Is high speed broadband a human right?

There's been a lot written about human rights, beautiful in sentiment and often beautiful in prose too.  A particular favourite of mine is the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their CREATOR, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.

The fourth article of the UN Declaration of Human Rights:

No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.

This always conjures up this image for me.  Used extensively as an anti-slavery icon, and referenced in the simple yet powerful 'I am a man' placards worn during the civil rights movement in the US.  When you think of these struggles then idea that a high-speed internet connection could possibly be a human right seems laughable.  Thomas Jefferson admirably covers all bases when he describes the unalienable rights as including life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, but I think anyone would struggle to convincingly tack on to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness and a high speed internet connection. What would be next- a flat screen TV?


Cast against these 'true'  human rights the idea of broadband being a human right seems a fanicful notion, yet France, Greece, Estonia, Spain and Finland believe it is.  These countries may have moral reasons for taking this standpoint, but the most compelling argument for the importance of a dependable high-speed internet connection is that it, as Dr Hamadoun Toure (secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union ) states "the internet [is] basic infrastructure - just like roads, waste and water."  I think that as we move to  knowledge based economy our digital infrastructure and access to it will become even more important.  


Having an internet connection means that I can participate in digital life, possibly that I can work from home, certainly that I can spend unpalatable chunks of my salary at Amazon.  This connection means that I can scrutinise what politicians say to me, I can get my news from just about anywhere, I can even write the news that you read.  I, or my business, can participate and thrive in the knowledge economy.  I can shrug the restrictions that come with just having a local paper or no access to a supermarket.  It  means I can file my tax return online, I can book a flight with the click of a mouse; I can even compare meerkats quickly and effectively.


The hardware I use is unimportant.  The method I use to connect a little more so: if the government enshrined my right to the internet as a human right, would companies currently unwilling to invest in the rural network change their attitude?  These issues aside what is most important is ensuring my access to the information out there, as Tom Watson MP says:

Human rights develop; I don't think you make a decision to create them one day. But people should have a right to access to knowledge. The internet facilitates that, so if you restrict people's access to the internet you restrict their access to knowledge.  

There is another aspect to this question and that is the principle of fairness.  Jefferson's statement that we were all created equal is perhaps true, but that equality doesn't last for too long.  Hiding behind most of the statements you read about human rights is the idea of a meritocracy, of people getting a shot at success regardless of their background.  This is one of the things people love most about public libraries.


Now I'm not going to get all dewy eyed and rant on about equality and justice for all, but I want you to think for a moment about what you do online that you did on paper or in person 5 or 10 years ago.  Book a flight, order your groceries, renew your passport, even find out what's going on in your local area?  Some of these you can still do in person, but have you ever tried calling Ryanair?  A Canadian colleague of mine in the public sector recently told me that just about all Canadian government services now have to be accessed online, the library service there regularly assists older people, the unemployed, people without computer skills or a machine at home to access key services.  I read only this week about listings and comment for local arts groups moving from the local press and freesheets to the blogosphere.  That's a lot to be excluded from, and we haven't even touched on the healing power of LOLcats yet.


Extra Credit:

Highly recommended: the stimulus for this post:
Offline: The invisible underclass - Features, Gadgets & Tech - The Independent http://bit.ly/dAof15 

Broadband and human rights | AlphaGalileo | http://bit.ly/9P0Vhd

BBC News - Internet access is 'a fundamental right' http://bit.ly/d3uTEm

Case study: Me!

I live this strange double life where during the day I have a constant online presence: I tweet, I FB, I blog; I browse, mostly for political and technical news stories.  When I go home I slip into another world, a world that is not unlike 1998.  In 1998 if I wanted to surf, which I did a lot, I had to pick a quiet time when no one wanted to use the phone and then dangle my extension cord downstairs to the telephone point so I could hook-up to my dial up connection.  Most sites were predominantly text based, with the exception of marching red ants and revolving New! ovals, so my little blue bar loaded up reasonably quickly.  Downloading sound clips or video took too long to be attractive.  I ran Windows 98 on a decent machine, had an AOL browser and my email address was a string of numbers @compuserve.com. Is this sounding like the digital Jurassic to anyone?


Back to 2010.  I live in a rural area out of the reach of normal broadband, we have an imaginative solution to pick up the signal from a nearby village via a system of hubs.  It's alright, and much better than any commercial company would offer us, but the speed for downloading isn't great, especially at busy times, when I'm reluctant to use it for online purchases.  Websites frequently time out and it takes from an hour and a half upwards to down load a one hour programme on iPlayer, we were once quoted an expected download time of 20 hours.


The telephone line down the stairs wasn't so much of a handicap back in my digital dinosaur period: most sites I visited were text based and downloaded at an acceptable speed.  Web design today, with its emphasis on multimedia, means that for people like us browsing is often not worth the bother.  Sure I can check email and draft blog posts from home, but often that's just about it.  The internet is a key part of my infrastructure and important to everyone in rural areas like East Anglia, it was mentioned as an crucial infrastructure improvement, along with road and rail in the Look East election candidates' debate 2010.  It's very important to all of us- hell, my village doesn't have gas either, but I've never been moved to blog about it!

Dinosaur is from nerissa's ring http://www.flickr.com/photos/21524179@N08/2678588264/in/set-72157606229117415/ used under a Creative Commons licence

Save NYPL!

Marsh and I had such a fabulous time In New York last year, the highlight for me was our tour of NYPL, so I was distressed to see that they are facing a pretty big funding cut.  There's a campaign against the cuts, this was my 2 cents:

"I'm a librarian from the UK and visited NYPL last year.  The stunning architecture apart what impressed me most about it was the open and welcoming attitude.  I was amazed to find that anyone could step in to read and to enquire.  It's a kind of openness that one doesn't find everywhere and that makes it even more important to preserve.

In times of economic hardship libraries are often the only places people can go to access current employment publications and access valuable IT resources.  Without these, ordinary people become disenfranchised from  our digital culture.  Tough economic times should prompt us to safeguard library services, not cut them."  

The library is open to anyone who lives, works, studies or pays property taxes in the State of New York, that's 19,541,453 residents alone.  They also make special provision to highlight specific library resources and help for job seekers.  This is just one instance of library cutbacks threatening services, there are many more across the UK and further afield.  I realise that I don't have the unenviable job of balancing the books every year, and that there's a lot to pay for with less and less money, but I believe that cutting funding to public libraries is nothing but a short term solution.

Why blog? From a Next Gen Blogger

A simple question and one I'm surprised not to have tackled yet.  Actually I know why I haven't dealt with this one.  The question is hard and most answers to it are emotionally charged and naff or hopelessly over-optimistic.  The only reason I'm lifting this poisoned chalice is because Andy Priestner's Twitter feed planted the idea in my head and because 23 Things Cambridge is due to start, and I should start writing about a wider range of library issues, rather than just twitter, browsers and beer.

So why do people write blogs?  Let's look at a few of the classic contenders:

The Journal Writer

At worst can be characterised by self-indulgent navel gazing, but at best can be insightful and deeply interesting, if mildly voyeuristic!  The Journal Writer has done this before, has probably kept a diary since childhood.  They have an amazing ability to sketch out thoughts with genuine ease, characterised by their confessional style they put themselves at the centre of the content.  

The Wannabe Journalist

Has a strong sense of brand and image, and is a strong flavour to match.  Love them or hate them, their excellent sense of point and idea provokes debate, and occasionally skirts close to polemic.  Perhaps has a tendency to write self-help guides, articles and reviews, and hopes the blog (usually part of a wider web presence) will lead to future successes.  

And the most unfortunate kind...

The Office Expert

Also known as the poor bugger.  So you can install simple software, fix minor computing problems,  and you don't use CD-ROMs as coasters; this talent, according to your boss, makes you the ideal candidate to write the company/departmental/darts team blog.  Never mind that you don't understand the content you have to write, the market you should aim for and that no one else will contribute in the writing of this dead albatross that is rapidly going mouldy around your neck.

To make matters worse, this kind of lousy experience is likely to put you off trying anything interactive online again.  Hell, you're only here because you can print the right way up on headed notepaper first time.  Take heart in the flowchart!

Don't get me wrong, sometimes a blog is exactly what your organisation needs, but often it is just something that a senior manager heard about at a conference and has decided on one for no better reason than trend, usually an old trend by that point.  Web presence  isn't for everyone, and even if it is for you the type of presence you need isn't necessarily a blog.  Adam Maltpress, my web consultant of choice, has some wise words on his approach to creating a web presence:

"I just listen to what you want, tell you what might be good or bad ideas, then make it work.

That might mean creating you a web strategy which fits with your other communications - you know, "synergistically". It might mean guiding you through the basics of search engines, social networking, blogging and e-commerce. It might mean building you a site. It might mean managing your existing suppliers. Or it might mean telling you that a website's not what you need. Don't worry - I don't charge for that."

The Next Gen Blogger.  Have I've just made that up?  Probably.

The office expert leads me on to a new type of blogger and one the one I hope to be.  When new types of social media become mainstream all sorts of people get on the bandwagon, now that this new innovation has been proven to have a relatively wide appeal and will not negatively impact on your organisation it becomes imperative that you must get one.  Immediately.  Even if you don't know how it works, whether it suits your business or not.  These rushed blogs often become stale when they should be dynamic, are badly structured and don't speak to their audience.  This doesn't just apply to corporate blogs, but to anyone who considers themselves a brand or wants to target a specific audience.

Reacting to this, the next generation blogger uses their blog in a subtly different way.  It's still a web presence, it still represents them, their ideas and thoughts, but rather than just being a place to showcase them it becomes a place to form them.  It sounds pathetic to admit it but I do think of myself as a bit of a brand.  I try to keep my web presences unified: twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. so people can find me and so that a good idea on one site is associated with the others.  I'm not fanatical about attracting followers, but I want my ideas to be heard.  I work in a fairly isolated role, so reaching out to people is very important to me.    Twitter is my main means of communication, but there are things I can't say in 140 characters, and that's where beauty_school_dropout comes in handy.  That's a pretty obvious use, a little less so is that keeping a blog helps me think.

I suppose it depends how your brain works, but I find fleshing out ideas in words helps me make to sense of them and draw my own conclusions.  It's also the case that I tend to forget about things, especially films and books, if I don't go through the intellectual activity of reviewing them.  I'll be sketching a quick pen portrait of a novel I've read and suddenly connections to other works become obvious.  It's not just about the technique of reviewing: this started out as a short post and look where we are!  I've had so many ideas since I started writing, many more than I would have if I'd just linked to the two resources at the bottom of this- both of them are written by men with beards, but that's all they have in common.

So why blog?  To get your message out, or at least off your chest.  To clear up confusion in your own mind and make concepts easier to understand for others.  To form a record of your thougths and experiences, from the software you've toyed with to the beers you've quaffed.  Most importantly for me, as a valuable reflection tool.

Extra Credit:

Why I Blog - Magazine - The Atlantic - Highly Recommended
Top Reasons Why I Blog | Online Social Networking

Minimalist.

So, this week I've been thinking, talking and writing about my secret love affair with Google Chrome.

I have lots of secret love affairs, most of them are bad relationships: trashy adventure novels I stay up until 2 am reading, Twiglets which are antisocial to munch.  Some of them are wrong but good.  I count Stephen King in there no matter how many people pooh-pooh him, chillies too: sometimes I fear what they are doing to my stomach lining, but they have vitamin C in, so they can't be wholly evil.

I think that the 'don't be evil' corporation's Chrome may be another one of those good for me secret affairs.  I have got the hang of the download function, I'm impressed with how easy it is to create and manage bookmarks.  I'm a bit confused that it's built-in spell checker doesn't recognise the word Google, but there you go.  Xmarks aside- I never leave the house without Xmarks- I've held off on fully exploring the extensions, perhaps that would be too much of a betrayal of Firefox.

Aside from what's under the bonnet of Chrome, what I like about it is the sleek minimalism of the design.  I don't like clutter, I don't like lots of buttons, and I want to be able to customise it so that key functions are where I expect them to be, not where the designer thinks they ought to be.  Customizability and a fuss-free interface are some of the reasons I'm such a fan of Firefox, and why I gave Safari a good long go before I gave it up.  It's also what makes Apple products so enviably gorgeous, but the Scot within is not prepared to pay the price premium for that.

The good news is that you can enjoy beautiful, pared down design for almost-free on the web.  I stumbled across this article from Smashing Magazine on minimalist web-design this morning, via the Librarian in Black's twitter feed.  As well as tips on how to strip back on unnecessary content, use white or blank space to your advantage, and hints on image choices it showcases some mouthwatering examples of good design.  The example on the left is from Anothercompany.  The monochrome image in the centre makes a strong statement and it's fabulously clutter-free.  Sadly it is under construction, so not much more than eye candy at present, but I find it an attractive design, and by far my favourite from the examples featured in the article.

beauty_school_dropout used to sport a basic black and grey design; I have missed the simplicity of the layout since my revamp, but I think it was well intentioned but boring.  Perhaps I'll do a bit more research and have a rethink.

Lake District Vignettes: Beer- the main course

Where we venture into comfortable hostelries and sup.

As we are both sad librarian types, Marsh and I planned a pub crawl around Ambleside using the internet.  This research proved invaluable as did the local Camra magazine Lakes and Ale- you know, fail to prepare, prepare to fail, and all that.

So here are our favourites and one to avoid.

Conveniently located at the bottom of our street, and a Good Beer guide regular, we very much enjoyed the time we spent in the Golden Rule.  The Rule is everything a Northern pub should be, right down to the velveteen banquettes and cosy snugs.  No music, no food, but a good variety of ales, all well kept and served.  Marsh opted for Robinson's Dizzy Blonde while I, unsportingly felt drawn to the Grolsch.

First food of the trip was taken in the Unicorn; decent pub grub and particularly good old-school puddings with custard- Marsh was happy!  Impressive selection of Hartley's and Robinson's ales, Hartley's XB and Robinson's Unicorn deserve a mention.

The White Lion really deserved a second visit but time sadly got the better of us, which was a shame as they had beers from the Kewsick Brewing Company on tap, Thirst Fall I think.  Keswick's Thirst Run one of my Desert Island beers: I love the stuff.

Let's get the one to avoid over with before the final flourish.

In 1999 my local brewery paid for me and a bunch of other school-leavers from the North West to experience life in another country; we went to China for the best part of three weeks.  I'd never been on a plane before, never been out of the country, I'd just turned 19 and it was an amazing experience.  I've always been happy to pay them back in pints.  I've drank a lot of Thwaites bitter in Blackburn and Darwen and wouldn't hesitate to recommend the Keswick Lodge (predictably, in Keswick) for beer, food or a bed for the night, but all these good experiences made the Sportsman's Arms in Ambleside even more of a let down.  Marsh and I necked the halves I'd fortuitously ordered as quickly as we could.  We were the only souls in there and there was a choice of four draught options, and one of those was Coke.  The barman had indicated that the manager had lost interest, they only money they seemed to be making was from the less than inspiring 'party room' downstairs.  There was plenty of Sambuca on offer, but we'd come in for a pint of Wainwright.  A shame.

Now for some good news.  Despite being an outside runner the Queen's Hotel provided our beer of the week.  True, it wasn't a cosy or snug, and in some ways it was a bit on the posh side- change out of your boots and waterproofs before you go- but they had a very pleasant and knowledgeable barman.  Sporting an excellent range of ales on tap, the highlight had to be the Yates' Bitter: even a dedicated lager drinker like me was itching for a last pint of it before we went.  Luckily for us the Booth's in Bowness had a plentiful supply which we bought most of!

Firefox 4!

Firefox 4 is due for release in November; it can't come too soon because my flirtation with Chrome is looking worryingly like the beginning of a relationship!

Mike Beltzner is promising us a "super-duper fast" browser which will be HTML5 ready, and feature a pared down user interface.  You can find the slides from Mozilla's presentation on Mike's blog.  You'll see that the interface borrows heavily from the sleek simplicity preferred by Chrome, something that gets a big thumbs up from me.  Of course looking good doesn't make it any faster or more effective, but who wants an ugly, clunky browser?  Another attractive point is that user generated add-ons won't loose their functionality just because the browser is overhauled, this is all thanks to Jetpack.

Points mooted at the presentation and ideas in the pipeline include dedicated twitter and Gmail tabs and Chrome-like background updates, saving you precious seconds during the initial boot, or possibly minutes if you live in the sticks like me and like your add-ons!

I don't think this is Chrome with a Firefox skin, although some people will feel that Firefox is leaning in too close to their rival.  As much as I'm enjoying using Chrome at the moment, I still feel that Firefox has more to offer the user.  I prefer their download manager, and the range of add-ons/ extensions is better and broader.

Beta could be out in June, but no plans are finalised, so expect to see some changes.

Further Reading:

Mozilla firms up Firefox 4 plans | News | PC Pro
Mozilla spills plan for, yes, Firefox 4 • The Register 

Picture credit:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ricplan/8539419/ used under a Creative Commons licence

Do you, ahem, Foursquare? Perhaps you should.

I read on Mashable that Foursquare has just clocked its 40 millionth check in.  If you've not heard of Foursquare, it is location specific social networking; its very big in the US where WiFi is better established, but is growing in the UK too- there's  even an entry for Cambridge University Library.

The idea is that you use your mobile device to log your location and interact with others.  In the library setting it might be seeking help or organising visits to the Tea Room; your device scanning the area for your Facebook and twitter friends.  Each location also has a 'mayor', and you can gain prizes and rewards for your social interactions- very clever when you consider the popularity of social networking games of the Farmville ilk.

Where Foursquare is really making an impact is in how it interacts with the commercial sector.  Foursquare users can share short reviews and recommendations on everything from films to cocktails to food in the locations they happen to be.  Eager to be part of the instant buzz this can create, businesses are offering special deals to Foursquare users.

I'm going to leave all the safety concerns about sharing your geographical locations with others aside for the moment, although lots of people have voiced concerns.  What makes Foursquare so interesting fro me is the way that it has successfully blended social and work interaction with the commercial sphere; this is probably what interests Facebook too.

Facebook is about to go local, which may concern Google as Facebook's ability to market targeted ads will now become localized.  McDonald's are going to be first to try it and I predict that the coffee guys, in all their incarnations will not be far behind.  In practice this may mean that as I'm a member of a Facebook group called Burger Thursday, I may need never hunt around for a McDonald's again.  Joy.

Over a year ago I posted an article (initially on Facebook) about how twitter was changing our interactions with each other, the piece was prompted by a Facebook redesign incorporating twitter-style status updates. I said in that article:

"Twitter more than Facebook is becoming the place where business and pleasure and meeting."

Facebook was playing catchup then and I think they still are.  The library fan pages we set up haven't been the dynamic, interactive start pages we hoped they'd be, undergraduates are more likely to listen in to our twitter feeds to find out about events at the library.  I'm not saying Foursquare is the next big thing, but something like it will be: something mobile, which allows users to connect with each other and with business in a way that suits them.  


Further Reading:


Foursquare Seeks to Turn Nightlife Into a Game - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com
Why Foursquare Drives Business: What You Need to Know | Social Media Examiner

Cam 23 Things

Yay! 23 things has come to Cambridge.  Over the next 12 weeks librarians across Cambridge will be dabbling, tinkering, playing, exploring, and possibly even dipping a toe into all things web 2.0.  I'm unreasonably excited about it and looking forward to sharing ideas, picking up hints and tips and being helpful when I can.

May the ceiling cat smile on our endeavours and the fail whale never darken our doors!




see more Lolcats and funny pictures

So we'll go no more a -roving?

So I've been worrying about it for a while, but now it's really here: my last day of 29; tomorrow I will be thirty years old and surely an adult by now.  As anyone who has listened to me winge lately will know, I've been a little disheartened that I haven't achieved more by 30.  However, I have my health, a good job, and a Marsh who loves me, plus the wisdom to know I should be thankful for them.


When I was 19 and staring down the barrel at 20, I happened to be reading The Rachel Papers by Martin Amis.  I found that I was the same age as the protagonist Charles Highway; I thought it would be fun to finish reading it on the eve of my 20th birthday, the same day as he finishes his narrative.  I was looking forward to going to Cambridge, to the gorgeous women I was sure to meet there (and I did) and to dedicate three years to drinking tea and reading books.  There was plenty of Highway-style bravado in those years, and pretty ladies, but sometimes my twenties bore a closer resemblance to Money than The Rachel Papers.  They weren't really weren't the playground I hoped they would be, often there were more dark days than sunny ones, so I suppose I should be glad to see that chapter close.


I hadn't thought about my timely reading of The Rachel Papers in years, in truth I only thought about it this afternoon, the memory triggered by another literary link.  I remembered how serendipitous I felt it was that I was reading the thoughts Charles was having the night before his twentieth birthday, on the night before mine.  I remembered all this because I was thinking about Byron.  Like many people I've foppishly thought myself a bit Byron-esque at times, usually with no real justification.  But I was once young and revolutionary, I still live according to the will of my heart, I'm driven by passion, and of course I have roved long into the moonlight.  Byron wrote that poem when he was 29.  I've wondered this week if he was feeling the same insecurities as me, wondering if the glory years were behind even though everyone told him the best was yet to come?

   So we'll go no more a-roving
      So late into the night,
   Though the heart be still as loving,
      And the moon be still as bright.

   For the sword outwears its sheath,
      And the soul wears out the breast,
   And the heart must pause to breathe,
      And Love itself have rest.

   Though the night was made for loving,
      And the day returns too soon,
   Yet we'll go no more a-roving
      By the light of the moon.

Feb. 28, 1817.

Byron didn't stop roving or loving at 30; I don't intend to either.  I will take this transition as an opportunity to slow down in certain areas.  I'm going to try and sleep more, drink less, and maybe try eating fruit more often, but I'm not ready to give up on passion and excitement, I'm not ready to give up on fun, and I don't intend to be buying elasticated waisted trousers anytime soon.  Every person I've moaned at has told me that your thirties are a fantastic time, there was one exception- he clasped me to his chest and said 'oh, it was horrible! horrible!'  Their collective wisdom assures me that I will have grown into myself, that I will have more realistic expectations of myself and others, and most deliciously: I will begin not to give a damn about what others think- these I all look forward to.


 P.S. There's an little immature joke in the second stanza if you know the Latin word for scabbard or sheath, being nearly thirty and all, I wouldn't find that kind of thing funny.

Playing with Chrome

I'm testing out the newest version of Chrome.  They've continued the use of themes first seen on iGoogle, some of them look very much like Firefox Personas.  Here I am wearing the brushed look:

And here we are with pencil shading:

and some of their designer themes...

Of course it's not all about looks.  Chrome is fast and easy to use, installation was painless and it imported all of my bookmarks (along with browsing history and saved passwords, if you choose) so the browser was ready to use and felt homey straight away.  It incorporates a lot of the addons I use anyway on Firefox: Google toolbar, obviously, but also opening a new tab (see two examples above) allows you to view a thumbnail of all the tabs you have open- a bit like Fox Tab.  

I've decided to give it a proper test, so I'll be using it all day.  I was just so impressed with how easily I settled into it that I wanted share right away.  I'd used Chrome in the past, but didn't really see what the fuss was all about.  I'm a Firefox girl at heart, but this a great alternative option.