save the date - 12th of March

if there was ever a time to watch me do something mad but cool and pushing forward in social media space with the eco, optimized edge i have been pushing forward on it would from the 12th of march.

on that day, i’ll take delivery of the smart fourtwo electric car for seven days as a trial in the hope that i can maybe raise some money to actually rent the vehicle and yet also at the same time, promotion, connect, network with and interview people while i’m driving around.  the plan is simple really.  i’m going to be spending my digital time mobile, out on the road for as many hours per day as i can testing out how well this electric car performs over the course of a week.

these are the things i’m pretty sure will be happening.. ..

streamed live
probably two, but maybe one.  i can definately do one on a stand in the car looking ahead with audio from in the car.  it could be two and at a total push it could be three.  but i have the connectivity, the knowledge and the technology to make it happen.

i’ll be using the cradlepoint mbr1400 for the first time and this badboy can have lots of usb dongles in to serve me up internet for me to stream with.

raising awareness of installation of charge points
let’s cut out the crap here, ideally i would love to be an advocate for raising awareness for businesses getting access to the funding help to put charging points around the east midlands for electric cars.  if there was ever a perfect fit for a project it is this one.

i need transport, eco as much as possible and i have a certain trip that i need to make three times a week at an awkward time (so no lifts or carsharing) and it involves an eco project at the other end.  it’s perfect.

i want this project to happen so i’m going to do what i can to see how many people we can get to download the pdf document and take up a conversation about providing a charging point for an electric car driver in and around the midlands.

testing 3g multi point internet with the cradlepoint mbr1400
i’ve been lucky to be blessed with the best sponsors, like really.  they are awesome.  it will be the first time out with the mbr1400 and i’m not even sure i can get it running in the car without some kind of converter block but i’ll work it out.  i’m pretty sure i can run a 4 way lead from the lighter socket and the draw for charging the phones and the router are fairly low.  we will certainly see how much power it will use from the onboard batteries and if that cause a great problem or not.

a custom website with videos and sponsors
i’ve not got long.  thankfully the website can be relatively lightweight will just being embeds and little blocks of refreshing content that i can include.  i’ve been secretly pulling together assets for the future streaming project anyway so i’m not starting from zero here.  i have a rough idea of the look of the site for the camera stream part.  it will require sketching out from inside my head thou and i need to move on that asap.

kickstarter (or other) fundraising over the course of the week
this will take the longest part to do and i’m not even sure if i’ll have time to push, get accepted and have all the things in the right place, i will for the ulule one because that’s nearly ready to go for the .tv student wordpress ten site project (yes, another part of the overall puzzle for social media deployment in nottingham but i’m going to push here.

i’m going to run two kickstarters for the ark project to see if we can raise awareness to getting funding for that and also another for funding for the car for the year.  if we can get at least the car funding for the year for the streaming project that will give us something to barter with for finding the five companies for finding the £5k from each.

surely, after this they will see the value of realtime social exposure - again, i need your help guys.  so spread the word, eco magazines, editors, social gurus, video people, streaming people.  dads that have daughters and must understand my pain of only seeing my daughter once a week.  ok, that was deep but it’s true.

getting to see my daughter three times that week
at the moment, when finances allow i get to see my daughter who lives about forty minutes away once a week on a saturday.  it’s never enough and i need my baby.  i love her dearly and these are formlative years.

i’m putting everything into this as those that have followed my blog over the last year will know.  having this trial will allow me to go and pick up ella three times or more over the course of the week.  i may even stay overnight locally to her and drop her into school in the morning to see how that runs like.

a ‘where has phil been’ tracking block
this might happen, all depends on if i can meet with my coder guy next week (that’s you dave) and we can pull something together, we have the code we just need to build it out on the site and make a cool little icon for the smart car.  i’m sure someone has one.

yeah, that’s quite an extensive list but i’m pretty sure i can get them things going.  i’ve got a tight timeframe from today until the 9th of march to make this happen and i have a lots of things happening before and after (TEDxNottingham anyone?!?) so this is tight.  i feel like this is another year for pushing the social media boundary of just what is possible these days.

the feels like a test bed to explore the idea of electric transport between nottingham and the ark and to test out the notion of charging and blogging for three hours while i wait for this car to charge (unless i go to a fast charger and then it’s only thirty minutes) - it’s going to be an interesting ride and test/trial and i’m super excited about the opportunity to make it happen.

the cosmos is just aligning for me on things at the moment.

i’m super thankful.  i need your social help thou team.  will you help?

Related articles

• North East has most electric car charging points (bbc.co.uk)
• Network of electric car charging points will link major cities (telegraph.co.uk)
• Electric-Car Buyers: Free Home Charging Stations Offered By ChargePoint (greencarreports.com)
• Electric cars step up a gear for 2012 (bfreenews.com)
• Vancouver to expand electric car charging stations (canada.com)
• Rinspeed Dock+Go provides bolt-on solutions for small electric cars (InnovationToronto.com)
• Green light for electric car project to expand (scotsman.com)
• Revealed: There are more charging points than electric cars in UK as sales slump (tarpon.wordpress.com)

http://fibreca.mp/the-power-of-seven-or-how-many-epic-projects by posted email about save the date - 12th of March if there was ever a time to watch me do something mad but cool and pushing forward in social media space with the eco, optimized edge i have been pushing forward on it would from the 12th of march. on that day, i’ll take delivery of the smart fourtwo electric car for se …

Phil Campbell of Fibrecamp is the first tenant to move into the Nottingham CleanTech Centre. He is setting up a social media studio on site for use by other tenants to promote their businesses. This will be a valuable addition to the range of services currently offered by the Centre to clean tech companies including low-cost accommodation, training and mentoring support.

Phil’s studio will give tenants and local companies immediate access to video streaming and broadcasting facilities to publicise their businesses across the web. He will also use his own considerable experience of social networks to help them create an effective and profitable social media presence.

Phil says “It’s great to be part of this exciting new venture. I’ve wanted to work with clean tech companies for a long time and offer them something which is unique within an incubator setting. I also want to do my bit to encourage the use of ethical technologies.”

Phil’s green principles have a huge influence on the way he runs his own business and how he lives. He doesn’t own a car, preferring to use pedal power and public transport to get to work. He’s also planning later this year to live part-time in an eco ark in the National Forest with his young daughter.

He’s the ideal first tenant for a Centre with aspirations to become the focal point in Nottingham for developing early-stage businesses involved in clean technologies. The Centre already partners the Nottinghamshire GreenTech Business Network, run by NDE, to provide business support and training to its 900 members.

This link, along with its close proximity to the University of Nottingham’s Innovation Park, provides a solid foundation for the creation of a clean tech community.

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really happy to have this new additional space.  we are just working through the details of getting another mobile solution kit box together and upgrading my existing one to be able to drop in and do social media making on location.  it all costs money (we do not have) but we are on the right track and some nice advocacy jobs are coming in for the end of this month and start of march.

http://fibreca.mp/first-tenant-at-nottingham-cleantech-centre-g by posted email about Phil Campbell of Fibrecamp is the first tenant to move into the Nottingham CleanTech Centre. He is setting up a social media studio on site for use by other tenants to promote their businesses. This will be a valuable addition to the range of services currently offered by the Centre to clean tech co …

quicklink | the nottingham cleantech centre launches!

The GreenTech Business Network would like to announce the launch of the Nottingham CleanTech Centre (NCTC), the first incubator in the region dedicated to accommodating and supporting start-ups and small companies involved in clean technologies.

exciting!

something very close to my heart is the merging together of social media, ethics, technology and enviromental issues.  we have the ability to make our voices heard, the ability to do the right thing by the products and services we offer and the technology processes advancing and superlative speeds that we can make subtle changes to the way we engage with our enviroment.

my whole ark project is focused around what a single person can do not only to live more sustainable but redefine what a new fresh life looks like whilst still utilizing technology to improve the relations and contacts around us to be able to live in a digitally connected world with those assets around us with the internet doing the heavy lifting between it.

indeed the ark will use a lot of technology but in an optimized way, it will look at power and need over want, utilizing elements of the cloud to interact with at a glance without too much thought of taking time out to focus on the creation of the content but more of a virtual intergrated element of my day to day life — taking social media and using it as a barometer or social ping to the people that lie between the studio and the off the grid enviroment. 

so it fills me with great pleasure to be in a potential hub of startups who are using clean, green technology focus to build out products, systems and ideas.  for me, it feels like a bit of a nirvana space and makes the last year of rounding out ideas with fibrecamp one the catalyst leading up to this new space.

what makes 2012 more exciting is the possibility quite quickly of fibrecamp III located in ghent in belgium as a european headquarters and makes spreading the idea of hyperlocal media based studios servicing the five or six blocks around it’s area a real interesting hot pot of digital outreach with the businesses being more than just a partner graphic on a website.

it sparks regular interaction bringing down the potential ‘head down desk’ mode i see from so many companies when it comes to building out services.  sharing, in the business space is as much a requirement as it is for the social realtime world we live in.

i have a really good feeling about the cleantech centre in nottingham, we are going in at ground level, at the rebirth of a space and a refresh for a building that is already bought, it’s owned — it’s not rented or has potential of being problematic — it’s a blank canvas of sorts with the potential to foster some fantastic green tech stars of nottingham and the midland arena.

best of all we get to help them understand the world of social media and create media around some of the exciting concepts and processes these green tech companies have which will obviously feed a foundation of topics for the ark project in 2012.

it’s a perfect fit.  we can’t wait to get started! :)

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• Nottingham City Council budget consultation phase 1 (seaadvocacy.wordpress.com)
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