Business & management:
• 13% of adults in the UK have no bank account, compared to 1% to 5% in the rest of Western Europe. A proposal to start a post bank system that operates through the existing post office network has been made by a coalition of unions and small businesses.
• The Greenlist is a website which allows consumers to compare how environmentally friendly products may be across a range of different sustainability criteria, while also allowing companies to promote their products.
• The US annual Innovations Review Report highlights innovative strategies companies have implemented to reduce emissions, conserve resources and encourage sustainable behavior.
Education
• The Ministry of Education has studied completion rates among the first two years' intake of Modern Apprentices and more than half the young people in Modern Apprenticeships and industry training leave without completing their qualifications. There are also big variations between industries, ethnic groups and gender.
• Research in the UK being released at an economics conference this week, has found that if boys stay on at school for just 1 more year, their future salary is likely to rise by 13%. Also being released at the same conference: boys do worse at English when there are girls in their class.
• Personal learning environments are one of the future trends in decentralized forms of learning predicted in education.
• A US professor who teaches about open education, and founded OpenContent.org has predicted that university institutions will be irrelevant by 2020.
• Trainers are using micro-blogging (like Twitter) to foster learning and meet like-minded peers.
Environment & sustainability:
• Crop growth, drinking water and recreational water sports could all be adversely affected if predicted rainfall patterns over coming years prove true. New research raises concerns about the level of phosphorous released from soils into surface water and the surrounding environment.
• The Federal government in Australia is assuring people in Adelaide that water is secure for 2009-2010, after the local water authority said it couldn’t guarantee that water would be delivered over the next 2 years.
• The International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO) says forests are under increasing degrees of stress as a result of climate change. Forests could release vast amounts of carbon if temperatures rise 2.5C (4.5F) above pre-industrial levels.
• The movement in cities to include or convert spaces to growing food for local communities has its most prominent recent example in the Obamas digging up part of the White House Lawn, but had begun much earlier in other US cities.
• The UK consumer magazine “Which?” says that council taxes there could be reduced if consumers recycled more effectively, since less waste would need to go to landfills.
• 120 US companies that are pushing the envelope in terms of water treatment, purification and management, have been rated on their technology, intellectual property and know-how, team quality and market potential.
• Rivers in some of the world’s most populous regions are losing water, according to a comprehensive study of global stream flows.
Health & wellbeing:
• Waltham Forest council has become the first in the UK to demand the closure of a fast food restaurant because it is too close to a school.
• A British bioethics group is raising concern about the use of the Internet and new technologies to revolutionise health care. The group says that there has been a rise in the use of online drug sales and private DNA tests and scans in recent years.
Law & Government:
• The head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime has warned that organized crime is now global, and poses a threat to cities, countries and even entire regions.
• The UK’s Young Foundation has launched http://www.futurecommunities.net/ “aimed at anyone involved and interested in building the successful sustainable communities of tomorrow”.
• Architects in the UK are suggesting that Prince Charles is abusing his position to unfairly influence planning decisions.
• London’s mayor has earned praise for retaining some fun, when it would be easy to cut back due to the recession.
People, culture & diversity:
• The UK think tank Demos has released a report “Resilient Nation”, on how a prepared population can be resilient in the face of disaster. Lifestyles, infrastructure and extreme weather are contributing to a perception that Britain has a “brittle society”. The report outlines ways to build and sustain community resilience with support from central and local government, relevant agencies, the emergency services and voluntary organisations.
• Debate is ongoing in the UK about the safety of social networking sites for children. A survey there has shown that 99% of children and young people aged eight to 17 use the internet.
• A researcher in the UK is working on a study that contradicts the idea that globalisation and the internet are ironing out differences between people in different regions. His research shows that with increased mobility, particular personality types live in certain regions, and his research follows on from similar work in America.
Science, technology & transport:
• “Failure to yield: evaluating the performance of genetically engineered crops” is a new report from the Union of Concerned Scientists. The report shows that over the last 20 years “genetic engineering has failed to significantly increase US crop yields”.
• Automotive manufacturers and traders in the UK, say that existing automotive technology has the potential to achieve significant emissions reductions, providing it has the right governmental encouragement.
• Experts predict that an ageing world population and continuing global military conflicts will be the two main drivers of robot design and function in the coming years.
• A digital software company is about to include Vancouver as its 3rd pilot city in a program to create working 3D models of urban centers. Salzburg, Austria was the first city, and Incheon, South Korea, the second.
• Leading automotive and energy companies have reached an agreement for a standardized plug for electric cars. Some of the automakers included in the agreement are Volkswagen, BMW, Ford, General Motors, Fiat, Toyota and Mitsubishi.
Thursday, 23 April 2009
Thursday, 16 April 2009
From the LOGIS news alert subscriptions (ending 16/04):
Education
• Robin Good provides an introduction to a resource article by Peter Morville, on visual thinking and communication solutions.
• Youtube has partnered with some major US universities (Stanford, Harvard, MIT, Yale, etc) to provide Youtube EDU. The more interesting content on the channel is straight from classrooms or lectures, and many schools have posted videos of guest lecturers, introductory classes and even a full semester's course.
• The final instalment of a UK government-commissioned report on school discipline has suggested that children shouldn’t have televisions in their bedrooms, and that a celebrity-saturated culture had led to bad role models.
Environment & sustainability:
• New Zealanders strongly support signing up to a new international agreement to limit greenhouse gas emissions.
• A new study on Monsant’s Roundup herbicide, shows that heavy reliance on Roundup may be weakening the herbicide’s ability to kill weeds.
• Climate change may cause weeds to become a more serious problem in Australia, as scientists there warned last month that tropical weeds may start to “move” southwards.
• According to a new US study, the higher a mother's level of exposure to air pollution in early and late pregnancy, the more likely it is that the baby would not grow properly. At the same time, researchers at Harvard say they are finally able to determine to what extent city air pollution impacts on average life expectancy.
• Researchers at the University of Ediburgh have discovered that failure to control type 2 diabetes may lead to poorer memory and diminished brain power.
• More and more news is appearing around the world to show how serious our water shortages are becoming.
Health & wellbeing:
• The Ministry of Health has launched a depression website to provide practical information, with video clips from NZers who talk about what worked for them. John Kirwan continues to play an integral part in the Ministyr of Health campaign.
• Doubt has been cast on Australian national guidelines that suggest there is a "low risk" level of drinking for under-18s. A Melbourne study shows no "safe" or "sensible" level of drinking for adolescents.
Law & Government:
• The UK government is promoting the idea of temporarily converting empty shops into social enterprises, local art displays or learning centres to help innovative communities prevent high streets declining The hope is to reduce the negative impact empty shops have on the high street - vital for town centre and business confidence.
• The UK Local Government Association is refuting claims by the press industry that council-run newspapers and magazines damage local newspapers.
• A UK commentator warns that the relationship between the press and politicians, will not work for the relationship between politicians and bloggers, who are less concerned about playing by “old rules”.
• The controversial French internet piracy bill that was going to introduce a “three strikes” system, has been defeated in the National Assembly, and an amended version will be reintroduced later in the year.
People, culture & diversity:
• Research from Unisys NZ shows that NZers believe that the global economic crisis will increase their risk of identity theft.
• Social networking users have still not learnt about being caught out by the material they post on their profiles. Tenants in the UK have been evicted after posting photos of a party on Facebook.
• A UK environmental charity has been getting teenagers involved in regenerating neighbourhoods with unused and neglected parks.
Science, technology & transport:
• New research by NASA scientists suggests the ozone layer of the future is unlikely to look much like the past because greenhouse gases are changing the dynamics of the atmosphere.
• A UK parish council is talking about taking a slightly alternative approach to traffic calming.
• Buying a PC with Windows 7 pre-installed, will still mean being able to downgrade to either Vista or XP, although there will only be security updates to the earlier versions.
• A new European study is suggesting that new CO2 standards for vehicles to be introduced in Europe from 2012 will lead not only to savings on oil (mainly via lower oil import volumes) but also to slightly lower global oil prices.
• Investing heavily in electric vehicles raises the need to consider recharging methods. Which is best - charging stations, battery swaps or home charging?
• The US report that showed just how high the risks are from shipping pollution has triggered criticism that European governments are underestimating the health risks from shipping pollution.
• One of London’s least appealing shopping destinations, Oxford Circus, is to have a “Barne’s Dance” crossing intersection. That’s the same kind of pedestrian crossing used at Queen Street intersections, where all traffic stops so that pediestrians can cross in any direction at the same time.
• Robin Good provides an introduction to a resource article by Peter Morville, on visual thinking and communication solutions.
• Youtube has partnered with some major US universities (Stanford, Harvard, MIT, Yale, etc) to provide Youtube EDU. The more interesting content on the channel is straight from classrooms or lectures, and many schools have posted videos of guest lecturers, introductory classes and even a full semester's course.
• The final instalment of a UK government-commissioned report on school discipline has suggested that children shouldn’t have televisions in their bedrooms, and that a celebrity-saturated culture had led to bad role models.
Environment & sustainability:
• New Zealanders strongly support signing up to a new international agreement to limit greenhouse gas emissions.
• A new study on Monsant’s Roundup herbicide, shows that heavy reliance on Roundup may be weakening the herbicide’s ability to kill weeds.
• Climate change may cause weeds to become a more serious problem in Australia, as scientists there warned last month that tropical weeds may start to “move” southwards.
• According to a new US study, the higher a mother's level of exposure to air pollution in early and late pregnancy, the more likely it is that the baby would not grow properly. At the same time, researchers at Harvard say they are finally able to determine to what extent city air pollution impacts on average life expectancy.
• Researchers at the University of Ediburgh have discovered that failure to control type 2 diabetes may lead to poorer memory and diminished brain power.
• More and more news is appearing around the world to show how serious our water shortages are becoming.
Health & wellbeing:
• The Ministry of Health has launched a depression website to provide practical information, with video clips from NZers who talk about what worked for them. John Kirwan continues to play an integral part in the Ministyr of Health campaign.
• Doubt has been cast on Australian national guidelines that suggest there is a "low risk" level of drinking for under-18s. A Melbourne study shows no "safe" or "sensible" level of drinking for adolescents.
Law & Government:
• The UK government is promoting the idea of temporarily converting empty shops into social enterprises, local art displays or learning centres to help innovative communities prevent high streets declining The hope is to reduce the negative impact empty shops have on the high street - vital for town centre and business confidence.
• The UK Local Government Association is refuting claims by the press industry that council-run newspapers and magazines damage local newspapers.
• A UK commentator warns that the relationship between the press and politicians, will not work for the relationship between politicians and bloggers, who are less concerned about playing by “old rules”.
• The controversial French internet piracy bill that was going to introduce a “three strikes” system, has been defeated in the National Assembly, and an amended version will be reintroduced later in the year.
People, culture & diversity:
• Research from Unisys NZ shows that NZers believe that the global economic crisis will increase their risk of identity theft.
• Social networking users have still not learnt about being caught out by the material they post on their profiles. Tenants in the UK have been evicted after posting photos of a party on Facebook.
• A UK environmental charity has been getting teenagers involved in regenerating neighbourhoods with unused and neglected parks.
Science, technology & transport:
• New research by NASA scientists suggests the ozone layer of the future is unlikely to look much like the past because greenhouse gases are changing the dynamics of the atmosphere.
• A UK parish council is talking about taking a slightly alternative approach to traffic calming.
• Buying a PC with Windows 7 pre-installed, will still mean being able to downgrade to either Vista or XP, although there will only be security updates to the earlier versions.
• A new European study is suggesting that new CO2 standards for vehicles to be introduced in Europe from 2012 will lead not only to savings on oil (mainly via lower oil import volumes) but also to slightly lower global oil prices.
• Investing heavily in electric vehicles raises the need to consider recharging methods. Which is best - charging stations, battery swaps or home charging?
• The US report that showed just how high the risks are from shipping pollution has triggered criticism that European governments are underestimating the health risks from shipping pollution.
• One of London’s least appealing shopping destinations, Oxford Circus, is to have a “Barne’s Dance” crossing intersection. That’s the same kind of pedestrian crossing used at Queen Street intersections, where all traffic stops so that pediestrians can cross in any direction at the same time.
Thursday, 9 April 2009
From the LOGIS news alert subscriptions (ending 09/04):
Business & management:
• Karen Stephenson is a business anthropologist who “considers an organizational network as the “genetic code” that can be used to unlock any organizational culture”.
• A list of the best online collaborative tools for 2009 has been made available in the form of a collaborative map.
• There is increasing discussion about the death of newspapers, but a big issue that needs to be overcome if they are to survive, is the conflict between open access to the information that they contain, and content control.
• "Doing Well by Doing Good? An analysis of the financial performance of green office buildings in the USA," is a report published by the the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors. It is the first report that investigates whether there is a financial benefit from building green offices.
• While going completely paperless isn't a realistic goal for most companies, decreasing paper use or going "paper-light" is a strategy that reaps several positive results.
Education
• A teachers and lecturers association in the UK has done a survey that has found more than one in 10 teachers are bullied by pupils and colleagues through text messages, emails and social networking sites.
• The same association has also discovered that growing numbers of pupils have mental health issues because of exam stress, family breakdown and pressures to look good.
Environment & sustainability:
• A ban on dishwasher detergents containing phosphates in a US county, has resulted in residents crossing state lines to buy the forbidden cleaners.
• A 5.6 acre flexible solar power generating system covering is being used as a landfill cover in Texas. Combined with the site’s methane gas-to-energy system, the landfill is expected to generate 9 megawatts of power.
• A Michigan-based financial group has announced ambitious plans to turn large areas of crime-ridden Detroit into urban farmland. The group wants develop up to 10,000 acres of underutilized and vacant land in downtown Detroit, and turn it into a mixture of cash crop land, ornamental gardens, and riding trails.
• The Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment (SCOPE) Internation Biofuels Project has published the proceedings of its workshop on the environmental effects of biofuel technologies.
Health & wellbeing:
• Researchers at Johns Hopkins University have confirmed that drinking sugar-sweetened beverages while you are trying to lose weight will affect your ability to reduce weight.
• A Norwegian study of over 27000 mothers and their 18-month-old child, shows that mothers with negative thoughts and feelings are more likely to give their children unhealthy food.
• Men's mental health is a dramatically understudied and poorly understood area of human wellbeing. Men are half as likely as women to be diagnosed with depression, yet twice as likely to abuse alcohol and drugs.
Law & Government:
• A mix of rural and urban councils around the UK are being funded in a pilot project to provide better local information for an estimated one million people. The initiatives provide better access to information, but some also allow for more opportunities for communities to influence local decision making.
• The director-general of the Confederation of British Industry, says that public services in the UK may need to be delivered by the private sector after the UK gets through the recession.
• A new law in the UK has extended the right of parents to ask for more flexible family-friendly working hours. The law previously only applied to parents of children under 6, but is now being extended to parents with children up to the age of 16.
• Birmingham is investing in a £193m library, that will be the biggest public library in Britain, a clear sign of the renaissance of the UK’s construction of grand civic libraries.
• Attitudes towards ownership of land and buildings are changing dramatically in the wake of the credit crunch and the global financial meltdown in the UK. There is now a move to mutual or community-based ownership of sites for development.
People, culture & diversity:
• UNESCO and 32 other partner institutions, have collaborated to bring together the World Digital Library (WDL), that will be launched on the 21st of April. The WDL will feature unique cultural materials from around the world, and provide free and unrestricted public access.
• Thanks to a partnership with the United Nations refugee agency, the over two million users of the popular social networking website Facebook can now lend a hand to uprooted people around the world in need of shelter.
• A carbon typescript copy of Schindler’s list has been “discovered” again in cartons of papers from Thomas Kenneally’s work on his book “Schindler’s Ark”. The cartons were bought in 1996, but the list was only recently found.
Science, technology & transport:
• Cyberspies have infiltrated control systems of the U.S. electrical supply network and planted computer software tools that could be used to destroy infrastructure components, when triggered.
• If you were just getting a handle on Web 2.0 technology, Tim O’Reilly of O’Reilly Media says that the new term will be “Web Squared”.
• A controversial EU Directive has come into force this week, that requires internet service providers to store the details of emails and internet phone calls.
• During a renovation of the art deco Empire State Building, its owners intend to invest an additional $20m to reduce its carbon footprint and energy consumption.
• According to a European Environmental Agency report, transportation continues to contribute disproportionately to Europe’s greenhouse gases, and still uses the least efficient modes to move people and goods.
• A French power plant that has been through a retrofit is to start operating this month with carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology.
• Boris Johnson intends to make London the electric car capital of Europe. He is pledging funds from the Greater London Authority’s budget, and wants to see 100,000 electric cars and 25,000 charging points, as well as proposing to change planning regulations so that developers must install charging points.
• Karen Stephenson is a business anthropologist who “considers an organizational network as the “genetic code” that can be used to unlock any organizational culture”.
• A list of the best online collaborative tools for 2009 has been made available in the form of a collaborative map.
• There is increasing discussion about the death of newspapers, but a big issue that needs to be overcome if they are to survive, is the conflict between open access to the information that they contain, and content control.
• "Doing Well by Doing Good? An analysis of the financial performance of green office buildings in the USA," is a report published by the the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors. It is the first report that investigates whether there is a financial benefit from building green offices.
• While going completely paperless isn't a realistic goal for most companies, decreasing paper use or going "paper-light" is a strategy that reaps several positive results.
Education
• A teachers and lecturers association in the UK has done a survey that has found more than one in 10 teachers are bullied by pupils and colleagues through text messages, emails and social networking sites.
• The same association has also discovered that growing numbers of pupils have mental health issues because of exam stress, family breakdown and pressures to look good.
Environment & sustainability:
• A ban on dishwasher detergents containing phosphates in a US county, has resulted in residents crossing state lines to buy the forbidden cleaners.
• A 5.6 acre flexible solar power generating system covering is being used as a landfill cover in Texas. Combined with the site’s methane gas-to-energy system, the landfill is expected to generate 9 megawatts of power.
• A Michigan-based financial group has announced ambitious plans to turn large areas of crime-ridden Detroit into urban farmland. The group wants develop up to 10,000 acres of underutilized and vacant land in downtown Detroit, and turn it into a mixture of cash crop land, ornamental gardens, and riding trails.
• The Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment (SCOPE) Internation Biofuels Project has published the proceedings of its workshop on the environmental effects of biofuel technologies.
Health & wellbeing:
• Researchers at Johns Hopkins University have confirmed that drinking sugar-sweetened beverages while you are trying to lose weight will affect your ability to reduce weight.
• A Norwegian study of over 27000 mothers and their 18-month-old child, shows that mothers with negative thoughts and feelings are more likely to give their children unhealthy food.
• Men's mental health is a dramatically understudied and poorly understood area of human wellbeing. Men are half as likely as women to be diagnosed with depression, yet twice as likely to abuse alcohol and drugs.
Law & Government:
• A mix of rural and urban councils around the UK are being funded in a pilot project to provide better local information for an estimated one million people. The initiatives provide better access to information, but some also allow for more opportunities for communities to influence local decision making.
• The director-general of the Confederation of British Industry, says that public services in the UK may need to be delivered by the private sector after the UK gets through the recession.
• A new law in the UK has extended the right of parents to ask for more flexible family-friendly working hours. The law previously only applied to parents of children under 6, but is now being extended to parents with children up to the age of 16.
• Birmingham is investing in a £193m library, that will be the biggest public library in Britain, a clear sign of the renaissance of the UK’s construction of grand civic libraries.
• Attitudes towards ownership of land and buildings are changing dramatically in the wake of the credit crunch and the global financial meltdown in the UK. There is now a move to mutual or community-based ownership of sites for development.
People, culture & diversity:
• UNESCO and 32 other partner institutions, have collaborated to bring together the World Digital Library (WDL), that will be launched on the 21st of April. The WDL will feature unique cultural materials from around the world, and provide free and unrestricted public access.
• Thanks to a partnership with the United Nations refugee agency, the over two million users of the popular social networking website Facebook can now lend a hand to uprooted people around the world in need of shelter.
• A carbon typescript copy of Schindler’s list has been “discovered” again in cartons of papers from Thomas Kenneally’s work on his book “Schindler’s Ark”. The cartons were bought in 1996, but the list was only recently found.
Science, technology & transport:
• Cyberspies have infiltrated control systems of the U.S. electrical supply network and planted computer software tools that could be used to destroy infrastructure components, when triggered.
• If you were just getting a handle on Web 2.0 technology, Tim O’Reilly of O’Reilly Media says that the new term will be “Web Squared”.
• A controversial EU Directive has come into force this week, that requires internet service providers to store the details of emails and internet phone calls.
• During a renovation of the art deco Empire State Building, its owners intend to invest an additional $20m to reduce its carbon footprint and energy consumption.
• According to a European Environmental Agency report, transportation continues to contribute disproportionately to Europe’s greenhouse gases, and still uses the least efficient modes to move people and goods.
• A French power plant that has been through a retrofit is to start operating this month with carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology.
• Boris Johnson intends to make London the electric car capital of Europe. He is pledging funds from the Greater London Authority’s budget, and wants to see 100,000 electric cars and 25,000 charging points, as well as proposing to change planning regulations so that developers must install charging points.
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