Memo to self: what am I up to?
Posted on Sep 8th by William in A place to live, Faith & practice, IdealGov stuff, VannFest, What needs doing?
Someone kindly enquired what I was up to nowadays. I had to think quite hard. Apart from family stuff, I think it’s (in alphabetical order)
- trying to find somewhere to live as a shared “co-housing” project. This is ambitious, brings together social, legal, planning, living and spiritual threads. Plus I want it to earn its keep. We’ve appointed an excellent search agent, are starting to see some places. This is hotting up.
- helping to found Ctrl-Shift.co.uk, a new business-to-business services firm examining the new business models made possible by user-centric identity, buyer-centric commerce or vendor relationship management (VRM) First event takes place 25 Sept.
- helping FIPR with a JRRT-funded enquiry into personal data and the “database state”
- still working for and with Kable which I founded and am delighted to remain associated, and keeping IdealGov ticking over. We still need to turn “Transformational Government” Mark I on its head; TG2 needs to be a lot smarter with personal data.
- helping to found Mydex.org (a Young Foundation Community Interest Company). This is the main gig; tricky to pull off, but potentially a very important undertaking implementing ideas worked out by my colleague Iain Henderson.
- chairing Open Rights Group. This is a part-time non-exec thing; ORG does a vital job campaigning for digital rights. The skeleton professional staff are wonderful and make my job a whole lot easier than it might be.
- helping the UK’s first blogging Permanent Secretary to find his online voice (and also with his live appearances). Sir Bonar is a delight to work with – a real old-style gent, even if some of his views are a bit trenchant.
- learning the Quaker business method serving on the central comms committee. This is very hard, but important. Quaker business method is based on the Quaker meeting for worship. There’s no argument, no retorts, no voting. Instead there is respectful listening, measured self-expression (or ministry) based not on what one wants to say but on what the meeting needs to hear, and discernment based on the guidance of the spirit. Try that in the House of Commons.
Vann Fest 08 was the best party yet, but that’s been and gone for this year, and next July feels a long time away.
I think that’s it.
It feels like pleasantly a bit too much. No need to drop anything, but there’s no room to take anything else on.
