Get along to Fleishmann Hillard at 6pm this Thursday for the discussion group session for Social Media Club.

This month, the discussion will be led by Ronna Porter, who wrote this at the SMC Blog last week and took part in our podcasting session.

All welcome but please register here

I was going to go into big detail on the four types or groups of people – or perhaps they are characteristics found within individuals that I noticed at the Uploading Innovation unconference on Tuesday, but I think I’ll just present them for now and maybe fill in the detail later.

The four elements I saw coming together more than I have done at other events are People People, Geeks, Capitalists and Philosophers.

People People – who focus on the social nature of collaboration, what it means to us as individuals and as groups of people

Geeks – who focus on technological facilitation of collaboration, what machines can do for us

Capitalists – who focus on making new businesses, how to make more money out of collaboration

Philosophers – who focus on the ideas and constructing theories about what this all means for the human race

Having contributions from all of these, rather than just one dominant group was one of the things that made the conversations on the day all the more interesting and productive. Thankfully most of those who came were aware of their shortcomings and there weren’t too many know-it-alls (my prejudice is that this is a geek trait – people people, capitalists and philosophers are willing to admit that they could know more about the tech, but some geeks insist that they also know everything about people, money and ideas) [ducks for cover]

Coming over to wordpress is good for the blog, but not for my e-mail If you are trying to get hold of me using the address in the image above – @perfectpath.co.uk – you may get bounced. If so, please try lloyd dot davis at gmail dot com

Since the last meeting (see video above) and a great conference call I took part in with Chris, Howard, Kristie and lots of other local leaders, I had another idea about how to do this in London. I would like to keep the third Thursday for the kind of discussion and networking activity we’ve had so far, but to expand what we do (probably spread quite thinly at first) and to establish a weekly meetup of one form or another so that we can say to anyone in London, “Thursday Night is Social Media Night.”

What I suggest is that anyone can come along at 6pm at a pre-arranged location to take pictures, make some audio or video, or just walk around town and blog about it, somewhere in London according to the following schedule:

* 1st Thursday: Photo-sharing
* 2nd Thursday: Podcasting & Audioblogging
* 3rd Thursday: Hosted Discussion & Networking
* 4th Thursday: Videoblogging
* 5th Thursday: Blogwalk

Except for the 3rd week, these will be out and about somewhere in London, maybe pub-based when weather gets rough, but dedicated to improving our social media skills by doing as much as by talking.

I’m committing to starting this on 1st March with a photo walk about in Soho, meeting at the John Snow pub in Broadwick St (bring your camera) – yes, it will be just getting dark at 6pm so the theme will be “Things you can photograph in Soho in the dark without getting arrested or your face smashed in”. Frankly, I’ll be happy if I get just one other person to come with me, but of cours, the more the merrier.

I’m going to start working up pages on the wiki to help flesh this out a bit. Do come and join in, the password is media. If you want to be kept informed, please do sign up for the London mailing list

tags: socialmediaclub & london & smclondon & social & media & photo sharing & podcasting & videoblogging & blogwalk

State of my onions

Originally uploaded by Lloyd Davis.

Oh mercy me!

The old one’s are, of course, the best. The opportunity to share with you, mah felluh blogizens, “The State of My Onions At Rest” was irresistable to my pathetic sense of humour.

Eat your heart out Dubya.

Arse salt

Originally uploaded by Lloyd Davis.

I saw it from this angle for the first time this morning and was, as the young people say, rolling on the floor laughing.

Apparently that makes me “such a boy”.

Which is a good thing. pfmmnnnf, it says “arse”

dalek tea party

Originally uploaded by Lloyd Davis.

A trip for tea to Elys in Wimbledon (much more exciting that Starbucks or Coffee Republic and with water, unlike all of Wimbledon Village) yielded a bit of a surprise and a disappointment for anyone who’d been pinning their hopes on getting into what is clearly an exclusive bash. Tea parties when I was a kid were teddy bears (cuddly) or chimps (funny – at least as long as they’re kept at a distance). I think I would have had trouble keeping my tea and buns down if a Dalek had turned up.

I mean, I once saw Tom Baker at a book-signing in the 70s and a toddler had hysterics because there was Dr Who – he was real and not a puppet who lived in the telly. I just hope they have paramedics on call and have made sure the emergency exits are fully operational.

I also wondered how big the Dalek actually was, because the aisles were a bit of a squeeze as it was.

The Christmas trees throughout Elys are the same colour as the title on that notice (only sparkly) all I can tell you is that wherever Vera got them, they don’t seem to have come from Argos – and while on that subject. If you choose to have this in your home this Christmas, please don’t invite me round for mince pies. (note the url’s for the argos site will doubtless degrade over time, I wish I could give you permalinks, but they are just too tight-arsed about their intellectual property – just believe me when I tell you that the one I’ve pointed to is vile and actually looks quite like a Dalek who got carried away at Mardi Gras)

The Balmoral Hotel

Originally uploaded by Matito.

So it’s a fortnight since I saw the first bloggers screening of Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie (softly spoken, but clearly a bull-headed Taurus underneath). I said on the night that I don’t like talking about a movie straight after watching it, but this is ridiculous!

We were asked not to review it but I will say It’s a gorgeous movie experience. So what has stayed with me for two weeks? I think foremost the that this is about taking the first steps in the life-long process of growing up, the paradox of growing up in a world where there are no grown-ups – or else that growing up means finding out that grown-ups aren’t all that grown up themselves. I was really glad that Hallam didn’t emerge from his rite of passage “a man”, grown up and finished, able to take on the world.

I also saw it about being apart from the city and it’s people, while being a part of the city. Also that despite moving from fabulous countryside to a fabulous city, he still takes himself with him – the tree house becomes a clock tower, his mother (literally) becomes his boss (Sophia Miles….droool), his father and stepmother’s relationship is replicate in his boss and her lover blah blah blah.

But I digress into reviewer, which I’m not. I was most fascinated by how my fellow bloggers found their own experience of adolescence in the film. Of course I did the same, but I’m going into details here. What do you think I am, some kind of exhibitionist?

Go see the Hallam Foe production blog by Colin Kennedy and the nascent flickr photostream. And if you’re that way inclined, check out the myspaces for Hallam, Kate and Verity

rip it all out again

Originally uploaded by Lloyd Davis.

On 1 August 1994, the Audit Commission moved back into 1 Vincent Square after a refurbishment. It was also the day that I started working there and I was comforted in my newbieness by the fact that no-one else really knew where anything was either…

[pause while I shudder at the fact that this is all twelve years ago]

Well, the Commission moved down to Millbank a couple of years ago and No 1 has stood empty for a long time, but now it’s being done up again, I have no clue for what purpose. So, when I passed down Regency Street, I pressed my nose and my cameraphone up against the window of what used to be Publications (the site of so much feverish activity, now still and dusty) and love the fact that you can see right through to the front without all the clutter in between.

Yay – Moo Cards!

Originally uploaded by Lloyd Davis.

They came! Lovely lovely moo cards.

I’m just thrilled. If you haven’t seen them yet go look at moo.com.

I paid for this batch of 100 – US$19.99 which translated to £10.84. They came nicely packaged with a postage cost of £1.27 so even with a couple of duds they still work out at less than 10p each. Fantastic.

I’m just not sure that I want to give them away….