Author Archives: Alastair Culham

About Alastair Culham

A professional botanist and biologist with an interest in promoting biological knowledge and awareness to all.

Digital dissent

Posted on May 14, 2012 by Alastair Culham

I follow several electronic newsgroups to ensure I stay at the front of my research interests. The ever challenging issue of science on Wikipedia cropped up today with an unusually heated debate on the accuracy of information on a page … Continue reading →

Posted in Digital Community | 1 Comment

A library in my pocket

Posted on May 14, 2012 by Alastair Culham

One of the problems of being a plant taxonomist is that my research relies heavily on books, and some of those can be a few hundred years old.  My modest working book collection covers an entire wall of my office … Continue reading →

Posted in Mobile technology | Leave a comment

Peer learning – Google Scholar Citations

Posted on May 8, 2012 by Alastair Culham

This afternoon one of those serendipitous conversations happened that allowed me to add another online profile to my digital presence; Google Scholar now offer individual academic profiles that update automatically, can be edited and keep track of an individual’s publications, … Continue reading →

Posted in Digital Community, Digital Literacy | 9 Comments

The Digital Human

Posted on May 7, 2012 by Alastair Culham

The advantage of bank holidays is the chance to hear weekday Radio4 from time to time.  This afternoon at 4.30pm I happened to hear The Digital Human. This is week two of a series of six programmes investigating the impact … Continue reading →

Posted in Digital Community, social media | Leave a comment

Are you digitally ready for a Snickers bar?

Posted on March 7, 2012 by Alastair Culham

University students have long been targets for advertising of products and events through leafleting campaigns and through email spamming.  During my tenure as a hall warden at Reading University I had frequently to deal with people who had gained access … Continue reading →

Posted in 3rd Party, Digital Community, Digital Literacy, Policy | 1 Comment

Digital Navigation

Posted on February 10, 2012 by Alastair Culham

While shopping on the internet for resources to develop or tropical teaching glasshouse over the past few weeks I began to realise  how much a matter of personal taste the website design for small businesses is.  Some businesses go for a … Continue reading →

Posted in Hints and tips, Uncategorized | 4 Comments

A digitally prepared project

Posted on January 18, 2012 by Alastair Culham

The UROP placement to further develop the Whiteknights Biodiversity web presence has been funded.  This project falls well within the bounds of our Digitally Ready project and I am hoping Pat will be able to conduct a before and after … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

24 hours without Wikipedia?

Posted on January 17, 2012 by Alastair Culham

Wikipedia are advertising their intent to black out the English language version of their site for 24 hours. That will provide a great opportunity for data gathering on changes of web page use. I will be watching with interest

Posted in 3rd Party, Digital Community | 1 Comment

A suggestion for the improvement of Blackboard from one of our students

Posted on January 16, 2012 by Alastair Culham

… Via a comment on one of the closed Facebook groups I run. ” It’s a shame that Blackboard doesn’t have a calendar tool that gives us a one page screen shot of all module assessment dates.” I agree – … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Email – usage and abusage

Posted on November 21, 2011 by Alastair Culham

  The classic work on the writing of good english ‘Usage and Abusage: A Guide to Good English’ has helped a generation to improve their written work.   The use of email, and what should be accepted as good or … Continue reading →

Posted in Digital Literacy, Policy, Uor | 25 Comments