In honour of this I’ve uploaded (above) a pic taken from a screen-grab of Street View of the spot in Leicester where a memorial plaque to Richard III, who some say is buried beneath the streets of the ancient city, is mounted. Except it’s covered up (Google Street View pic taken in 2009). By a lettings advert. For a building which is still vacant. And which is surrounded by barbed wire.

Fortunately the advert has gone now, and the memorial is now visible.

There’s a nice article from the Leicester Chronicle, donated by the Richard III Society, on clues to where exactly Richard III might be buried. Personally my favourite plaque is round near the old castle, which says something like ‘back at the time of the Battle of Bosworth in 1485 the people of Leicester met two kings in three days’. Or words to that effect.

The exact location of the battle between the two kings of England is now on show to the public:

The precise location of one of Britain’s most famous lost battlefields has been revealed today (19th February 2010).

The latest discoveries, announced by Leicestershire County Council pinpoint the exact location of Bosworth Battlefield, where Henry Tudor and King Richard III clashed on 22nd August 1485, and shed new light on the way the battle was fought and where King Richard III died.

The exact location, which has been the topic of much debate amongst historians for years, was discovered as part of a groundbreaking archaeological survey to locate the Battle of Bosworth, funded by a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Holy Bones, Leicester
Originally uploaded by Stuart Glendinning Hall

Brighten up the winter in an exciting Leicester experiment and learn some 21st century skills. We’re looking for people who are open-minded, enthusiastic and curious.

Amplified Leicester is a city-wide experiment to

- explore diversity and innovation

- build a network across diverse communities

- create, share and develop new ideas

- use social media like Facebook and Twitter as an amplifier

This is an opportunity to work with people you might otherwise never meet and learn how to:

- benefit from Leicester’s huge diversity of people and cultures

- generate lots of new ideas quickly

- think like a futurist and see the bigger picture

- organise and collaborate better

- be persuasive in different social situations

- share and develop creative ideas

- manage the stream of information which bombards us every day

- choose the best people to collaborate with

- make the most of different kinds of resources – social, economic, creative

Participation is free of charge but places are limited. Deadline for applications Friday 11^th September 2009.

Find out more and download an application form from http://www.amplifiedleicester.com

For an informal chat, please contact Sue Thomas or Thilo Boeck:

Sue Thomas t: 0116 207 8266 e: sue.thomas@dmu.ac.uk
Thilo Boeck t: 0116 2577879 e: tgboeck@dmu.ac.uk

Amplified Leicester is managed by the Institute of Creative Technologies, De Montfort University in partnership with the DMU Centre for Social Action and Phoenix Square Digital Media Centre. The project is commissioned and supported by NESTA, an independent body with a mission to make the UK more innovative.

“A group that thinks in diverse ways will address a problem from many angles.” Charles Leadbeater, The Difference Dividend

Amplified Individuals and Business Resilience 18th June 2009

Originally uploaded by suethomas

We’re all looking thoughtful at the recent #nlab event on 18 June!

RT @suethomas Thanks to @Solobasssteve for recording AudioBoos at the 18 June #nlab day. Here come the Boos: http://is.gd/1lOxx

Sikh festival procession from stuart Hall on Vimeo.

I’m taking this great BusinessWeek piece about creating jobs by supporting start-ups in the US to the meeting in the town hall, and hope to get the chance to discuss  its relevance to Leicester in beating the recession.

Video from NESTA We20 event above also sets the scene.  Note the connection with NESTA’s Amplied City Leicester in creating a network of amplified individuals who might benefit from such entreprenurial support?

At e-mint last night WordFrame’s David Terrar reminded me that next week NESTA is interviewing people who’ve entered proposals to be the learning partner for ‘Amplified City Leicester’. What’s Amplified City Leicester I hear you say? Watch the video above to get a conceptual idea, then read below…

In terms of an overall project overview here’s what I’ve extracted from the ITT:

Amplified City is a city-wide experiment designed to grow the innovation capacity of Leicester by networking
key connectors across the city’s disparate and diverse communities in an incentivised participatory project,
enabled by social media:
• To develop a transferable model for amplifying a diverse city’s grassroots innovation capacity through
connecting diverse communities through key individuals
• To generate practical examples of how collaborative technologies can be exploited in a city context

It clearly has a lot of potential in a city which is set to be the first city in Europe where the BME population is 50% or higher:

Informed by research conducted by the Institute for the Future; de Montfort’s Institute of Creative Technologies’s work on transliteracy; the NLab regional social media network and the IOCT’s visiting professor Howard Rheingold, the project will build on the participants’ existing understanding of their working styles, motivations and expertise.

The aim will be to create new structures and processes that bypass traditional constraints and stimulate innovation for social and commercial benefit across the city.

Watch this space Leicester!

PS: Talking of amplification it’s great to see plans for a new music project, ‘Lock 42‘, to open in a Victorian Mill on Frog Island in Leicester in October, out of the ashes of the famous Princess Charlotte, where I saw the Dandy Warhols play.

I thought I should report this from the Leicester Civic Society as I understand there’s a petition to save the Western Bridge:

“The ‘Bowstring Bridge’ viaduct at the junction of Western Boulevard and Braunstone Gate has been a Leicester landmark since the 1890s and is now under imminent threat of demolition.

“De Montfort University now own the nearby Pump & Tap public house and the land surrounding the bridge and are seeking to build a new swimming pool there. Various reports have suggested that the bridge is in danger of collapse yet years of delays to the demolition and the fact that the road underneath is still in use suggest otherwise. It has carried 1000 ton trains for over 100 years!

“The bridge itself is primarily above the road and does not substantially occupy development land. We believe a solution can be found whereby DMU get to build the much-needed city centre swimming pool whilst retaining this unique remnant of the Great Central Railway.

“DMU have made some important contributions to the regeneration of Leicester and we believe this is an opportunity for them to go the extra mile and prove they care about Leicester heritage. The bridge itself would make a fantastic centrepiece to any new development.

“We therefore call upon De Montfort University and Leicester City Council to retain and reuse the bridge. Please sign our online petition below.”

Hmm, wonder if my old Leicester classmate of BBC TV’s Restoration Marianne Sur knows about this?