I saw something at the weekend that made my academic blood boil. In Sainsburys, Gillan McKeith food bars (which are only labelled “Gillain McKeith” vitamin C bars on the packet) are still being sold as “dr gillian mckeith” products, according to the pricing information.

For the uninitiated, Ms Gillian McKeith is a tv celebrity who has a program in the UK called “You are what you eat”. She helps obese people get thin through the revolutionary tactics of encouraging them to eat healthier, eat less, and move about more. She has a string of well selling books, and related foodstuffs.

So where’s my beef? Firstly, her poor understanding of science has long been discussed on the interwebs. This is someone who doesnt really get basic high school level biology, yet has made a career explaining it to us lesser mortals.

But secondly – Ms Gillian McKeith is not a medical doctor. She has a doctorate (like myself) but unlike me, and most of my colleagues, her PhD was gained by correspondence course from a non-accredited American college. Her research has never been published, never been vetted. And yet she has in the past paraded her “Dr” as if it was equitable to those aquired by rigourous academic study and examination and publication.

A draft adjudication by the Advertising Standards Agency in 2007 suggested that her products allegedly breached two clauses of the Committee of Advertising Practice code: “substantiation” and “truthfulness”. To avoid public publication of this document, Ms McKeith accepted “voluntarily” – not to call herself “doctor” in her advertising any more.

And yet, here we have Sainsurys selling Dr Gillian McKeith products (let me stress one more time for the lawyers- this is on the Sainsburys printed material, not Ms Gillian McKeith’s packaging).

Why does this make me angry? Firstly, doing a PhD is tough. Its hard work. Buying one off the internet is just not the same as going to an accredited school and putting in the hours. (Lets go over the difference between a PhD and a medical Doctor: PhD’s have been granted to those reaching the highest standards of academic achievement possible since medieval times. Physicians have only been called “doctor” since the 18th century – and this only to distinguish those who had some medical training from untrained barbershop surgeons – so anyone who suggests having a PhD doesnt make you a “real doctor” can go and whistle).

It generally takes around 4 years of dissertation work, on your own, to get a PhD from an accredited school. You are examined by experts in your field, and if you are good enough you may go onto publish your dissertation – but at any rate your research will generally be made public in the library of your institution (yes I know there are time barred exceptions). I repeat – buying one from the Internet is just not the same.

And in that four year stretch, your friends from your undergrad and postgrad degrees will go on to get jobs, buy houses, go skiing, start families… and you will still be existing off Sainsburys basics range, wondering how you will pay the next phone bill, and stressing about the fact the library shuts on a friday evening as you really need to keep studying. It really is a calling, and its something that only those with dedication and hard work get through (only 7 in 10 people who start a PhD in the UK complete it. And only 1 in 10 people who get a PhD in the UK go on to get an academic post. See? Stress!). It is for all those other reasons that I do not have time for colleagues without PhDs who say – “oh, I could have done a PhD. But I chose not to!” – you either go for it or you dont. Dont patronise my time spent working as a cleaner, the broken relationships, the moving house 25 times in 10 years to chase cheap rent, as something you “could have done”. The fact is, you didnt. And dont buy one of the Internet. We can tell if its an accredited qualification, you know!

Sainsbury’s selling this as “Dr Gillian McKeith” products is therefore as wrong to me as them advertising something as Organic, when it isnt, or “suitable for Vegetarians”, when it isnt. It wont hurt or kill you if you eat it (unlike something “nut free” that contains nuts, or something “gluten free” that has gluten in). But it leaves a bad taste when you realise you’ve been sold a mistruth.

(As if I’d buy a granola bar at £1.55 anyway!).

I’m going to send this to Sainsburys and see what they say. And what the heck, I may as well copy a letter to the Advertising Standards Authority, and the Food Standards Agency.

As for Ms McKeith? If she shows me hers, I’ll show her mine.

You’ll of course be aware of the row between Wikipedia and the National Portrait Gallery:

The online encyclopaedia has accused the National Portrait Gallery (NPG) of betraying its public service mission.

But the gallery has said it needs to recoup the £1m cost of its digitisation programme and claims Wikipedia has misrepresented its position

[link]

Its a good overview of both side’s story. (But I have to say I’m on the NPG’s side on this one – its involving images pieced together to deliberately get round NPG’s attempts at looking after their high res images).

I had a grand day out yesterday, to Clare College at Cambridge. I was one of the invited speakers at the ARLIS (Art Libraries Society)conference, where I was asked to give a paper on the “changing visual image”, so I did one called “Should we just send a copy? digitization, usefulness and users”.

I was nervous: a) it was a long time ago that I studied art history, and here was I talking to art librarians and b) I teach librarians and archivists (at MA level) how the interweb works, but that doesnt mean I know too much about being a librarian on a day to day level. But I’m pleased to report that they were all very friendly (and stylish), very welcoming, and seemed to like my rant regarding the fact we know very little about how people use digital image archives.

I’m going to write it up as a paper for their journal, and I’ll see if I can post it somewhere at some point, as its going to be a personal opinion piece. Looking forward to writing it up, really (writing is easily my favourite part of my job.)

I also really enjoyed the other papers I say yesterday, particularly Debby Shorley (Head of Library Services at Imperial)’s Keynote. Great speaker: provocative and engaging. Very rare I see a speaker who I both find what they say interesting, and find how they present it interesting. (Which is not to say that I expect people will find both in me!).

Some random thoughts:
– Nice to be at a conference where I am not on any committees. Havent helped organise it. Dont have to report to anyone, or take responsibility for IT fail, etc.
– Strange to be out of my comfort zone in a conference where I didnt know anyone. The feeling of being 5 years old in the playground again! Which is nice, actually. And as I said – plenty of friendly faces.
-It was in Husband‘s undergraduate college, which I’ve never really been into before. I’m in ur colleg, climin ur staircasez!

Gorgias Press is expanding its interest in technology and classics and welcomes book proposals regarding digital classics research, for both monographs (including revised dissertations) and edited collections (based on conference sessions or otherwise). Proposals should be no more than 4 pages pdf and include contact details and a biography of the author(s), an overview of the topic and its importance, a brief description of all chapters, and a summation of how this text will relate to other texts in the field. This is an open call. Please send proposals to submissions@gorgiaspress.com.

I dont think I’ve mentioned it here before – but remember the DHQ issue I edited alongside Greg Crane (Tufts/Perseus): Changing the Center of Gravity: Transforming Classical Studies Through Cyberinfrastructure? Well, its going to printed up a as book, by Gorgias Press.

Which means its my job to turn it from spangly lovely efficient DHQ XML into camera ready copy by means of…. MS Word templates, supplied by the publisher. Sigh. But I have put on my work gloves and back to the silicon face I go. (I figure for something so small, as a one off, there’s no point wrestling with the XSLT to-PDF transformation for this particular stylesheet).

Its the kind of repetitive task that is both frustrating and yet enjoyable on some level – making sure that everything is fine, slotting in an hour a day to do this over the next few months so its doesnt become too tedious. Right. Here I go. First hour, then I get to do some *proper* editing and writing for the rest of the day.

… regarding my paper at DH09, which was also blogged about by Jeanne Kramer-Smyth over at Spellbound.

Some really interesting points added by Jeanne, too! Thanks for the input!

Its been a crazy few five or six weeks. The schedule has gone something like:

Hame, London, Hame, Glasgow, Hame, San Francisco, Victoria BC, Vancouver, Chicago, Washington, Maryland, Hame, Norfolk Coast (holiday), Hame, Reading, Hame, London, Hame…

And that, my friends, is how pandemics spread quickly these days.

Tomorrow I gets to work in my shed at the bottom of the garden. Hurrah! Let some sort of routine prevail, for the next few weeks!

when the news broke, the Internet slowed down.

I was actually in the hotel lobby at UMUC, just waiting to leave from DH09. Someone came into the lobby and screamed the news – and everyone turned to the web to verify, amongst a chorus of “no ways!” and some screams.

Its worth reading the comments on this guardian story, asking people to “share your novel in 140 characters or less!” to see just how over twitter some people are getting.