About
Brief Bio
Hello. I’m Meg Pickard, and this is my site. There’s more info about this site and its history, below, but first, here’s a bit about me.
Meg is my real name. It’s not short for Megan, before you ask.
I originally trained in Social Anthropology, conducting ethnographic research into cultural identity with communities first in Bolivia and subsequently online, and eventually succumbed to the Internet industry’s bright lights in 1997.
I currently work at Guardian News & Media where I’m Head of Social Media Development, responsible for developing and managing existing and new social web strategy and experiences for guardian.co.uk.
I have also worked in magazine publishing, in a cybercafe running internet training courses and during holidays at university, I worked as a cook in a Scottish youth hostel. If required (and given enough onions and a big pot), I can easily make soup for 70 (though this doesn’t come in particularly handy these days, unfortunately).
I spend a lot of my free time taking photographs, drinking tea, creatively tinkering with things (and ideas, code…), going on chilly walks, and exploring places by foot and vicariously, via map. If I had more time, I’d do more of the same.
I’m in my thirties. My birthday is on March 12. I’m a Pisces, but I think astrology is bollocks. My Amazon wishlist is here, and I like presents.
Distributed Me
Having been online for fun since 1993 and for work since 1996, I’m all over the place. The web, that is.
You can find me:
- http://www.megpickard.com
- http://www.flickr.com/photos/meg
- http://del.icio.us/megp
- http://megpickard.tumblr.com
- http://www.last.fm/user/meish/
- http://www.twitter.com/megpickard/
- http://linkedin.com/in/megpickard/
- http://www.photoboxgallery.com/megpickard
…and doubtless all sorts of other places.
Site History
I’ve been online since 1993, and I’ve had a site of some description since 1996. This is the latest incarnation. I started blogging in January 2000, painstakingly hand coding each new entry and uploading to my ISP’s filespace via FTP, over a wonky modem. I happily switched to Blogger and my own domain (now long-departed – notsosoft.com) a couple of months later.
In 2003, I moved everything to meish.org. What does meish mean? This site is a digital approximation of self. It’s a lot like me, and contains lots of bits of me, but it isn’t actually me. If you read or see anything here and think that you know exactly who I am based on that, then you’re sadly wrong. It’s not me. It’s me(ish).
Software
This site is created and edited using WordPress, which I embraced wholeheartedly after years of wrangling with notepad, Homesite 4.5, html, php, perl, jibberish, Movable Type, and before that Blogger. Old skool.
Bits of it are powered by Flickr, tumblr, del.icio.us and last.fm. I’m generally powered by vegemite on toast and Yorkshire tea.
Any graphics are cooked up or faffed with using Photoshop, and photos are organised online using the ever-excellent Flickr and offline via an increasingly wheezing iPhoto database Adobe Lightroom. You can see more of my photos here. You can buy prints of some of them here.
In case you’re curious, you can keep up with what I’ve been listening to recently via my last.fm profile, though don’t pay too much attention to the charts of my “favourite” music – since 99% of the time I listen to mp3s with itunes in shuffle mode, it tends to be more representative of what the software likes, than me.
I browse the web using Mozilla (Firefox), and I aggregate all my mail from various domains in Gmail. This site is hosted with pair networks, who have always been truly excellent, even when I’ve exploded the server on Valentine’s Day (oops, sorry), as have my ISP, Zen, who continue to provide a flawless ADSL service.
Hardware
Both at home and at work, I use Macs as my main digital consumption and creation tools. However, I’m happy with both Macs and PCs – they each do different things well. My netbook of choice is an MSI-WIND device, which runs XP (though since I use it 97.8% for web browsing, it’s much more about the form factor).
My Photos are taken mostly with a Nikon D80 DSLR or trusty iPhone, though I also carry around a Canon IXUS 750 compact digital camera or a Vivitar UWS pretty much everywhere I go. Some older pictures were taken using a Nikon D50, Canon IXUS 400/300, Kodak DC280 Digital, a Canon EF-M SLR or Canon EOS 1000F SLR, or an Olympus 100M 35mm. I also have a variety of toy cameras which I use irregularly, though getting film developed is a) a pain and b) increasingly difficult. Where from prints, photos were scanned using a trusty Agfa Snapscan Touch. I tend to order prints through the excellent Photobox service. They also do my photogallery fulfillment. I make annual photo books using Blurb.
I also take a lot of photos with my cameraphone: currently an Apple iPhone.
Where
Although I’ve lived in Nigeria, British Columbia, southern Spain, Bolivia, Scotland (west and east coasts) and the north-west of England, these days home is in SW London, UK, where I live with my husband Paul and a small brown cat called Pickle.
We are within 200ft of the river Thames, which is a good place to be, unless it floods, when it won’t be at all. We live under the flight path into Heathrow (but that’s not saying much: most of West London could say the same), at the point where the wheels come down on the approach to land. I like thinking that as they hurtle overhead, people on board are just a few minutes from homecomings, reunions and holidays.
We have a wireless home network, many, many gadgets and the comfiest bed in the world, which we got from the Big Table furniture Co-op in West London. If it ever breaks (and as it’s guaranteed for 20 years, I doubt that it will) wherever I am living at the time, I will hurtle back to London to get a replacement. Yes, it’s that good.
I spend a lot of time on the west coast of Scotland, and the North-East of England, and not nearly enough time swimming in warm seas. Living in London, I also spend a lot of time on, or waiting for public transport.
Anything else you need to know? Please feel free to ask.
Hi Meg, I came across your photos on Flickr when I was searching cameraphone pics. I really enjoyed your pics, excellent stuff, a witty visual diary, with a fine eye for composition too. A bit of a Cartier-Bresson really?!
Have fun, all the best, Andrew (Nth Yorkshire)
Hello, Meg! It’s a pleasure to meet you!
meish org was found after a search for the Mayfly Project. Though one was posted one last year, I didn’t know where the idea came from until today. Thank you!
What I find so appealing is the opportunity to write creatively with some guidance.
Meg,
I absolutely love me(ish).org.
Thank you.
Meg,
I really wanted to see your anti-valentines, but alas, I am at work and cannot access that page. I also cannot see the pictures you have featured but the captions are tantalizing. I thoroughly enjoyed your site and plan to be a regular visitor. Also, I am from the US and it’s likely I say Yrup. There’s nothing I can do about it.
great fotos on flickr dragged me to your site… great site.. very well presented… i too live in west london and yes its a great place around.. im sure to stay tuned to both of your sites
hey. must admit, got vd first, then checked in, very inspiring. am hopping on over to flickr. will be checking back for more on a regular basis. i’m simply in love with inspiration from unexpected sources, like worcestershire, for instance. i hope i spelled that correctly. i’m from south africa and i hope we don’t have any generally irritating traits.
Ms. Meg, thank you for your cranky cards. I was feeling a bit down since my fiancée broke-up with me over New Years (right after a car crash, really!), & these cards just cheered me right up. I look forward to reading more of you on the web.
bumped into the Vd site by accident, made me laugh, exploring your other projects & absolutely loving the ideas and the style! Thanks for perking up my February! and hopefully many more…
I just found the anti-VD cards, and have been laughing my butt off for hours. Your site is fantastic!
Oh Meg. I’d be you if I were 10 years younger. I’m a geek without the skills, wanting to creat a great community portal like yours, but without the first clue how. Due to a busy life and job and kids, I’m imprisoned in the old skool blogger but desperate seeking release.
Anyway, nice to fine you. I will return.
Hey Meg. I really appreciate your idea, this is fantastic site and I was waiting for this stuff for 4 years finally found this one, cant wait for the month of Feb now :)
Cheers!
P.S. You really seem to be very talented and a very nice person, I envy your friends :)
[...] Meg hat sich mal an einer Typologie der Twitter-User versucht – mir persönlich fehlt da jedoch der “Ratlose Spieler”. [...]
Hi Meg
Seeing your name in Private Eye today brought all sorts of memories flooding back.
You’re a star. I’m very sad we’ve lost touch (all my fault, I’m afraid). I’m so glad things are so cool in your world.
Love always,
Pat
Meg,
Discovered this site through a search for aggregating Flickr/Last.fm type information into a portal page….that was a good 20-30 minutes ago.
Great site, and good to see another West-Londoner out here.
Oh, and aren’t the Moo Notecards awesome?
I found your blog through Moo. It’s very interesting!
I stumbled across your site a while ago after spotting your fridge moognets how-to guide, but forgot all about it ’til today when I remembered *that’s* what I was going to do with all my remaining moo cards – make sticky things! ;)
Anyway, I’ve bookmarked you properly now (and shall be making return visits), so keep writing interesting stuff and taking inspiring pictures.
Oh, and it you didn’t already have a new job lined up, you seem like you’d fit in really well at moo.com… :)
Hey Meg,
I’ve been reading Anna’s blog for quite a while now and read the ‘Tis The Season stuff that you and her did but have never get round to actually becoming a regular reader of your blog. At a loose end today (read: revising hard for my exams) so figured it was finally time to add you to my RSS feed.
Love the About page. It’s by far the most informative of any blog I’ve ever read :)
[...] About [...]
hey, Where has the sight with all the album covers gone, I was nearly finished!!!
=].
Your site really made me smile. You seem like a genuinly lovely person..*scowls*.
Thanks.
x
rfy73o hi nice site thx http://peace.com
Hi Meg, How lovely to see you site and catch up on you life. I was sorry we lost contact, ive always been bad at keeping in touch. I found you by googling camas tuath, happy memories.
Love to you