Thursday, February 28, 2008

Wish I had a Nokia :-(


Wow wish I had a Nokia. I just found out I could use this really cool website and provide a live stream to the web with my Mobile phone. However it only works with Nokia's at the moment. September will be the month for a new phone. Maybe I will go to Nokia. However the next gen Iphone series should be very cool. Well plenty of time to discuss with my wallet.

If you have a Nokia you should have a look at this site. And let me know what you think about it. How does it work? Is it fun? That kind of stuff. If you don't have a Nokia. Just have a look anyway.

http://qik.com/

Kodak Moment?

After seeing this video, you just know Kodak will return!


Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Why students don't blog


I think about 2 % of the students from my course have an active blog. Why should we use this medium? Why should we come up with stories people won't read. Why should we even bother to put time and effort in an article from which the quality won't be the same as that from proffesional bloggers. Why should we blog?

Interactive Media students, the new media experts. They can think cross-media, develop applications for new media, they can easily work in teams etc.

The interactive Media students are pretty fast in understanding new media. Who can you reach via a new medium? What does it cost? And what is the deadline? You should think a blog to keep up with yourself shouldn't be an extra luxury. Well it is.

The positive effects from a blog come on the long term. You can actually make an archive from your own interests. But on the short term, a blog just robs you from your time. Students don't want to produce news, but consume it. Have it the easy way. That way I get my news from 3 different blogs. I filter every site I'm on, and use gmail as my homepage. That way I get my information the fastest way. The most relevant information I want, ends up in my mailbox. As a somewhat different Interactive Media student I do have a blog. I also have twitter, jaiku and other mini blogs, but I do like to write. I make time to let other people know what I find Interesting in the big world of new media.

The reason for this post is that I find it very weird young people like myself, simply hate blogs. They think they are very subjective, just like wikipedia. I don't agree, I think a blog is a way of starting conversations, keeping friends/contacts up-to-date and for the proffesional ones publishing news on the web.

Well I think I'll just keep going with writing my opinion.

here are some of my favorite blogs,

Erick Alejandro
This blog is of Erick Alejandro who is a student in Guatemala. He is very up-to-date with new mobile developments and other tecky news.

Mobuzz TV
Mobuzz TV, well this is simply my morning ritual, I watch it every morning to keep myself up-to-date with Mobuzz News.

Emerce
This is a dutch blog which produces some cool news from the world of Internet

Friday, February 22, 2008

Been there done that @ the Mobile World Congress.

Wow time flies, almost a week ago I packed my bags for the journey back to the Netherlands. Now back in my student life, with my Mobuzz morning ritual and my journeys with the wifi bus, I look back at Barcelona with a big smile on my face.

The first day at the MWC I noticed that I was probably one of the youngest persons at the congress. I figured that students ( like myself) must find this congress really interesting, but the Spanish media students weren't there. A bit odd, cause these students, will be part of the media world in a few years.

So what did a Young Media Investigator find at the Mobile World Congress? What did he find interesting, and what did he think was absolutely ****. Well let's start with the coolest hall. I think hall 7 was the best. The creative media companies, Ice cream and great cool demo's made this happen. Vizrt, yahoo and clip in touch are the winners in this hall.

Vizrt had these real cool real time 3d graphics. The football demo that Francois Laborie showed me was really cool. In this demo you could get information about different players from a team. But the design of this program was so User friendly, and was very clear that I needed to tell you all about Vizrt.

Yahoo? well besides they had very nice Ice cream with chocolate topping, yahoo also had the one-search application, which I found very interesting. This app allows you to get information just as fast as you'll get on your your desktop. The relevant links which yahoo provides are really relevant. Not just a random ad. OneSearch provides multiple ways to get the information you want, you could actually send a text to an number, to get an answer on your phone almost instantly. Within 3 clicks you could get to the same information. They also launched the GO3.0 Beta. Which actually is a very handy starting point on your mobile phone. I couldn't get an demo on this app, but it looked very interesting and it would be worth to have a look at there site.

Then I get to the point where I'm going to talk about probably the most cool demo I got at MWC. Clip in Touch, why was this so cool? Simply because this product is real easy to use and I could see myself use this. Clip in Touch is exactly what the name says. Clip in touch makes it possible to transform your desktop or mobile phone in your own production studio. Within a minute you can mix text, transitions, graphics, user generated content, music and video. So you could send an video clip to your friends. The results are very nice, and you don't have to be tecky at all. Clip in touch is a product everyone could use to surprise a friend in a very original way. Please have a look at there site for it may be become the way to "text" your friends. You could see clip in touch as MMS 2.0.


These companies had the most impact at me. But which other stands were worth visiting? In hall 2 you had a very cool stand Spinvox. Which allowed you to transform Voice in text. I couldn't get a demo from the product itself. But the pitch that was given was a nice scenario. If it works as the lady said, it will be an very handy tool. Think of Mobile blogging, or a journalist who has interviews very often.


Also Momac, a Dutch company who was in hall 7 impressed me with there demo. Momoc has made this tool where they can very easily make Mobile Websites. It was a very smart program they made, in which you can build the website in blox. If you know some HTML it shouldn't be problem to make an Mobile website. If your interested in a mobile website, Momac is the place to be!


So what was absolutely ****? Well I expected MUCH more from stands like Orange. What did Orange try to do at the MBC 2008? They had a few meeting rooms, and some showcases with their "great" livebox. Well the stand gave free drinks, so that was the only reason to drop by some times. I don't want to make this a very negative article, cause I had a really good time at the MWC. But these companies who did this should reconsider their stands for next year.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

World Mobile Congress


I have never seen anything like this. The atmosphere, the stands, the location. It all seems to fit. I'm at the Mobile World Congress, and I'm having loads of fun.


So what do I do here then? Well, I try to get an overview of the congress. What technologies are new? Innovative and what companies are the rising stars. I have seen some nice stuff from Adobe (flash lite) and Vizrt has some real nice graphics. Besides graphics and cool stuff I have been to the stand of Spinvox where every voice is converted into text. Should be very handy when interviewing with skype, or writing on your blog without having access to a computer.


I'm in the press room at the moment, and some people really are willing to kill somebody for access to a computer. Check fulltime chris for updates. Cause a full GSMA report through the eyes of an young media investigator will be available at the end of next week.


Hasta luego!


check these sites for more info:





Monday, February 04, 2008

Mobuzz Live!


I had a nice surprise when I went to my morning ritual; Mobuzz. The daily buzz show went live and had a discussion with a chat function. This way Mobuzz viewers could interact with the Mobuzz team. For a first show it was great. And I really hope it would become a weekly live show. Next time Mobuzz could better brief us what the Mobuzz team is going to discuss. Ask us questions on forehand. This way we could even more participate with the discussion. Doesn't need to be long, the Monday minute should be enough. But that way we could ask/discuss about the subjects in the live show. You can find the Mobuzz video's at: www.mobuzz.tv.