It could’ve been so beautiful

Who is Tim Overdiek?

Overdiek believes that journalists without a blog don’t have a future. That’s quite a statement, coming from a respectable journalist as he is. He currently occupies the position of Deputy Editor in Chief of the Dutch national public broadcasting news outlet.

His first claim to fame was his much applauded reporting about 9/11 from Washington. After the prestigious job of U.S. correspondent, Overdiek ran an one-man multimedia circus from London. He reported for radio, television, and.., a blog.

Now he continues his blogging quest as the Deputy Editor in Chief at NOS News. This asks for a completely different approach.He shared some of his tactics and views during the BLOG08 Journalism Versus/Heart Blogging panel.

What makes this Overdiek’s best post?

It was an early Saturday morning in April 2007. I had just gotten up, was making coffee and listening to BBC Today. This just in, said the announcer, word that prince William and his girlfriend Kate had broken up. The Sun had had the scoop, but soon the rest of the British media followed, and of course I had to cover this as well. But how, where and when? As the London multimedia correspondent for NOS Dutch News I treated British royalty stories as charming icing on the cake. This particular news event was ideal for my blog. Don’t take it too seriously, use a loose writing style, but best of all: Publish before the news wires had informed the rest of the world. Quick and easy, a great start of my day. All without that first shot of caffeine.

Het had zo mooi kunnen zijn

Londen, 14 april 2007 – Potjandorie, dat was nou niet de bedoeling. Wie mij er eenmaal toe aanzet om een mapje over hem of haar te openen en knipsels te gaan verzamelen, hoort er niet voortijdig de brui aan te geven. En was ik dit jaar niet begonnen met de boude voorspelling dat 2007 hun jaar zou worden? Nope, William en Kate zijn uit elkaar.

De primeur behoort aan, waar anders, tabloid The Sun, die de wereld deze ochtend exclusief laat weten: Wills & Kate Split. En om anderhalve minuut over zeven bevestigde de BBC het nieuws dat een donkere sluier over dit zomerse weekeinde zal leggen. Het Britse volk had Kate Middleton immers als de nieuwe Diana in de armen gesloten.

[Beluister] Beluister het radio-verslag van de breuk

Maar prins William heeft er volgens de berichten een eind aan gemaakt. De breuk, zo wordt gezegd, is amicabel. Met andere woorden, de toekomstige koning heeft ‘nee’ gezegd en het speciale maar nu weer gewone meisje kon niet anders dan instemmen. Maar waarom? Waarom is de romance doodgebloed? Waarom geen verloving?

The Sun houdt het op Williams tijdrovende verplichtingen aan het leger. Als officier is hij de komende jaren behoorlijk zoet met opleidingen voordat de nummer twee achter Elizabeth aan het echte koninklijke karwei gaat beginnen. Maar in het weekend, schrijft The Sun ook, ging William liever zuipen met zijn maten dan zoenen met zijn liefje.

En dat ging Kate kennelijk niet in de koude kleren zitten. Belaagd door de sensatiepers kon de toekomstige bruid amper meer ongestoord over straat. Ze diende onlangs zelfs een klacht in, toen de Daily Mirror een ongeoorloofde foto publiceerde. Het kwam tot een schikking, maar het was kraakhelder dat de druk op Kate en Wills enorm was.

Dus gaan de Britse media dit weekeinde lustig speculeren of de relatie simpelweg niet sterk genoeg was om de publiekelijke hoogspanning te weerstaan. Hebben de tabloids hun steentje bijgedragen aan het liefdesverdriet? Ongetwijfeld, want elke openbare zoen was voer voor royalty-watchers die zochten naar kalver- of echtelijke liefdessignalen.

Kate zit ondergedoken bij haar ouders op het platteland. William moet ook ergens zijn, maar Clarence House zegt niks. Hoe staat het eigenlijk met die vroegtijdige souvenirs voor het onvermijdelijke huwelijk? Die zijn nu vast een hoop waard op eBay. Niet te vroeg gejuicht of getreurd, de komende maanden blijven we hopen op een hereniging.

http://www.nos.nl/nosjournaal/columns/londen/weblog_tim_williamkate.html

The People versus The Expert

Who is Tessa Sterkenburg?

Tessa Sterkenburg is the founder of The Next Speaker, an agency representing speakers that are experts in innovation, new technology, new media and entrepreneurship. She has a background in web technology and scientific publishing.

What makes this Sterkenburg’s best post?

I saw the documentary “The Truth According to Wikipedia” at the Next Web Conference in April 2008, wherein Andrew Keen stated that we should leave the publishing of information to the experts, and that Wikipedia could never be an alternative to a real Encyclopedia. I totally disagreed with it, as I strongly believe that information can only become better when more people are involved and discuss the information. When I came home, still agitated, I read in the Dutch newspaper that Rita Verdonk, a Dutch politician who just set up a new political party, decided to let the people write her political program through a Wiki. But then I didn’t like this democratic process at all! Apparently ‘power to the people’ doesn’t stretch this far for me. Confused with myself, I started a discussion on the democratic process, what information to trust and the establishment of truth. Apparently I was not the only one struggling with this theme, the post stirred up quite some discussion and even Larry Sanger, co-founder of Wikipedia joined in!

The People versus The Expert

April 6, 2008

On Friday afternoon The Next Web Conference hosted the world premiere of the documentary The truth according to Wikipedia from IJsbrand van Veelen. The leading questions in the documentary were: Should we let just anyone state his or her opinion or should we leave the publishing of information to the experts? Could the openness of the web be dangerous? Who has the right to establish truth?

The people being interviewed are amongst others Jimmy Wales (co-founder of Wikipedia), Larry Sanger (the since-fired (Correction: Larry was not fired but laid off when Bomis needed to scale down from 12 to 4 employees.) co-founder of Wikipedia) and Andrew Keen (author of The Cult of the Amateur: How Today’s Internet Is Killing Our Culture and Assaulting Our Economy).

Andrew Keen is against the openness on the web, and argues that we should give the right to publish back to the experts, so that we know that what we read on the web is actually the truth.

That is an interesting statement. If we draw a parallel to the description of World War II in the Netherlands then Andrew Keen wants us to read Lou de Jong only, even though many people want to hear the opinion of the famous 14-year old ‘blogger’ of those days: Anne Frank.

(Lou de Jong was the official Dutch historian during World War II and author of “The History of the Netherlands in the Second World War”. Later, this book series received a lot of criticism, as Lou de Jong was accused of misrepresenting the truth by being too favorable towards the role of the Dutch resistance during the German occupation.)

Rita Verdonk is a Dutch politician who recently set up a new political party in the Netherlands. During the launch of her party on April 3, she had lots of one-liners, but…no program! Rita is going to set up a Wiki and let the people, collectively, determine the program. Power to The People!

When I came home from The Next Web Conference and saw her on TV, my first reaction was: “Oh my God, we should really leave this to the experts”. I want someone who knows what he or she is talking about, studied it, balanced all the pros and cons of the problem, takes informed decisions. I want experts to do this! Not a crowd of uninformed civilians!

Similarly I have many American friends who are disgusted with the politics in their own country, and seem almost embarrassed about the fact that most people vote without really understanding the issues and the consequences.

In 1995, a poll on capital punishment in the UK showed us that 76% of British respondents supported the death penalty the UK. Yet, I am very glad that the British government then decided not to re-instate capital punishment.

At the same time I am very much in favor of democracy and freedom of speech. In 1994, I spent some time in Malaysia, a country that officially embraces democracy but didn’t always seemed to practice what they preach and, at the time heavily censored the media. I concluded after 5 months that I could never live there, because of the political system and their views on freedom of speech. However, my Malaysian colleagues insisted that you could just not let everyone say what they wanted. The government knows what’s best for you and you should let the government determine the truth… Hmm, doesn’t that sound like Andrew Keen?

Democracy is what everyone wants, but that doesn’t mean that every single decision should be made by the majority. A democracy means that we vote for someone who makes those balanced and informed decisions for us based on expert analysis. So when actual decisions are made we don’t want the people to be directly involved, but when it comes to information we do. What does this mean for our valuation of information? Do we take our information seriously enough?

Where do we draw the line? Obviously we value democracy highly. Wikipedia is a great resource as an instant and reasonably reliable reference. But do we want The People to determine our economic policies? Do we re-inforce the death penalty when the majority of people want this? Is the majority always right? And who are the Experts? The Malaysian government or the 14-year old blogger?

Considering that even scientific authors have to continuously revise what has been written: What is The Truth?

http://thenextweb.org/2008/04/06/the-people-versus-the-expert/

Brussels’ Library Take-over

Who is Alex Deforce?

Deforce is filling his days with drawing, interviewing, dj’ing, reading, promoting (co-organised Locoflows Festival in 2005) and perfectioning his coffee techniques (mind you, there’s different methods to a style.)

An unhealthy coffee addiction resulting in periods of insomnia, which in time combined with an uncompromising just-let-me-do-my-thing attitude gave birth to a trademark style.

His drawing depict faces marked by the tension of modern day life, balancing on the tipping point between the grime of the city and the frivolous facade of metropolis. Warm in their darkness, refined in their dirtiness.

Next to using his pencil, Deforce also regularly interviews people, mostly for his employer – Gent-based trends agency Trendwolves.

What makes this Deforce’s best post?

Browsing through Brussels public library, me and my friend Jazz Neversleeps (ineversleep.net) came accross what appeared to be a promo initiative of the library.

A nice little stand stuffed with shortlists recommending items of the collection. On a monthly basis the library invited local celebrities to come present their favourite books, dvd’s, cd’s and comics. These were then printed on small flyers that were meant to guide the visitor through the library. And probably also to help choose the visitor overwhelmed by the massive

Brilliant in its simplicity and oldschool methods, this seemed like an outdated formula to us though. Not because of the use of paper flyers, not because of the shortlist idea. But because of the selections, at least half of the celebrities that were asked were simply irrelevant to today’s youth – which is a big part of the library’s core public, obviously. We felt overlooked, and decided we could do better.

Back home all it took was a scanner and a bit of photoshopping, a short journey through the online catalogue of the library and our shortlists were compiled.

Brussels’ Library Take-over

April 21, 2008

Lists, you’ve got to love them, right?

When properly done, a good list of quality tips can make my day. Seriously it can.

Just as much, however, it can ruin my day.

Last week me and Jazz Neversleeps were cruising through the Brussels library (the one at Muntplein/Place de la Monnaie) and our eyes fell upon this stance filled with little cards with tips. Reading, viewing and listening suggestions, carefully selected by local celebrities such as Jo Lemaire, Kris Wauters, Geert Hoste, etc.

Curious as we were, we started looking at these lists, and for some strange reason, we felt insulted. Did Jo Lemaire really think we didn’t know of Kuifje/TinTin? Did Kris Wauters think we hadn’t heard of Michael Jackson yet?

I mean, when you’re asked to come up with a list, you better put some effort in it.

Consider it a privilege.

And well, if you’re not asked to come up with a list, do it anyway and take over the damn thing.

Like this:

Here are the lists we came up with.

The Choice of… On-point:

DVD’s:
Marc Singer, Dark Days
Wilbur Leguebe, Les Silences De Spilliaert
Jim Jarmusch, Ghost Dog
Jiskefet, Lullo
StunnedFilm, Kroonjuwelen
Rik Kuypers, Meeuwen Sterven In De Haven
Fat Possum, You See Me Laughin’
Terry Zwigoff, Crumb
Clint Eastwood, Bird
Julian Schnabel, Basquiat
Mel Stuart, Wattstax
Raoul Servais, Alle Kortfilms
Bill Hicks, Relentless
Robert Pulcini, American Splendor
Ricky Gervais & Stephen Merchant, Extras saison 1 & 2

Books:
Teun Voeten, Tunnelmensen
Kristof Clerix, Vrij Spel
Alex Baker, Beautiful Losers
Jeff Chang, Can’t Stop Won’t Stop
Douglas Coupland, Eleanor Rigby
Chris Anderson, The Long Tail

The Choice of… Jazz Neversleeps:

DVD’s:
Ridley Scott, Blade Runner
Tony Silver, Style Wars
Ishiro Honda, The Mysterians
Osamu Tezuka, Metropolis
Michel Gondry, The Work Of Director…
Ishiro Honda, Gojira
David Lynch, Inland Empire
Spike Lee, She’s Gotta Have It
Jiskefet, Dierenwinkel
Pieter Bouwman, Gummbah & Hans Teeuwen, Poelmo – Slaaf Van Het Zuiden

Music:
Shuggie Otis, Inspiration Information
J Dilla, Donuts
Stevie Wonder, Songs In The Key Of Life
Omar, Sing (If You Want It)
Sun Ra, Space Is The Place
4Hero, Play With The Changes
John Coltrane, Crescent
Gilles Peterson, The BBC Sessions Volume 1
Moodymann, Black Mahogany
Lord Finesse, The Awakening

It seems like the whole concept is refreshed every two weeks or something. Next guest invited to present a list of favourites is Frieda Van Wijck, presenting her choice in the library this Thursday from 12:30 til 13:15.

Now in her I can lay my confidence for some proper listing work. I remember sitting down with Frieda for an interview for our school paper. I joke you not, until now, she’s the only interviewee that charmed me (and my classmate) so hard, I forgot my questions.
What is that, interviewblock, or something?

Anyway, Frieda’s mad on-point, but you already knew that.

Brussels’ Library Take-over Part Two

April 24, 2008

Yesterday I received a mail from the library asking me to take all references to our library take-over offline.

To be continued…

Brussels’ Library Take-over Part Three

April 24, 2008

Back from the library, where I attended the presentation of the new list, compiled by Frieda Van Wijck, a good list, honestly, proper work.

Got into a little conversation with the head librarian, I won’t get too much into it. Oh well, let me just give you some random quotes:

“I’m asking you to take all images and text about this action of yours offline, asap.”
“You’re young, right?”
“Personally I think it’s a good list, but that’s not the matter here.”
“We will take legal action against you, I can guarantee you that.”
“You should apologize.”
“No I don’t see the humour in this.”

Well, I can’t take anything offline, this is not China, you can’t pull any censorship tric on me, maybe legally you could, but it’s jsut a tad to absurd to even consider such a thing.

Secondly, I haven’t offended anybody, if by any chance people do feel offended, I feel sorry for them. And I’ll be happy to buy them a beer. But apologies? Sorry.

Ow and yes, I might be considered a youngster. But what was that remark all about? Never in my life have a started a conversation saying: “You’re old, right?”. Honestly, I didn’t, that’s not how I was brought up.

Thank you for enjoying our lists though. It’s sad you’re taking it in such a wrong way, we were celebrating the catalogue of the library and with that criticising people making bad lists (in our humble opinion), but have never even spoke a bad word about the library.

Lastly, cheers to the people supporting our little action.

http://www.on-point.be/?p=1007

A bottle of Beerenburg

Who is Petra de Boevere?

She’s Meisje (means Girl), aka Petra de Boevere. She’s mother, entrepreneur, and a cyberjunk. Everything she experiences in daily life finds its way to her weblog. She’s well-known in Holland as the owner of a liquor store who used blogging to stimulate revenue. “Blogging made my world smaller and my network larger”, she says.

What makes this De Boevere’s best post?

A weblog is still a digital diary and not everything about life is Hallelujah. Every once in a while I experience really touching things which I want to write done. Not just to share them, but also to make people stop for a moment and let them think about their and mine emotions.

I wrote this post in 2004 and republished it in the summer of 2006.

Brok in mijn keel

July 31, 2004

Hij was een aardige man. Hij behoorde tot wat ik noem “mijn zomerklantjes”. Mensen die de zomermaanden in Zeeland doorbrengen en je ’s winters niet ziet. Zo gauw het Pasen wordt verschijnen ze weer. Vaak hebben ze hier huisjes, caravans of boten liggen. Al jaren kwam hij bij het begin van het haringseizoen Corenwijn halen. Speciaal voor hem bestelde ik altijd speciale glaasjes. Elke week kwam hij vervolgens wel een flesje beerenburg halen. Ik had hem al gemist, maar ook vorig jaar kwam hij al wat minder, en was wat afstandelijker als hij kwam, terwijl we jaren leuke gesprekjes hadden. Hij werkte evenals zijn vrouw in het onderwijs. Vanochtend een mevrouw voor de toonbank: “Ik heb een vreemde vraag”, er blonken tranen in haar ogen, ze had het er duidelijk moeilijk mee. “Sipke, onze vriend dronk altijd beerenburg en die had ik altijd voor hem in huis. U kent hem ook wel, hij was een levensgenieter en u heeft regelmatig dingen speciaal voor hem besteld. Afgelopen winter heeft hij zelfmoord gepleegd en elke keer als ik die fles zie staan denk ik aan hem. Mag ik hem ruilen?” Even pijnig ik mijn hersens, Sipke…vaak ken ik ze niet bij naam mijn zomerklanten, dan zie ik hem voor me en bedenk dat die meneer innerlijk vorig jaar al door een hel moet zijn gegaan. Ik krijg een brok in mijn keel en natuurlijk neem ik de fles terug.

http://www.meisjevandeslijterij.nl/hetmeisjevandeslijterij/2006/08/brok_in_mijn_ke.html

Vodafone Helldesk: “how can we screw you, sir?”

Who is Patrick de Laive?

Patrick de Laive is a true web enthusiast who just can’t stop organizing events to bring other web fanatics together. He initiated one of Europe’s largest web conferences The Next Web, started OpenCoffee Amsterdam, co-organized Kings of Code, and used two sports – bowling and petanque – to offer Dutch new media professionals a relaxed and fun networking environment. And.., he has also moderated BLOG08.

What makes this De Laive’s best post?

When I got the Vodafone bill I couldn’t believe my eyes: 300 euros for 10mb traffic in the UK. I felt robbed and I knew I wasn’t the only one who was facing this problem. I called the helpdesk and they told me to write a letter to the helpdesk. I did, but this time I didn’t send it to them, I was angry and decided to post the letter on my blog. A got a lot of sympathy from other people who had the same problems and within a day the online Vodafone team got into contact with me, via the blog. In the end we worked out a solution, I got 150 euros back. This is an example of the influence a blogpost can have in daily life. Bloggers have more ‘power’ then they think.

Vodafone Helldesk: “how can we screw you, sir?”

November 21, 2007

I think I can say that I’m a good customer for our dear friends at Vodafone. I have a Blackberry account @ 32,50 eur per month, a calling package @ 35 eur per month and on average (don’t ask me how it is possible) my bill is around 170 euros a month.

I’m the kind of user that actually pays his bill, although not very content with the delivered service. People who call me will recognize the awkward silence when I pick up the phone, because Vodafone thinks it is useful to cut me off for the first couple of seconds… forcing me to say something like this: “Hey Boris…. Boris.. Boris .. Boris Boris Boris aah there you are”

Now things get funny. I just received a bill stating that I had consumed for 423.87 euros of value during the October month. You can imagine that I was curious where the actual value kicked in. I couldn’t remember calling my ex girlfriend for hour and hours while on the middle of the ocean needing a satellite connection. I’m 100% sure that I watched ‘Blood Diamond’ from my hand held memory and not streaming (over GPRS ). So would it be the olllo service I tested once -well in fact that is owned by KPN and I did receive a hell of a lot txt messages with “I’m sorry we haven’t found any matches in your city, don’t worry, we will continue looking for you!” but that was in November as far as my mind tells me (meaning that I’m getting that on my next bill).

WOW. 299,87 EUROS Vodafone Live data traffic abroad!!! I have been for 2 days at FOWA, but all I did was checking my email (blackberry service pulls in the first 2 kb of every e-mail, that’s 500 mails for 1 MB). I received 85 emails in those 2 to 3 days. And as far as I know I never use Vodafone Live (which moron does?).

How come that I ended up with 299,87 eur of traffic costs? I called the Vodafone helpdesk and here is an overview of the conversation:
Vodafone operator “I can see that you had 10MB traffic in the UK”
“10MB!!!! ?” I asked with a bite of sarcasm
“Yes 10MB”
“Wow, that is like watching a YouTube movie of 3 minutes.. or downloading 2 whole songs (at least the Radiohead songs we’re for free)”
“Yes”, the kind Vodafone guy said to me
“ok, I understand that this is abnormal use of bandwidth, but still 300 euros?”
“Well, 1MB of data is 12,50 eur and on a different carrier its 20 eur per MB, email data is 20 eur per MB anyways”
“WHAT!!! 20 euros for 1 MB of email??? holy shit, why didn’t you warn me?
“oh you weren’t aware of the costs of traffic when you’re abroad?”
“Well, I knew you guys would charge me a factor 1000 of what I would pay in the Netherlands for my internet connection, because screwing customers is what Telco’s are all about, but a factor 1000.000… no that I was not expecting” “and oh, 10MB times 20 eur is still 200 euros, so something is not right…”
“uuhm, I’m not specialized in data plans, you can write a letter to: Vodafone Klantenservice SSV, Postbus 1500, 6201 BM in Maastricht”
“ok, I will”
“Is there anything else I can do for you?”
“no”
“Have a nice day mister de fevre” (thanks for not pronouncing my name right ).

I have send exactly this post to Vodafone (in print of course).

I FEEL ROBBED, NO… I AM ROBBED

I’m wondering how Vodafone will make this up to me.

Thanks for ruining my day and my precious time.

http://patrickdelaive.com/2007/11/21/vodafone-heldesk-how-can-we-screw-you-sir/

How do you paint a white rabbit?

Who is Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten?

Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten, speaker at BLOG08, is well known as one of the first Dutch Successful Serial Internet Entrepreneurs. He started his first company in 1997 and sold it during the hype of 1999. Starting companies, inventing innovative technology and coming up with new ideas is his daily work.

A lot of his time is spent on keeping up with new trends on the web, internet and in technology in general and looking for opportunities. He co-founded The Next Web Blog in January 2008 to put that information to good use. Not just for fun, as he even hired several bloggers. In only seven months, the blog has become one of Europe’s most influential tech blogs, serving 5000 RSS readers a day.

What makes this his best post?

I remember waking up in a panic and looking around the room not knowing where I was. Then I focused on this painting of a bunch of rabbits and realized I was in my sisters old bedroom taking a nap. I stared at the painting for a while as I thought about my company and the work I was doing. That is when I got the idea for the White Rabbit post.

On Sunday I was visiting my parents house to celebrate Easter Day. As we drove there we noticed a perfect white rabbit sitting by the side of the road. I stopped to show it to our children and told them it must have been the Easter bunny. My parents hid painted real eggs and chocolate ones in the garden, which the kids had to find, and then had lunch. After lunch I took a nap in my sisters room. As I woke up I looked around the room and noticed a drawing of a white rabbit. I stared at it for a while and noticed that that painting was actually a very good metaphor to starting a company.

How do you paint a white rabbit?

April 16, 2006

When you start a company you have to know the answer to the question:

‘How do you paint a white rabbit’

In art academy (which I attended) you are taught to think different and one way to practice that is to think in negative shapes. You can paint a white rabbit, or an invisible form, or a bright light by outlining the outside of the form you wish to make visible. In the case of the white rabbit painting in my sisters room there is a background and a shadow which make the white rabbits stand out from the paper. In art academy they call that ‘inversion’ or ‘a negative’.

In Flecks case the white rabbit is our product. As you start to establish the company you build the background. We started with a patent, a blog and logo, then a website and a little funding. Then we hired developers and worked up a demo. You could say that we started working on all the stuff around the actual product and the more stuff you but in the background the clearer the white rabbit/our vision becomes.

This is a scary procedure. All the time you are building around, talking about and building upon something that simply isn’t there yet. You are constantly thinking “this is all background stuff, I want to see the actual product!’. But to get there you have to go through all that other stuff first.

It is strange to talk with investors about your dreams and vision. What you are actually trying to do is show them the white rabbit. The more stuff you show (Excel sheets, patents, demos and plans) the more clearer the white rabbit becomes.

Then one day, you wake up, and are suddenly staring at a very real and white rabbit and everybody can see it…

http://bomega.com/2008/06/09/how-do-you-paint-a-white-rabbit/

Pearl Jam has found another Purple Cow

Who is Frank Meeuwsen?

Frank Meeuwsen was born in 1973. He is a lot of things. A Brand Director. A blogger since 2000. Pioneering on the field of businessblogging. Initiator of the first corporate blog in The Netherlands (frank-ly.nl). He is a true believer in Getting Things Done and founder & Lifehacking.nl, the dutch website about working and living smarter. He also like to Twitter.

What makes this Meeuwsen’s best blog post?

We are at a conference which celebrates the rockstars of the Web, the bloggers. Bloggers have played a big part in the new media ecosystem as we know it. Bloggers were at the forefront for change, and those who wanted a change found blogging to be a powerfull publishing tool.
In this post from 2005 I describe how a few of my passions intersect. My favorite rockband who are finding new ways to be innovative with new media, who dare to challenge the status quo in the musicbusiness (remember, this is 2005!) and take control of what happens with their music.
I link their action to Seth Godin’s Purple Cow theory, an idea which these days still stands. A theory that still needs an explanation in a boardroom.
Webloggers are still the rockstars of the web. Marketeers should at least be sidestage on the guestlist, listening and learning.

To freely quote the legendary Neil Young: Keep on rockin’ in a hyperlinked world.

Pearl Jam heeft wederom een Purple Cow gevonden

September 27, 2005

Ik ben al sinds jaar en dag een absolute fan van Pearl Jam. Wat er ook gebeurt in de muziekwereld, welke trend er ook komt en gaat (zoals Grunge), Pearl Jam blijft bij mij absoluut de top. Ik ga hier niet helemaal uitleggen waarom en hoezo, dat kun je nu ook makkelijk zelf beoordelen. Waarom? Je kunt namelijk op dit moment alle (!!!!!) concerten downloaden die ze dit najaar in Canada geven. Voor slechts $9,99 per concert. En let wel: DRM-vrij! Dus geen gedoe met branden op slechts 2 CD’’s, alleen op een iPod afspelen en zeker niet delen met je vrienden. Niets van dat alles. Gewoon direct MP3′’s downloaden en je mag er mee doen wat je wilt. Moets ik vroeger weken, maanden wachten op een tape met een concert ergens uit Amerika of Azië, nu kan ik de downloadapplicatie zo instellen dat ik vooraf al een show koop en het moment dat hij beschikbaar is (enkele uren na het concert) staat hij op mijn harddisk. Het mooie is ook dat al sinds 1995 een website werkelijk elk concert van Pearl Jam in archief heeft met setlist en recensie. Dus je kunt vooraf bekijken of een show interessant is aan de hand van de setlist en de reacties. Deze recensies zijn niet door professionele journalisten gemaakt, dat is saai. Nee, ze komen van de fans die er bij waren. Want zij kunnen als geen ander een show op waarde schatten.

Wat heeft dat met Purple Cows te maken? Lees het gelijknamige boek van Seth Godin er eens op na. Pearl Jam deed dit ook tijdens de vorige tournee, waar ze 72 (!!!!) live albums uitbrachten. Ik heb er 5, om ze nu allemaal te hebben is wat overdreven. Maar ze doen iets speciaals, iets opmerkelijks. Voor fans, maar eigenlijk voor iedereen die van muziek houdt.

Ze hebben dit al vaker gedaan. Ik denk bijvoorbeeld terug aan 1995, toen de uitzendingen van Monkeywrench Radio legendarisch waren in het bootleg-circuit (ik heb nog wat opnames voor geïnteresseerden). Wat deed de band? Voor en na elk optreden in de US kochten ze zendtijd bij een lokaal radiostation en met een mobiele radiostudio maakten ze hun eigen shows, voor die avond, in die plaats. Wederom remarkable en de rafelige randjes van je passie opzoeken! Nu pakken ze het groter aan. Want ze beginnen met de tour-opnamen, maar ik heb al begrepen dat er ook in de archieven wordt gedoken en er uniek materiaal zal worden aangeboden. Ik kan niet wachten…

In de tussentijd dat ik dit schrijf is mijn eerste concert al binnen. Die gaat weer op de MP3-speler!!

http://www.frank-ly.nl/pearl-jam-heeft-wederom-een-purple-cow-gevonden

The best tip of your life concerns black convertibles and Karel Appel

Who is Ernst-Jan Pfauth?

Ernst-Jan Pfauth is a blogger and journalist, who previously worked in New York to cover news at the United Nations. He’s currently Editor in Chief of The Next Web Blog and was the co-organizer of BLOG08. Next to writing, he’s also singing in the band Christina Five.

What makes this Pfauth’s best post?

In November 2007 I started blogging about tech news. That was the start of an era for me, I met tons of interesting people, traveled the world, and made the Digg frontpage a couple of times. Highlights for a Dutch blogger like me. Yet I missed blogging about stories from the streets. Real life stuff, gonzo so you want. So I took some time for this post and was really happy with the result and comments.

The best tip of your life concerns black convertibles and Karel Appel

August 26th, 2008

This post contains the best tip of your life. I realize that’s quite a bold statement, especially coming from a 22-year old chap. But it’s really important, since it’s the one tip you DON’T want to hear.

It’s just after five ‘o clock in the afternoon when the first kite surfers hit the water. They’ve escaped their cubicles to jump over San Franciscan ferries. I’m on the run as well. After the three-day conference Supernova, I’m about ready to admire a red structure I’ve only seen in the movies so far. I got rid of my infamous white suit, but still wearing the shiny white shoes. This doesn’t go unnoticed by a forty-five year old All-American woman. “Those aren’t your average beach shoes, right buddy?” is her conversation starter. She has lost her job a year ago, spent some time in the Philippines, and just got back in the States. “I’ve gotta go”, she says, “have to go home, just across the bridge”. “I can give you a ride over the Golden Gate if you want? The view is amazing“.

Seven weeks later. My girlfriend and I hop on a late Zürich – Amsterdam flight. We’ve spent two weeks in Chioggia, a small fishermen’s town 35 kilometers under Venice. I decide to check my mail before the captain asks the cabin crew to prepare for take-off. “Quite an airplane toy you’ve got there”, a healthy and bright-looking 60-year old man tells me. We wind up in a duet, a hymn for the iPhone. After a short chat, I grab a book and start reading. I’m tired. The last thing I need is a two-hour talk. My conversation partner gets the hint and starts reading The International Herald Tribune. After a while I feel sorry. My intuition says this man is not just somebody. Shall I try to pick up the conversation again?

A rather old woman offering me a ride? What’s that all about? Thoughts are racing through my brain. I’m tempted to say yes, since my Wallpaper travel guide says everybody should drive over the Golden Gate bridge in a convertible. But what if the woman hands me over to her boyfriend, who will either want my digital SLR camera or my life? I decide to tell her about my travel guide’s convertible. “What a coincidence”, she laughs, “That’s exactly what I was gonna drive you in”. What the hell. I accept her offer. What times do we live in if you can’t even trust a nice lady? She’s happy. “My friends will kill me though, offering a ride to a stranger”.

I don’t have the guts to pick up the conversation. I’ve brushed the man off too harshly. A typical example of a rude boaster of the new generation. Though I’m pretty sure he has interesting things to say, I keep reading Hunter S. Thompson’s Kingdom of Fear. The plane hits the ground and taxies to the D gate. When the seatbelt sign goes off, the man reaches for his hand luggage – which appears to be pretty big. He grabs a huge package and leaves the plane, leaving me wondering.

The ride over the world-famous bridge is great. San Francisco, my third favorite city, smiles at me in the last sunbeams that will make it over the hills that day. My camera is working over time. I also take a pic of the woman who has just removed an item from my bucket list with her black Chrysler convertible. When she drops me off, I thank her a million times. Then I start walking back, enjoying the stunning view – glad that I’ve conquered the ridiculous fear the media have planted in my mind.

The man who stands in front of me at the passport check queue, is my former neighbor from the airplane. I wish him luck with the large package, hoping he will tell me what’s in it. “Thanks”, he says, “I’m just glad it survived the flight”. “Is it a piece of art?”, I ask him. He nods, and remarks, with a unbelievable sense of nonchalance, “a Karel Appel“. The customs officer waves at him and one of my greatest missed opportunities for an interesting friendship walks away.

It’s unnecessary to elaborate on the moral of these two stories. I’m pretty sure you’ve found that out by now. Just try to live by it. How scary it may be. Break out that comfort zone.

http://dutchproblogger.com/2008/08/26/the-best-tip-of-your-life-concerns-black-convertibles-and-karel-appel/

It really exists: the Terra Incognita of the Web.

Who is Edial Dekker?

Edial Dekker was studying New Media at the University of Amsterdam for a while, when he suddenly realized he wanted to try out the theories in practice. That was 10 months ago. Since then, he became an editor of award-winning blog Spotlight Effect, founded a mobile start-up called MaptheGap, and initiated the BLOG08. He managed to build up a significant presence in the Dutch new media scene, both online as offline.

What makes this Dekker’s best blog post?

I come from a very theoretical background of watching New Media. This was one of the posts where I saw a chance to put my University knowledge into something more practical. It’s also one of the post that triggered people to get in touch with me (which is awesome).

It really exists: the Terra Incognita of the Web.

June 15, 2008

Science Fiction writers, visionaries, whose books I consumed as a child, made me believe that in a few years, shiny robots would handle all mundane tasks. There are many robots today, but no funny-whistling R2-D2’s. The robots today are invisible and immaterial, reading and indexing millions of websites on daily basis. They are robots built for speed and efficiency, mapping the Internet as fast and as accurately as possible. A few years ago we thought we could find anything that was out there on the Web, today we realize the Web is fragmented, divided into four continents with ‘Terra Incognita’-islands; websites that are clustered and simply can’t be found, no matter how many times you click or how hard you try.

No round-trips

Most search-engines do not even try to reach the full Web, because indexing as many as websites as possible isn’t necessarily the best way to provide the best search results. The Web is big yet small. But the small world behind the Web is a bit misleading. The Web is a scale-free network, dominated by hubs and nodes with a very large number of links. The World Wide Web has a directed structure. Andrei Broder, Vice President of Emerging Search Technology for Yahoo!, was the first person to notice how this directed network had consequences for the topology of the Web itself. For example, if you want to go from website A to website D, you can start from node A, then go to node B, which has a link to node C, which points to D. But you can’t make a round-trip. Most likely there is a different route one would have to find for going from node D to node A.

The four different continents of the Web

Albert-László Barabási, a Hungarian scientist, famous for contributing his insights on network theories, has tried to map the Web into four different continents:A Strongly Connected, or Central Core (SCC): this contains a quarter of all websites, it gives a home to all indexed websites and is easy navigable. This does not mean there is a link between all nodes; but the paths are defined and allows you to surf between the nodes.Than there are the IN and the OUT continents: these continents are just as large as the Central Core but are much harder to navigate. From the IN continent you can easily reach the SCC, but there is no path taking you back to the IN continent. In contrast, the OUT continent can easily be reached from the SCC, but has links to take you back to the core (where all the magic happens). The OUT continent is mostly populated by corporate websites that can easily be reached from outside, but once you get in, there is no way out.

The fourth continent is made out of Tendrils and disconnected Islands; they are interlinked groups that are unreachable from the SCC and have no links back to it. These websites can contain thousands of documents. The location of these websites have nothing to do with the content, but with relation to other documents.

There’s no way you can reach it

These four continents significantly limit the Web’s navigability. Where we can go, depends on the continent you start your search at. No matter how many times you time you want to click, when you are in the Central Core there is no way you can reach the IN continent or the Islands that surround it. Ever realized why search engines are giving user the option to submit websites? It’s because then the crawlers can sniff into those isolated islands that can otherwise never be found.

Is this fragmented structure here to stay? Barabási thinks it is. As long links remain directed, homogenization will never occur. One of the founding fathers of the Web, Tim Berners-Lee has been stressing the importance of links that track back to where they are linked from, for many years. The way blogs use the track-back system, can also be used for connecting the IN and OUT continent. The bottom line is that directed networks always break into the same four continents. The only way to organize is to reorganize the relations documents have with each other, semantic web anyone?

http://thenextweb.org/2008/06/15/it-really-exists-the-terra-incognita-of-the-web/

Metro sues Metro

Who is Piet Bakker?

Piet Bakker is a professor at the Hogeschool Utrecht and associate professor at the University of Amsterdam. He has been blogging on a daily basis since August 2004 about newspaper innovation. During BLOG08, Bakker participated in the Journalism versus/ heart Blogging panel.

What makes this Bakker’s best post?

I run a specialized blog ‘newspaperinnovation.com’ on free daily newspapers. Daily visits between 1700 and 2100. In August one of my sources (around 25 percent of news stories is send to me by people around the world, the rest comes from alerts, rss-feeds, newsletters and trade magazines) mailed me that free daily Metro Hungary had to change its name because of a lawsuit by a retailer. A few weeks later a small item in a German trade magazine pointed me to more possible lawsuits. I checked all possible name disputes and wrote the entry, with sources and links. Soon after it was noted by other specialized news sites and begun to appear in mainstream media around the world as well. Most of them with the proper source. The last thing is not always the case, stealing news is something I don’t even protest to – I just put the magazine on the black list (refusing to be interviewed by them next them). It is weird of course that I measure my success in terms of being quoted by mainstream media, but I must admit that seeing the blog or my name mentioned in The Guardian, Business Week or the New York Times makes my day. What made it successful? Maybe the catchy title “Metro sues Metro”, the weird items always seem to do well: “Warsaw metro to ban Metro” on a ban on newspaper boxes because they could contain bombs, also was picked up by many mainstream media. Other things that do well are stunning figures: My story on the first decline of free daily readership in Europe after 12 years of growth was picked up by dozens of media, from Venezuela to the Ukraine.

Metro sues Metro

September 21st, 2008

German wholesale retailer Metro is thinking about suing free paper publisher Metro International after the successful lawsuit in Hungary.

In August the Hungarian Metro was forced to change its name to Metropol after the retailer argued successfully that the use of the ‘Metro’ brand was an infringement to its own right.

According to business website B2B Köln first options would be Italy and France.

Other contested markets could be Greece, the Netherlands, Portugal, the Czech Republic and Russia. Also Belgium, the UK and Poland where other publishers operate Metro papers could be affected.

The Metro brand, however, is not used in all markets. In France, Italy, Russia, the Czech Republic, Denmark and Poland the company does use that specific brand name. In the Netherlands, Greece, Portugal, Spain and the UK the supermarkets are called Makro. In Belgium and Greece both names are used.

In Denmark the Metro paper is called MetroXpress. In Spain it is officially called Metro Directo although Metro is the brand used.

The Metro Cash & Carry group is longer around than Metro International (40 against 13 years) and is active in 28 markets.

In Germany the retailer already asked the court in Hamburg for a ruling which resulted in Metro International not being allowed to publish a free daily with that name in Germany.

Metro Cash and Carry is part of the Metro Group. Other brands are Makro, Media Markt, Saturn, Galeria Kaufhaus and Real.

http://www.newspaperinnovation.com/index.php/2008/09/21/metro-sues-metro/