Chiperoni ku Basel

Author: nchenga

  • sunset



  • Return of the Blog

    Gigaom recently published an article that highlights an important point. A point that has been resonating through my head since Lift 07:

    In this incredible sea of data that surround us, what happens to my data when a service like Twitter or Flickr or FriendFeed is sold to another company.

    Gigaom writes:

    The cynical me believes that it’s foolish for any of us to expect that Web 2.0 companies be in the business of providing services for charity. They are, after all, for-profit entities and when opportunity arises, everyone looks out for themselves. That’s just the way of the world.

    I really like Flickr, Twitter and I recently started using Friendfeed more actively. Mainly ‘cos I can search thru my Twitter content more easily.

    But… what happens when these services are discontinued?

    It is my data. I am the owner. As the owner I want:

    1. To be able to download a backup copy when I want to
    2. Close, shut down and delete all of my data whenever I want to
    3. Control who sees which data, where and when

    These are my minimum requirements for online, interactive web applications. Sound easy and straightforward.

    End of topic. Well, not quite.

    Many web applications – and I’m kind of shying away from the omnipresent social media / social network term here – don’t offer an easy Export/Backup all of my data/Batch Download function.

    Flickr Batch Download
    Consider Flickr, by all measures one of the more established and mature tools. If you click Get Help this dropdown menu displays:

    Flickr Help Topics

    It doesn’t list an item how to download photos. titles, descriptions and comments or create a backup of photos and comments using a batch downloader or similar.

    The tools page only lists applications to upload files.

    Flickr Tools to upload and share

    Apparently, the export feature is being discussed in the Help forums. I know that there are lots of threads, discussing download tools for Flickr, ‘cos I was worried about my data at Flickr. Yes, every dedicated photographer has a backup system in place for their photos.

    There are some third party tools like Downloadr (I haven’t tested this yet).

    Here’s an example how to create a backup of your Twiitter content using Dave Winer’s OPML tool:

    How To: Backup And Search All Your Friends’ Tweets In Google Reader

    But, my point is: the effort is on the users’ side. And I know many users forget or ignore this. Luckily, the RSS format offers a number of options.

    One way street
    Signing up and uploading is made as easy as possible. I have years of data at Flickr and I really like the application. So far the benefits outweigh the downsides by far. I like sharing my photos at Flickr. But since I signed up, Flickr was purchased by Yahoo and now Yahoo is partnering with Microsoft. Who knows what will happen in the next 1-3 years? A good web application should offer a batch export/download function.

    My advice if you’re signing up for a web application:

    • Be aware of the fact that most web apps are one way streets. They are in the data business. They want your data to display on their website for business reasons.
    • Read the terms and conditions carefully.
    • Find out how you can export or download your data beforehand.
    • Find out how you can close and delete your account.
    • Be prepared to spend time and resources to learn the web application that you are using. Learn the advantages as well the disadvantages of the web application. It is important that you acquire web skills.
    • A good web application should offer a batch export/download function. If it isn’t available, ask for it. Remember: It’s your data.
    • Build your own blog. Get involved in building your own website. Your blog is your mothership. Consider services such as Twitter and Friendfeed as fast and zippy spaceship shuttles that bring visitors to your mothership. Rather than feeding Facebook and co., you will experience a learning curve that will benefit you in many other areas.
    • Develop your research skills. We need independent, ad-free blogs more than ever.

    Remember the continuous bootstrap curve.

    Gigaom writes:

    But somewhere between my cynicism and people’s Utopian desires lies a happy place. It’s called the blog.

    Your Opinion…
    What are your thoughts on this? How are you backing up your Flickr and Twitter and Facebook and Friendfeed and Google data? Do you care what happens to your data? What precautions are you taking?

  • cook a lot



  • Marc, Macke, and Delaunay



    I liked this show at Sprengel Museum.

  • looking up



  • Rhybadhysli



  • Study weekend + Long walk

    I spent most of my weekend working and discussing my MBA homework.

    Learning about:

    • the exchange equation
    • money supply
    • the monetarists’ first and second proposition
    • the cause of inflation
    • incremental cash costs
    • motivating employees – “interesting work” seems to be a universal motivator

    This afternoon I went for a long walk up to St. Chrischona (522 m. above sea level). Lots of bikers and hikers and joggers and nordic walkers were out there as well. There are some beautiful wheat fields. Need to go back with a camera

    Watching youtube videos on Milton Friedman that @lotm sent me.

  • Wasser



  • Blogging is Dead. Long Live Blogging.

    This morning I read a phrase which captures why I blog:

    “…now my attitude is that if I’m not blogging for myself it’s not worth it” (seen at ma.tt)

    Between you and me, I don’t care if blogging is dying. Let the social media experts decide. What I do care about is writing. I like the way I can capture and organize thoughts through writing.

    Maybe one day I will become a writer. Maybe not.

    In the meantime this is my niche at Chiperoni.ch.

  • Cloud spotting: the pointing finger

    the pointing finger

    I took snapshots of clouds (and pool water) at the local swimming pool (in Swiss German: that’s a Badi…).

    This looks like a hand raised at school to answer a question, or maybe somebody is pointing out something:

    “Can you see the silver lining? Every cloud has one”

  • Malawi Twitterers

    As Malawi celebrates independence day tomorrow, here is a list of Malawi twitterers you might like to follow:

    Vincent Kumwenda – currently at Muloza border, Mulanje; topics include Malawi news, world news, interesting Malawi web pages, and soccer. He also writes a blog.

    Fred Bvalani – in Blantyre; tweets about mobile applications and phones, Oracle training in freezing cold Cape Town, Manchester United, movies, church, Escom power cuts, and Malawi news and websites. Check out his blog.

    Dannie Grant Phiri – first started twittering during the recent Malawi elections; writes about Malawi and soccer in his blog at http://daniso.weebly.com/.

    Soyapi Mumba – well-known Malawi blogger and twitterer, software developer, volunteer developer at Ushahidi, lives in Lilongwe. He writes about software development, interesting mobile and web applications, Malawi news. He is the programmer behind Owinna – a web app on Malawi football league fixtures and results, as well as the Premier league and other international championships. You can access this information through the website or SMS by texting FOLLOW owinna to +447624801423 or on Twitter.

    Clement Nyirenda – blogs and twitters from Tokyo, where he is doing a PhD in computer science. He covers many IT and development topics related to Malawi. A good resource to learn about projects such as Seacom. He discusses entrepreneurial ventures and their effect on Malawi. Read his blog post on Ashton Kutcher’s Twitter stunt to raise awareness about malaria.

    There are many more, which I might mention in a second blog post.

  • Requirements

    This web project manager had a requirement blackout today. In a meeting at the day job somewhere in Switzerland, I seriously couldn’t remember if the tool that I evaluated six months ago – and which I am now using – runs on a Microsoft server.

    (Err… Microsoft server? Was that a requirement? )

    Sometimes memory fails. I haz a sad.

    And time to start planning the vacation…

    Bonus link on an unrelated topic:

    The cathedral plus the bazaar

  • Social Media News Room

    Twitter / Home

    Cyberwiter posted the above tweet on using social media to enhance your company’s online news room.

    The article lists ways how to aggregate text, images, audio and video to make it useful for corporations and their target audience.

    Ein gutgemachter Social Media Newsroom ist essentiell für die Online-PR: Er …

    1. eröffnet einen schnellen Zugang zu den wichtigsten Unternehmensinhalten
    2. lebt von aktuellen und vielfältigen Inhalten, die möglichst täglich erneuert werden
    3. ist komplett per RSS abonnierbar und individualisierbar
    4. basiert auf Pull-Elementen und nicht auf Push
    5. spricht Journalisten wie andere Influencer gleichermaàŸen an
    6. verweist nicht nur auf die eigenen, sondern auch auf fremde Quellen (Verlinkung)
    7. öffnet seinen Pressespiegel für alle (Social Bookmarking erleichtert das)
    8. ermöglicht den schnellen Kontakt für einen Dialog (Twitter, Facebook, Skype, etc.)
    9. nutzt Real-Time-Elemente (Livestreaming auf Basis von Twitter oder Friendfeed)
    10. erleichtert die Vernetzung mit den Ansprechpartnern im Unternehmen
    11. bietet reichhaltiges lizenzfreies Video- und Bild-Material (gerne auch Pod- oder Vodcasts)
    12. fordert alle Besucher zu Copy & Paste auf
    13. regt Online-Diskussionen auf anderen Plattformen (Facebook, Twitter, Blogs etc.) an
    14. Integriert eigene Corporate Blogs und Microblogs
    15. bringt die News des Unternehmens zum Laufen

    The article lists a number of corporate examples.

    The web consultant hiding here at Chiperoni headquarters (errr… me!) believes this is one way corporations can profit from new media technologies.

    • Build a better online newsroom using these new distribution channels. Instead of sitting on the sidelines commenting on the quality of content. While I don’t know which services will survive the next couple of years, I do know that the real-time web is here to stay. Unless we run out off electricity to power all of the server farms.
    • Start small. Grow incrementally. Bring lots of endurance and patience. Remember that most people stop blogging after 3 months. A large percentage of Twitter is dormant.
    • Avoid PR speak. Press releases no longer target journalists alone. Publish useful content that supports the buying process. Read David Meerman Scott’s book.
    • Aggregate useful content. Become a subject matter expert on the web.
    • Offer a quality filter for your company’s specific area of expertise. Don’t try to copy private bloggers or twitterers. Be authentic and personable. But don’t swamp us with blog posts and tweets from your coffee break. And please do check for spelling mistakes. I expect a newsroom to have a higher quality.

    And I’m not only talking. I have been using blogging technology and RSS feeds within a company context for over four years.

    My experience… some traditional PR distribution services still don’t understand that it’s important to be included in Google News.

    It is. Whether you like Google or not.

    A newsroom is more than just collecting and archiving press releases…

    To build a community around Twitter or Facebook or similar, you will need a concept and a company policy regarding behavior in your communities. And before you quote me wrongly. I am not saying your company should start a Twitter or Facebook channel. Think about your time resources and goals beforehand. Ultimately you will want to draw people to your site or sub-sites. And there may be a different way that is better suited for your corporate environment. And most importantly, read the TOS before you start posting your content on third party sites.

    See my simple WordPress prototype here – a quick test install to demonstrate how WordPress can be used for a simple corporate newsroom.

    I need to run and finish my MBA assignments for today…

  • red and white



  • Connections

    As social media is becoming more mainstream, I find I am discussing various tools and voicing my opinion in many daily situations.

    Half-geek that I am, I have explored quite a few tools over the years.

    For instance I find myself explaining:

    • Why I deleted my Xing and LinkedIn accounts. Why it’s not such a good idea to list all of my customers on Xing. That I didn’t really get any good networking results on Xing and LinkedIn. There’s a lot of showing off and spam. Cos of my Marketing IT profile I was contacted by dozens of IT outsourcing providers.
    • Why I am wary of Facebook. It’s a closed garden. I haven’t forgotten the recent TOS uproar regarding content rights.
    • Why I still like Flickr. After so many years.
    • How Twitter is establishing itself as a news channel. And how I can see scenarios where people blindly re-tweet propanganda and myths.
    • Why I believe a consolidation phase is bound to happen ‘cos many tools haven’t really figured out their business models.
    • That building communities is hard work. And requires lots of time. It doesn’t happen out of the blue.
    • While Scoble and his followers are discussing the real-time web, I find myself trying to explain how I use Google Reader. And that it’s about the flow rather than individual static web pages.
    • Why I sincerely believe that everybody on the Internetz needs to develop media skills. The Internet does not forget.

  • Google Mail Tips

    I discovered a couple of very useful lists of Gmail tips

    Gmail: Tips

  • Ted Video on Creativity

  • The Five-Step Decision-Making Process

    From my Cost Accounting textbook:

    1. Identify the problem and uncertainties
    2. Obtain information
    3. Make predictions about the future
    4. Make decisions by choosing among alternatives
    5. Implement the decision, evaluate performance, and learn

    straightforward…

  • Van Gogh Läckerli



    27.20 CHF

  • Mindblogging

    Inspired by lots of fresh air

    After lots of hours cramped in front of my books, trying to catch up with my studies, I went jogging for a couple of rounds on the Finnenbahn ( a sawdust track ) in the woods. Usually I find running around in circles boring. But today I didn’t mind cos my head is full of unprocessed data.

    And while I plodded around the loop, I thought about:

    • Twitter and the Iran election and the video of the dying woman.
    • Thoughtless re-tweeting. I find it scary the way people follow others blindly. With good intentions. But without thinking and researching for themselves. I thought of setting up a slogan such as: Think before you re-tweet.
    • How the initial design of ARPANET, to compensate for network losses, probably explains why people can still find ways and means to send out tweets and photos and videos out of Iran.
    • My Macroeconomics homework about inflation and interest rates.
    • The soothing effect the colour of green leaves has on my mind.

    The term mindblogging was coined by fellow blogger Persillie and refers to the writing of virtual blog posts while doing something else such as jogging. By default mindblog posts are always better than their written equivalent.

    Congratulations to Mlle. A.! Her blog Handmade 2.0 is featured in the current edition of t3n, a German IT and web magazine.
    Way to go!
    Next in Brand eins?

    I talked to my mom about internet connections in Malawi. She says that prices for mobile internet are getting more affordable. TNM offers USB modems. I need to research this…

  • Broken WordPress Plugin Woes

    Message from the admin:

    For a couple of days, the WordPress installation at Chiperoni was broken. The framework of the website was displaying but all content within a blog post or page had disappeared. I could see the content in the admin view.

    markdown plugin caused blog post content to disappear

    I finally found the culprit: version 1.01 of a plugin called Markdown from early WordPress installs was causing this display error:

    Manage Plugins ‹ chiperoni.ch — WordPress

    Interestingly the site worked fine directly after installing 2.8. This error only displayed a couple of days later. And at first I didn’t link it to the upgrade.

    Unfortunately I did not get much of a response at WordPress.org. Thank you to Esmi for responding. I appreciate your help. Let me just add: the lack of response is very different from the pioneer days in 2003 and 2004 when I first started evaluating and using WordPress. There are a huge number of queries and an individual – and dumb – question like mine doesn’t get any notice any more. The downside of going mainstream…

    Apologies to all regular Chiperoni visitors for the recent downtimes and techie problems. There are plans to move to a new server…

    Hope this post will help other WordPress users.

  • the red crane and the white chimney



  • Reality Mining

    Just confirming what I already knew.

    No need to fight against machine-readable passports with RFIDs (c.f. #biometrischer pass). Your regular cell phone (that’s without any fancy GPS functions) already provides all the data needed to track you wherever you go.

    c.f. this Namics presentation on Internet trends.

    Add some pattern matching with some other online tools and voilà  you’re identified.

    Some links mentioned in the presentation:

    Wikipedia on Reality Mining:

    Reality Mining is the collection and analysis of machine-sensed environmental data pertaining to human social behavior, with the goal of identifying predictable patterns of behavior.

  • The internet is for everyone

    Got to love the Internet. Nothing is too obscure.

    Videos of rain

    And a web page for non-twitterers…

    Tell the world why you don’t tweet:
    http://www.whyidonttweet.com/

    Buon weekend

  • chirsimarkt