This is inspired by Derek Sivers now page site which he blogged about here.
Last updated: September 2026 from home in Devon, UK.
Currently working as Digital Research Compute Lead at the University of Exeter.
The work is split between developing the pathway to a next generation Digital Research Infrastructure, and improving existing service delivery. I work under the guise of Research IT, part of the IT Services function. This is quite middle management, but involves enough in the realm of service design, stakeholder (e.g. researcher and other research providers) engagement and hands-on technical jiggery-pokery to keep me broadly satisfied, if a little too busy!
I continue to try and build a happy home with my partner and our child, which is a neverending but immensely satisfying task, when it goes right.
My partner's family are farmers, running both a medium scale organic fruit and veg farm, as well as a Community Supported Agriculture scheme. It's been unbelievably dry this year, so irrigation has been a challenge.
The balance between tech work and farming is a novel one to strike, but brings some important things into my world view as a techie responsible for providing costly services to the research community. I need to write more about this!