Phil Booth
Phil Booth has been working in the digital media and Internet arena since 1994, with a history of fiddling with computers that goes back to the late 70s. He lives and works in East Sussex, also through Einstein's Attic Ltd, a strategic / visionary ICT consultancy that is building a national and international client base, working with partners across the UK and around the world.
As a teenager, Phil coded graphics and games on early personal computers, including the ZX Spectrum, before studying to be a sculptor and, later, a teacher. He combined both careers for a while; teaching and lecturing, doing residencies and INSET workshops - in Primary, Secondary, F.E. & H.E. - while slowly working on some large scale public sculptures, now sited in and around South Wales and Bristol. In 1994, he set up his first digital media company and soon found himself doing strange things like presenting and explaining Rolls Royce Motor Cars' logistics strategy to its worldwide management.
Phil's clients in the early years of the commercial Web, and since, include: AOL, Apple, BBC, EMI, Microsoft, Sony, The Who Cares? Trust and the University of Birmingham*. He began to establish his reputation for delivering innovation and creative solutions in the commercial arena but has, since the late 90s, concentrated his efforts on affecting social change through the ethical and appropriate application of technology. Phil has advised on and demonstrated novel principles of ICT and network thinking to several branches of central and local government.
In 1997, Phil helped launch BBC Schools Online with a Megamaths programme tie-in site. He joined BBC Digital Media, Education later that year - where he commissioned and produced sites such as the Little Animals Activity Centre (literacy, numeracy & learning support for pre-and early school age children), Virtual Science Centre (the story of DNA from atoms to ecosystems), and assisted in the development of, e.g. BBC Online's Communities and Navigation initiatives. He was responsible for the conception and delivery of the BBC's DfES-commissioned digital TV GCSE Channel Pilot - trialled in 10 schools around the UK, Jan/Feb 2000.
* Phil's current interests and involvements outside VDSL include being Honorary Research Associate of UoB School of Psychology and Technology Director of the enABLEr/s Research Group, and consultant to The Who Cares? Trust's CareZone project - which Phil helped design and initiate, building demonstrators and assisting in the development of the Pilot programme.