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Hello Outriders!

In this edition of the podcast you’ll hear about what’s making Sir Tim Berners-Lee lose sleep, whether Facebook needs to take responsibility for kids online and what you can do to help everyone learn how to fix their technology.

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Hello Outriders!

This week on the podcast I have been nosing around another hack weekender, finding out about One Day on Earth and learning more about the evolution of journalism.

There are more and more hack events taking place around the UK and around the world it seems with creative coders and developers getting together to make cool stuff. This means that Jamillah gets to poke around these events with her mic and find out what clever people are making.

This weekend I followed the hack weekend, organised by GoSquared, to find out what coders could make with access to APIs and data from the providers Twilio, Geckoboard, Amazon Web Services, RabbitMQ and Pusher.

The weekend's work started for the teams on Friday night and after a lot of coding and not much sleep, the projects were shown off and winners were chosen. So what sort of state were people in by Sunday? Have a listen to find out...

Thinking back, regular Outriders listeners may remember the project where people are encouraged to record a video of what is important to them.

All of these clips from all over the world have now been collated and so I caught up with Kyle Ruddick, founder and director and Brandon Litman co-founder and producer of One Day on Earth.

The environments in which journalists work and publish are already almost unrecognisable though of course the core principles remain the same. Journalism is still evolving and one of the Outriders at the forefront of these changes is Adam Baker of . I caught up with him to ask about the current state of Blottr and about his latest move which helps to complete a circuit when it comes to citizen journalism.

As always, so many things to talk about and not enough time. This means of course that I'll just have to come back next week with another edition.

In the meantime, let me know if there is something you would like to hear more about or if you are working on something that we need to share. You can find me on all the usual social platforms. Tweet at me on find us on and .

Hello Outriders!

This week on the podcast we learn about an amazing act of kindness, how to make a visual time machine and an upcoming event with electrifying sound.

The internet can reflect many facets of society - both good and bad. Sometimes though, you get to hear about something where strangers get together and change someone's life. , is a sort of social news forum where people can upload links or write news that they notice around them or online.

On Reddit, there are sub communities where people also get involved with topics that interest them. BackpackWayne on Reddit runs a sub community where people help others out. So here is he with a little more about himself and the story of helping out a family in Texas.

Let's move it along to another story of people working together, this time to make history! Grigory Rudko is from Moscow and he is making a . It sounds cool, because it is cool and he told us all about why he is making it and what can be found there.

As you may know the original Dr Who theme tune was created by the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Radiophonic Workshop. If I had a TARDIS I would love to visit that time of innovation in sound. But today there are still innovators who are the Outriders of electronics and music and some of them are gathering for an event called . Dan Stowell is helping to organise the event and he's also a programming musician. He explained what will be happening at the event.

That's all for this week, but if there's something online that you would like to hear more about, if you're a hacker, maker or digital Outrider in your own right - then you must get in touch.

Tweet at me on Twitter where we are or find us on and by searching for Outriders there and adding us to your information feed for discussion and updates.

Until next week! ~ Jamillah

Hello Outriders! This week on the podcast I have been learning about sunflowers, getting excited about geography field work and our Chris Vallance went out to choose his own adventure.

First let’s consider sunflowers, through a lens of mathematics.

As we know this year is Turing Year, marking the centenary of Alan Turing’s birth and celebrating the extraordinary work he did. You might not make the connection immediately, but Alan Turing was not just an amazing code breaker, he also had an interest in the ways in which mathematics fits into the natural world.

Jonathan Swinton is a computational biologist working with the in Manchester and he explained how we can do a little maths and brighten up our gardens at the same time.

A tip of the hat to Outriders listener on twitter for making sure I found Turning’s Sunflowers - I’m very glad you did!

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For those who would like to spend even more time outdoors after they have planted their sunflowers, there’s an event coming up in May that might well appeal. Its for those who code, develop or design and geography teachers looking for a dynamic way to use technology in the classroom. The first fieldwork hack is taking place in Slapton Ley.

Ant Miller works by day in Research and Development at the ´óÏó´«Ã½ but in his spare time he does what he calls ‘guerilla innovation’ - that is getting involved in hack days and maker faires and weekends like the this one. The runs from the 18th until the 21st of May, so let’s hope that they’re in for some good weather!

This year marks three decades since the publication of the bestselling fantasy book "The Warlock of Firetop Mountain". The book was unusual because it allowed readers to chose how the story unfolded. I’d get my nerd-card taken off me if I lie and said I didn’t. I loved choose your own adventure books.

ÌýTaking control of a story and being able to re-read in in different ways was so exciting! The Warlock of Firetop Mountain is a classic of the so-called game-book genre it inspired many who now work in the UK games industry.

Chris Vallance met up with the books co-author Ian Livingstone for a game-book style interactive interview in the mysterious caverns under ´óÏó´«Ã½ Television Centre.

exploring with Chris Vallance in possibly one of my favourite pieces of audio so far this year. To mark the 30th anniversary Ian will publish a new book titled - "Blood of the Zombies" - hmmm braiiiiiiiinzzzzz something tasty to look forward to!

If there’s something online that you would like to hear more about, if you’re a hacker, maker or digital Outrider in your own right - then you must get in touch.

Tweet at me on Twitter where we are or find us on and by searching for Outriders there and adding us to your information feed for discussion and updates.

Until next week!

~ Jamillah