Citizensheep. "Michael Grimes lives in Birmingham (UK). This is his blog about anything that he fancies."

Every so often I find myself in an unexpected and memorable situation. Today, 1 February 2012, I am reminded of the time I met Umar Ghuman. I was traveling home to Birmingham on a Virgin train – not something I do often – and I sat at a table with a couple of Pakistani men. [...]

I was pretty sure the song’s title was also that of a sitcom starring Geoffrey Palmer and Judi Dench, so I could easily have Googled it. But that felt like admitting early defeat, so I closed my eyes and tried to remember. A tried and tested trick (by me, at least) is to run through [...]

I don’t like the term ‘gamification’. Maybe I’ve missed the point, but if we have to turn something into a game doesn’t that suggest it’s not fit for purpose anyway? Eight or nine years ago a man from Immersive Education introduced my colleagues and me to Kar2ouche. He explained it was the result of some Oxford [...]

I’ve not posted on this site for a couple of months, partly because I haven’t had the time or energy and partly because I was experiencing severe technical difficulties with it (and didn’t have the time or energy for those either). WordPress was playing silly buggers; the front end wasn’t working well and the back [...]

I’m sorry for the odd and user-unfriendly behaviour of this blog recently. I am aware of it and I will try and sort it out soon. I upgraded the WordPress installation recently and it seems that a number of the plugins are no longer compatible and are causing havoc with my customised templates. I’ll try [...]

I’ve just read on the cover of Metro that the details of Prince William’s wedding ceremony were released ‘exclusively on social networking site Twitter’. Even Clarence House is bypassing traditional news outlets; so are we finally seeing the demise of ‘traditional’ media? No, probably not. The thing is I didn’t discover this news on Twitter. [...]

Just to remind you that Mitch Benn’s ode to the BBC was released today. GO AND BUY IT. Of course you don’t have to buy it, but ‘I’m proud of the BBC‘ is a nice catchy feelgood tune about a great British institution and it’s only 79p from iTunes – possibly even less elsewhere. What [...]

I’m a big fan of the BBC, and very pleased that Mitch Benn is releasing this song on 1 November. Wouldn’t it be great if we could get it to Christmas Number One while the government is busy tearing chunks out of the Corporation?

I’m liveblogging the Beyond 2010 conference. Not well, as usual. Beyond 2010

I really like Audioboo, but have struggled to understand why. Yesterday it finally dawned on me that it allows me to satisfy the need to perform without requiring an audience to perform to. I’ve always wanted to read The King’s Breakfast out loud to someone. I tried it with my nieces the other week, but [...]