Learning with the Fang » science

Tanya’s team gets subtantial funding for research in Adelaide

mseyfang — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 00:26:31 +0000

Not sure if I am more excited or relieved to be able to share the great news that a team led by Prof Tanya Monro from the University of Adelaide has won significant funding for research here in Adelaide!

In case you missed it in the good-news blitz of the Prime Minister’s ‘nation-building infrastructure package announced by the Prime Minister to support Australia’s economy in tough times’ yesterday, here is the skinny:

The Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing at the University of Adelaide – $28.8 million

The University will create an internationally leading

transdisciplinary Institute which will allow it to develop new

fibre-based platform technologies to underpin paradigm-changing tools

for human health, the environment, industrial processes and defence

systems. It will also facilitate breakthroughs in physics, chemistry,

biology and environmental science.

And more from the news section of the University website:

“What sets this institute apart is that we have a vision to bring

together scientists from different areas to focus on some of the big

problems. This transdisciplinary approach to research will have a real

impact by focusing research on the knowledge gaps between the

traditional scientific disciplines, by stimulating the creation of new

industries, and by inspiring a new generation of scientists to be

engaged in solving real-world problems.”

Great news! – well done to all who worked so hard for so long on this.

Twitter, cursebird and the Anthropologist

mseyfang — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Since my earliest tinkerings with the social web, I have thought the digital trails we write to the internet would make ideal data for anthropologists to study. My instincts regularly ‘give me feelings’ that the things I experience through my online networks are profound and perhaps mirror the inner workings of my brain or maybe even an ant colony. I have often wondered what a scientific study of the digital tracks left by my blog posts, comments, flickr images, video mashups and most recently twitter tweets might do to re-enforce or de-bunk my intuition.

Having had the privilege of hanging out with Microsoft’s chief anthropologist Anne Kirah after a presentation I gave a few years back got me thinking about what people in her field of research would make of this data.

Then, just before the US Election I discovered ‘cursebird‘ through a very *serendipitous tweet exchange with JP (the 5th beatle of the Cluetrain Manifesto and oracle of all things online and social):

jobsworth :

RT dsearls (who’s sitting next to me at telco 2.0) Holy shit, it’s Cursebird: http://cursebird.com/

2008-11-04 04:23:02

Reply

fang :

@jobsworth – say Gday to Doc from two OZ fans, @fang and @dnwallace. Loving the tweets cursing the cursebird ;-)

2008-11-04 05:21:59

Reply

jobsworth :

@dnwallace @fang hello back, and looking forward to the fourth and final contest starting this Friday.

2008-11-04 05:34:16

Reply

Which really showcased (to my warped mind anyway) how an open set of API’s on a bunch of data from people thinking out loud (140 characters at a time) can reveal much to a half-crazed pseudo-scientist. Here are my first quickly jumped to and almost fact free conclusions:

My hand picked twitter network (following just under 100 people I actually ‘know’) are not as obsessed as the general twitterverse with US elections BUT… I can not recall seeing one pro-republican tweet in the midst of much pro-obama rehetoric. Makes me wonder if I should apply my ’subscribe widely’ ethos to my twitter followers to avoid the echo-chamber.
The swearing twitterverse was swamped with the meme ‘dont fuck it up america’ in the hours leading up to the US election. It seemed that these messages came from both within and outside the US of A – some of them from my own network. There seemed to be a real push for action intended to spur Americans to get out and vote democrat.
Just after Obama claimed victory the swearing twitterverse resonated with “ we won!” My own network contained several emotional and positive references to Obama’s victory speech and seemed to echo a sentiment of a new era of hope.
Within hours the hope had evaporated for some when the LA gay marriage vote went down and the odd cynical self proclaimed expert touted ‘Obama voted against gay marriage and is therefore a hypocrite’ – end of hope). Fascinating stuff!

I tried to go back and collect some cursebird screenshots as evidence but alas, I’m too late. At least one punter out there shares some of my enthusiam for cursebird’s window into the global brain.

billmerrill :

Watching fucking cursebird instead of dumbass teevee, better election coverage.

2008-11-04 18:54:22

Reply

This morning I woke up with a bunch of cursebird inspired titles for possible future blog posts:

Twitter, cursebird and the Anthropologist
Twitter, cursebird and the US-Centric echo chamber of the social web.
Twitter, cursebird and ‘instant karma’ by scatterbrain
Cursebird shits on my clean feed (showing how to subvert pornfilter into a pornfinder)

Please enjoy this post, cursebird, recreational drugs, religion, self loathing and alcohol responsibly.

*serendipity

Fang – Mike Seyfang

technorati tags:seyfang, mikeseyfang

Tanya Monro wins Malcolm McIntosh Prize for Physical Scientist of the Year

mseyfang — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 12:15:43 +0000

Congratulations to Professor Tanya Monro from the Centre of Expertise in Photonics at the University of Adelaide for winning the Malcolm McIntosh Prize for Physical Scientist of the Year.

According to this website, the prize was awarded at tonight’s Prime Minister’s Prizes for Science awards in Canberra. Following this link will give you more information on Tanya, her award and a short video outlining some of her work and inspiration.

More information as it comes to hand – stay tuned.

- Press via Google News. AusSMC. More here (some info on the Science of holey fibres)

- Blog entry HERE (note 3/5 prizes went to people working in South Australia).

Fang – Mike Seyfang

technorati tags:seyfang, mikeseyfang

London Science Blogging Conference – a view from DownUnder

mseyfang — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 16:07:54 +0000

It’s just after 1.00am and I am sitting at my desk in my PJ’s as I take part in a Science Blogging Conference in London. This ‘remote/online’ conference experience has been rather special for a number of reasons. First, the event is a kind of ’soft-launch’ for my new collaboration with Kristin, Lisa and the other ladies from Bridge8 = sciencegeekspeak.com.

Sciencegeekspeak.com might just grow into a global platform for a continuous conversation about science – more on that later. Check out THIS POST for one summary of the various facets of tonights online conference. I managed to publish a podcast of audio from the opening remarks before the lunch break. (And learnt a lot about the history of the RI and one way streets in London.)

Twitter was the place to be at the start of the event, lots of tweets and a bunch of interesting new people to follow. Then Cameron Neylon streamed video live to the web from mogulus. The audio was a bit distant for the first session, but was brilliant for Matt’s breakout session (tho the video didnt really add any value, just chewed bandwidth). At the end of that breakout, Cameron left the camera running while he chatted with participants and made notes on his laptop – it was just like being there! (I think I spied Jean Claude Bradley in the background).

After the lunch break the video stopped (batteries??) and twitter went silent. It seemed like everybody compared notes at lunch and decided to move all their attention to comments on various ‘threads’ in the friendfeed room for the event.

Interesting.
Good Night.

Fang – Mike Seyfang

technorati tags:seyfang, mikeseyfang

Directions to LaserTAG at Open Day on Sunday

mseyfang — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 10:22:13 +0000

This Sunday (Aug 17) is Open Day at the University of Adelaide and I will be involved in some LaserTAG goodness in the Bragg Lecture theatre most of the morning. Here is a little video with rough directions, starting from the Pultney street entrance on North Terrace:

Come along, have a go and bring your phone with bluetooth enabled – that way you can can share your laser creation with your friends, or better still the interwebs. If you do upload to the interwebs, TAG your creation with ‘uofaoday‘.

Fang – Mike Seyfang

technorati tags:seyfang, mikeseyfang