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

Professional and amateur photographers were yesterday given the opportunity to share their work and swap photos, at an event organised by Birmingham Photospace. The ‘Flash Swap’ was the group’s first publicity event, intended to raise the profile of their campaign for a dedicated photography gallery in Birmingham. Although hidden away in a dark corner of [...]

Is it possible to work full-time without an office, simply taking advantage of free wifi offerings? To find out, I intend to spend one week trying it. And I call on others to do the same. The dates are yet to be confirmed, but I hope to try and work for a full five days [...]

I’ve started a fledgling blog to help me make sense of Birmingham’s creative organisations; of the different names and acronymns that crop up when people talk about Birmingham’s various ‘creative’ and ‘social media’ groups (the two seem to overlap an awful lot). This started from a comment I posted on Paradise Circus months ago, and [...]

Simply a flash mob of Twitterers in Birmingham City Centre. Bring along a sign with something like "I'm a twitterer", "Twitter rocks", "tweet tweet" written on it. At midday we (I guess I ought to join the humiliation; what have done to deserve this?) will stand still for two or three minutes, holding our signs up. For people to laugh at. So the more who join us the less embarrassing it will be. Actually it's a great idea for showing our physical presence to the nay-sayers, so please come along if you can. And it'll be fun. Honest.

Visit Twitter flash mob in Birmingham tomorrow

Producing a consultation document that the average member of the public can understand is easy, if you really care. Birmingham itself has plenty of top class graphic communicators, journalists, copywriters and sub-editors. The Big City Plan is such a massive undertaking that there are, presumably, the financial resources to make sure the public is consulted properly. It seems that it’s just the will that isn’t there.

These are my links for 27 January 2009 from 23:02 to 23:02

I sincerely hope this story isn’t true: because if it is, it shows the degree of contempt that Council Leader Mike Whitby has for the people of Birmingham. Two weeks ago a bus of council employees was scheduled to visit the Highgate area of Birmingham. The purpose was to consult local people on the Big [...]

This website aims to present Birmingham Council’s ‘Big City Plan‘ in plain English. It also encourages open comment and discussion. It is unofficial, but was created by a number of enthusiastic people who want to help the council make the right decisions. You can also offer your opinions directly to the Birmingham City Council at [...]

This collaboratively produced Google map shows where you can get wifi in Birmingham (UK), and whether or not it’s free. It will continue to evolve as more places are added. Hopefully it will grow much bigger as more places offer wifi. Anyone can add to the map (just follow the guidelines). Visit Wifi in Birmingham

Eventually I shall write a fuller post about this, and about my perception of how it’s being managed and communicated. In the meantime though I just want to help publicise the bus that’s doing the rounds in Birmingham. The council is seeking people’s opinions on its Big City Plan (a massive development plan for Birmingham), [...]