently attending WikiSym 2008 in Porto, Portugal. WikiSym is a small conference with a mix of participants: wiki enthusiasts, developers, researchers, consultants, cynics and evengalists. It also has a very open freeform structure, helped along by the fantastic Portuguese sunshine (a weather event not seen in the UK since April 2007), and the welcoming city of Porto, which looks like an

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-54628323651970752152008-08-18T15:30:00.000-07:002008-08-18T15:39:25.498-07:00

Saw a great video pop up on Digg a little while ago, less Mac-based then the last one, and this time proving that there is a point to Second Life (even if its not quite the samauri sword filled metaverse that we might have hoped for).This video by Robbie Dingo is based on The Starry Night by Van Gogh, and underlines that not everything in Second Life is real.Or something :-/

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-67584942726647981552008-07-27T16:51:00.000-07:002008-07-27T17:05:33.292-07:00

Why is the brilliance of the new iPhone 3G so intangible? When I try and explain why I've replaced one 3G, GPS enabled, touch screen smart phone (a TyTN II) with another I get blank stares. When I show people how it works, they nod and smile as if to say that this is just what they expected - all perfectly normal.So how come I feel like I've made such a technical leap forward - how come this

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-11331338004034473812008-07-16T15:35:00.000-07:002008-07-16T15:46:24.990-07:00

I'm at the JISC Innovation Forum this week. The Forum is a chance for people working for and funded by JISC to get together and discuss the big challenges in HE, FE and e-learning. The event is arranged around a number of discussion sessions, panels and forum (so its unlike a traditional conference as its not about individual work, but the lessons that we can learn as a community).Yesterday we

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-58219181416382109552008-07-10T15:39:00.000-07:002008-07-10T15:46:45.655-07:00

Last week I was at IEEE ICALT 2008, held in Santander,Spain. Last year's conference was a bit of a wakeup call for me, partly because of Mark Eisenstadt's wonderful keynote, and partly because of the realisation of just how quickly Web trends were making much of the presented work obsolete.This year the community seems to have noticed the change of pace, and although no wonderful answers were

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-76601589594081476532008-07-08T13:35:00.000-07:002008-07-08T15:34:37.036-07:00

This month I discovered the wonders of free web design. I'm not sure why it never occurred to me before, but it turns out that there is a blossoming community of web designers out there who are in it for the glory, and who make their designs available on sites such as OSWD.org. You can browse the libraries and download a zip package of html templates and css files that you are then free to modify

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-3744419324707912022008-06-26T03:55:00.000-07:002008-10-27T14:05:01.444-07:00

Update 27-10-08: A more formal version of this blog entry appeared in the SIGWEB Newsletter as the Hypertext 2008 trip report. You can find the full text as a pre-print in the ECS e-prints repository.I've just got back from this years ACM Hypertext Conference in Pittsburgh, PA. Hypertext '98 was also in Pittsburgh, that was my first academic conference, and also my first trip to the States, so it

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-43761076842166457932008-06-12T15:52:00.001-07:002008-06-12T15:56:01.310-07:00

Last night I went to see Bon Jovi play at St. Mary's Stadium in Southampton - it was the first UK date of their Lost Highway Tour.My wife Jo and I don't really share the same tastes in music, she likes unbearable cat stranglers like Westlife and Enrique Iglesias, and I like bearable but LOUD cat stranglers like Muse, Metallica and Nightwish. Bon Jovi manage to sit in the very small overlap in our

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-43933606997746426742008-05-12T14:12:00.000-07:002008-05-12T14:26:25.117-07:00

I came across this fabulous music video created by Dennis Liu using only Mac OSX - even if I hadn't switched I'd think this was brilliant:I've been using the Mac now for almost two months and the shine hasn't rubbed off yet. Some of my earlier quibbles have disappeared as I've got used to the Mac way of doing things (most notably the additional Command key, and the missing right mouse button),

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-23328903964154242022008-05-08T05:30:00.000-07:002008-05-08T08:40:57.490-07:00

Over the last few weeks the BBC have been running what at first seems a trailer for Panorama. In the trailer a camera pans over dimly lit streets of circuitry, diodes flicker like broken lamps, and sink estates wallow in the shadows of tall capacitors. "Your town; your street; your home..." the narrator threatens, "its all in our database."The viewer raises an eyebrow, expecting some shocking

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-40404995900000365152008-04-29T22:03:00.000-07:002008-05-01T14:28:32.764-07:00

Tom Franklin pointed me towards this really neat website called VisualComplexity run by an interaction designer called Manuel Lima, which is a catalog/index of interesting data visualisation techniques, examples and tools.At the moment there are over 500 items in there, and you can filter by what is being visualised (so for example, Internet or Knowledge Networks) to see a subset.Some are pretty

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-68367028780861111992008-04-23T15:55:00.000-07:002008-07-12T09:08:25.013-07:00

Earlier this month I went to Portugal for the IADIS m-learning conference, a smallish conference on e-learning and mobile devices. The conference was really quite interesting, although it had a curiously ex-pat feel to it because of the number of UK delegates.One presentation really got me thinking, it was an account from Malcolm Andrew, a lecturer in microbiology at De Montfort Univeristy, of

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-57505221388272688492008-03-30T16:47:00.001-07:002008-04-02T13:16:33.687-07:00

Arghhh!!! What is wrong with Microsoft? How has one of the biggest software companies in the world got it so wrong?As you may know I recently escaped to a Mac to avoid the problematic and unappealing MS Vista, unfortunately I still do a lot of document editing and so one of the first installs on my shiny new MacBook was Office 2008 for Mac. On XP I had already noticed that Outlook 2007 had some

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-69624515422526073212008-03-20T17:03:00.001-07:002008-03-20T17:03:32.931-07:00

In my last post I described why I have decided to switch to a Mac. Well a shiny new MacBook Pro rolled up earlier this week, I've had a few days to acclimatise, and its probably a good time to report on what life is like this side of the switch.Before the machine arrived I noticed an interesting change in my attitude to Windows, I don't know if it was the feeling of freedom, or some sort of

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-73431849685239738052008-02-29T15:11:00.001-08:002008-03-20T17:03:01.131-07:00

Right - that's it. I've had enough. It's time to say goodbye.I'm fed up of hourglasses, crappy modal dialog boxes, ugly UI and an OS that reboots itself without bothering to ask first. After 15 years of suffering its time to move on. I've decided to buy a Mac.Don't get me wrong, while there's a lot wrong with Windows, there's also quite a lot of things that are right. Its much more stable and

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-63555777012094558262008-02-20T23:55:00.000-08:002008-02-20T16:02:52.214-08:00

I have read a number of pieces recently attacking the notion of the Digital Native - Prensky's notion that there is a new generation of students who are in some way soaked in technology to the extent that it has changed their behaviour.Stephen Marshall suggests that the concept of the Digital Native is reaching its autumnal years, and that there has been too much hype around this notion, and not

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-75964577053802704662008-01-31T22:40:00.000-08:002008-01-31T17:00:41.663-08:00

I can't bear it any longer. I can feel the rage building as I push forward through the crowd, people jostle and I duck a stray elbow. I catch a glimpse of him through the pressing bodies. I can't believe no-one else has noticed.Most people seem enraptured, but some seem distracted. One man steps aside clutching a copy of Macworld, confusion in his eyes. Another holds up a Nokia, caressing the

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-60739899185153362272008-01-17T20:07:00.000-08:002008-01-18T16:27:45.970-08:00

Mmmm... so the other night I caught a BBC Horizon programme hosted by Michel Portillo called 'How to Kill a Human Being'. The point of the programme was to look into the various methods of execution used around the world - but particularly in the United States - to see which was the most humane, and potentially to propose a better method.I have to say that since seeing the mighty Portillo fall to

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-27262135676039359852007-12-22T16:39:00.000-08:002007-12-22T08:42:55.330-08:00

Great article over at Gamers with Jobs about a near religious experience with Guitar Hero 3. I've not played Guitar Hero, but I can certainly relate to that moment in-the-zone when your senses extend beyond your body, and for a brief few moments you are one with the world.The guys at Slashdot don't seem convinced by the whole religious experience angle, but I'm not so sure. There's something

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-42813645955795751302007-12-07T19:55:00.000-08:002007-12-07T12:03:54.555-08:00

Earlier this week I managed to watch The Descent, a British horror flick that I missed on its cinema, rental, DVD, and satellite spiral. Luckily the nice folks at Channel 4 marched it into the last broadcast saloon known as terrestrial telly and I finally caught up with it. Unfortunately they failed to warn me that it is the scariest movie ever made :-(Essentially the story is that there is a

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-16184801325951975412007-11-23T14:59:00.000-08:002007-11-23T15:32:13.524-08:00

This week I went to the JISC CETIS Conference in Aston as a panelist in the Semantic Structures for e-Learning session. After my bleak interaction with the e-learning community back in ICALT, I was pleasantly surprised to find a really progressive mood.In particular Mark Stiles gave a characteristically candid closing keynote that was uncannily like my own talk on Web Literacy a few weeks ago.

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-47600769950984835832007-11-15T01:12:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:36:51.545-08:00

(a position statement for the JISC CETIS conference, Aston, UK, held Nov 2007)I've been invited to present a position statement at this years JISC CETIS conference on the topic of Semantic Structures for Teaching and Learning. The session aims to explore the potential of Semantic Web technologies in e-learning, and also raises the question of why Semantic technologies haven't been more successful

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-91531352102550330452007-11-08T01:07:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:35:22.759-08:00

I've just given a seminar to my research group (The Learning Societies Lab) on the notion of the New Web Literacy, how e-learning systems should change to support it, and what we should be doing as e-learning researchers to enact and understand that change. I have wanted to present something on this topic ever since I went to ICALT earlier this year. There seemed to be two groups of people

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-58248275737598767182007-10-21T09:53:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:34:50.944-08:00

Recently we moved to Wiltshire, a beautiful county, but one which has only recently discovered electricty (and some of the locals still arent convinced). With a bit of effort we managed to find an ISP with telephone wires at least nearby, but it has taken us a lot longer to sort out our television reception. Our house has a television arial the size of the Eiffel tower on the roof which provides

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-91388599309916193042007-09-27T23:14:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:34:16.157-08:00

On my commute home the other day I was listening to the Radio 4 PM show, which had an article about acupuncture. It was inspired by a news item about a recent trial (also reported by BBC news online) and was framed as an interview with two experts. One expert (I couldn't find out his name) was pro-acupuncture, the other (Ben Goldacre) was quite sceptical.Now I have no axe to grind about

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-33985985108032316312007-09-14T14:57:00.000-07:002008-06-26T04:10:54.443-07:00

I've been on my travels for a while, culminating this week in Manchester, where I attended the ACM Hypertext Conference. Hypertext is a smaller gathering than it used to be and in recent years has been in danger of becoming a fringe event, however this year numbers were up and the conference felt very positive. Besides I think that everyone should hang out at the fringe occasionally, it's good

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-82228844513394226712007-08-13T23:17:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:30:30.073-08:00

This week I have been regressing to childhood. It started when I received a Wii for my 31st birthday, immediately turning it into my 13th birthday. As a paid up member of Generation X I grew up with gaming culture, but I haven't had a console since my original Playstation died of dust poisoning a few years ago. Wii Sports is a lot of fun but it's The Legend of Zelda that's been soaking up my time

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-31719563386987157262007-08-08T17:32:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:29:36.233-08:00

Discovered this fabulous little flash game called Boomshine. It's a bit like Missile Command but with a calm sense of oneness instead of the needless aggression. Wonderfully Zen.

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-92127322050082192022007-08-01T22:20:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:28:59.755-08:00

In the last few weeks I've been getting bored with Windows XP (my OS of lack of choice) and have had a bit of a roving eye, sneaking lusty glances over the shoulders of Mac users and hanging around in dodgy Windows Vista galleries ogling Aero through the glass.Having decided that I cant really justify a MacBook when my Samsung PC has pretty much identical hardware already, I have resorted to a

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-56485546057361486922007-08-01T21:40:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:28:28.028-08:00

I've had a chance to organise my photos since coming back from Japan, and also had a chance to play with Picasa (which as you'd expect is very polished and nicely integrates with all Google's other goodies). Turns out that we've all been busy little photo sharers:Dave's PhotosHugh's PhotosMaurice's PhotosAlex's albumEspecially Alex's album of bad English translations and general weirdness :-)My

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-79604752713190255942007-07-24T23:53:00.001-07:002007-11-21T11:27:57.735-08:00

So the ICALT conference is over for another year. It's an interesting event that tries to bring together researchers from both east and west, and for the most part it succeeds - the mixture of presenters is about half and half and there is a lot of opportunity to meet people from countries that in the past have been under-represented in international academic research.Of course there are some

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-88421213181184920382007-07-17T22:20:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:26:27.193-08:00

I'm off on my travels again, this time to sunny (well, luke warm and sticky) Japan, and the International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies (ICALT) 2007, held in Niigata on the north coast.It was an interesting start to the trip. Just after we landed in Tokyo the Niigata area was hit by a 6.7 earthquake which caused quite a bit of damage to buildings and disruption to the travel

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-86546434151242323042007-07-06T08:37:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:25:33.040-08:00

I'm quite bare-bones when it comes to my PC. I go through the damn things like a wrecker ball in PC world and so cant be bothered to personalise them much. As a result I use them pretty much out of the box, so I'm not a big fan of fiddly little productivity apps. However, in the last few days I've come across a neat little utility called Launchy, a very lightweight application launcher, and I'm

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-1180747884137273662007-06-13T13:29:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:24:46.363-08:00

In the last month or so I've been listening to the new albums from Within Temptation and Lacuna Coil. I've discovered both of these bands in the last year and subsequently realised that they are already massively popular just out of earshot, which is always mildly disappointing, but it hasn't stopped me enjoying their new efforts.'The Heart of Everything' is Within Temptation's disc. It's really

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-35659077059557155682007-06-10T14:42:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:23:50.806-08:00

At last I had a chance to see the Summer's big film (well - May's big film) in the form of Spiderman 3: Spiderman vs the icky-black-goo thing and the sandpit dude. I have low expectations of superhero films; for years I was convinced that if only they treated the subject matter with seriousness, as modern myths, they could produce some wonderful cinema. Then I saw X-men and realised the error of

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-60192609716550939482007-05-28T06:25:00.001-07:002007-11-21T11:23:33.559-08:00

I know that I'm just another liberal lefty academic but all the same I was very impressed with this piece by the historian Chalmers Johnson on the current path of the American Empire.Occasionally I watch some 1970's American TV show or film and am reminded of how much we (meaning the British public) used to love America. Growing up in the 1980's I saw America as an ideal progressive and modern

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-77958500173261484152007-05-18T01:12:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:22:49.587-08:00

Yes, folks - hidden away in the depths of the BBC technology pages is the revelation that at last, after years of false starts and obfuscation, you will finally be able to legally download music online.Of course, many people falsely believe that they can already download music. They are sadly mistaken. The current set of online stores allow you to purchase a limited legal right to listen to music

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-32064541452937006892007-05-05T17:45:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:21:26.895-08:00

I live in Wiltshire, in the Borough of Swindon, and so I was one of the people who got the chance to try the new electronic voting system at last Thursday's Council elections. I didn't vote beforehand, but opted to use the computer in the polling station - it was a horrifying experience.There were no instructions on the welcome page. I had to press a button labelled "Check Voter" which didn't

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-12640326181658200202007-04-24T17:16:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:20:43.889-08:00

Imagine a world in which The Sword of Shannara was written before the Lord of the Rings. It's good, Tolkien's critics might say, but its just a reworking of that Brook's drivel - isn't Gandalf just Allanon with a beard? Why has Shea shrunk? Swords, rings, who cares?In a more just Universe Danny Boyle's new film, Sunshine, would have been released in 1997 and I would now be saying that the newly

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-22348875220835956562007-04-16T14:56:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:20:14.464-08:00

Wow! - the Battle of Thermopylae has never looked so good. I've just watched the film adaptation of Frank Miller's 300, itself based on the 1962 film The 300 Spartans. I've been struggling a bit with how to describe it - the critics are divided, is it a 21st century masterpiece or a shallow array of action set-pieces? What about the plot, they ask, what about the characterisations? But that's a

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-87288939639604776082007-04-12T14:12:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:19:48.254-08:00

I came across this tower defense game on del.icio.us. I found it oddly familiar, and then realised that it's essentially Command and Conquer on an etch-o-sketch. No wonder it comes naturally, I've been playing its big brother all week.Oddly satisfying :-/High score to date: 1998

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-19470174297888238542007-04-06T15:37:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:19:16.448-08:00

I love the smell of Mammoth Tanks in the morning. A few days ago I grabbed myself a copy of Command and Conquer 3 and I'm currently enjoying smashing, crushing and blasting my way through the Brotherhood of Nod. It was in my student days that I was first introduced to the RTS joys of Command and Conquer; that game, and its Red Alert sequels, were a stable of our student LAN parties and I still

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-22457712810651648922007-03-22T19:44:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:18:26.613-08:00

Doodled during the Shock of the Old Conference (Oxford)

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-20793961318645577052007-03-22T11:26:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:18:03.997-08:00

Don't you love it when surveys confirm your own prejudices :-) A few years back I came across a Times article about how Night Owls were the wiser (I think based on this Science article), condemning the dim-witted Larks with one well-aimed comparison (Churchill = Owl, Blair = Lark).Now there's another marvelous survey that claims that metal is the music of choice for our bright young things.

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-847530543536987012007-03-22T11:03:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:17:30.598-08:00

I was checking my del.icio.us feed today and noticed a site that brings together the best documentaries on-line. Most of them look like naughty Google Video rips to me - but the site doesn't host them so that's OK. Go on - download some communism and edutain yourself :-)

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-83778709971742017652007-03-14T21:03:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:16:10.071-08:00

Is it just me, or at the mention of Sir Tim does everyone look around nervously for the vicious Chicken of Bristol? Brave, brave, Sir Tim Berners-Lee - the inventor of the Web - is a Professor at the University of Southampton, and I've just returned from his Inaugural Lecture on the past and future of the Web.Despite his growing geek-fame, and the commercial temptations it must have brought, he

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-34373077824800707452007-03-12T14:10:00.000-07:002007-11-21T11:15:12.239-08:00

I finally got around to watching last weeks Dispatches program (Channel 4, UK) on the arguments against climate change. It was a fascinating, well made piece of rhetoric, although I'd rather have seen a balanced presentation of the facts. We are long past the point about arguing about whether climate change is real, it is now obvious that the world is getting warmer, but this programme questioned

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-88571528928494820712007-03-10T12:08:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:14:23.128-08:00

Why am I always the last to hear about bands? Rock music is a guilty passion of mine and last month I spent a few idle hours on Youtube looking at a number of Symphonic Metal Bands and wondering if I should speculatively buy an album or two. In the end I found this group called Within Temptation from the Netherlands and bought a couple of their albums.Now Im totally addicted. If you were generous

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-36395826206417570052007-03-05T15:39:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:13:43.111-08:00

Doodled during a CPD session on University Finances (held in Southampton).

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-61764381431255615992007-03-04T20:30:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:12:54.812-08:00

Watched the Lunar Eclipse last night a lot more successfully than the solar eclipse a few years ago in Cornwall (where it was interesting to watch the clouds go dark for a while). This time I had a great view and very pretty it was too.

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-59834935942742202372007-03-01T13:12:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:12:18.837-08:00

Good grief - the BBC reports that they're going to make a new Star Trek movie.This is a bit like Paramount announcing that they're going to dig up your ancesters and make them put on a fun zombie clown show - it might be entertaining, but its probably best just to let them be.

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-28200809590602910012007-02-28T23:50:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:11:42.319-08:00

I recently upgraded my PDA Phone from the i-mate JAM that I've had for the last two years to the new Glofiish X500 from ETEN. They're very similar devices - but the X500 has twice the processor power, and built in WiFi and GPS.I've had the X500 for about a week now and I'm pretty impressed. The processor makes quite a difference to the feel of the GUI and some of the hardware issues from the

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-57855041328974625592007-02-28T23:36:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:10:49.577-08:00

Doodled during a workshop on e-learning repositories (held at Southampton).

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-5765615049526026852007-02-28T22:01:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:09:52.123-08:00

I have resisted the temptation to blog for a while now - it all seemed rather pointless when I have a perfectly good website (est. 1994) to stand and rave at the disinterested passing world. But I've worked in the hypertext research community for nearly ten years now, and have seen the fall of the old hypertext order (Hypercard anyone?) and the rise and rise of the new. Now Web 2.0 sites have

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9074284509110862749.post-87976016475047963982007-02-28T20:48:00.000-08:002007-11-21T11:09:21.818-08:00

Mmmm.... blogs.Blogging is senseless, pointless, self-deluding, self-promoting, biased, unregulated, legally dubious, time-wasting, reactionary, band-wagon-chasing, mob-pandering nonsense.On second thoughts it is a marvelous thing! I like this blog stuff already.

Dave Millardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08966887376240219660noreply@blogger.com