Fulltime Chris

What the F**K is Social Media: One Year Later

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 14:34:00 +0000

I saw this keynote a few weeks ago and saw that I didn't post it on my blog. I think that this presentation is a very clear story on how Social Media works. What the F*ck is Social media?! Enjoy ;).

What the F**K is Social Media: One Year Later

View more documents from Marta Kagan.

The rise of the SME's!

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 21:39:00 +0000

I posted this video about social media experts some time ago. Which made me think about the Social Media Experts (SME's) we have in The Netherlands nowadays. Probably the rise of these characters is all around the globe. However, I notice that every one of them keep coming with the same story. Very ~~interesting~~ entertaining to know how many people use Facebook or Hyves, how many people use twitter, what the succes stories are?

I came across this powerpoint today. A dutch one. " sorry, lo siento ;)"

20091019 Dutch Work Innovation Day

View more documents from Tribewise.

What this ppt basically tells us, are some entertaining stats, and this same story which every social media expert tell us. Nice design and I'm sure a great story when they give the presentation. However when do people really start using social media, and how should they use it? I wonder what a director of a bank or bookwriter thinks when he sees this. " yes, I should do something with social media".

I wonder when we all stop telling this story and move on to the next phase. "How would I start implementing social media in my business? What are the pro's and con's? "

I also think we should start realizing that social media is a different story for every company. We know some basic rules thanks to the great presentations online. However which rules has my business?
Where's the start? Then, ready, set , go!

This makes you think, doesn't it? Social media counter

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 14:25:00 +0000

Found this counter made by Gary Hayes on personalizemedia.com.

It is an interesting counter based on the following:
20 hours of video uploaded every minute onto YouTube (source YouTube blog Aug 09)
Facebook 600k new members per day, and photos, videos per month, 700mill & 4 mill respectively (source Inside Facebook Feb 09)

Twitter 18 million new users per year & 4 million tweets sent daily (source TechCrunch Apr 09)
iPolicy UK – SMS messaging has a bright future (Aug 09)

900 000 blogs posts put up every day (source Technorati State of the Blogosphere 2008)

YouTube daily, 96 million videos watched, $1mill bandwidth costs (source Comscore Jul 06 !)
UPDATE: YouTube 1Billion watched per day SMH (2009)- counter updated!

Second Life 250k virtual goods made daily, text messages 1250 per second (source Linden Lab release Sep 09)

Money – $5.5 billion on virtual goods (casual & game worlds) even Facebooks gifts make $70 million annually (source Viximo Aug 09)

Flickr has 73 million visitors a month who upload 700 million photos (source Yahoo Mar 09)

Mobile social network subscribers – 92.5 million at the end of 2008, by end of 2013 rising to between 641.6-873.1 million or 132 mill annually (source Informa PDF)

SMS – Over 2.3 trillion messages will be sent across major markets worldwide in 2008 (source Everysingleoneofus sms statistics)

What Is A Social Media Expert?

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 15:01:00 +0000

How to import rss to twitter

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 14:26:00 +0000

So in another post I said something about that you can use twitter as an autobot to post news. Please people don't use this the wrong way. Because if you mis-use the import of rss within twitter you'll be seen as an spammer and you won't get a lot of followers. Believe me. Who wants to follow someone (thing) when they update every 4 minutes with the same type of messages?

If you are clear in your communication that the account which has te import function of rss and twitter is a news account, then this is a very usefull tool!

So let's get started!

There are a few tools to import RSS into your twitter account. Here is the way I do it.

1. Go to twitter and make sure your signed in with the account you want to import RSS to.

2. Go to this website and sign up. http://rss2twitter.com/ ( this one is still in Betá however it works fine ( Safari 4 on Mac OSX)

3. Make sure you get the confirmation e-mail and activate.

4. Add a twitter account by clicking on " add account" this will bring you to the twitter website where you need to click " Allow"

5. When your done twitter is connected with rss2twitter.

6. Click on "my feeds" and add a feed. Just follow the steps on the screen.

7. The bottom three optional options can be used as filter within your RSS feed. This way you can always add #marketing or #socialmedia for instance.

UPDATE: I also came across https://twitterfeed.com which basically does the same.

Hope it works for you guys.

Cheers.

How social is Social Media

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 11:57:00 +0000

Well we all know about social media. " Even my mum is on the Dutch social network Hyves ;)". When we talk about social media, we like to think of Twitter/Youtube/Facebook/Flickr or bebo. Well forget that last one.

For a lot of people in The Netherlands the social networks are pretty important. And are used daily. We poke each other on Facebook we scrap each other on Hyves, a lot of so called BN'ers famous dutch people have discovered Twitter, some free newspapers use Twitter to interact with their readers and well I go on for a long time. We are going social.

So here is my question. Why do companies find it hard to be social?

Come on.. Look at it. A lot and I mean a lot of companies try to be social. But instead of preparing a normal social media strategy they tend to just start a public profile on a social network and forget about it. Look at these "Dutch" Hyves one of sns-bank http://sns-fundcoach.hyves.nl/ or http://landal-greenparks.hyves.nl/ . The last one has potential but if you analyse the scraps you can see that there is absolutely no conversation. Instead you see a moderator(s) broadcast news/photo's and gadgets on a new channel. So why would I ever join one of these groups? To say that I had a fantastic time using their product? Give them compliments? Upload photo's so they finally have an update on their channel? What's in it for me?

Why do you even bother starting something 'social' when you don't make time to react? I see it happening so many times when companies don't even react on the @replies which I have sent on twitter. There is somebody who is receiving that. Isn't it a great fast way of communication between two parties? A way where you can easily solve a problem.

Another problem which I see starting social companies is that they want and expect instant results.

Social Networking takes time! I know about these success stories! But think about all the initiatives which have failed because there was no one who interacted with the campaign and where people just pulled the plug!

If you like to start something social on the web. Don't try to be like the big boys when you're not. Have patience, and be honoust about what you provide. You see a lot of companies which just spam everywhere to get some followers or members on their network. Come on, it's not a marketplace! I have 496 unread hyves mail of invitations for different hyves. I'll tell my vision on why people join a group in a different post". Really, your talking to people. Stop shouting and start thinking. I think you should simply start every channel with a different strategy.

For instance:

Twitter:

You can have a company channel, however what makes you interesting? I wouldn't want to follow updates of a hosting company. What do these guys have to say? Well, in this case I would say that they can use twitter as an Helpdesk. Let all the know that if they have a problem or question that they can easily ask it by tweeting it.

In this example you see that twitter is used as a Helpdesk. But there are millions of ways you can use it. Think of simple website/blog updates which can be just an autobot. Or think of the personal use of twitter.

Some people ask me for what I use Twitter. And since I don't have a company, am still a student, have some knowledge on social media and video and simply like sharing things. I tweet about:

Workshops which I attend
Remarkable and funny video's
Interesting Re-tweets
@ replies (reacting on other tweets)
Good video tutorials
In my opinion good blogposts
And sometimes some spanish stuff "Mostly when I feel Spanish on a Friday night ;) "

And why do I do it? I made contacts through twitter. I follow stories on live events which I can't attend. I keep in contact with friends abroad. I use it as SMS with some of my friends. I have gotten a job through twitter.

And Indeed it does seems a bit frightning when you only have 4 followers. But what does a number say ? Exposure.. Maybe these 4 people can help you more than any other person in my followers list. If your interesting, you'll get your followers. It just takes time.

Seems like I needed to write down some of my frustrations..

Do wonder what you guys think about social media strategy.. Should there be one? Should you just start? Who's responsible for the job. IT?

Speaking Piano - Now with (somewhat decent) captions!

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 11:31:00 +0000

Like this video.. Wonder when there will be a speaking drumset.

A Million years ago.

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 09:22:00 +0000

I have thought a lot lately what to do with fulltimechris, It hasn't been full time lately and still I only want to post stuff which makes sense. However I did feel that I needed to share some things with you ever since I went sabbatical in January.

So how did my last 6 months go?

As you might know, I have been studying in Madrid at the Universidad Europea de Madrid. An university on which I did a lot of experience in the filming and advertising industry. I have mastered loads of effects in Final Cut Pro and learned a lot about managing a film production.

I have embedded my two best video's below this post.

Next to the studying I also gained a lot work experience at Orange Aria. I work for this company for over 1,5 years now and I still could do video production, social media intergration and blog building while I was in another country. This has been a great opportunity, and a good basic income to manage my social life in Madrid.

I have seen a lot of things in Madrid. Just like the last time I have been there (July, August '08) they just use social media in a different way than people use it in The Netherlands. Some sites like the Dutch Hyves and the Spanish Tuenti can be seen as a similar website. However the " little" differences in the websites make a big difference in the use of the 2.0 app.

Tuenti for example doesn't make it possible to "spy" on profiles with which you haven't connected. Hyves however is the biggest James Bond application in The Netherlands. A lot of people don't know how to switch on the " private profile" modus and hyves has become a symbol of your image. What photo's do I upload? Which " scraps" do I leave on my profile page. Do I say that I'm in a relationship? etc. etc.

The filter which other social networks have can be seen as a safe thing. Especially if you think that somebody with pedofile beards can see your daughters Hyves profile page. But doesn't it make social networking extremely fun as a teenager? At least I find it fantastic to see how my classmates of high school are doing and that I'm able to see with who they are connected etc.

Enough about this social networking, I can go on forever. I have ideas about producing a documentary from January 2010. I will update you guys on this blog about my progress on that. See this post as my return on the blogosphere. Although I have been doing a lot of videoblogging ;) " In Dutch "

Here are the video's I have been talking about.

My selfportrait

Videoclip - Do it Again

Sabbatical blogging

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 14:25:00 +0000

I had my first sabbatical. It has been the 2nd of December since my last blogpost ( what a shame). Last month has been a real crazy rollercoaster ride. I have been busy working with www.marketingfacts.nl where I have been active as a projectmanager, managing a team of Interactive Media students, like myself.

Also my work at Orange Aria has been a real exciting experience. I have been involved in producing a new concept called Blogstars. We had a redesign which has been a great improvement on the website. check it out on www.blogstars.nl.

And of course! I have been preparing my 6 months Madrid safari. Mainly finding a home for the next period. I managed to get a room in a student flat based around 40 meters from Plaza Mayor. =D.

So what will I be doing now?

Some people may know that yesterday I arrived in the wonderful city of Madrid. I am in Spain to study as an Erasmus student. In a few hours I'll be getting a tour on the campuss which is located in Villaviciosa de Odon. Really exciting!

Next to all the studying, I will continue my work for Orange Aria. I'll be mainly focussing on www.blogstars.nl , on which I also will have an account. There I will gather blogposts, video's and podcasts in a blogstar environment.

I hope to have this ready in the coming weekend. I'll update you guys about that once I have dealed with it.

My next challenge is to get a montly ticket for the public transport, my spanish is not that good, but I think I'll be able to manage to do this.

Hasta luego!

Nokia N97

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 21:26:00 +0000

Today I heard Nokia will come up with a new phone. The Nokia N97. If you have a look at the youtube film which I embedded. You'll notice that the combination of keyboard and touchscreen looks pretty useful. I'm a Nokia fan, and I love the way Nokia keeps coming with these great phones!

Of course I haven't tested it. But here are some of the specs*.

-5 megapixel camera

-32 GB internal flash Memory (room for a 16 - 48 GB Micro SD card)

-Wifi

- HSDPA

-3,5 inch (640×360 pixels) screen 16:9

-Touchscreen ( not multi-touch as it seems in de video)

If you have a look at this you'll notice that it has a lot of memory. I wonder what this will do with the way people use Mobile.

This phone will work on Symbian, just like the N95 and N96. Since the Iphone has more than 10,000 apps. The symbian platform has been opened as a open-source platform. I wonder what succes that will bring.

The N97 should be in store in the beginning of 2009 and will cost around 550 euro.

Just have a look at this video. And get amazed by this phone!

* I found the specifications on this phone thanks to " http://weblogs2.nrc.nl/hebben/2008/12/02/nokia-n97-touchscreen-smartphone-met-keyboard/"

Internet Desktops...Jooce

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 10:32:00 +0000

From all of the Web desktops online. "Netvibes, symbaloo, Igoogle etc.." I have found another great flash based Internet desktop.

"Jooce is a Flash-based web operating system and sharing platform. They are targeting the millions of people who use “cybercafes” to conduct their Internet affairs instead of a regular desktop or laptop. The Jooce product is aiming to provide these virtual vagabonds with a web-based desktop to manage their IM, email, storage, media and widgets in a secure and protected way. They also provide virtual nomads with an online desktop that they can share with friends to swap files like pictures, documents, audio and video."

This is Jooce in a nutshell. I've been testing the website for a few days now and noticed that it has great potential. The messenger client is not really great "it keeps switching from online to offline and vice versa in Google Chrome", and there are some other bugs on there which can frustrate you. However, the fresh design and the audio/video features works perfectly!

You can create an online back-up of your music library and stream this in perfect quality from your browser. I think Mac users can have a bit of problems with the navigation, for the apple dock has been used again! Firing up this website will make the mac users controlling two of the classic Apple dock. Which could be confusing.

However "I'm a pc ;)" and this will not be a problem for me. What was a problem for me was the name of the site. "Jooce" come on! The names for web 2.0 sites are terrible "most of them" , and they look so much alike.

Jooce, Joost, Juice blegh! Be orginal!

I was impressed though by their fast and beautiful website, which I'll be checking out again when more bugs have been fixed.

Maud Mulder & Blogstars

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 14:30:00 +0000

If you watch Dutch celeberies website's, you'll notice that these sites mostly are nothing more than nicely designed Biography,Discography and lyrics. Of course they have a blog where they occasionaly post some updates about some performances, and they would most probably have a guestbook. However, if you really want to know what these stars are up to. You need to be briefed by the television or gossip magazines.

The information that you "as a fan" gets is either promotion for their new released album or gossip.

At Orange Aria we developed a way that Celeberities can upload films, foto's and texts directly on their Blogstar website. I have installed software on Mobile Phones so the Stars just need to produce the content and upload it to the website. This process takes really short because all Mobile generated Content "MGC" produced can be uploaded by pressing 1 button on the phone.

At the moment there is a pilot going on. Maud Mulder "Idols artist in 2004" has started to use the Blogstars platform. We have never announced the website and in the last four weeks we have achieved to get 9000 pageviews.

At the moment we are in conversation with a lot of Artist who would love to get the Blogstar platform. This means that in January we hope to have at least five different artist's or groups who are using this platform. The design will have a lot of tweaks in the coming days. What is on there at the moment is a global idea of what it will look like in the end. If you have tips about navigation, colors, buttons please let me know!

I really want to know what you guys think of this idea, would you follow the Blogstars?

check out maud.blogstars.nl for the website of Maud. "It's in Dutch though, sorry guys!"

Vloggers On The Road

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 12:47:00 +0000

If you're a dutch blogger. You must be aware of Hollands most popular Marketing Weblog named Marketingfacts.

The past two weeks I had the opportunity to post some video's on that blog. With seven fellow other students I am setting up 2 formats for a new online video site called M!TV, Marketing Facts TV.

These posts were in Dutch, and to get some more feedback on the concepts I thought I would turn to you guys. In the video's I posted I asked for feedback on the concepts which we developed. Because we think we could use the wisdom of the crowds, in the end; we are producing these formats for the M!community!

Vloggers on the Road is a concept were the community gets hold of a vlogbox. This vlogbox contains a camera, microphone, a manual "How to Edit" and trial editing software. This box will be in hands of the bloggers of Marketingfacts.

The Idea is that these bloggers make videos about every Marketing related subjects. They could take the vlogbox to Events, interview interesting colleagues or could just show the world a glimpse of there life. Everyweek the vlogbox will be given to another blogger. This way the bloggers of M! need to set up an appointment to hand over the Vlogbox. This way we hope there will be a sort of chain-letter effect.

We thought of this concepts because there are a lot of online video channels which just copy tv to the web. I think there is a very different way online video channels work than ordinary tv. Lately a lot of webTV channels are just copying tv, which in my eyes don't work. Look to blueshots.tv , a dutch vlog which actually is just a bad copy of tv. Watching interviews of 43 minutes is just not going to work, unless it is really special. I think the only webTV platform which can get my attention for those videos is ted.com, which you guys most certainly heard of.

I think for a starting webTV platform you need original and fresh content. It doesn't have to be a proffesional tv production. Look at some of the crap quality video's on youtube. I think on the road content should be fun and surprising. Certainly with vloggers on the road. Because you never know which blogger is the next on Marketingfacts TV.

Future Projects

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 12:24:00 +0000

Grotere kaart weergeven

For the ones who didn’t know. I will go back to Spain shortly. I have been accepted as an Erasmus student at Universidad Europea de Madrid. An university about 20 km from the city of Madrid. I will study different subject on Journalisme and video production. Next to that I will learn Spanish and will improve my English. For the subjects are given in English “Spanglish I’m guessing”.

One of the reasons why I went to Madrid last summer, was to investigate if I liked the city and see how the media world works in Spain. I liked this beautiful city and I definitely learned what the differences in media usage is. I’m writing a big article on how new media is developing and differs between North and the South of Europe. I will continue travelling to countries and write my reports on how this works. I do however want to include as much as countries possible. For this I will ask input from people in Germany, Sweden, Italy, Romania, and Czech republic and so on.

Where is new media going in Europe, what are the differences between North and South, East and West.

This Article which will take a lot of time. I will record a podcast “As told to chris”. Which will include everything I see in Madrid.

Next to that I’m trying to set up a show which will include conversations between different continents. One of my dreams is that I’ll set up a network just like myself. Media junky’s who like to cross borders with the web. This way I’ve already met Erick Alejandro. I know you other guys are out there as well. As I made my preparations I’ll make an announcement where I’ll ask for people to contribute to this global podcast.

Help save Mobuzz TV!

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 14:50:00 +0000

To produce an online video show 5 days a week, in three languages en multiple formats you need money. To be exact Mobuzz TV spends 15.000 euro's a month to produce the shows. Hosting costs/production costs/staff etcetera, it adds pretty quickly.

Mobuzz TV is an European well known videoblog. The bite-size shows are mainly about Digital Lifestyle, gadgets, the web, 2.0 and other fresh topics to keep the passionate and computer-savvy generation an interactive show.

Mobuzz is in trouble! Mobuzz TV has started a rescue plan on a web 2.0 way. They use twitter, bloggers, there website and viral marketing to get 120,000 euros before the 9th of November.

It is a rough time for 2.0 companies, certainly because most of the business-models are not working. Producing all these free shows, and get your income through a few banners and pre-rolls. It just don't seem to work.

I think the strength of videoblogging is not so much the reach that you have. Of course, you can earn money by putting up ads and tell your sponsors that they reach this big audiance you have. But a business model based on this, I think is crazy. Proffesional (b)(v)-logging is hard, and not yet a booming business.

It's a tough world and that's why I also want to help this very high-quality show from Madrid. Watch the video where they give more additional information. And help save Mobuzz TV.

Save Mobuzz from Anil de Mello on Vimeo.

Orange Aria - Grand Opening

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 10:16:00 +0000

Thursday Night

Finally the time had come. The last two days Michel Penterman has officially opened Orange Aria with a kick-off workshop and a party. In the workshop he gave an interesting presentation about New Media Developments, Crossmediafacts and other in-depht Media stories. He had some speakers which are very specialised in their sector which created a fun and diverse presentation on New Media.

With people from RTL, Sanoma, Ilse Media, Thaesis and 538 in the room the diversity of people was very high and an interesting network opportunity. Michel asked me to do a short presentation during the workshop.

So I did, I presented myself as a New Media User. Which type of media do I use? Why do I use those? How do I use New Media both in College and my work for Orange Aria. And what is the "Real" story about the use of Social Networks under my age group?

I had very good feedback and was grateful for the opportunity which Michel Penterman gave me to give my minutes in the workshop.

After the workshop the bar opened. We had a drink an a bite to eat. During that the networking session I talked to a lot of interesting people who where very interested about my Digital Lifestyle.

Why do I have this Blog, Twitter, Flickr, Youtube channel, Skype, MSN, 8 Different Social Networks etc.? And how do I not end up crazy with a wifi connection connected to my brains?

Wondering what feedback Orange Aria gets =).

For photos check www.flickr.com/orangearia. The video with interviews will be posted here pretty soon.

El mundo through our eyes.

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 18:55:00 +0000

Since 12 March this year Erick Alejandro and I started the blog El Mundo Through Our Eyes. "the world through our eyes"..

I met Erick Alejandro through this blog and for about a year we now have almost daily contact. We started the blog to compare our different cultures and the use of our Digital Lifestyle.

In the chats I had with Erick I noticed there are so many differences in use of digital media just because of the differences in culture.

It's a fun concept but it needs some changing. We would like to expand the number of bloggers so we can make a world wide discussion panel of Bloggers just like us. Next to that we are using flickr, Twitter and our youtube channel to bring our stories to life.

We however think that expanding the blog from two bloggers to a bigger number can create a great international network of interesting people and ofcourse discussions.

At the moment we have contact with people from : Honduras, Chile, Colombia, Germany and Spain.

Feel free to drop me a line if you are interested in joining the group.

The blog will continue in English. The quality of your english is not really important. It is mainly to have a basic language in which we can communicate and discuss. With google translator it is easy to understand the main lines of the stories we will post.

For input or other ideas you can always contact me or Erick.

Looking forward to hearing from you guys.

Twitter on Hyves - tWWWitter

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 13:31:00 +0000

So you are using twitter and hyves. How cool would it be to link those two together?!

In hyves you have an application called WWW ( Who, What and Where) in fact it is a way to microblog just like you do with Twitter, Jaiku, Facebook etc.

You get probably bored with typing in your updates in 10 different websites. So I decided to give you a small tutorial link your twitter updates with your Hyves WWW.

There is a website made by Tijmen Brommet which allows you to link your twitter with your hyves.

The only thing you'll have to do is just typ in your username. "just where the red arrow points towards to.

The following which you need to do is give permission to your hyves account to link your tweets to Hyves. You can do this by clicking on "naar hyves gaan om toestemming te geven!" which means "go to my hyves account and give permission!"

You'll end up at the hyves website where you need to login. After that you should just click on "toestemming geven" which means "give permission".

After that your tweets will turn up on your WWW at hyves.

Enjoy it!

Nokia against Apple starringMobile TV

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 06:47:00 +0000

I'm proud to say that I'm one of these guys using Nokia!

Watching tv on a Mobile phone. The n96 makes it ( as you guys may know) possible. Wednesday I was able to get my hands on one and had a go with it.

It is so Sexy! And I wonder how many people are with me on this one.

"The N96 is a better phone than the Iphone"

With the great camera 5.0 mpx camera, improved design, dvb-h receiver, Nokia maps ( geo-tagging) the new Nokia is a dream for me.

I know the Iphone is just a real nice phone, and I agree on that. Only I think that people need to decide what their plans are with the phones. Will they listen a lot of mp3's ? Will they watch a lot of video? Will they play a lot of highly interactive games. If this is what you do with a phone you should get an Iphone.

Are you a blogger? Who wants to be in contact with the Internet for 24/7 , directly easy geo-tagged

pictures on your blog/flickr/facebook? Free Mobile TV everywhere you go? Then you should get a N96.

My opinion at the moment is that the Iphone doesn't work as a phone for me. It is sexy, and it works.

Only in The Netherlands your a doomed with a 2 years contract with T-mobile , which has a crap signal

in the places where I come. Next to that I think that the Iphone could be replaced by the also really sexy

Ipod touch.

I wonder what you guys think about this issue. For me the touchscreen is not "yet" a reason to buy a phone.

Certainly not with the Iphone which doesn't really give you all that extra in stead of the Itouch.

I made a video in which I demonstrate Mobile TV on the n96, connected to a beamer.

You can see how easy you can, watch, record and remind programs, next to that you can see it's quality

which for me was really impressive.

let me know what you think guys!

12,5 anniversary of the beach in Aalsmeer

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 21:41:00 +0000

Almost two weeks ago I went to the Beach in Aalsmeer.

The beach is a very big indoor sportingcomplex including two beaches. I was invited to make a short video of the big party over there. And here is the result.

for a higher quality version of this clip dubbelclick on the youtube player and select "High Quality" on www.youtube.com

The cause of the plane crash in Madrid.

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 14:05:00 +0000

One day before my flight a plane crashed at Barajas Airport in Madrid. Around 150 people died and this was so close. A lot of helicopters and ambulances could be heard in the city.

The left engine failed during take off and made the airplane crash on the airport. It must have been terrible for the passengers because it was the second try to take off. The plane had a lot of fuel inside, which causes a really big fire.

A member of the Sin Futuro team 'Boris' didn't think this was just an accident. In a conversation with him he told me that 3 months before the crash Barajas airport had fired 25 % of the employees. "including 68 mechanics". They did this because they couldn't pay them anymore.

What happened was that there was a shortage of mechanics on the airport which meant the Pilots had to dubbelcheck their planes themselves. These people were not trained for this but had to do it because they had the best knowledge about the plane.

I was glad the next day the atmosphere on the airport was really relaxed so I could have a relaxing flight..

What I also found Interesting is how Twitter was used to inform other people about the crash. Within 10 minutes I got 58 tweets which informed me about what happened, how many deaths, flight details etc. Also people used twitpic to show the world of twitter what it looked like from the Highway.

I think Twitter is becoming a very up to date social newsroom...

The only thing that keeps me warm..

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 13:54:00 +0000

Is work!

Heya guys, back again since the 21th. I know I haven't posted much lately, however this didn't come because of a lack of exciting stuff that I had gone through. Not at all.

I have done so much stuff that I need to find a way not to post another 100 posts.

I'll brief you guys again from now on ;). check this video by The Onion. Really funny how they can change the context.

Portrayal Of Obama As Elitist Hailed As Step Forward For African Americans

We are going to get the James Bond Cloaked car!!

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 13:32:00 +0000

I found this topic through the newsroom of Mobuzz TV "ENG". I guess we are getting close to rebuild James Bond cars!

"Poof! Scientists closer to invisibility cloak

11 hours ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — Scientists say they are a step closer to developing materials that could render people and objects invisible.

Researchers have demonstrated for the first time they were able to cloak three-dimensional objects using artificially engineered materials that redirect light around the objects. Previously, they only have been able to cloak very thin two-dimensional objects.

The findings, by scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, led by Xiang Zhang, are to be released later this week in the journals Nature and Science.

The new work moves scientists a step closer to hiding people and objects from visible light, which could have broad applications, including military ones.

People can see objects because they scatter the light that strikes them, reflecting some of it back to the eye. Cloaking uses materials, known as metamaterials, to deflect radar, light or other waves around an object, like water flowing around a smooth rock in a stream.

Metamaterials are mixtures of metal and circuit board materials such as ceramic, Teflon or fiber composite. They are designed to bend visible light in a way that ordinary materials don't. Scientists are trying to use them to bend light around objects so they don't create reflections or shadows.

It differs from stealth technology, which does not make an aircraft invisible but reduces the cross-section available to radar, making it hard to track.

The research was funded in part by the U.S. Army Research Office and the National Science Foundation's Nano-Scale Science and Engineering Center.

This was my 100th post , first person who comments will get a post just about his/her website =)..

Great price, no ;-) ?

Classic, What if a Ad agency created the Stop Sign..

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 11:26:00 +0000

I found this video on the blog of Jim Cutler..

I thought it was brilliant!

Creating A Stop Sign - Watch more free videos

Tentacul.us

marks.christopher@gmail.com (Christopher Marks) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 09:33:00 +0000

At twittmad last Tuesday I met an interesting young man who calls himself Gafeman. I remembered he had a great application working on his Ipod Touch. Which allowed him to listen to music. Just like Last.fm. He had a "special version", on which he gave me a demo.

He went to http://tentacul.us/m/. There he saw the tentacul.us interface. He could click on one of the songs on the homepage but he did a search for "fall out boy".

The application suggested a band while he was typing in the name which helped him for a quick search,

and result. He clicked on the song which he wanted to play

and Voila! The song started to stream ( very fast) in his browser and provided him a High quality version of the song.

Because of his "special" Ipod he was also able to download the song to his ipod.

I was amazed by this, especially how fast it went and checked it out on the web.

Tentacul.us doesn't stop with the Iphone. Tentacul.us has a application for the: Playstation 3, Twitter, Mozilla Add-on, Iphone and an special jukebox which does random search in the database.

At the moment the Database is not big. They added a lot of music from different artists. However the full albums aren't available, the most Hits of the artists are.

As I saw for the votes and the clicks on the songs, I'm guessing the website just started. I think it has great potential with their easy and very simple interface.

I think especially the Playstation 3 app. is good. At the moment the music player in the Playstation is very bad. If I plug in my Ipod the songs aren't well categorized. The Categorize the songs on dates it was added and the names of the albums

are impossible combinations of numbers and letters.

If you browse to http://tentacul.us/ps3/ with your playstation you will see the special tentacul.us playstation website. Here you can search the database for the song which you want to listen.

If you click on the song, it will stream just like the web version of Tentacul.us however if you click 2, you will download the song to your ps3 Harddrive.

This is like a combination of Limewire and Last.fm on your ps3!

The twitter app. doesn't answer the question: " What are you doing?" but "What are you listening?" Your twitter will be updated every time you will listen a song. And people will not only know what you are doing during the day, but also what you listen!

Go check it out for yourself, I will be waiting for the N95 App!