20
Mar
2011
ideas speed dating
This is a bit of a UTS architecture classic, I think I first heard about it from Adrian Lahoud and Tarsha Finney a few years ago, and Friday’s class was the first chance I’ve had to really try it out.
The format is simple, split the class in half, and sit the two halves facing each other. Then get them to talk about their ideas for 4 minutes. I had everyone sitting pretty close together – it gets pretty noisy but it seems to pump up the endergy a bit. Once the 4 minutes is up you get one side of the group to rotate. Then start again.
It got good feedback from the class. It's almost too easy, it feels a bit like cheating! Because of the short time and high energy the ideas seem to flow so quickly. There is a bit of a problem with how to rearange the group so that the static ones get to talk to each other too, but I'd imagine that once I get around to reading group theory in the bedroom I'll have a way to fix that.
I had an odd number so I popped the odd one off the end and gave them a 4 minute write up session so that they could capture their ideas.
21
Feb
2011
Canyon pics
Canyon pics, posted with vodpod
Here’s some pics from the trip to the Blue Mountains.
Read the rest of this entry »
19
Feb
2011
Both sides of the story
I’m setting a reading list for a debate amongst my students about Australian energy policy. It’s likely to be relatively abstract discussion as none of us has access to, or expertise in, the specific data.
I’ve already got
and
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WHY vs WHY Nuclear Power Barry Brook (YES) vs Ian Lowe (NO) |
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Sustainable Energy – without the hot air, David JC MacKay |
as the main texts for the debate. The first book is specifically Australian, but the second is UK focused (but only really from a data point of view). I’d like to include some contrarian texts too, the two that come to mind are
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The False Promise of Green Energy , by Andrew Morriss, William T. Bogart and Roger E. Meiners |
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The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves , by Matt Ridley |
but I haven’t read either of them, and I’d be interested to hear what other people recommend, and what they think of the books mentioned.
The current motion for the debate is: “this house believes that Australia’s energy supply mix is doing just fine the way it is” and I’m a bit worried that nobody will come to support the motion with any enthusiasm.
I’ll be posting more studio related bits as it gets going, but I’d love some suggestions.
18
Feb
2011
solo canyoning
Tomorrow I’m going to go nice and early to the blue mountains to do a pair of canyons, Jugglers and the Grand Canyon. I’ll be solo, so it should be relatively fast, but even so, it’ll be a fairly long day. I’m going to try for the Blue Mountains train Dep: 3:48am Sydney Terminal Platform 7 Arr: 5:50am Katoomba Station Platform 2, then cycle to near the start of the canyon (here). Assuming a worst case scenario for time, I’d say that the latest that I’ll be out of the canyon and back to the bike will be 6pm. I’ll update with a comment here to say that I’m back safely.
I’ve got a new camera, so there will be photos!
4
Feb
2011
Navigation Project explanation
Last Friday we presented the work that Dan & Bin have been doing as a part of the Summer Scholarship that we (BVN) have got going with the Sydney Uni computer science department. I videoed it because I’m narcissistic, so if you are interested in what we’ve been up to then here it is.