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Inspired by Caribou

Canadian artist Joyce Majiski has published another stunning book of artworks, this time, as the eponymous title suggests, inspired by caribou (reindeer). These are the Porcupine Caribou herd – the keystone species that roams across Northern Canada and Alaska – which she has encountered several times in the Ivvavik National Park in the northern Yukon.

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A Field Guide to People Centric Practices

A booklet of personal reflections, by Giles Lane, on what a set of principles for working from a people-centric perspective might be.

People centric practice implies not just a human centred approach, but one which encompasses the whole context in which we live and work, and impacts on other creatures and lifeforms that are part of such environments – the more-than-human world. It addresses the whole ecologies of which we are part, on upon which we depend for our very existence. People does not have to mean exclusively human – we might consider other species (trees, birds, mammals etc) as peoples, as some indigenous humans have done, since they constitute their own societies and ways of being in the world. All have as much right to life as each other, it is only human hubris which champions our right to own and exploit everything else as paramount.

The booklet brings together, in a simple way, a set of principles and guides for working based on empathy, common sense, trust and agency. It is centred on establishing and following an ethos – through listening and responding, trusting and being trusted; anticipating consequences and reflecting on what you do. It adds into the mix principles for building trust borrowed from Baroness Onora O’Neill’s 2002 Reith Lectures, as well as the Precautionary Principle, Duty of Care and the Nolan Principles of Public Life. It also includes personal values: passion, intensity, intimacy, pleasure, obligation, responsibility, culpability.

Download on bookleteer, or read the online version.

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education examples news

UnBias Fairness Toolkit Handbook

Proboscis has been working on a research project about algorithms, bias, trust and fairness with the University of Oxford, Horizon Digital Economy Institute (University of Nottingham) and the University of Edinburgh since September 2016. Our role has been to develop a “Fairness Toolkit” intended to stimulate awareness of these issues and to provide mechanisms for people to share their concerns and hopes, as well as for industry stakeholders (IT professionals, policymakers, regulators, activists, researchers etc) to respond, triggering a ‘public, civic dialogue’ about “our future internet, free and fair for all”.

The UnBias Fairness Toolkit is now available and free to download – you can read all about it in the Handbook below:

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examples ideas & suggestions news

Workbooks for community knowledge networks


Last year Proboscis collaborated with a group of local people and a community run centre (PAG) in Pallion, Sunderland to co-create and co-design a sustainable ‘knowledge network’ that could help people respond to the bewildering array of changes taking place in the benefits system. Our project became the Pallion Ideas Exchange (PAGPIE) – weekly meetings and get togethers run by and for local people to help each other identify and address problem, share information and experience and help share the results with others in the community. A key part of our collaboration (the project was also part of the Vome research project led by Dr Lizzie Coles-Kemp at the Information Security Group of Royal Holloway University of London) was the tools we designed to help the community think through not only how they could identify problems and opportunities, but also how they could figure out what they as individuals and as a group already knew and could share with others. All the tools were designed to be easily produced/reproduced using standard office stationery or, in the case of the larger posters, could be cheaply printed at a local copy shop. Everything was also designed to be easily captured for sharing on the web via blogs, twitter, facebook etc – in whatever way was both safest and most appropriate for the local community.

We devised simple workflows, diagrams and ‘thinksheets’ as well as developing some workbooks and notebooks that individuals could use – all made with bookleteer. We printed up a batch of each using the Short Run printing service, but a key part of the design was that anyone could easily download, print out and make up more copies if they needed to, or the centre could easily order more printed copies as and when they had funding.


We are now creating generic versions of all these tools so that anyone else can set up their own version of a Neighbourhood Ideas Exchange (NIE), can download and make up the notebooks and other tools. We’ve completed versions of the existing 4 notebooks – Experiences, Managing a Problem, Communicating a solution online, Things To Do – and are writing a general guide to the toolkit and NIE concept.

We’ve also been condensing our experiences working in Pallion, as well as many years experience working with other communities both here and abroad, into a playful set of StoryCubes designed to help communities, facilitators and organisers think through the different kinds of steps needed for something like a neighbourhood ideas exchange or other community network. We’re hoping to have the whole toolkit finished in time for the AHRC Connected Communities Showcase on 12th March, where we’ll be showing materials created for our other collaboration with ISG on the Hidden Families project.

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examples ideas & suggestions publishing on demand

City As Material Set


We’ve just received the complete set of 10 City As Material books back from the printers and next week we’ll be designing and making the special slipcases to hold them together and collect them into their limited edition (50 copies). The set will go on sale from the 31st March 2011 via the proboscis online store.

We think this is a great way of showing how easy it is for individuals or groups to create and print multiple books in short runs (such as 50 copies) that can be collected together to make a beautiful publication. We will be aiming to add the ability to design and print out your own slipcases to bookleteer later this year, but in the meantime we’re happy to discuss designing and printing custom slipcases for your projects.

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case study education examples news publishing on demand

CCI’s Library of Traces


Back in September Frederik posted a case study of Cambridge Curiosity and Imagination‘s use of bookleteer. They’ve continued using it as a creative and documentary resource, and in doing so have created a Library of Traces – a series of eBooks which enable both participants in their professional development workshops, and others, to follow the traces of their experiences and share reflections and observations.

To help CCI widen the audience for their work we’ve posted 7 eBooks on our diffusion.org.uk library and will be making others available there as they are created. All are welcome to download and share eBooks from the Library of Traces.

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examples ideas & suggestions

Holiday memories in your back pocket

Hi, I’m Radhika, the Marketing Assistant at Proboscis. You’ll see me pop up weekly, as I’ll be writing posts on ideas and suggestions for using Bookleteer in new and inventive ways. Take a look at my first idea…

Going away this summer?? It’s a great feeling, once you’ve booked that holiday and start counting down the weeks to a get-a-way, somewhere beautiful, adventurous or even laid-back and relaxing.

Exploring the craziness of New York’s Time Square, the hustle and bustle of Abu Dhabi’s Souks, the calmness of Maldives serene beaches, the list goes on…

Coming back with all those memories and stories that you can’t wait to tell everybody! The only problem I have is remembering the name of that fantastic coffee shop I went to, or that busy vibrant market where I got my dazzling shawls from or even the restaurant where I tasted the delicious local food. So if someone asked me to recommend places to go and see or where to eat, sure I could get their mouth watering describing the succulent chicken and thirst quenching cocktails, but I couldn’t actually tell them the names of these places… because I had forgotten!

I’m always in need for a scrap piece of paper to jot things down. Having a book that can easily fit into a pocket or a handbag would be most ideal. Creating a book on Bookleteer gives me this exact opportunity, to easily print and assemble and take with me.

It’s also useful to jot down other little things you come across on holiday such as the local language. Maybe how to say ‘hello’ in Mandarin or ‘thank you’ in Greek.

Have a look at the mock up book I made, to give you an idea of what can be done…

A handy book that can easily fit into your back pocket or your handbag and taken with you everywhere on your holiday! Now you don’t have to struggle to remember everywhere you went, just scribble it down in your own Bookleteer book!

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examples publishing on demand

Some Recent PPOD books

September was a busy month here at Proboscis and on bookleteer: we sent seven books to be printed via the PPOD service as well as 10 different StoryCubes. The range of publications was very broad, from books about exhibitions and art projects to a book in Arabic about a major archaeological excavation in Sudan and a special notebook for a symposium on digital engagement and another full of QR codes. The StoryCubes included an 8 cube ‘cube of cubes’ set by artists Joyce Majiski and Alice Angus on their Topographies & Tales project, a promotional cube about bookleteer itself and a cube by artist Melissa Bliss to promote her installation, Bird Song, at the b-side media festival in the Isle of Portland.

The photo above shows the various StoryCube and printed eBooks :

  • Excavations in the Temple Precinct of Dangeil by Julie Anderson & Salah eldin Mohamed Ahmed (in both English and Arabic versions)
  • In Good Heart; what is a farm? by Alice Angus
  • where it ends and we begin by Fian Andrews
  • Tales of Things: Objects, Stories & Voices from the BME Communities in Greenwich by TOTeM
  • Graffito by BigDog Interactive & Proboscis
  • Inspiring Digital Engagement Festival by Ann Light & Karen Martin
  • Bird Song by Melissa Bliss
  • bookleteer StoryCube by Proboscis
  • Topographies & Tales by Alice Angus and Joyce Majiski
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    examples inspiration making

    Tangled Threads eBook

    Proboscis have been invited to make a film that will be presented as part of a Leonardo/MIT mobile digital exhibition curated by Jeremy Hight. The film will provide an abstracted overview of Proboscis’ themes and projects over the past few years and will be made and illustrated by Alice. However, the process of making the film was begun by Mandy who drew up the storyboard which has now been converted into the Tangled Threads eBook.

    Mandy’s starting point was a piece of text I wrote which aimed to invoke the imagery and metaphors often used by Proboscis to describe their projects. The text also provided points for jumping into more detailed overview of Proboscis’ work from the past few years. Mandy took this text and transformed it into an intricate and beautiful mix of words and illustrations.


    Storyboard panel sketches for Tangled Threads

    Mandy moved quickly to produce her initial sketches, discarding ideas and developing a single artistic strand. After creating the storyboard panels you can see above she worked on individual frames drawing them up in detail before digitally painted the images to produce a full-colour illustrated eBook.

    At the back of the eBook are a number of illustrations for you to cut out and stick them into the allocated spaces throughout the pages. Instructions for doing this are provided on pages 1 and 2. Making Tangled Threads the very first pop-up eBook!

    And this is the result..

    Download the eBook and make it up for yourself on diffusion.org.uk and read more about Mandy’s storyboarding process on the Proboscis blog here..

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    eBooks at Inspiring Digital Engagement Festival

    As I wrote last week, I have been co-organising the Inspiring Digital Engagement Festival in Sheffield and I wanted to make an eBook for it to try to capture participants feelings and views around digital technologies, digital inclusion, engagement and the festival itself. Thanks to Giles, these eBooks were printed through bookleteer’s PPOD service and ready for me to take to Sheffield on Tuesday.

    The eBook was imaginatively titled ‘Inspiring Digital Engagement Festival‘ and consisted of 14 pages with the first page being an introduction and the last page providing space for comments and observations. Pages 3 and 4 were a double-page showing the programme for the day and this was so useful! It helped people anticipate the order in which things would happen and figure out who they were listening to at that moment.

    The rest of the eBook was filled with a selection of open-ended questions. Questions included ‘How do you spend your time?‘, ‘Who owns digital space? What are the limitations, restrictions or edges?‘ and ‘What unexpected pleasures did today bring?‘ If you’re a member of bookleteer you can download the eBook here if you’re interested in seeing all of the questions we used.. (If you’re not a member you can sign up here!)

    Example of a page from the IDEF eBook

    The eBooks were handed out as people arrived at the event – you can see them on our registration ‘desk’ in the photo above… We had designed a selection of micro-activities to take place throughout the day which would have led people into filling in the eBooks individually and collaboratively. Of course, we ran late and some of these activities were cut, however, in the closing minutes of the festival we asked people to turn to their neighbour and to fill in their eBook together.

    While the eBooks seemed too seductive for people to want to give them back to us the few that we have show such thoughtful answers and leading questions that I would love to see the rest and I feel that using the eBook for reflection and evaluation was successful and certainly something I would use again – though hopefully with more time to give to it throughout the event.