Theicecreamdebate

Today in my mailbox: a big envelope…I felt it, weighed it and concluded: my Twit2Art was in it…

I had my cloud immediately dance beneath the sky. I love it, don’t you?

Thanks to the launch of the iPhone last Friday in Belgium, mobile internet has become a hot topic. The three mobile operators in Belgium each have their own fees to welcome mobile surfers. T-zine gives a clear overview (in Dutch) .

Picture (and sadly enough also the iPhone) by Filip Bunkens.

The Belgian women’s magazine Flair has recently launched a mobile version of its product.

How does it work?

On your cellphone you download a mobile application of Flair. You get the link via an sms. When you start the mobile application, you find a very attractive interface (for girls at least ) with fashion articles, information about events,… But there’s more to it. Flair goes interactive with the application: you can participate in games, polls and tests . Stubru presentators Sofie and Peter tried out the ‘Which sex beast are you’-test. The Flair magazine appears weekly in Belgium and this also applies to the mobile magazine: users weekly get a new mobile edition, which is automatically installed when you start the application.

Ok, and how does it not work?

It does not work on my cellphone. My problem: they gave me the wrong cellphone at work .Because when you look at the list of compatible cellphones, there are already quite a few models on which the Flair application works. And so it does function on the cellphone of one of my colleagues (see picture below).

I find it very brave for a women’s magazine to start with a mobile version. They are the first in Belgium, and definitely not the last. And let’s hope this initiative helps to break open the Belgian mobile internet market.

In a former entry I promised to tell more about a great Twitter-initiative. As a matter of fact, it’s very simple, yet amazing. It brings the virtual Twitter world to the ’real’ world, a bit like twunch does.

As you know Twitter is a micro-blogging system in which people send messages to their friends and contacts. They report about what they are eating, about great websites they discovered, about their lives in general,…

Well, the Belgian artist Jan Leenders came up with a great idea: send me a tweet and I’ll make an artwork of it. The first one who jumps on the initiative pays 1 euro, the second one 2 euros,…And so on. I am number 34, which means I paid 34 euro for my twitter art. Jan has finished his 20th piece of art at the moment so I am patiently waiting for the result. For an overview of his work till now, visit the Twit2Art website.

The text I chose?

Yes, I admit it. I stole the text. From Heather Nova, one of my favourite artists. It’s great to have something virtual transformed into something touchable. And I really wonder what my grandchildren will think about this in 50 years. Will they laugh about the way we used technology? Will they understand? At any case, the piece of art will always remind me of my ‘Twitter-period’. “Yes, yes, your grandma used to Twitter”

Update: in the meantime I received an email from artist Jan thanking me. Because of this blog post the Online Journalism Blog jumped on the story and ordered a 36th piece of art. Great!!

Yesterday we had our first twunch in Hasselt. Twunch, I beg your pardon?

Twunch is a fusion of ‘twitter‘ and ‘lunch’. Which means, in non-geeky words, that I went to lunch with my Hasselt Twitter friends. In Antwerp and Ghent, there have been quite a few twunches already. So high time for a Hasselt edition . It’s nice and easy: somebody ‘launches’ at Twitter that he’s feeling like lunch, and who wants to join, joins.

For this first edition in Hasselt, we were with 5 ‘Twitterers’. We talked about stuff like iPhones, a next mobile webcamp, other Twitter initiatives (soon I’ll tell you more about a fantastic Twitter project I got to know!!!), but we also discussed holidays, work, the high oil prices,…Conclusion: I like the initiative, and I liked the conversations. 

Last week I was invited in Leuven for a brainstorm together with 6 other participants. We were asked about our favourite meeting places, both virtually and in the ‘real’ world, and about our intrest in politics. The brainstorm is one of the first facts within the so-called VEP project (Virtual European Parliament). In Belgium, research groups like memori and also the research lab i-City, participate in this project, which wants to involve young EU citizens in the decision making process of the European Parliament. The research is going on simultaneously in several countries of Europe. Here some more information from the official website:

• The VEP project aims as a trial project at integrating young EU citizens from 3 different regions (Lulea, Barcelona, Flanders) in the decision making process of the European Parliament. As a trial project the Virtual EP activities will run parallel with the actual agenda of the European Parliament. The young EU citizens will be able to: access relevant information via the VEP portal, share thoughts with the other participants, collaboratively write reports on specific topics and will be asked to give their opinion via mobile voting and surveying.

I always like brainstorms because it makes you reflect on ‘normal’ things in life you normally don’t really think about. So apart from learning a lot from the others on eg European politics (I could actually mention only one Belgian member in the European Parlimanent, shame on me), I learnt a lot about myself. Like: why do I like a place? I realised that it depends on my mood, my expectations,…So one day, I can like a place a lot, and the other day, I don’t (anymore). But a good place -for me- is always WARM, hmmm, nicely warm. I hate cold places…

Right now at work, I’m drawing quite a few community plans for projects we are working on. Apart from the fact that it is so important to know what you want to offer to whom (in other words to set your goals straight), you have to find a trigger to get your target group to you. You need to know their needs. You need to know what gets people out of their seats, right to your project.

An example I tend to use a lot these days to make people clear what I mean, is a project organised in my hometown Sint-Truiden. This year, for the second time already, a ladies city day was organised. Not just ‘a’ day, no no, the ladies city day took place at the 22nd of May.  Exactly, the day of the Champions League Final. Usually a day at which men grab the remote control, don’t want to let go of it anymore, and want to sit in front of the television for about two hours, with beer, chips and their mates.  Women are brutally left behind, they don’t count at that day.  To sketch things in a stereotypical way .

So what did the organisation of merchants in Sint-Truiden do? They organised a women’s day. Shops were open till 9pm on the 22nd of May, famous Belgian actors came to town for signature sessions and performances, shops organised special actions,…And 10.000 women invaded town. Friens of mine who live kilometres away from Sint-Truiden came to the city centre. In other words, the event was a huge success.

And why? Not only because the organisation of merchants knew the needs of women (almost every woman loves to go shopping with the girls) but they also found the right time and the right moment to organise an event for their target group. They found the exact trigger to have ladies come to town ànd buy stuff. Great!

Last week I didn’t only visit Mobile Monday but also ThinkTomorrow in Diegem.  At the event companies showed succesful cases of implementing ’social networking’ and ‘web 2.0′ in their business.

-The most impressing and useful presentation to me was the one brought by the French Emeric Ernoult of Affinitiz.com. He told  amongst others about a project of his with the French lawyers organisation. They wanted more visibility on the web, a better image (modern, not old school) and they wanted to be present when people have legal questions. Ermeric and his team figured out the options and concluded that French lawyers should blog to achieve their goals. After 8 months, 850 lawyers have a blog, 10.000 articles are published and 20.000 comments have been posted. Curious? The portal of ‘les avocats’ via this link.
The quote of the day came from Emeric as well: You want people to create value for your brand, first find how to create value for them.

-Another great presentation was given by Sabine Allaeys of Minifizz. I like the Minifizz concept very much because it shows how the internet also works succesfully for girls. Moreover, I saw some male spectators learning a lot, not only about girls but also about how you can reach their needs on the internet (quite different than male needs, like Sabine put it: “girls just love to dress up”. And indeed they do ).

-Last but not least, I stumbled upon Sam Desimpel. I know him from a ‘former life’. Being a journalist, my first trip abroad went to San Fransisco. Together with people from eBay Belgium I was invited to celebrate (and write about) 10 years eBay. Quite a party, with Sam, who worked for eBay at the time. It was great to see him at ThinkTomorrow introducing his brand new company IntroNiche. Take a look!

2nd of June

My first Mobile Monday Amsterdam. I carpooled with my colleague Koen and with Stef, Tijs and Filip from Belgium to the Netherlands to join the sixth edition of this mobile event. Raimo van der Klein, who gave a presentation on ‘mobile wands and wizards’ at the Mobile Webcamp Hasselt I organised earlier, is one of the hosts.

What I recall:
-Doc Searls himself! Waw. Great to see and hear the writer of the Cluetrain Manifesto in real life. And despite what everyone (like Tijs ) says, I loved his shirt ;-). Searls also made thé quote of the evening: A free consumer is more valuable than a captive one.
-The presentations on mobile were quite ok (for a great review, look at this blog post from Koen), yet there is a lot of work to catch up. Companies on the one hand are not entirely ready for mobile internet, but consumers aren’t either. I guess it’s not only because mobile internet is too expensive or because not everybody has a mobile internet connection yet,…What I realised listening to all those presentations is that we aren’t using the mobile internet the way we should/could. At the moment we are ‘cloning’ the possibilities of the ‘normal’ internet, yet mobile consumers and companies will find their own killer apps and added value. Like location based services. We’re thus still finding out where mobile internet will take us.
-Dinner at club 11. Quite an experience, and that’s all I say. You just have to find out yourself!

Pictures by Filip Bunkens

Hmmm, much too long ago since I’ve written an entry. Which is my fault. Completely. And which makes me realise there’s quite a lot I haven’t been talking about on this blog.

So, back to the past.

1. Yesterday. Girl Geek Dinner number 5 already. I’m a geek not a freak. Out of the 5 Brussels Girl Geek Dinners, I have attended 4 till now. Luckily I missed out one, otherwise I couldn’t defend myself anymore when people call me a freak . Anyway, it was great to see some ’usuals’ back like Clo and Smetty ànd to meet new people like Pimpajoentje. Moreover, we got ‘speculoospasta‘ in the goodie bag. I’m staring at it right now with hungry eyes but I am patiently waiting for the right moment to try it out.

2. The 6th and 7th of May. A friend of mine organised quite an interesting event for people who are involved in arts and culture. During this so called ‘hybrid spaces’ event, the participants were challenged to think, talk and work around four thematic issues:

• local/global,
• private/public,
• narrative/creative
• visible/invisible.

Those ‘borders’ can be looked at in many ways since the coming of ‘new media’. More information on the Spacecowboys website.

3. Way back in time, at the 29th of March. Barcamp Ghent and Girl Geek Dinner number 4. Apart from meeting lots of interesting people in Ghent, I was very proud that I had been able to pursuade some colleagues at City Live to join me there. And very relieved that they enjoyed the event and came back with new contacts and great ideas as well . Furthermore, I discovered the wii. Which wasn’t only very funny, but which brought me into contact with two great people: Ywein and Filip. Ywein was my opponent, Filip the one taking pictures while we made a fool of ourselves .

After the Barcamp in Ghent, the fourth Girl Geek Dinner took place at the offices of Netlash. Not only again a nice place to meet interesting people (at or in between the cocktails and French fries I met Britt and also Bart), but also the place at which I won…YES, I won…a microsoft webcam. Thank you!