Goddamn...

Now, the page this links leads to is in Swedish, but it's just too weird not to comment on. It leads to a Christianity test at a Swedish congregations webpage, which I took - it only took some minutes, but all the questions were quite leading and the answers more so. I was hoping that it would've been an ironically geared webpage - sort of "yeah, you THOUGHT that we were this fundamental and narrow-sighted, but ha! alas not!" - but it turned out that all the questions and all the answers were quite seriously meant.

So, having completed the test I am, according to the test, a Satanist. Something which I strongly deny, of course. I believe the good people of said congregation should take a long, hard look in the mirror, remember the one important message that Jesus spoke - "LOVE THY NEIGHBOUR" - and some minor ones as well, most particularly the one about the one without sin being the one to throw the first stone.

Fundamentalists - one of the most annoying things on earth.

* * *

Update - having become a lil' but suspect about some of the other content on the site, I started searching for more info on said congregation... and, luckily enough, it all turned out to be an elaborate, pretty old hoax. Phew. Scary thing is that even though the congergation and its webpage is a hoax, quite a few people have reportedly wanted to join the congregation... well, fundamentalists still suck :)

Transparency - new interactive cinema

There are a lot of things happening in the world of interactive content and interactive narrative. New devices and new technologies offers opportunities to do loads of stuff previously unimaginable. Some - like me and my colleagues - work with creating interactive tv formats, which have a potential to sell on the national or international market. Others do something else, equally important, but in a different sense.

A friend of mine, Carlos from Portugal, har just finished his cinematographic project, called 'Transparency', as a part of his research into interactive narrative content. It's a storyline that the viewer himself/herself can influence, to create a number of different storylines and outcomes. It's ambitious, it's complicated, it's nice. Go have a look, while I return to my slightly more commercial products :)

How to be a renowned blogger

So, finally, we all know what to do to get lots and lots of hits on our blogs. It's simple, really:

1) Have original and good stuff to write about
2) Build up a massive network
3) Make sure you get some scoops - like the Watergate scandal I presume
4) Advertise ad infinitum

Hm. Original content, scoops, massive network and humongous amounts of advertisement. I wonder what WOULDN'T sell with that combination? Here's the original article about how to get your blog seen (or rather "Become An Internet Source") , in Swedish though.

Back in business

Back in Vasa, which is nice. Wales was pretty good too. Will upload some photos to my Flickr-page, so's anyone interested can have a look.

Even managed to bring home some cans of Ddraig Dwbl - Double Dragon Ale, which in my opinion is rather nice. But security at airports nowadays, it's just no fun anymore. Having purchased a bottle of 14y Scapa at Heathrow, the clerk forgot to put it in a sealed bag for me, and I forgot to ask for such a bag. Hence, coming to Arlanda, I had to pass through another security check to get to the proper terminal and gate. Alas, though, since the UNOPENED bottle of Scapa was not in a sealed and stamped bag, I could not bring it through security. Since all reasoning fell on deaf ears, I had to go out through customs and check my bottle in separately. Wrapped in acres of plastic it even somehow managed to travel from Stockholm to Vasa wihtout breaking.

Sometimes, it would be good if one could reason with people.

* * *

One of the photos on my Flickr-page is of a huge congregation of starling in the skies above Aberystwyth. For some pretty funky moving images of this phenomena, check Rhodris blog, and the uppermost YouTube-feed.

Cymraeg!

This is actually the first time I update this blog via a television set, which is done from a hotel room in Cardiff, or Caerdidd if you happen to be speaking Welsh. (Someone should however do some serious usability testing on these keyboards. Not only are they small and uncomfortable - the arrow keys are thinner than Kate Moss' silhouette and I have yet to find the Tab-key - but the mouse-and-right-click-and-left-click system is just ridiculous.

Still, this is a bit along the way of what interactive television should look like. The system is apparently called eTV - as good a name as any - and functions all in all pretty well. Except you cant get to all the webpages you want to go to, the resolution is like one on a frightened 386 PC with Windows 3.1, there is no sight of IPTV, the possibilites are limited.

Still, better than what I have at home, I must admit. Looking forward to something like this, only better, reaching my neighbourhood.

Caerdidd btw is a nice city. Especially down by the harbor, where lots and lots of new and interesting buildings have sprung up over the past few years - the Assembly, the Red Dragon and of course The Welsh Millennium Centre. Two things though - "Millennium" sounds awfully late 90s, and the gigantic thing on top of the entrance is just plain silly. Must've been a good laugh, though.

Aberystwth tomorrow, looking forward to it.

Orgasmatron!

For everyone wondering what to buy their loved ones for their next birthday, look no further than the ORGASMATRON. No, it's not really excactly what it sounds like - but quite close :)

And, if you haven't got quite enough of stuff already, and feel like doshing out some 10€ on some totally useless bling, go get this little indispensible thingee - who wouldn't want a monkey dancing everytime you receive an SMS?

And for those things you really CAN do without, check out TechEBlogs list of seven gadgets you would NOT want to be seen using. Amazing stuff.

Gadgets. Gotta love'em.

* * *

On another, still funny note - have you ever wanted to write a speech for George W. Bush? Now's your chance! Interestingly enough - however I try to put silly wordcombinations together, it still sounds like the real thing... scary :)

More on the iPhone

Some enlightening clips with regards to the iPhone and it's impact on the VOIP and telephone market. First off, Microsoft CEO Ballmer, on CNBC-TV, tries feebly to laugh off the threat from the slick new face on the block. I'd say he's a bit worried, though...

For a closer look at the iPhone, have a look at CBS report from MacWorld. Pretty impressive display of the iPhone, but 500$? Hmm... But my Gawd, it's a really nice gagdet.

And, finally, Conan O'Brians take on the iPhone. Even more impressive :)

Told you so! (or did I...?)

In October, everything was looking rosy and nice. Vodafone launched their mobile TV channel, in exclusive cooperation with BT:s Movio-service, giving their 4.5 million mobile phone customers in the UK access to loads and loads of mobile TV content (and of course anyone else who'd like some mobile TV as well).

Now? Well, a good thing is that there was a surge of new subscribers around Christmas. A bad thing is that the surge amounted to no more than 2,000 persons, with the total amount of subscribers amounting to no more than 7,000 persons as of yesterday.

There is a nice phrase in the English language to describe a situation like this.

It's called "tits up", and that's what Virgin Mobile TV has gone.

The next big thing, or the straw that broke the camels back?

Just a quick note to comment on the biggest hype in the mobile industry these past few days - the Apple iPhone, combining internet telephony with the usual iPod stuff, adding internet communication for good measure.

At first glance, it's a nifty thing. Just the stuff we've come to expect from Apple, still frontrunners when it comes to slick and stylish gadgets, with a potential for multi-million-dollar sales.

At second glance, it's still nifty. There is, however, the question of the pricing. The cheaper model retails at about 420 €, which is a helluva lot of cash to splash out on something that most people have - a phone, an mp3-player and an Internetconnection. Only thing is that this time these are all bunched together in this little piece.

My two cents? It'll sell. But it won't sell the 10 million units by 2008 that Apple are hoping for. With internet telephony on rapid rise, there will be an abundance of competitors - and probably cheaper competitors at that. Best of luck to Apple, though, You still make the best-looking gadgets on the market.

A good link, if you want to read about VoIP and internet telephony, is this magazine. Happy reading!

* * *

As a side note - anyone but me getting a little bit worried about consumer hysteria? We had a brief discussion about this at work the other day - I mean, people are throwing out perfectly good tv-sets, because they need / want / got to have a 42" LCD tv instead. About 100,000,000,000 VCR-players are getting tucked into the wastebin so as to make way for the DVD-player, which in turn is getting ditched for the HD-DVD-player. Now iPhones, so we can get rid of our ancient, two year old iPods and mp3-players, as well as our mobile phones and all other unnecessary stuff.

My point is - it's all well and good that the market is going forward. But without a backwards glance now and again, we risk leaving a trail of waste behind us that'll take generations to clean up.

Well, a short piece

With an absurd amount of stuff to do atm, I will not be in a position to update this blog in the coming few days with anything of real importance.

Well, excluding this little piece of extremely valuable information - every tip there is to give about how to perform the ultimate search on Google. Actually quite handy - there are a lot of other things you can write besides "+" and "OR" if you want to find what you're searching for.

Happy Googling, everyone :)

A change in the power hierarchy?

...or just a small ripple on the water?

Looking to the Scandinavian TV market, which by default is a pretty small one compared to the big ones out there, there are a few relatively big players on the scene. Aside from the public service broadcasters - big in their own right, but not really into the market-side of it all - you have amongst others the fairly big Zodiak Television World, sporting a growing content library, format catalogue and increasing international sales. Now, though, the second person to leave Zodiak and head for competitors Nordisk Film is former Zodiak VP Jan Salling. This coming hot on the heels of Nordisk Film announcing the creation of a new company - Co+TV, in cooperation with advertising agency Co+Hogh - focusing on the development of creative content and tv formats for the international market, it smells like the competition is heating up a bit.

Guess who's leading this foray into new territories? Jacob Houlind, who left Zodiak in 2006 for Nordisk Film. So, expect interesting times in the Scandinavian TV market in the coming months...

Apologies to all English-speakers...

..this here is going to be a bit more about the Swedish language. See, every year the Swedish Language Board gives out a list of new words that have been incorporated into the Swedish language.

Personal favourites this year have to be:

flexidaritet: kombination av solidaritet och flexibilitet, slagord i centerpartiet; 2006
genuskänslig: uppmärksam på skillnader i villkoren för kvinnor och män; 2006
latteliberal: alltför liberal; oäkta liberal
sverka: klaga på inköpt vara som man är missnöjd med; bildat till Sverker Olofsson i tv-programmet Plus
tjejkött: kött som tjejer brukar föredra (kyckling, kalkon)

For the full list, please visist this page. Fun stuff :)

More and more mobile television

Looks like everyone and their grandmother are convinced that mobile television is da sh*t, at least if you look at all the new offerings jumping up left and right. In the UK, for instance, you have 3 and mobile media company Player X teaming up to offer the properly named Geek TV. The channel offers made-for-mobile content, but also full length tv shows, like Miami Vice. I'd like to watch that, if I could...

In other news from the mobile tv market, analysts at ABI Research predict that the emerging market in China will have 32 million mobile video users by 2008. That's quite a lot. The major upswing for mobile video in China is thought to be the Olympics in 2008 - I mean, who wouldn't want to watch women shot put qualifiers on their 1,5"x1" screens? I for one will be glued to my mobile.

To conclude - it just doesn't look like mobile tv is going to go away. So for all of us in the content industry, there is just one thing left to do: figure out how to make good content for the smallest of screens. Piece of cake, right? Right.

Gimme a bandwagon...

...and I'll happily jump on it :)

Fear not, I have not yet started to "express myself" on youtube (although at the rate this is going, it won't be long :) ... no, just thought I'd upload some stuff to the best photo-sharing and -storing website on the net, Flickr.

My aim is to show that it is quite possible to take good photos using sub-standard equipment - in this case, my more-than-two year old Nokia 6630 phone with 1,3 Mpix camera (and a fair amount of scratches on the lens to go).

More to come soon, I hope!

Wow...

...and not WoW as in World of Warcraft, but rather Wow as in "Wow, I really would like to have one of those!".

"One of those" is one of the new nifty little thingies developed by Agere Systems, "a global leader in semiconductors and software solutions for storage, mobility and networking markets." While this does not sound exactly interesting, their new offering, the BluOnyx Mobile Content Server certainly does. It is a small, credit card sized storage server, with the size ranging from 1Gb to 40Gb (and the prize ranging accordingly). It allows the user to store material and data, and transfer it to and from just about anything - mobile phones, digital cameras, PCs, Gameboxes etc, using wireless, USB and SD solutions.

So now the little BluOnyx lets you get something you downloaded to your PC, wirelessly transfer it to the BluOnyx server and later on watch it on your mobile phone on your way home from work. Or just about any other combination you can think of. One nifty little thing is their coined "Digital Campfire"-possibility - put the BluOnyx on a table and let all the friends around the table access it with their mobile phones.

Short of the slightly tacky name, it's simply great.

So, please please mr Santa, one of these, ok?

What to do this year...

Well, in a strictly professional way of looking at things, there are quite a few interesting conferences and meetings one could attend. If funds would be available, and time as well, that is... :)

A cornerstone in the television industry year is NATPE, the National Association of Television Program Executives, and the biggest industry meeting in the US of the year. This year held at the Mandalay Bay Resort in Las Vegas on the 15th-18th of January, they will - apart from the usual buying and selling - devote the whole of the first day to mobile television. Could be fairly interesting, with subjects ranging from "lessons learned from the IPTV roll-out" to "Alternative Reality: Does Primetime Still Matter?"

Keeping up the steam nicely is the Mobile TV World Congress, to be held in France on the 23-26.1.2007, concentrating on one of the most hyped things around at the moment - mobile television.

The IPTV World Forum, to be held in London on the 5-7.3.2007 is also mighty interesting. The three days are themed differently - day one is "Making a business of IPTV", day two is "Competitive Services" and day three "Threats and Opportunities". Could be well worth to check it out, seeing that many of the leading figures and companies in the industry will attend.

And then, of course, we have the one to dwarf them all - MIPTV featuring MILIA, this year to be held fairly late in April, on the 16-20.4.2007. With close to 13.000 people attending and business reaching multi-billion dollar levels, this will be quite a good place to be.

That's what the spring looks like - so pack your bags and let's go! ;)


* * *

One more thing - the melding and meshing of media has never been this intense. The latest news report that the Sundance TV Channel will open up a screening room for its offerings in Second Life - an online MMORPG. Pretty neat, and also just another step towards the future, where media itself becomes less and less important (no more "am I hearing this on an mp3-player, on my phone, on the net, or where?" or "hmm wonder if my DVD-player supports .wmv-files?") and the content is what matters.

Bring it on, I say. I, for one, cannot wait.