Monthnote, March 2025

This is my monthnote for March, a post where I reflect on my previous month's work alongside other life stuff.

What I've been working on

A few highlights, in no particular order:

• I'm very pleased we've finally announced GovCamp Scotland, happening in Edinburgh this June. It follows a series of conversations going back over a year with enlightened, like-minded folk from Public Digital, National Library of Scotland, and NHS Education for Scotland about the need to get something a bit more practioner-focused happening in the digital/services space in Scotland.
• Back at the start of the month, Adam and I met Scottish Government to talk about metadata standards, the wealth of data held in various different parts of SG, and our own metadata catalogue, which has been undergoing some very helpful user interface updates recently. Plenty to think about when it comes to applying standards across different organisations, as well as the perennial problem that no-one ever gets around to updating their metadata.
• I attended an event in Glasgow facilitated by Scottish Enterprise, looking at funding opportunities for digital health. Much discussion of 'innovation' and the struggle to scale novel solutions. As ever it's always valuable, and grounding, to hear the perspectives of a wide range of NHS peers, and a pertinent reminder of how different the demands of the health service are based on geography.
• We had our first meeting of this year with SAIL Databank, an organisation that's most easily described as the Welsh equivalent of Research Data Scotland (but are so much more than that!). SAIL was initially set up almost 20 years ago and the team are always hugely generous with their advice and steer based on years of operating a trusted research environment (TRE) and providing access/linkage to a huge range of datasets.
• Talking of TREs, the animations my talented team commissioned and co-produced have been nominated in the DataComm Awards, one of three different awards we’ve been shortlisted for this month; our Researcher Access Service is also a finalist in the British Data Awards and Business Charity Awards. I've always had mixed feelings about the value of awards, but they're great for profile-raising and it's for nice for people to get recognition for the hard work that goes into designing and building services.

• One of the most constructive things I did all month was take a short walk with one of my esteemed colleagues, following a tricky meeting. Having the headspace to mull over, refocus, and talk things through – away from a screen – can be a godsend, especially as the winter greys start to make way for Spring blues and yellows. Incidentally, one of the topics we covered was just how much a sunny week in March has helped lift moods across our teams.
• I read couple of useful resources/articles that zoom in on terminology problems with AI: 'Learn fast and build things' is a fulsome report published by Ada Lovelace Institute; 'No one knows what the hell an AI agent is' suggests we're just not learning any lessons when it comes to befuddling everyone with meaningless jargon.

Reading, watching, listening

Somewhat less prolific this month, I guess my excitable pace had to slow. A total of zero cinema visits and zero fiction books read 😢

• In terms of non-fiction books, it was ALL about Facebook and Twitter, as described in the newsletter I published last week.
• Quite liking the new album by The Horrors in a sort of late-90s/early-00s-indie-sound-you-don't-hear-much-of-these-days; superb new track from the uber talented Kae Tempest; the drip feed of new Self Esteem tracks just gets better and better.
• Picked up in various places, one of the best things I read this month was Phil Adams' reflections on five years as an independent consultant. Phil's writing has a clarity I'm in awe of, and his newsletter is always thought-provoking and excellent brain fodder.
• Loved this look back at 20 years of Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go on the New Statesman culture podcast, an unforgettable book which I remember scrambling to finish, heart pounding, in a rain-sodden Welsh campsite.
• I thought Unexplainable's four-part 'Good Robot' series was a superb deep dive on AI and its implications – it's specifically on point in highlighting the differences between AI ethics and AI safety, and the communities that coalesce around those terms.
• Talking of AI, it was tempting to use a ripped-off Studio Ghibli style image for my cover pic. Oh wait, no it wasn't. Brian Merchant's urgent, angry post on this topic is worth a read.
• Went to see the wondrous Lauren Mayberry at a sweaty gig in Edinburgh's La Belle Angele. She was hilarious, and the performance was incredible. The cover of Bittersweet Symphony was a particularly special treat though.