All posts by pibinko

Dec. 13-21, 2023: The Fourth Jug Band Colline Metallifere Winter Fest

Announcements

This is the flyer for the Fourth Winter Fest organized by the pibinko.org network, in collaboration with those who are willing to collaborate (names of individuals and organizations will be disclosed as the festival unfolds). While the first three editions were set in the Farma Valley, a lesser known location in Southern Tuscany (some 100 km South of Florence), in this round we will propose a travelling event, with a dozen or so stops in three Tuscan provinces. At this stage the finer details are intentionally omitted. Partly for non-business confidentiality agreements, partly in order to turn this into some kind of treasure hunt , partly because some of the stops will be defined in “co-design” mode.

It is to be noted that, in addition to the three past Winter fests, the organizers have proposed an average of one event per month since 2007. So, even though the flyer looks somewhat obscure (also to our Italian-reading audience), for once please trust us and ride the wave.

For more information on places and times of what will happen:

Fog from Valdera under Montecatini Val di Cecina (Pisa) – Dec. 7, 2023

Videos

We have been roaming around Val di Cecina and Valdera (the southernmost part of the province of Pisa) for over five years, and we never observed fog in such a scenic form. Our photo report will follow. For other forms of observation and mapping by the pibinko.org network:

For more information and booking: micalosapevo@pibinko.org or +393317539228.

A Quiz for Astronomers and Stargazers (BMMPOD #346)

Compositions

NASA, in collaboration with Michigan State University, has been maintaining for years a site where every day an astronomical picture is published. The site was called “APOD” (i.e. “Astronomy Picture of the Day”).

With the BuioMetria Partecipativa (BMP) project we do not intend to challenge the outreach capabilities of this project, but in our own small world we sometimes like to share a “picture of the day”, given our penchant for photography: some may recall that in 2010 we launched a photography contest which had over 600 participants from 52 countries, for example (see Between Dusk and Dawn), and that we have collaborations with various professional nightscape photographers. So, here is our “BMPPOD”:

The image clearly has a low quality and has been acquired in a region with very significant skyglow, so this cannot be in Southern Tuscany (where one of the darkest skies in Italy is found, see TV report). Furthermore, the image might have been taken with a fish-eye-like optic (such as those used in all-sky CCD camersa), and the draped on a plane. We realize this is an extreme challenge, but we also know that there are very qualified experts out there.

If you are able to guess to which celestial region the image is referred, we will be glad to interview you in the context of our activities for interdisciplinary protection and promotion of the night sky. Please send answers and/or comments to: bmp@pibinko.org or whatsapp +393317539228.

At last, we have an “Arretration” Manager

Compositions

With the pibinko.org network and the Jug Band Colline Metallifere we have been working on this for a while. Finally, we made it. We are in an era of innovation, regeneration, chatgpt’s, IA’s, startups, etc. and in all these situations innovation managers are a key role. On our side, we have been for years looking for an “arretration” manager.

We were looking for someone who, while facing huge innovation challenges, would be able to implement creative strategies in order to create a working environment which would not abuse of innovative technologies, nor would it require technologies which end up being too expensive compared to the average revenue of othe context in which they are proposed.

The arretration manager will not just remind us that there are old solutions to do this in a less “dry” manner, but will also work to bring new processes and products “back”. The role of the “arretration” manager is defined by the skills to manage change “in reverse”.

…”se pareba boves” (cit.)

Some “arretration” cases which we have been proposing in time:

  • 2000: after being invited to strategic meetings to plan activities for a science park, we proposed of removing colour from monitors in a research centre, so that people could work in black and white.
  • 2010: in the context of a series of scoping meetings for the design of a document management system supporting a national remediation plan for 42 contaminated sites, we proposed handling the program with a couple of days of training in order to clean up some local folders on a server, rather than “investing” (as said by the sales rep. at the time) at least 150k Euro (of which 100k would have been related to the license for the server).
  • In 2011, at a meeting with research bodies from two continents, focused on the definition of ideas on how to invest 24 million dollars, we proposed withholding a certain amount for celebrations, and we indicated clerics as one of the roles in scientific research (see https://www.pibinko.org/accounting-for-people-in-earth-observation/ for the full presentation)
  • In terms of “arretration”, in 2012 we defined the format for a training course on digital awareness.
  • Since 2008 we started to promote the BuioMetria Partecipativa project, for a more conscious use of artificial lighting (see link)

etc. etc.

A random multi-coloured pic to make this post less boring for those who are not used to spend more than 21 seconds in reading

In this long and winding road, which does not relate to neo-Luddism, but rather to simply improve, in our view, there was a vacant role: the manager! And now we found it.

Or, we actually had it, but we didn’t know. Who could help us manager our (and potentially your) “arretration” processes better than Mauro Tirannosauro? He has consulting experience since the Createcous.

Mauro Tirannosauro the participatory lithology project (March-May 2020)

In order to have opinions and quotes for your “arretration” needs, you may contact Mauro Tirannosauro at maurotrex@pibinko.org.

Translator’s note: looking to find a way to define the opposit of an “innovation manager” we have been working on ideas to translate “arretramento” (as “going backwards, or going back). But the terms we found did not sound cool. So we thought about “arretration”, which is not proper English, but will remind Italian folks of this song: