So, as I was saying on Friday, I have been accepted to attend CogSci 2005 which is being held in late July in Stressa, Italy.

In preparation for the poster I will present there, I have prepared one for our own Informatics Jamboree, a celebration of work in Informatics, though mostly our own. This will be really helpful because it will be a similar situation as I will find myself in at CogSci, and it will be valuable feedback on both my poster, and my subsequent discussion/explanation of it.

I made my poster last week, and it should now be up, awaiting the lunch poster sessions today and tomorrow, and I will be on hand to answer any questions. In preparation for this I'm trying to work out what questions there might be. I guess the most common one would be Why? Why Blogs? Why this measure? Why any of it? What are your goals, what are your aims?

...

So I was writing that yesterday before I went. I needn't have worried.

It seems mostly people go to these things for the free lunch. And if they do read posters, they either just read their friends, or they read those of work similar to theirs. Right now, my work doesn't appear to be that close to anyone's. There were a few people reading the poster, and I was able to discuss a few matters with them. I even got some useful feedback. It just wasn't as much as I had imagined, and I certainly didn't have any tough questions.

On an interesting note, I met a Masters student who also blogs with blogger. I'm considering gathering a list of bloggers within the university, so far I know of at least 4. But maybe I'll only link to academic aspects of their lifes, should they so chose to blogs such things.

I shall of course be back at today's poster session/lunch manning my poster. Hopefully the food will be better.

So I've been very busy with work, other work and moving, and so I've neglected my blog in recent times. Just like usual. So a veru quick update post, to keep you informed:

• The paper I was writing a couple of months back, got accepted to the Conference. I'm off to Italy in July
• It was accepted as a poster, and early next week my department is having an internal 'thing' and students can display posters, so I very quickyl cobbled together a poster for that.
• My office mate has also started blogging, spread the word of blog:

  A blog about my empirical investigation of film perception,

  Continuity Boy

Surely. I really didn't think it had been that long. Well knock me down with a light and fluffy feather. I've just been so busy. I have so many things to do, things to earn money outwith my PhD, that when it comes to blogging, I feel i should better do some of my own work rather than take time to write here. Even though as I said, in the long term this will help, because it is a place to gather my thoughts.

So I'm afraid I don't really have much PhD related to tell. My supervisors wanted to see a plan for the next 6 months, my final 6 months, so I drew up a Gant chart. Which was fun. And I just need the time to get on with it. Having to fund yourself in your final year is a nightmare. Seriously, if there are any PhD students reading this with funding for only 3 years, work as hard as you can to get it all done within the time.

I had also planned on posting plenty of links on blogging things that I have found, but I'm sure they are out of date now. I think I might post them regardless.

First there was the article concerning evolution of language and how Netspeak isn't as bad as people imagine it to be. Then there was the story about a newspaper that has taken seriously to blogging.

Then there was the BBC News programme Click Online that discussed the global impact of blogging. You can both read about it AND watch the programme.

I also found some more sites related to academic blogging, things I can sign up for and get my name out there, but I shall come back to discuss them.