About this Blog
Hosting and Software
It’s hosted by http://www.wordpress.com which provides a free service, easy to edit and configure. I recommend it highly. You can also download the WordPress software to your own site free from http://www.wordpress.org. Equally good and gives you more control of formatting, appearance and layout.
Posting Dates and versions
You may notice that some of my posts have dates from before blogs were invented. Where the post is being used to provide access to an earlier publication I use the date of the publication rather then the date I posted it. This mainly to ensure that entries are in a helpful chronological order. If I change the date of any other post I’ll include a note to explain why I’ve done that and when the item was originally posted.
Similarly if I make substantial changes to a post more than a month after it is published I’ll include a note to explain that. I have not done that yet and it’s better practice to post a new version rather than tinker with history.
During the first month or so after publishing it is quite likely that I’ll edit the post to improve clarity or expression.
Use of images
As is common, in my posts I have images from a great variety of online sources as well as photographs taken by me. Where the image is widely available in the public domain, such as promotional images produced by manufacturers and reproduced on many websites, I may not have credited the source, but as far as possible I have tried to give proper credit and a link to the original image.
It is technically possible to include an image by making a link to the website where the original appears and ethically this is the safest approach. However when I have done this in the past it has often led to problems when the original image has moved or disappeared so I generally import the original images into this blog but provide a link, by clicking on the image displayed here, to the original.
If you notice that I have used an image in an unsatisfactory way I would be very pleased it you would let me know, you can use the contact form
Why do I have this Blog?
As an academic I’ve found that having a web presence is the best way to make sure people know about my work and I’ve always valued other people who have made it easy to find their stuff online. Until 2009 I used a conventional website but the development of blog and wiki software has made it much easier to create and maintain websites so I’ve switched to WordPress and started to think much more in blogging terms – less structure, use the site to develop ideas, use it for anything I want to point other people to, etc.
Recently (in 2012) I retired from academic work and my aim for the blog has changed. It will be less about research and more of a platform for personal critiques of design. My main interests in doing this are in product and service design but also to do with design in relation to making music and active travel (developing walking and cycling to keep us fit and happy)
How to get in touch with me
You can send me a message directly using the contact form here
You can make a public comment about any of my posts using the comment box at the end of the relevant post.
(updated 15/12/2013 to reflect changes in my personal direction)
Chris Rust's Blog 
21 May 2009 at 3:59 pm
Dropping by and viewed your blog. Very clean and concise.Was wondering why the dates of the posts were way earlier than the birth of WordPress.com. It is good system to arrange in this order. But it also means that people could manipulate the post dates, which can be a worrying issue.
I am the elfin type. I won’t settle to make a formal one until I’ve played enough online with different ideas. Could be a bad thing, but I have another different thinking to online presence. Cheerio !
22 May 2009 at 7:59 am
Hi Karen, I guess it’s up to WordPress that they allow the posting dates to be edited, I take responsibility for explaining my actions here so that (I hope) people can trust my blog.
It’s even more fuzzy than you suggest since these older entries were imported from my previous website, which predated WordPress (although one colleague described that site as a blog so maybe I was ahead of the curve). So some of the entries have the date they were posted in WordPress, some the date when they were originally posted on the web by me, and some the date (within a month, of when the content was in the public domain for the first time, eg the conference date or publication date). The main reason I have done this was that I originally imported the material into WordPress in a random way so the date order did not reflect the creation order, I added the years in the titles but it still seemed confusing that older material appeared after newer stuff. If I’d been more on the ball and done it in strict order I would not have felt the need to alter the posting dates as long as the chronological order was true.
I won’t change the posting date of any new material created since the blog started earlier this year. That would be very dishonest.
Incidentally, it’s quite a good thing that blogs can be ported to other software and keep their original dates. Anything that preserves the real integrity of the material rather than its technical integrity is probably a good thing. As a researcher you will always be alert to the need to understand these things and make your own decisions about truth (well spotted). And of course a blog can be updated at any time to confuse the truth about what was said earlier. I am relaxed about editing material for a month or so after first posting but after that I’ll try to add dated notes rather than change the original.