Internet of things – designswarm {thoughts}

10 questions we should all be asking designers

I’ve been hiring people for almost 20 years. These are some questions I think we should ask more often: What grinds your gears in the design industry? Tell me about a time when you had to give difficult feedback someone Tell me about a time when you encountered an ethically murky situation. What did you… Continue reading 10 questions we should all be asking designers

Sunday Scraps #66

Things aren’t alright in the world so my reading reflects that. Sorry. The six mistakes of man by Cicero is on point / Mr Bean’s house/bunker for cars / the 18thC communes of the Icarians / the Belisha beacon is awesome but most of the cars in my neck of the woods ignore them and… Continue reading Sunday Scraps #66

End of year Review

Thanks to Prof. Dr. Molly Steenson for initiating this habit. 1. What did you do in 2021 that you’d never done before? Prioritised my finances over how interesting or aligned my work was. 2. Did you keep your New Years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year? We were in the middle of a… Continue reading End of year Review

Smart homes or smart paperwork?

It’s been almost 3 years since I wrote Smarter Homes but my interest in the historical role of the home in our communal and societal decision-making hasn’t stopped. After working as Head of Labs at Bulb and doing research for Overlay (by ING Labs) I got really interested in the more administrative side of homes.… Continue reading Smart homes or smart paperwork?

Repairable by design?

I’ve been a trustee of The Restart Project, a right to repair charity, for almost a year. They are focused on raising political awareness of the need for right to repair legislation in the UK and Europe and have been doing a fantastic job over the past 6 years. It’s an honour to meet with… Continue reading Repairable by design?

Sunday Scraps #41

The subversive art of Colette Justine / the stamps (or Haupstrom) of Joseph Beuys / Seed crystal / the feminisation of chocolate / How to Map Nothing or what we choose not to map / A podcast about the problems of power in Bristol’s food culture

Sunday Scraps #36

William Lethaby, founder of the Central School of Art and Design, wrote a book on architecture and mysticism in the late 1800s / the impact of Womanhouse and a film about it / a new book on neo liberalism and logistics Assembly Codes / a friend told me I should read The Sun Also Rises… Continue reading Sunday Scraps #36

Alone together: the past 20 years of remote connections

The pandemic seems to have triggered some investigation of how we connect remotely with others. Welcome to the last 20 years of HCI everyone! Seriously though, people have been researching how we connect with others and our surroundings in situations that are mediated by technology for a long time. So careful before you claim it’s… Continue reading Alone together: the past 20 years of remote connections

The world of (inconsistent) data

I left Bulb in late April 2019 and moved on to work with a team inside ING researching how financial institutions could utilise building data to develop a new generation of sustainability-led financial services until March this year. After working with Bulb, EDF & British Gas over the past 15 years, I certainly knew plenty… Continue reading The world of (inconsistent) data

A shepherdess: 9 years at the helm of #iotlondon

In autumn 2011, I was asked by Usman to curate and organise the London Internet of Things Meetup. He was busy growing Pachube and I had just shut Tinker London the year before. Ed Borden was the Pachube evangelist and ran the first 2 or three. I got involved from November 2011 and our 100th… Continue reading A shepherdess: 9 years at the helm of #iotlondon