Hal MacLean

I wrote to all of my contacts from my time at Ultralab, but I think I may have missed one or two. If that’s you, here’s what I sent out:

Dear [Firstname],

I am sending this email to friends, colleagues, work partners and
people I have had contact with over the last five years at Ultralab
(and before) - you are listed under my contacts as someone to keep
in touch with. If you have no idea why you got a copy of this email,
my sincere apologies, there may have been an error, so please disregard it!

You may have heard about the uncertain future of Ultralab in the
national media recently. Anglia Ruskin University has decided not to
continue Ultralab’s research and consultancy work and so I and most of
my colleagues have been made redundant. Ultralab closes as a physical
department within the University structure on 31st December 2006 after
nearly twenty years of ongoing success. The university is keeping some
of the Ultralab team, however, in order to continue to run some of the
larger money making projects which have been started. Thirteen
colleagues will stay on in the faculty of education to run Ultraversity
(http://www.ultraversity.net ), and a further few will work in the new
university centre for learning and teaching.

Far from being distraught about all of this (although it is undeniably
sad when you think of the outstanding work that has been done by the
Ultralab team over the last twenty years), the opportunity arises for
us to continue in a different way.

And on that thought, I would like to introduce you to ‘Cleveratom’.

I have been working with some colleagues to form a new company,
‘Cleveratom Ltd’ which will officially start ‘trading’ on January 3rd.
The company will focus on three core activities, including working with
schools, colleges and other educational establishments to look at how
ICT can be used to support and enhance learning. Building Schools of
the future will be a key part of the work that we do. Secondly, the
fantastic projects focussing on digital creativity will continue, with
several excellent events already lined up for 2007 (have a look at
http://www.digitalcreativity.org ). Thirdly, we will continue to work
to develop and deploy unique online community and social software,
building learning spaces for creativity, virtual learning environments
(VLEs) and more. The web site is at http://www.cleveratom.co.uk
although there is little more than a holding page there right now.

We are keen to further develop the work that we have been doing for the
last few years and would be delighted to talk with people who are
working in the same areas as we intend to, or have a brilliant idea
that they want to make a reality.

My contact details change with immediate effect (see below) and I would
be grateful if you could reply to my new address with your latest
details too… although you are probably enjoying a well-earned rest
and won’t get this until after next week. I am working on updating my
blog (http://www.halmaclean.co.uk ) and you can always keep in touch
with me there if you prefer.

I hope that you are enjoying the season’s festivities, and my very best
wishes to you for the New Year.

Sitting in the Freeport cinema it’s often easy to miss out on the film being shown because of the younger members of the audience who take it upon themselves to provide alternative entertainment. However, today they were no problem at all and I have a suspicion that it was the film we were watching that held their imaginations for longer than usual!

In fact, Night At The Museum is a pretty good film for adults as well, although it isn’t exactly a difficult plot to follow - it is aimed at those who want to have a chuckle without having to think too hard. The story is fairly obvious really - Ben Stiller plays the divorced father of a ten-year-old child, and needs a steady job in order to stay living in the same apartment. Taking on the night shift at the museum he finds all hell lets lose once the doors shut, and it is simply a story of how he brings some order to the proceedings. Oh, and there’s a theft to solve and the problem of improving the number of visitors to the museum itself…
All very easy, and no real depth of thought needed, but this film has a cast of characters that make it shine just a little bit more than you’d expect. Robin Williams plays an uncharacteristically understated role, which is refreshing, Mickey Rooney makes a screen appearance (been a long time since the last one, I think), Dick Van Dyke (without the accent) is a central character, but by far the best for me has to be the British contingent. Steve Coogan and Ricky Gervais really steal the show for me, with Coogan playing a (miniature) Roman general and Gervais playing the museum director. The absolute best part for me is where Stiller is telling off Coogan and Owen Wilson (a cowboy) - Coogan’s responses and expressions are priceless!

All in all this is an easy to watch, thoroughly fun yarn - I’d recommend it for anyone who wants a light hearted way to spend a couple of hours without taking anything too seriously. The special effects are bordering on OK, so don’t go for those. The plot is thin, so don’t go for that. The fun is definitely in the cameos from the supporting cast - definitely worth seeing Gervais and most certainly Steve Coogan… neither of whom I was expecting to steal the show quite to the extent that they do. Take the children too, they’ll really enjoy it!