www.josschuurmans.com

Mobile Internet sucks (= conclusion of 3 wks without ADSL)

I've been without broadband Internet at home for about three weeks - I was "between providers", so to speak.

Must say that, while I was still able to consume some of my daily Internet fix - browsing RSS feeds on my mobile phone -, it was at the same time a sobering experience of how embarrassingly ill adapted the applications on my Nokia N95 are to mobile Web 2.0 participation.

I'll probably remember this period best as the time when Doc Searls went in and out of hospital and blogged  it all. Good health and happiness to you, Doc!

Data speed is not the bottle neck. It's the lack of mobile client-side participatory software.

With my Nseries device and 3G coverage I could browse and email, but that was about it. No tagging, no digging, no blogging with any level of convenience.

So what I ended up doing was to bookmark the URLs I would have liked to tag, digg or blog and thus collect them in my mobile phone's browser for future reference.

I hope to catch up blogging some of those bookmarks over the coming days.

Dugg: The Internet Organizes Itself: Here Comes Everybody | Glenn Fleishman

"(...) Clay Shirky's (...) book "Here Comes Everybody" (The Penguin Press, 2008) explains his views on the power of individuals to organize into groups without companies, hierarchies, or outside efforts. (...)"

Glenn Fleishman writes:

"(...) I sat down with Clay on 14-Mar-08 to talk about the book for a short article that appeared in the Seattle Times, focused on the business side of his book. However, the Seattle Times allowed me to publish a podcast of our roughly 40-minute conversation. (...)"

The 40-minute podcast is indeed worth the listen. Clay talks about a lot of stuff, including the notion that we don't yet understand where the Internet will be taking us. And another thing I found quite interesting was his reference to "more is different", i.e. scale changes the nature of things (such as the Internet).

(via Charlie Schick, who adds on a personal note:

"(...) My tongue is bleeding, I am biting it so hard. Though a beer can loosen it, in case you are interesting in a tale of enlightenment, abandonment, discovery, creativity, stealing, cluelessness, and dissapointment. (...)"

Charlie, what's your favorite beer? Come visit and I'll put it cold for you.

read more | digg story

Blood from stone: Don't focus on ad revenue from social networking services | Charlie Schick

Charlie writes: "(...) Your core service drives the interaction with the customer, but the money can come from some other area.

But, be careful where you _think_ you can get the money. (...) Online social networking services thrive because they are a form of social lubrication. (...) Yes, social network is the concentrator, but what the folks end up doing is where the money's at. (...)"

Interesting comment from Stefan Constantinescu: "(...) recommendation engine may sound unsexy now, but they will LEAD the next generation of corporate buy outs and be the foundation for the services we use in the upcoming decade. (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: Poets of the Fall - unplugged at the Nokia HQ canteen | josschuurmans on Ovi

"Poets of the Fall" were playing live over lunch today in one of the canteens at Nokia House, the company's headquarters in Espoo, Finland. Recorded with a Nokia N95 and shared on Ovi.com.

read more | digg story

Dugg: Reuters' "mojo" experiments with Nokia | Jemima Kiss

"(...) Reuters' journalists are experimenting with the potential of mobile journalism through a project with Nokia's research centre. (...)"

read more | digg story

Can the Cellphone Help End Global Poverty? | New York Times

"(...) “Just in time” is a manufacturing concept that was popularized by the Japanese carmaker Toyota (...) Toyota became, in essence, lighter on its feet (...) There are a growing number of economists who maintain that cellphones can restructure developing countries in a similar way. Cellphones, after all, have an economizing effect. (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: Lifeblog: Scobleized! | Charlie Schick

"(...) He then whipped up his phone and started recording live, with questions coming from his audience.* I basically told him what we were up to in Social Media Communications and such.

(...) *Heck, this was real interactive TV and no one is calling it that. Interactive TV dies and then was reborn and no one noticed. (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: Review: Nokia DT-22 Universal Tripod | The Nokia Blog

"(...) I will review the Nokia Universal Tripod DT-22. Now that our phones can handle exceptional pictures and video, it is almost a necessity to have something that will keep our phone steady to capture precious or random moments. (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: Nseries PC Suite Graduates, I Agree It’s Ready | Symbian-Guru.com

"(...) The best new feature is the inclusion of Nokia Photos, which replaces the old ‘Image Store’ application, as well as Lifeblog, so it seems. The best part of this is that now, when you sync pictures and videos from your phone to your desktop, they’re no longer both stored lumped together in a folder in your My Photos folder! Videos are appropriately placed in their own folder within your My Videos folder in Windows XP, and pictures in their own folders within My Photos. I really love that, as it makes it so much easier to keep track of where things are at when it comes time to edit. (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: Nokia Nseries PC Suite graduates from Beta Labs | IntoMobile

"(...) The 300+ MB heavy suite is actually a collection of applications (Nokia Lifeblog, Content Copier, Nokia Application Installer, Nokia Multimedia Player, Nokia Music Manager, One Touch Access, PC Sync, Nokia Photos, Nokia Map Loader) that "seamlessly link your Nokia Nseries multimedia device and your PC."

read more | digg story

My first 100 days with EverNote (day 1)

I signed up for EverNote online yesterday and installed the beta for Windows today.

 

At least when sitting behind a PC, this beats writing notes in Notepad, which has been my practice until now. One thing I like is that all my notes are available in one chronological view within the same application. It is much easier to switch between notes than this way than between Notepad files in a Windows file directory.

 

The synchronization between the PC client and the online tool seems to work nicely. While staying logged in through Firefox, I've been switching between the browser and the PC client without problems so far.

 

In terms of features, as mentioned in the Web Tick (Wired?) article, an RSS feed could be really neat. That way, my public online persona, by way of my blog entries, could be captured by EverNote automatically.

 

Reversely, I'd very much like to blog straight from EverNote. Let's say that EverNote would publish /synchronize all notes tagged "www.josschuurmans.com" as blog entries through the TypePad API. Have to find out if something like this is possible.

 

Perhaps equally urgently, I'd really like a Symbian client, which would then compete rather heads-on with Nokia Lifeblog.

 

I wonder about compatibility. Can today's exports be read by next releases of EverNote? By other applications? Will there be an open source, more future-proof alternative?

 

I wonder about privacy. Is the CIA going to read my notes? Or rather Supo, who according to Sitemeter dropped in on my blog after I posted about the Jokela drama. Or my neighbor? Can it be hacked? Leaked?

 

I wonder about data security. Can EverNote guarantee sufficient physical backup? Should I do as Crhistian, and keep physical backups in several countries. (the answer is yes, of course)

 

I also wonder if the competition will be more reliable. Nokia is part of this value chain through the device input, Lifeblog and Ovi. Google can be. My email provider is.

 

Further, Flock comes to mind. Haven't heard much about the "social browser" lately. Sounded so nice, in particular - and most relevant to EverNote - the capturing functionalities.

 

Okay, so far so good: this works quite nicely as a blog post drafter/editor. So I think I won't spend too much time on Qumana.

Dugg: Fragility of Digital Life | Christian Lindholm

Christian Lindholm points out a problem that is becoming more and more pertinent as more and more people engage in digital lifelogging:

"(...) led me to export all my 30.000 items out of Lifeblog (...) a digital archive is vulnerable, I have made decent back-up's of my Lifeblog, have some in London, some in Finland on several HD's etc. still I feel extremely fragile. (...) I am sure most people are worse prepared than I am, the funny thing is I do not think people think about it until the hard disk crashes. (...)"

Which combination of reliable, future-proof software and physically distributed storage can put our minds at rest?

read more | digg story

Dugg: Nokia Morph Concept Phone Revealed Today | Concept Phones

"(...) Morph, a joint nanotechnology concept, developed by Nokia Research Center (NRC) and the University of Cambridge (UK) - was launched [on February 25] alongside the "Design and the Elastic Mind" exhibition, on view from February 24 to May 12, 2008, at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York. (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: The Morph concept | Nokia.com / YouTube

"(...) Featured in The Museum of Modern Art “Design and The Elastic Mind” exhibition, the Morph concept device is a bridge between highly advanced technologies and their potential benefits to end-users. (...)"

"(...) Morph is a concept demonstrating some of the possibilities nanotechnologies might enable in future communication devices. Morph can sense its environment, is energy harvesting and self cleaning .

Morph is a flexible two-piece device that can adapt its shape to different use modes. Nanotechnology enables to have adaptive materials yet rigid forms on demand.

It is also featured in the MoMA online exhibition "Design and the Elastic Mind". It has been a collaboration project of Nokia Research Center and Cambridge Nanoscience Center. (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: Nokia and University of Cambridge launch the Morph | Nokia press release

"(...) Morph, a joint nanotechnology concept, developed by Nokia Research Center (NRC) and the University of Cambridge (UK) - was launched [on February 25] alongside the "Design and the Elastic Mind" exhibition, on view from February 24 to May 12, 2008, at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York.

(...) Morph is a concept that demonstrates how future mobile devices might be stretchable and flexible, allowing the user to transform their mobile device into radically different shapes.  It demonstrates the ultimate functionality that nanotechnology might be capable of delivering: flexible materials, transparent electronics and self-cleaning surfaces. (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: Nokia remade | Raphael Grignani

"(...) With Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo presenting a short video of the REMADE mobile phone during the Mobile World Congress 2008, I am able to share one of the case-studies addressing sustainability our team* has been working on passionately. (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: Nokia 'Remade' concept | YouTube

"(...) Nokia has released a short video showing a new concept from our design team exploring how recycled materials could be used to make mobiles in the future.

The idea behind the "remade" concept was to see if it was possible to create a device made from nothing new. It has been designed using recycled materials that avoid the need for natural resources, reduce landfill, and allow for more energy efficient production.

It is made out of metals from upcycled aluminum cans, plastics from drink bottles form the chassis, and its rubber key mats are provided by old car tyres. Inside the phone are new more environmentally friendly technologies such as printed electronics, and the graphics used on the display save energy without compromising on style.

Remade is a concept that explores potential new ideas for the future, and is part of Nokia's ongoing work looking at how it can help people make more sustainable choices. It is designed to help inspire and stimulate discussion on how mobile devices might be made in the future.(...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: How to set up Podzinger's personalized podcast search feed

Steven explains on the S60 blog how you can set up a permanent text search for podcast content on Podzinger, and have it fed via RSS to the Nokia Podcasting application on your S60 mobile phone.

read more | digg story

Dugg: Andrew Keen is the Anti-Chris

In this podcast Moira Gunn speaks with author Andrew Keen, who claims that today's Internet is killing our culture. With descriptions like "dystopia", "Orwellian nightmare", and "tyranny of the amateurs", Keen explicitly disagrees with Chris Anderson on the virtues of the Long Tail and the abundance of free content.

Anderson's more optimistic views on emerging economies of abundance and the business of "free" are well captured in another podcast on IT Conversations from June 2007, as well as in his keynote at the Nokia World event in Amsterdam, in December 2007 (which I blogged about earlier today).

Keen describes Web 2.0 as a stage in the development of the Internet in which businesses attempt to build revenue models around user-generated content, whereas during Web 1.0 businesses explored the Internet as a new distribution channel for their existing, professionally produced content.

read more | digg story

Dugg: Chris Anderson: 'Free' | Nokia World 2007

(streaming video and downloadable .mp3)

At the Nokia World event in Amsterdam in December 2007, Chris Anderson discussed themes from his upcoming book, 'Free', in which he argues that when the price of production and distribution of (digital) content (and services) approaches zero, you might as well treat it as if it were free, and sell something else.

Open your mind to create new business models around "free", in an economy of abundance.

We are entering a world in which every way that content (and even physical products) can be created, WILL be tried, because it costs next to nothing to do so.

The old scarcities are: time + money. The new scarcities are: time + money + attention + reputation.

When working with Intel, Chris tells, they did a thought experiment. What about, instead of selling hardware and software as 1+1, selling it perhaps as 0+2?

Is Chris suggesting that Nokia should give its devices away for free in order to sell MORE services?
Could and should we move from selling hardware+software as 1+1, towards 0+morethan2?

To put it more urgently: is this the ONLY way to go?

read more | digg story

Listen to my blog!

I signed up to test Odiogo's text-to-speech solution for blog content and was happy to receive an email with the following:

[STARTS]

Hi there,

We’re happy to inform you that the audio version of your RSS feed is now available at the following urls:

Audio Enriched RSS Feed:

http://podcasts.odiogo.com/www-josschuurmans-com/podcasts-xml.php     

This is your Odiogo RSS Feed.

Odiogo Control Page:
http://podcasts.odiogo.com/www-josschuurmans-com/podcasts-html.php

This page allows to:

- Perform a 1-click subscription of your Odiogo feed to major podcast clients (iTunes, Juice) Please note that the text content is embedded into the audio file and can be viewed through the lyrics option of your iPod and on some other mp3 players. More information on http://blog.odiogo.com/index.php/2007/08/31/new-feature-listen-and-read-blog-posts-on-your-ipod/

- Subscribe to Web RSS readers such as MyYahoo!, netvibes, google, etc.

- Share the control page with Facebook, Del.ico.us, Digg, etc.

- Stream the audio articles of your blog

- Listen to the individual audio posts

As a TypePad user, you can leverage our new Listen Button feature which displays a listen button above each post.

To install the plugin, just browse to http://www.odiogo.com/listen_button_typepad.php?feed_id=64247 and follow the instructions.

Your Odiogo Feed ID is 64247.

The Subscribe button gives access to all the options provided by the Odiogo system. You can add it to your blog by ticking the Subscribe tick box.

We advise you to review our FAQ and our blog; they both provide with tips for enhancing and promoting the service on your blog.

Please note that by using the Odiogo service you signify your acceptance of our attached Terms of Service (TOS).

Feel free to contact us if you have any questions at support@odiogo.com.

We hope you’ll enjoy using our service.

Odiogo Customer Support

http://www.odiogo.com

support@odiogo.com

[ENDS]

To listen to blog content while on the move, type an Odogio feed's URL into the podcast application on your Nokia Series60 mobile phone, e.g. like this:

Menu -> Applications -> Podcasting -> Podcasts -> Options -> New podcast -> Podcast URL: (type: http://podcasts.odiogo.com/www-josschuurmans-com/podcasts-xml.php) -> OK -> (click, click, listen!)

Where I am in Nokia

Indoor Positioning is a Symbian application, which indicates a mobile device's current location within a building (where GPS normally does not work).

With the phone application you can decide if you want to share your indoor position with others. If you decide to share your position it is sent to a server and your colleagues can see where you have been seen last.

Developed in Nokia Alpha Labs (restricted access), Nokia's Internet services and applications developer community, the application is based on WLAN technology. It runs on Nokia S60 3rd edition phones that have WLAN support, for example: E51, E60, E61, E65, E70, E90, N80, N91, N92, N93, N95.

The following Nokia sites and public buildings are currently integrated:

    * Helsinki-Vantaa airport
    * Hervanta
    * Karaportti
    * Nokia House
    * Palo Alto
    * Peltola
    * Pitäjänmäki
    * Ruoholahti

Alpha Labs is a place where ideas and prototypes mature to market trials in Nokia Beta Labs.

Nordic Nokia executives...

Quote from the International Herald Tribune:

"(...) Nokia's executives describe their own impressions in flat, unemotional terms that would seem scripted, if they were not Nordic.(...)"

Dugg: Nokia's innovation story part 2 - Internet innovation | Stephen Johnston - ThreeDimensionalPeople

"(...) Internet innovation is an unwieldy beast, and I'll divide it up by stakeholder group - customers, employees and partners / developers. I leave out shareholders here, since they are the outcome, not the input to these efforts. So, what does Internet innovation mean to each of these groups for Nokia? (...)"

read more | digg story

Dugg: Nokia's innovation story, Part 1 - key trends | Stephen Johnston - ThreeDimensionalPeople

This is a gem. Wonderful integrated trend analysis by Stephen Johnston, based in large part on his work for the annual Nokia WorldMap, a strategy project within the company's Insight & Foresight team.

"(...) If Amazon can use its smarts to get me to a buy a book based on my behaviour, why not allow someone to recommend what car I should be driving based on an analysis of my actual life, not just the slice of me inferred by my purchasing habits on one book-orientated website. (...)"

read more | digg story

What's the top life recorder for the season?

Christian,

How are things at Fjord? And yourself?

JIT for Xmas, perhaps a good moment to give us an update on your favorite life recorder?

With the Nokia N73, you picked your 2006 cameraphone already in August of that year.

Later in 2006 you seemed charmed by the Nokia N95.

I know, "life recorder" does not equal "cameraphone"... but still. With a two-year-old running around and his brother or sister on the way, I want to use Lifeblog to its fullest potential - that means, among other things: with the best hardware.

Funny really, when we spoke about Nokia Lifeblog beta in 2004, and you confided that first-time parents would be a major target group for the application, I didn't quite buy that.

I thought the memory prosthesis was just as compelling a proposition to any Internet-savvy DINKer like myself.

But now I know better. With kids, you just don't want to compromise on the quality and ease of use of recording their young lives.

So, how about it? Give us your take! :-)

Best wishes from Espoo and Mäntyharju,
Jos

Dugg: New Kyte User Guides | Kyte blog

The Kyte team created new user guides to help people get started using Kyte on the web or with their mobile phones: Kyte Quick Start Guide; Kyte Mobile Guide; Kyte Nokia Web Upload Guide.

read more | digg story

Dugg: Nokia N95 Tips | Kyte blog

Instruction video showing how to increase the Nokia N95's battery life by change the WLAN power consumption settings and by draining the battery a couple of times.

read more | digg story

Kyte video from N95 via Lifeblog

I just posted the second show on my Kyte channel, "josschuurmans", titled 'Kyte video from N95 via Lifeblog'. It's a little video clip that I recorded after changing trains in Kouvola on my way home last evening.

But before I did that, I first recorded a clip on the platform, while changing trains, with a Nokia N95.

In this show, I'm trying to share how I uploaded the first (platform) clip to the Nokia Lifeblog application on my PC, after which I would upload to Kyte to post-produce and broadcast it.

Next, I will produce and broadcast that first clip from the train platform, and then I'll try to describe my experience of producing the clip on Kyte.

Linking up with Kyte.tv's Daniel Graf

Daniel Graf was at Nokia HQ here in Espoo today to demo his Kyte.tv. The San Francisco-based mobile video sharing company announced on June 12 that it had received funding from Nokia's investment arm, Nokia Growth Partners.

Pretty interesting stuff. I'm going to set up an account and try it out here on my blog. At the same time, I'll try and get a feel for Kyte's suitability for intranet video sharing purposes.

Daniel calls it "mobile socialcasting". Kyte's concept of distributed video channels, rather than stand-alone video clips, seems quite powerful. A video channel is immediately updated with the latest video that its creator posts to it. This can be done as least as easily from an S60 mobile phone as from a PC.

The content can be made more conversational and response-provoking by dragging-and-dropping interactivity modules

Feedback is also very immediate: viewers can reply instantly by text chat, video, still images, or audio clips.

Lifeblog is a blogging application!

Yes it is, Ivan! :-)

Granted, Nokia Lifeblog is foremost an attempt at a memory prosthesis, as Christian Lindholm explained in that interview before the launch of the beta version in 2004.

Gordon Bell is making a more thorough attempt, albeit one that would be unpractical for the Nokia Multimedia Business Group's target customers at this stage. But don't worry, we'll get there. (See also Wikipedia: "lifelog")

The content you consciously capture (photos, video, sound, text) is part of that extended memory, as is the context information which mobile devices will be able to capture for you in the background. Both consciously created or selected content and less consciously captured context are part of our human memory, so the metaphor still applies.

As you mention, Ivan, content and contextual information is not all that valuable unless it can be searched. True, or, to put it in somewhat broader terms: real value is derived from all that information only when you start using it.

Now, this is where the onions come in.

Huh?

Trust your life to a piece of Nokia

The following text is a condensed version of an article published on Nokia's intranet (restricted access) on March 11, 2004. I've omitted part of the original text for reasons of company confidentiality and the confidentiality of interviewees.

[STARTS]

Trust your life to a piece of Nokia

By Jos Schuurmans March 11, 2004, 16:00

HELSINKI, Finland. -- A dozen brains at NVO Multimedia Applications in Ruoholahti have combined their visions of mobility, their entrepreneurial spirit, technological expertise and marketing skill to work on... the "memory prosthesis".

Well, sure, there you have an exaggerated metaphor. No external device is likely to replace the human brain any time soon. But the larger idea certainly holds water and the first tangible result of their efforts will be version 1.0 of Lifeblog, a preview of which will be shown at the CeBIT fair in Hanover, Germany, next week.

NVO Multimedia Applications team's Director Christian Lindholm has been pushing the case for usability within Nokia for a long time. He invented the Navi-key and has, more recently, been standing at the crib of the Series 60 platform, which he is now actively promoting and developing.

Dugg: Media event: 'The Way We Live Next' | Nokia.com

"(...) In the “The Way We Live Next” technology media event a team of technology experts and visiona