Weeknote 46/2024
I’m composing this while watching Liverpool take apart Man City on TV. Despite the magnitude of the fixture, I’m watching it alone as my wife and daughter are at a social event, my son is watching it with his mates, and my dad is down at my sister’s.
It’s probably for the best, as I’ve only just finished going through the final draft of an NDLN Horizon Scanning report into microcredentials. It’s a little over the word count, and I think the conclusion could do some work, but the thread that runs through it is solid and so I’ve sent it to our editor, Catherine Cronin. I’m looking forward to her feedback and its publication, which will presumably be early next year.
Other than that, I’ve been working on the Friends of the Earth AI sustainability principles article, as well as pitching to Amnesty International UK about some potential upcoming work. After an interesting discussion, I turned down some lucrative work that didn’t mesh with my values and ethics, had an initial call with a recruiter about a (part-time) job, and confirmed my availability for interview for another.
After a hiatus, I’ve been back posting at Thought Shrapnel this week. Ideally, I’d like to make it more like Warren Ellis’ notebook, but I don’t live the same kind of life. It’s about the time of year when I rethink everything and become generally dissatisfied with things. Sometimes not changing things is OK, sometimes it’s not.
Other things worth mentioning:
- We had fantastic feedback on the ‘Greening AI’ roundtable for Friends of the Earth. It would be fantastic if they found funding to continue community development around that.
- I went to a Mozilla Alumni virtual meeting which was hosted by Dees. Some of the best memories from my career are from the time I spent at the Mozilla Foundation (2012-15) so I’m keen to see what the new Executive Director has in store for reinvigorating community.
- My mother celebrated a birthday this week, so we had an enjoyable meal in No. 59 Restaurant at The Townhouse.
- I took my dad and son to the Newcastle Eagles basketball game against Cheshire Phoenix. It had everything: huge points swings, excitement, drama, and grudges.
- My son scored four baskets as his team lost narrowly in his basketball game yesterday. He played well, as he did today in his football game in which, again, his team lost narrowly.
- My daughter played for East Northumberland against Newcastle in a district-level schools match that is better off forgotten. She then received Player of the Match and scored two from outside the box as her Saturday team beat one of their rivals convincingly. Shame about the drubbing her Sunday team received from a boys team earlier today.
I’ve got two weeks of work in December before taking three weeks off over my birthday, Christmas, and New Year. It’s kind of pointless trying to do business development other than developing content (thought leadership!) at this time of year as everyone is starting to wind down. WAO could do with more work, especially as this has been a pretty lean year for most freelancers and organisations in our position. Hence me looking at part-time jobs. We’ll see how it goes.
Image: taken by me on Friday night at the basketball game