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It’s been a while, so here’s another meme: FridayQuestions, courtesy of Neil’s World.

FQ1: Suggest something to read, something to watch

Read “A Warning To The Curious” by M. R. James – purveyor of the finest Victorian ghost stories. Watch Lego Spiderman, or Fahrenheit 9/11.

FQ2: Suggest someone to admire, someone to stare at…

More difficult, this one. Admire (but not in a nice way) Tony Blair for being outrageously blatently unrepentant about taking us to war on the back of intelligencebollocks. Stare at the strange man outside my window in Memorial Gardens who appears to be attempting to rustle a greylag goose….

FQ3: Suggest someplace to go, someplace to avoid…

Go to London, for on Monday it will be the London Symposium On Social Tools In The Enterprise. Avoid York – I’m seconding Neil on this one. Not only are the (horse) races on, but it’s also the Dragon Boat racing on the Ouse, which means that even my end of town will be heaving.

FQ PROJECT: Suggest an itinerary for somebody visiting your city by listing the five must-see attractions of the area.
But if you must come to York…

1. York Minster, finest Gothic cathedral in Northern Europe. Marvel at the fact that it was built by hand in an age untouched by Health and Safety, but beware tripping over obese American tourists crying “Gee, Hank, look at the purty church!”
2. Clifton Ings – twenty minutes walk up the river from the Minster, and you’ve got more wildlife that you could hit with a spear.
3. Millenium Bridge – an utterly fantastic bit of engineering showoffness – “look how wobbly we can make our bridge look”…
4. City Screen – 70mm independent cinema with huge seats and THX auditoriums. Uber-trendy, and shows the type of art-house stuff that I feel like I really ought to see, but very seldom get around to. A very impressive bar, as well.
5. The city walls, which I only mention because of the unhealthy fascination that they exert on my youngest offspring. It comes to something when a pile of (largely Victorian) stone is more fascinating to an eight-year-old than a Playstation, but if I had a pound for every step I’ve taken around them while he fights off Saxons, Vikings, Celts, orcs and the occasional balrog, then I’d have bought them by now…

One of the fantastic things about working in this field is that you’re never short of surprises. In case you thought that weblogs and wikis and the panoply of social software only had applications in hi-tech situations, this might make you think again. It’s the wiki of Low Moor allotments, not far from me in York.

In case you’re wondering, allotments are something uniquely British – small patches of land, usually in urban areas, that are owned by local authorities and leased to private citizens who use them for very small-scale agriculture. Which is a roundabout way of saying that they’re used by enthusiasts to grow vegetables. The stereotypical allotment holder is a retired man in late middle-age who potters around growing prize leeks, and about as far from your stereotypical blogger as it’s possible to get.

But the allotment holders of Low Moor are far from stereotypical. Not only do they have a website, they’ve got a blog and a wiki as well – it’s the community Greenboard, used for everything from advertising a greenhouse for sale to solving the mystery of the missing compost bin to announcing a reliable source of horse manure. There’s a register of fruit trees, a problems page and more besides. It’s a great example of new technology being used to solve old problems.

It’s not a particularly sophisticated theory, but I reckon that once it’s being used to advertise horse manure, you’ve got to consider a technology pretty damn mature.