Richard Pope

Platformland activity club ❤️

Black and white photograph of tabby cat on wooden floor

#policywonks Interested to know if this happens in other fields? Tech policy is littered with overly simple solutions that will never do what it says on the tin but which *can* easily be communicated to the media or understood by politicians with low technical literacy.

Nominative determinism alert "Hedgerows are a major component of WLF, and broadly defined as rows of woody shrubs and/or trees surrounding fields or pastures, which are managed by cutting to maintain their shape and integrity (Pollard et al., 1974)."

Thinking out loud on the NHS 10 year plan ...

richardpope.org/notes/nhs10-...

My house, and as a result my head, is mostly kpop demon hunters songs on a loop each waking minute with no coming up for air. Luckily v good tunes.

Given the prevalence of 'capability mapping' in old style IT projects, and how much consultancies still push it today, you'd think there would be an evidence base that if you do it, it means you get better outcomes. Drawing a blank so far. Any pointers?

"My antisemitic social network poisoned my credulous AI" 😭

For all the talk of digital and growth, there's been surprising little on creating a digital economy. Here's a few ideas for starters: www.nesta.org.uk/feature/digi...

Exactly that. Decompression dogs sound 😊

I know it's been great for many people, but as a dyslexic, adhd person, the move to remote, document first, time boxed working regularly borders on the impossible. Add in the precariousness of freelancing and 'life events' and it's hard to make it work.

This post is about the types of service design problem where you need to start small and do it for real: waysofdoing.rpp.works/notes/types-...

I've started a new blog called 'ways of doing' which is about ways of doing digital. Thanks to @matthewsheret.com for suggesting the name.

I started (but not been able to keep updated) this workingintheopen.xyz

Red sign for the bus cafe - delicious food at reasonable prices!

Totally and I know team will iterate. But I worry from the wrong product proposition

I understand where you are coming from Josh, but conspiracies and sewing doubt don't really help. I really want government do to a great job of this.

There are established patterns. We learnt at moo.com in the 00's the value of letting people get started and only asking for auth when needed. On Universal designing for escalating trust was a core principle.

if the product proposition is not, as it is with the NHS app "things you can only do because you are signed in", I really hope the decision to add friction to every journey by putting everything behind a password is revisited ...

Downloads gov.uk app > can't login because I can't track down auth code. What percentage of the population will experience the same every day? Much respect to the team in getting it out in short order, but ...

This is now on the Firefox Extension's site for easy installation addons.mozilla.org/en-GB/androi...

The roundabout icon is beyond perfection

creates teams duty bound to fictional business cases and binds teams in dependencies before they even start.

When it comes to failure heuristics in public sector digital projects I'm yet to come across a stronger signal than: "we are breaking down all the capabilities from level 1 to level 3". It's guesswork that ...

I tried to, but the first screening question assumes birth parents? (adoptive parent here, so 'had children' doesn't really work, same will be true for step parents).

AI vs creative industries - the UK government's foolish choice | Computer Weekly Despite fierce opposition from cultural industries, the UK government seems to be following the US lead by bowing down to the broligarchy (again) when it comes to protecting the copyrights of artists ...

The numbers in this from @emercoleman.bsky.social are pretty stark... www.computerweekly.com/opinion/AI-v...

Lots to like in this... Abstract away the complexity so it's better for people. Save time for clinicians so they can spend time on what matters. Start small to understand what works. Maybe even grow the economy if you get it right.

In Prague for a packed Creative Bureaucracy Festival

Secondly: when thinking about a digital first 'life event' service like one for new parents (which I'm sure someone will at some point), don't just meet the mainstream needs of those already well served.

That supposed to be the implication, maybe should have been clearer. Was trying to make the argument that...

Firstly: existing IRL services (schools, family hubs) don't have an effective digital component and the should. Should not infer digital only.