Andragy

Google genders engineering

2012-01-28T10:49:00.001+11:00

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Jobs & Education - Education - Teaching & Classroom Resources

Science - Engineering & Technology - Robotics

Your demographics:

We infer your age and gender based on the websites you've visited.

Age: 35-44

Gender: Male

via google.com

I've checked out my Google ad preferences. Classic. If you like technology then you must be male.
If there weren't so many other examples of gender by design, this would be depressing. But I've seen magazine display racks, toy shops and clothing stores. There are so many fronts to fight this battle on.

Posted via email from andragy's posterous

What scares me is feeling as though I've been coopted. As Google collects data from more and more places, where will it be ok to be female or middle aged or anything not associated with my work or public persona. I don't wan't to turn in to a stereotype. I'm tweeting #VAGINA more frequently to keep female technophilia alive. Let's encourage alternatives and defeat stereotypes.

STARTUPYOU | FAKE GRIMLOCK FTW

2012-01-25T08:41:00.001+11:00

via flickr.com

Awesome is exhausting for some of us but FAKE GRIMLOCK has tapped the motherlode and is distributing it via twitter, blog, posters and maybe even in person. Although it could be kind of scary seeing a giant metal robot dinosaur with a penchant for eating stupid humans.

FAKE GRIMLOCK is my new favorite reading (along with The Bloggess and xkcd), because what he says makes a lot of sense. It also drips with sarcasm, awesomeness and blood. Many technology luminaries (like Eric Ries, Brad Feld, Fred Wilson and CNN) have noticed that FAKE GRIMLOCK carves through all the cream and gets straight to the coffee. I'm still new over here but sometimes I think that America is all froth and foam and eff all coffee. Then I remember stuff like #Occupy and STOP SOPA.

I wish I had some of FAKE GRIMLOCK's gift for awesome communication because the tech world both fascinates and dismays me. We are changing society right here - punching code through the walls of the world. But all too often the vision is just personal or commercial success.

"STARTUP IS MAKE FIST OF CODE, PUT IT THROUGH THE WORLD. VISION IS PUT FIST IN RIGHT PLACE, BREAK WORLD IN HALF."

Roadblocks of gender, race and class are still huge. Sometimes technological advancement is just making bigger roadblocks. Startup philosophy, which emphasizes the individual, is often powerless before huge areas of fail. We aren't all giant robot dinosaurs and sometimes we don't share the same visions. For example, feminism is a great conversation killer, because not a lot has changed in last 50 years. Seriously - this 1991 MIT report by Ellen Spertus is still accurate. That's depressing. It's great to celebrate awesome women engineers and ceos, but important to point out the systematic obstacles women face in the tech and startup worlds.

Fake Grimlock's irresistible awesome is up against some pretty immoveable objects, but at least reading @fakegrimlock makes me feel like a raging fury in a good way.

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Brain Drain - i do it right?

2012-01-25T05:07:00.001+11:00

This is what I found when I searched for brain enema. I also got Thor, a heavy metal band from the 80s. Enough said. My brain is still clogged up with all the words I didn't write last year. Every day for the last month or three, I've tossed them around like a salad and tried to serve them up. Every day, I've ignored my healthy diet of self expression and loaded up on cheap internet carbs and stodgy domestic duties. Sweet, eh.

I hereby swear to post until I've unblocked my brain. Life is full of open tickets and I'm like an intern on the helpdesk. I'm still not certain if it's OCD or procrastination, but I can't sit and write until I've cleared my way to the desk. By then I'm mentally drained and turn on the distractions.

American bureaucracy is in a league of its own. I spent all of last week arranging a new dentist for the family and following up on asthma appointments. We've all had the first round of appointments which required 1 hour of paperwork EACH and each visit has spawned a minimum of one more visit (and in some cases 3!). I also have filled out 13 pages of school forms and still haven't updated medication and insurance details for 2 of 3 kids. And preliminary camp forms... there goes another day.

OK. I am making post-its and lists and crossing shit off, but I must start putting writing first for a while, so that I can START THINKING AGAIN. Of course, the new year period has been dogged by MY COMPUTER INSISTING THAT IT WOULD NO LONGER OPEN STUFF. Not until I'd filed, archived or trashed some things. I think that says it all.

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SOPA STRIKE SUCCESS

2012-01-21T06:52:00.001+11:00

via sopastrike.com

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Sociology 1010101010101

2012-01-18T07:40:00.001+11:00

Andra Keay - 12:38 PM - Public
Great article - describes a huge study showing that weak social ties can insert information into our online 'bubbles', reducing the echo chamber effect. However, as Mahjoo points out, the content of the new information wasn't evaluated, so really whether new information that has radical content (ie. protax if you aren't) is as effective as neutral novelty (ie. cute kitten) is still an unknown.
It's also really cool that this study covered 1.2 billion instances of link sharing from 250 million people! Massive.Edit
Howard Rheingold originally shared this post:
The End of the Echo Chamber
A study of 250 million Facebook users reveals the Web isn’t as polarized as we thought.
Online echo chambers: A study of 250 million Facebook users reveals the Web isn’t as polarized as we thought.
Today, Facebook is publishing a study that disproves some hoary conventional wisdom about the Web. According to this new research, the online echo chamber doesn’t exist. This is of particular interest...

via plus.google.com

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When I don't want to be me — TheBloggess.com

2012-01-14T14:31:00.001+11:00

via thebloggess.com

There's no one better than the Bloggess. She seems to share my interest in many strange geeky things and has no fear of using the word vagina. Frequently. I didn't post much in 2011 due to moving overseas and finishing my thesis... and starting the robot blog(s). So I'm kicking off 2012 with the sort of post I'd like to be posting, if only I'd finished building the dinosaur out of plastic spoons etc.

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What is a Robot?

2011-12-20T11:25:00.001+11:00

A dream. The common definition of a robot, as situated and embodied, is incredibly broad. Robots, or parts of them, are developed constantly and subsumed into other ‘things’ or technical assemblages. Your car is a robot. Increasingly, so is your phone.

I say that a robot is whatever a roboticist is working on. But really, most robotics research is absorbed into other things, and what we call a robot has a lot to do with a vision. A dream of a robot that is personable and a slave to human needs. A robot has an animal or humanoid body that we can relate to socially.

via robotstate.wordpress.com

We are on the verge of changes in robot technology and development that will revolutionize what a robot is. It starts as toys, hidden technologies and transparent interfaces. It started with the Kinect, the smart phone and the cloud.

Now, you might say I’m a dreamer…. but here are some really great recent examples of the increasing democratization of robotics technology that indicate the fundamental ways the ground is shifting as we move into SME and consumer robotics.

DragonBot from MIT’s Personal Robotics Group is powered by an Android smart phone. Kombusto, the DragonBot is blended reality, living on your phone as well as in the fur. Being a cloud based robot, Kombusto can learn from other robots/interactions. (Image from IEEE Spectrum article Wed Dec 14)

Parrot AR drones, Romotivs and Sphero, utilising smart phone controllers, also open the door to cloud based robotics and crowd sourced learning for devices. Another approach is Brainlink, using smartphones – or other interfaces – to hack existing infrared controlled devices, via a bluetooth ‘brainlink’ to imbue cheap toys with extra intelligence. Brainlink is only $125, open source and eminently hackable. They also won an educational award at Maker Faire earlier this year.

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Why women have to work harder to do startups | VentureBeat

2011-12-13T08:56:00.001+11:00

via venturebeat.com

This article by Julia Hu is spot on the money. It takes money to succeed, not talents that women have proven they have. More women run successful small businesses, but anything that requires asking for funding is harder for women.

It isn't about changing women any more. It's about changing what is effectively a boys club for funding into something more flexible. Something that can see why women are underfunded, undervalued and RIPE FOR ACQUISITION.

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We are entering a new space | The Robot State

2011-12-08T08:23:00.001+11:00

We are entering a new space

Posted on December 7, 2011 | Leave a comment | Edit

I am fascinated by the changes in our situated awareness made possible by the merges in gaming and personal technology. Chris Chesher discusses the impact of gaming on sat nav systems in the journal Convergence and how we are entering a new space as we share our control systems with our game environments. I’d like to go further and suggest that our self awareness is shifting as we incorporate visual displays onto mirrored surfaces, ranging from the rapidly becoming pervasive rear view mirror/backup monitor/sat nav, to these newer technologies in R&D.

There is a qualitative shift from the ‘shopping’ style magic mirrors, which show you with different outfits, watches etc. Shopping mirrors function as a ‘paper doll’, you are selecting outfits for yourself much as you would in real life. However, the use of mirrors as channels for other information changes the space that you (in a mirror) are in. The more you switch modes the more you are changed. All the way to the complete carnival mirror changes below!

Via Pop Sci | An Augmented Reality Mirror That Alters Your Appearance

excerpt… Using a webcam hooked up to custom PC software, a pair of researchers at Queen Mary, University of London, have created an augmented reality “mirror” that morphs your facial features at will.

Unlike existing applications that overlay virtual features onto real-world video, this program doesn’t add any synthetic elements to the video feed. It creates a 3D model of the user’s face, tracks their features, and then subtly warps the video. The user can then see how they would look with a smaller nose, wider mouth, or Powerpuff Girl eyes.

Via Mashable | via Augmented Mirror of the Future Reflects You and Your World.

excerpt… The New York Times‘s R&D Lab has developed a digitally enhanced mirror that allows you to interact with personalized data during your morning routine.

Unfortunately, the mirror won’t be making its way into your local Restoration Hardware any time soon. Rather, it’s a proof of concept designed to explore “how the relationship between information and the self is evolving and how media content from the New York Times and others might play a part,” The Lab’s team explained on a page outlining the project.

via robotstate.wordpress.com

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State of the Technological World

2011-12-08T06:12:00.001+11:00

State of the Art

A snapshot of the rapidly changing world of computing, communications and technology. Related Article »

A GLOBAL INTERNET

In just four decades the Internet has spread to much of the world. Now, the shift to high-bandwidth connectivity and the global availability of supercomputing is accelerating.

Related article: A High-Stakes Search Continues for Silicon’s Successor

Related article: Creating Artificial Intelligence Based on the Real Thing

A MORE CONNECTED WORLD

Cellphones are proliferating rapidly in much of the developing world. The use of smartphones and other Internet-connected devices is still low, but should rise quickly in countries like China, which will soon have the world’s largest domestic market for Internet commerce and computing.

Related article: Vast and Fertile Ground in Africa for Science to Take Root

TOWARD AN
INNOVATIVE CHINA

China is the dominant maker of computers and consumer electronics, and is readily able to adapt and improve on technology innovations made elsewhere. But innovation within the country has been limited by government controls and the relative lack of intellectual property protection.

Related article: China Aims for High-Tech Primacy

RAW MATERIALS
FOR INNOVATION

The synthesis that made Silicon Valley—the concentration of science and engineering talent and venture capital—is now beginning to proliferate in the developing world. China’s growing venture capital market is now the second largest in the world.

Related article: With a Leaner Model, Start-Ups Reach Further Afield

via nytimes.com

Remember that YouTube only started in 2005. That most businesses only used the internet for email in 2000 (if they used it at all!). That phones used to be just phones, not mobile phones let alone mobile internet devices.

As William Gibson famously said, 'the future is already here, it's just not evenly distributed.' It's worth considering the distribution of technological advances. It isn't always where you think.

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VALE Lynn Margulis 1938-2011

2011-12-07T17:27:00.001+11:00

Lynn Margulis 1938-2011
"Gaia Is A Tough Bitch"

Lynn Margulis [11.23.11]

-->

Introduction
By John Brockman

Biologist Lynn Margulis died on November 22nd. She stood out from her colleagues in that she would have extended evolutionary studies nearly four billion years back in time. Her major work was in cell evolution, in which the great event was the appearance of the eukaryotic, or nucleated, cell — the cell upon which all larger life-forms are based. Nearly forty-five years ago, she argued for its symbiotic origin: that it arose by associations of different kinds of bacteria. Her ideas were generally either ignored or ridiculed when she first proposed them; symbiosis in cell evolution is now considered one of the great scientific breakthroughs.

via edge.org

I have found Margulis' comments about culture and science to be very astute.

"If science doesn't fit in with the cultural milieu, people dismiss science, they never reject their cultural milieu! If we are involved in science of which some aspects are not commensurate with the cultural milieu, then we are told that our science is flawed. I suspect that all people have cultural concepts into which science must fit. Although I try to recognize these biases in myself, I'm sure I cannot entirely avoid them. I try to focus on the direct observational aspects of science."

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Nasa finds new planet

2011-12-06T09:15:00.001+11:00

via stuff.co.nz

I always wanted to go to another planet. I wonder what the travel time is and when Virgin will offer flights to Kepler-22b?

excerpt from "Nasa finds planet that's just about right for life" by Seth Borenstein on suff.co.nz

Nasa has found a new planet outside our solar system that's eerily similar to Earth in key aspects.

Scientists say the temperature on the surface of the planet is about a comfy 72 degrees. Its star could almost be a twin of our sun. It likely has water and land.

It was found in the middle of the habitable zone, making it the best potential target for life yet.

The discovery announced Monday was made by Nasa's Kepler planet-hunting telescope. This is the first time Kepler confirmed a planet outside our solar system in the not-too-hot, not-too-cold habitable zone.

Twice before astronomers have announced a planet found in that zone, but neither was as promising. One was later disputed; the other is on the hot edge of the zone.

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Introducing The Robot Launch Pad

2011-11-24T17:57:00.001+11:00

Since moving to Silicon Valley, I’ve been wondering how to combine my interest in human-robot culture (or making and culture hacking) with the strengths of the startup community and the robotics industry. Introducing ‘The Robot Launch Pad’!

We might not see a robot in every home yet, but the democratization of technology is occurring rapidly in robotics. As more robot platforms are developed and more sensor and hardware modules are improved, the price of a robot reduces, while the power increases. This allows more people to enter the robotics research and development cycle, developing new robots, new business models and more robot applications.

Robotics is still primarily industry and enterprise level, but the time is ripe for innovative thinking around robotics uses, new business cases and robotics as a service model. Small and medium enterprises may be the next generation of robot businesses, followed by enthusiasts who can finally afford to ‘play’ with advanced common platforms. This crowdsourcing (as epitomised by the DIY Drone community) can kick start another cycle of improvements and innovations.

… So, in April 2012, the Robot Launch Pad will hold the first of a series of robotics startup weekends, focusing on an existing robotics platform and inviting participants from the start up community, as well as robotics, to build new business models under the guidance of startup mentors and investors. It’s going to be an insanely fun and inventive weekend with really practical results, great panels and a bridge between the successful software space and robotics.

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ICSR 2011 - social robotics is 'Alive'!

2011-11-24T17:55:00.001+11:00

The International Conference on Social Robotics (where I’m presenting a work-in-progress) is underway with a theme of ‘Alive’. Sandwiched between keynotes from robot designer, Dr Tomotaka Takahashi and science fiction writer, Ken Macleod, are three days of social robotics papers, presentations, panels, tutorials and a design competition. And all in beautiful Amsterdam!

Dr. Tomotaka Takahashi

Robot Designer and ProfessorTomotaka Takahashi creates, designs, and invents unique and original humanoids (Ropid, FT, Chroino, Neon). His passion for the cutting edge in robotics brings him into collaborations with other leaders in the field, researchers and corporations.

Mr. Ken MacLeod

Science Fiction Writer

Ken MacLeod is the multiple award-winning author of many science fiction novels, including the “Fall Revolution” quartet (collected in the twin omnibuses “Fractions and Divisions”), the “Engines of Light” trilogy (Cosmonaut Keep, Dark Light, and Engine City), and several stand-alone novels including “Newton’s Wake”, “Learning the World”, and the recent “The Restoration Game”. Born on the Scottish isle of Skye, he lives in Edinburgh.

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Obit Friedrich Kittler | The Robot State

2011-11-15T08:40:00.001+11:00

via robotstate.wordpress.com

Friedrich Kittler, the 'Derrida of the Digital Age', recently passed away. His work in theorising technological relations was hugely influential in cultural and new media theory. Kittler was neither a technophile, nor a technophobe but strongly and with great detail expressed the ways in which people were shaped by their technologies. From an excerpt of his obituary in the Guardian via Berkeley Center for New Media:

Kittler once wrote: “We are the subjects of gadgets and instruments of mechanical data processing.” He was entirely serious. In his extraordinary book Gramophone, Film, Typewriter (1986) he argued that “those early and seemingly harmless machines capable of storing and therefore separating sounds, sights and writing ushered in a technologising of information”.

Later technologies – the internet in particular – further extended technology’s domination over us. He told one interviewer in 2006 that the internet hardly promotes human communication: “The development of the internet has more to do with human beings becoming a reflection of their technologies … after all, it is we who adapt to the machine. The machine does not adapt to us.”

Kittler, sometimes dubbed the “Derrida of the digital age”, thus tapped into humanity’s fear of being neutralised by its own tools. Gramophone, Film, Typewriter was written in the wake of such science-fiction fantasies as William Gibson’s Neuromancer (1984), Donna Haraway’s A Cyborg Manifesto (1985) and the first Terminator movie in which übercyborg Arnold Schwarzenegger travelled back in time to destroy humanity. Kittler’s point was not that machines will exterminate us; rather that we are deluded to consider ourselves masters of our technological domain.

The work of recent cultural theorists like Derrida, Haraway, Latour and Kittler provides the most far sighted and yet grounded suppositions about the way in which humans and technologies operate. They have led the return to investigating the 'stuff' or material of communication and culture, balanced in a the web of social and power relations. The work of cultural theory casts a wide net over the social sciences for methodology and also over the material sciences for matter. The concern of cultural theory is very relevant for robotics.

Understanding the methodology and 'use' of cultural theory is perhaps harder to grasp. Two useful articles are Ien Ang's 'Who Needs Cultural Research?' and Raymond William's classic (but difficult) 'The Uses of Cultural Theory'.

As Ang explains it, culture has little to do with 'high' or 'pop' culture and everything to do with how meaning and value are produced in the world. "In other words, culture is not only very ordinary, to speak with Raymond Williams, it is also fundamentally practical and pervasive to social life, as it is inherent to how the world is made to mean, and therefore how the world is run."

"In short, the distinctive intellectual currency and social utility of cultural studies research lies in its capacity for inducing conjunctural questioning, rather than in providing positivist answers to set questions." Ang admits this makes cultural theory resemble essay writing, however good cultural theory can provide both early response to emerging situations and the most challenging approach to accepted ones. "The very notion that culture is always contested, that meaning is always negotiated and constructed in concrete contexts, can be mobilised and applied in myriad strategic contexts in partnership with other specialist knowledge producers and users. There's nothing more practical than that."

I believe that Friedrich Kittler, like Ang and Williams, was immensely practical. His understanding of the relations between technology and war extends well beyond considering the military-industrial complex and the production of machines, but to the warring discourse networks of different technologies. His work will continue to be influential for anyone studying innovation and the global economy, and of course, human-robot culture.

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2011 Loebner Prize won by Rosette

2011-10-28T07:37:00.001+11:00

The 2011 Loebner Prize competition is over and the winner is... Rosette, by Bruce Wilcox, who scored 1.5 and wins the bronze medal and $4000 USD. None of the entries fooled the judges, so no silver or gold medal was awarded. As far as we know the Minsky Loebner Prize Revocation Prize has still not been awarded either. Judges this year included Noel Sharkey, Antony Galton, Paul Marks, and Jonny O'Callaghan. This year's event was held at the University of Exeter. The rest of the 2011 results can be found on the Exeter website. Full transcripts have not been published yet but should appear on the Loebner website shortly. The I Programmer blog posted the transcript of Rosette's winning conversation. If you'd like, you can chat with Rosette yourself. Read on to see a transcript of my own chat with Rosette.

via robots.net

Timely as I'm off to a seminar on 'AI - a Legal Perspective' via Ryan Calo's Stanford Internet Law group, who seem to be the group spearheading the discussion of robot identity.

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Another cool Aussie company - first Siri hack

2011-10-23T02:00:00.001+11:00

via smh.com.au

Great company/duo from Australia, Omar Kilani and Emily Boyd with Remember the Milk. See the full write up in SMH article "Aussies First to Get Inside Siri's Head" http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/smartphone-apps/aussies-the-first-to-get-i...

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Collaborative Discovery Engine meet Water Hackathon?

2011-10-22T07:09:00.001+11:00

via hybridwisdom.com

Two great ideas I've been following recently: Hybrid Wisdom Lab's Collaborative Discovery Engine and World Bank's Water Hackathon.

I wonder if there's a future together for them? Solutions to water problems shared by water professionals using this visual social search?

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Only Spiders!

2011-10-22T07:02:00.001+11:00

via westseattleblog.com

Only saw spiders on my walk today. Atleast I finally got to walk this week. I also saw the mist lifting off the tops of the hills like rising steam. Wait a minute. I only saw spiders? (borrowed picture again not mine)

There were spiderwebs everywhere, little ones on every blade of grass, large ones strung between trees, funnels on the ground, streamers in the air. I am always amazed by how my default interest is searching for bobcat and deer and other roughly pet or person sized things.

I wonder if this is a social reflex or visceral? Ironically, the deadliest creature on the planet is the mosquito, so I shouldn't be searching too hard for snakes and sharks!

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Whitehead’s Media Theory—a beginning

2011-10-17T02:04:00.001+11:00

Adventures in Jutland

Whitehead’s Media Theory—a beginning

August 7, 2011 by Ib | 0 comments

(Alfred North for those not living in the 1930s) Whitehead presents a little remarked upon but comprehensive ‘media theory’ that resituates media in the world, not “bifurcated” from a large slice of it. This theory is arguably more complete, if similar to, and yet predating, McLuhan’s. Indeed McLuhan read Whitehead extensively (see Douglas Coupland, Marshall McLuhan: You Know Nothing of My Work! 45, 59). In Whitehead’s theory of media there is no “bifurcation” between different types of signal (technical or natural, for example). Thus Whitehead’s philosophy becomes one in which the complexity of signal at the level of the world is paramount. Signals become “vectors of transmission” for the (“prehension” of) feeling which is central to his account of process. The world is a medium (Whitehead, Process and Reality, 286)—or a multiplicity of worlds (284) are mediums—for such vectors. For “the philosophy of organism the primary relationship of physical occasions is extensive connection,” (288) not simple extension of previously existing “things” (such as “us”).

Whitehead also preempts the very basis of both McLuhan’s thought–“the medium is the message.” He writes, “These extensive relations do not make determinate what is transmitted; but they do determine conditions to which all transmission must conform” (ibid.–see also Steven Shaviro, Without Criteria: Kant, Whitehead, Deleuze, and Aesthetics, 52). In a similar but again perhaps more comprehensive manner than McLuhan, Whitehead further understands the “the human body” as a kind of signal transducer or modulator, “…as a complex ‘amplifier’–to use the language of the technology of electromagnetism” (119). Even more than this, “the predominant basis of perception is perception of the various bodily organs, as passing on their experiences by channels of transmission and of enhancement” (119).

There is more to say on this on another occasion. Here I will just point once again to the undoing of the bifurcation of nature within Whitehead’s philosophy with regard to signal.

Douglas Coupland, Marshall McLuhan: You Know Nothing of My Work! [New York: Atlas, 2010]

Steven Shaviro, Without Criteria: Kant, Whitehead, Deleuze, and Aesthetics [Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2009]

Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality [New York: The Free Press, 1978]

via andrewmurphie.org

Andrew Murphie's take on Whitehead and McLuhan's media theory is very succinct. McLuhan has become popular again but close examination of his work reveals sources including Whitehead and Innis, both of whom have more depth to their theories. Whitehead's process philosophy seems increasingly relevant in understanding a world where the 'original' separations between animate and inanimate, human and non-human are shifting and "the relation is the smallest unit of being and of analysis"(Haraway 2008:156).
I don't know why Andrew Murphie's blog is called Adventures in Jutland. More reading is called for.

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Planet of the Apps - not totally unreal

2011-10-15T04:38:00.001+11:00

Planet of the Apps

New toy ... intrigued gorilla prods iPad
DARREN FLETCHER

via thesun.co.uk

A GORILLA prods the new toy which scientists hope will transform the way primates are kept alert and happy in zoos — an iPad.

Animal behaviour experts handed out the gadgets to five apes in an experiment. The super-smart gorillas quickly learned to turn the screens on and off and seem fascinated by the colours and pictures.

Amazingly not a SINGLE one of the five tablets which download apps has been broken since being given out at Port Lympne wild animal park three weeks ago.

Head keeper Phil Ridges said yesterday: "We thought they would bang them on rocks but they carry them round as if they were babies."

Gorillas get iPads to aid alertness and keep them happier in zoos | The Sun |News
.... this story is dated April 1st .... but I couldn't resist it.

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Bobcats Up Close!

2011-10-15T01:20:00.001+11:00

via torykallman.com

A surprise bobcat sighting on my walk today. A pair of bobcats sauntered past me while I was stretching at the top of the little hill trail near home. They weren't fussed by my presence at all. From the squalling and caterwauling after they went into the bushes, they must have been a mating pair.

Every time I go for a walk I see something new and interesting but it can be just small things like butterflies, scat, clouds etc. and I nearly didn't go out today because it was already the middle of the day so I didn't expect largish animals to be about.

One of them was going to walk straight by me on the trail, while the other was more cautious and went around the tree, but by the time I'd fussed around finding my phone to take a photo, they'd both gone into the underbrush. I've borrowed a lovely photo from Tory Kallman Photography that looks just like my sighting.

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New Zealand 'Hasn't Forgotten... | Stuff.co.nz

2011-10-09T06:37:00.001+11:00

NZ 'hasn't forgotten Christchurch'

CHARLEY MANN

Last updated 05:00 08/10/2011

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David Hallett/ Fairfax NZ

'SOBERING': Governor-General Sir Jerry Mateparae makes an aerial tour of Redcliffs.

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Christchurch Earthquake 2011

Benefits of local pools underlined City girl gets down and dirty on farm Call for red-zone visitor area USAR team get new toolkit Hospitals 'need to be ready for disaster' Vantastic Kombi was handy after the quake Homes 'should never have been built' City overbridge closed to heavy traffic Chance to end 'Crimechurch' tag Provincial chambers on world watch list

Governor-General Sir Jerry Mateparae wants Christchurch to know that the rest of the country still cares, even if the focus appears to have shifted to the Rugby World Cup.

Mateparae yesterday spent a "sobering" morning walking the earthquake-hit streets of Redcliffs, stopping to talk to residents.

"It is over a year since the September quake, and then the February quake ... and you can still see the physical devastation," he said.

"That doesn't convey the emotional and people tragedies, which had been very sobering. But people do still think about them, even with the passage of time, and even with the Rugby World Cup, people do still care."

Redcliffs resident Fletcher Stanton, who helped establish the Redcliffs on Sea community information centre after the February 22 quake, gave Mateparae a tour of the area.

"It's unfortunate that no-one takes any notice [of Redcliffs] because we're supposed to be filthy rich, but everyone is in the same boat here," he said.

Redcliffs on Sea started as a small stall on February 23, giving out bottled water and food.

It grew into a big operation, supplying pet food, fresh water, hot meals and finding tradespeople to fix damaged properties.

- The Press

Next Christchurch Earthquake 2011 story:

Big variation in quake buyout legal fees

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328   #4   05:39 pm Oct 08 2011

No, NZ hasn't forgotten about Christchurch; its just that alot of them are sick to death of hearing about us and our shattered city, houses, businesses, and lives. They have no concept of what happened or of the damage. I have had people in Europe, Australia, and even parts of NZ, who innocently asked me 'so, has life returned to normal now'.

Michael   #3   02:14 pm Oct 08 2011

yeah right!

maggie   #2   01:24 pm Oct 08 2011

@1 Jeffrey, I have to agree. I went to a mtg in Wellington for work recently and no-one seemed to be aware that life had changed here or even asked whether it had. You get to the point where you just don't talk about it to anyone outside Chch. This is very sad, and adds to the feelings of isolation and despair. I begin to understand why people needed RSL clubs after the war as they couldn't talk about their experiences to anyone else but those who had been through it.

Jeffrey Huffadine   #1   01:04 pm Oct 08 2011

NZ hasn't forgotten Christchurch?At least it is interesting to see that the new Governor General Sir Jerry Mateparae has actually been touring Christchurch and has thought of Christchurch since the February and September and June quakes and reiterated and reminded NZ that this country hasn't forgotten Christchurch.Not many governor generals would say that NZ hasn't forgotten Christchurch.The reason for Governor General Sir Jerry Mateparae for being in Christchurch was because of the Rugby World Cup and also my guess is as good as anybody elses that NZ cares about Christchurch.

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One year of earthquakes for Christchurch, NZ. I'm living in the Bay Area now but hearing stories from my old home town makes me realise just how unprepared I am for a serious earthquake event. The few relatives I have still in Christchurch are incredibly stoic. So much was destroyed that everyone is grateful for whatever they still have, but the cost of rebuilding and the length of time it takes is hard to grasp when you are safe. The TV cameras aren't on anymore.

While the same applies to Japan in the aftermath of the tsunami, and also Joplin, USA after the tornado or New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, there is one huge difference. NZ is not a very large country. Japan's horrific tsunami is economically the worst natural disaster in total cost, but the cost of the Christchurch earthquake to every person in NZ is approx $200,000 per person and blowing out all the time.

There have been three major quakes (Sept 2010, Feb2011 and June 2011) and many small aftershocks are felt every day. More stories from the front line include this collection at: http://oneyearon.tumblr.com/post/10449989877/such-a-tough-year

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Ada Lovelace Day - Carol Bartz

2011-10-08T14:49:00.001+11:00

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It's Ada Lovelace Day and to share the woman in tech who inspires me was hard. I can think of a lot of fantastic tech heroines. Ultimately, I choose Carol Bartz, ex CEO of Yahoo and AutoDesk. Throughout her entire career she has not been afraid to be a woman in a hostile environment. She stayed in tech, she fought to the top of the industry and she kept a family life balance, saying it's not possible to be perfect. She looks totally glamorous, swears like a trooper and worked her way through a comp sci degree as a cocktail waitress.

On balancing a career with family, Bartz says: "I have a belief that life isn't about balance, because balance is perfection ... Rather, it's about catching the ball before it hits the floor." ^ Kharif, Olga. “To Autodesk – and Beyond?”, Business Week. (May 12, 2004) via Wikipedia/Carol Bartz.

In the 70s, Bartz worked at 3M but they wouldn't promote her because "women don't do these jobs", so she moved on to various companies including DEC and Sun Microsystems. As CEO of Autodesk in 1992, Bartz transformed the company into a focussed highly successful business. Bartz also served on several boards and has been a member of the United States President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. Bartz's move to Yahoo in 2009 was perhaps a 'glass cliff' as most were sceptical about the chances to resurrect one of the original internet dinosaurs, huge but facing extinction.

In spite of pleasing business analysts with her performance over the last two years, Bartz was ignonimously dumped from Yahoo a few weeks ago, whereupon she called the board a bunch of 'doofuses' who had 'fucked her over'. I love how Bartz went out fighting. She also continues to behave with integrity, honoring commitments made before leaving Yahoo for talks, donations, and visits.

She's telling it like it is. Sometimes it just can't be rosy for women in tech. I love the Wired cover of Limor Fried, who is another kickass tech girl goddess. But evoking Rosie the Riveter just reminds me of what happened to all those women who ran the factories and farms while the men were at war. Booted out when the war was over.

Although Ada may have been forgotten, originally computer programming was going to be a female job, while the men built the hardware. But it seems that the moment an industry looks interesting and/or lucrative, it becomes a male industry.

Statistically, no matter how well women are performing academically, and no matter how many great role models we can now point to, there still aren't many women at the top.

"Since 1966, the number of women receiving bachelor's degrees in science and engineering in the US has increased every year to come close to half. The proportion of grad students closer to 40%. The more technical an area is seen to be, the fewer the number of women.

Research on women's participation in the "hard" sciences such as physics and computer science speaks of the "leaky pipeline" model, in which the propoertion of women "on track" to potentially becoming top scientists falls off at every step of the way, from getting interested in science and math in elementary school, through doctorate, postdoc, and career steps. Various reasons are proposed for this, but the vast differences in the "leakiness" of this same pipe across countries and times argue for a cultural interpretation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_science

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Robotics Club Fun again

2011-10-06T03:00:00.001+11:00

The first Lego League Season is in mid swing. I'm delighted to have the chance to coach at my children's middle school, having suffered withdrawals from Newtown Robotics Club.

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Ada Lovelace Day - Carol Bartz

Robotics Club Fun again

TOWARD AN
INNOVATIVE CHINA

RAW MATERIALS
FOR INNOVATION

Lynn Margulis 1938-2011
"Gaia Is A Tough Bitch"