Category: report
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Pattern Matrix at Algomech (part 1)
I’m writing this on the train with a slightly sleep deprived brain fizzing and popping from thoughts, ideas and conversations from this year’s Algomech festival in Sheffield. The Penelope project took a significant role in the festival, with the group’s participation in the Unmaking Symposium, the exhibition and also testing our latest weavecoding technology at…
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Technology after Collapse
The philosophy underlying contemporary ‘seamless’ technology production seems to be one of endless energy, bountiful resources and waste being someone else’s problem. Naive working assumptions of some form are a requirement when designing for the future, but do we believe in these enough now to make them useful? Flashy ‘aspirational’ tech videos of ever thinning…
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Report: Rethinking Diversity in a Rural Region Conference
FoAM Kernow is an organisation in one of the most disadvantaged parts of the UK. Many of the gaps in our society are particually obvious in Cornwall, the separation between those whom our social structures benefit and those who they do not are clear to see in the separation between the coastal and inland regions,…
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Quipu: further experiments in Dusseldorf
A report on further experimentation with Julian Rohrhuber and his students at the Institute for Music and Media in Dusseldorf during our coding with weaves and knots remote seminar this week. As we have so little idea what the Inca are telling us in their Quipu, it seems appropriate to add a cryptanalysis approach to…
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Photos from the machine wilderness workshop
Busy times at Foam Kernow, here are some photos from the Machine Wilderness Workshop weekend before last. This was a project between Foam Amsterdam and us, with 30 participants from all over the place geographically and professionally. My role was as facilitator, so mainly obtaining raw materials (electronic toys, recycled trash and e-waste) as well…
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Training teachers in coding at Truro School
I’m part of a UK Department of Education funded project to join up 10 primary schools in Cornwall and get them programming. The teachers are very important people in this equation, so our first activity was a training day for them. The idea of this was to get them familiar with using the Raspberry Pi…
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Foam Kernow mini update
A short update on the things currently going on at Foam Kernow alongside the stuff I’ve been blogging about lately. We are near completion of a new version of the butterfly hunting game – this time being developed for the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, where it will be a citizen science exhibit…
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Organisation hacking (part 1)
Over the last six months I’ve been taking a crash course in company formation, treating it like any other investigation into a strange and esoteric technology. Last year I registered FoAM Kernow as a UK non profit organisation in the mould of FoAM Brussels. Starting off with absolutely no knowledge at all (but with a…
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Thinking Digital 2014
Last week I had the honour of both performing with Alex and presenting at Thinking Digital 2014. Suzy O’Hara invited me to represent the intersection of art, science and education of FoAM kernow and present the work I’ve been doing with the Sensory Ecology Group at Exeter University. I did a quick Egglab game demo…
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Dagstuhl – Collaboration and learning through live coding
Dagstuhl seminars are week long free form meetings between different disciplines centred around computer science. The location is a specially designed complex in the German countryside, and activities include long walks in the surrounding hills, a well equipped and beautiful music room and a well stocked wine cellar. Our seminar was called ‘Collaboration and learning…