Microlearning Conference and BlogWalk 8

Sebastian Fiedler is busy trying to organize a BlogWalk meeting in Innsbruck on June 25th 2005. This on the day after the Microlearning Conference in the same city, which takes place on June 23rd and 24th. It certainly looks like a great conference also from a KM and social software viewpoint.

Are you going to the Microlearning conference, and would you be interested in participating in a BlogWalk meeting? Let me know, so we can let you know early enough what will happen, so that you can take it into account when making travel plans.

(tag BlogWalk)

Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (3) (posted by Ton Zijlstra at April 24, 2005 08:38 PM)

Blognomics, a much needed event

Finally the Netherlands has seen it's first symposium on the use of weblogs. Drawing a mixed crowd of journalists, politicians, business people and of course bloggers, Blognomics was a succes to my eyes.

Have a look at Technorati for impressions, in words, video and pictures. I will upload my pictures to Flickr.
I have written down more extensive observations in Dutch at my company's weblog.

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) (posted by Ton Zijlstra at April 24, 2005 06:07 PM)

BlogWalk 7: Mechelen

It is our pleasure to announce the next BlogWalk meeting!

On May 20th BlogWalk 7 will take place in Mechelen. Tom de Bruijne, Maarten Schenk en Clo Willaerts have kindly agreed to be our local hosts.
The theme will be civic journalism.

BlogWalks are by invitation only, and the number of available places is limited. We are sending out invitations in the coming days. E-mail me if you're interested to attend; usually we can fit all those who are interested.

(tag BlogWalk)

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (3) (posted by Ton Zijlstra at April 20, 2005 09:34 PM)

How Do You Use RSS?

Lee Lefever asks What's Your RSS Reading Strategy?

I need to make two remarks before answering Lee's question.

First, I think information overload does not exist. Our usual information strategies are failing us because they are based on information scarceness. In order to deal with the new information environment we find ourselves in, we need to change our strategies. That is why Lee's question is an important one. We need to learn from eachother to find out what works for us.

Second, I increasingly treat information as a landscape I move around in. This info-landscape lies over the physical one. Information as a landscape shapes much of how I treat information, and try to build my own information strategies.

Ok, RSS.

250 feeds, 2 readers
I read about 250 feeds, and the number is growing in bursts. After each burst of growth, the number levels off somewhat while I familiarize myself with the new people who's feed I read.

To read RSS I use two feedreaders. First and most important is Lektora. A web-based reader that stores all content on my local drive. As I read often while on the train this is very important. The second reader is Bloglines, which I use while away from home, or when my laptop hasn't got connectivity. I also use this to show others what I read. The feeds in Bloglines usually are somewhat behind what's in Lektora, as I use Lektora most.

Two approaches to reading
As the number of feeds grew, my reading behaviour has changed.

I used to read all postings everyday. Now I have two main approaches. One is to simply browse through the feeds to get a feeling of what is going on, what themes are getting attention. To detect patterns. Because I try to see RSS feeds as parts of a conversation (I subscribe to people not feeds), listening to what these voices are telling me, is using my social network as a filter, a community filter. Gossip 2.0, so to speak. In this mode I hardly read any specific postings, and if I blog something because of it, it is triggerd by patterns I see.

The other approach has its starting point in myself. Whatever I am currently working on or interested in, questions I am exploring etc. (such as information strategies right now), trigger reading specific postings, commenting and blogging.

Filling the landscape
All my feeds are still thrown on one big heap, but with 250 feeds that is becoming less usefull. If information is a landscape, I am currently experiencing my feedslist as a landscape with too little distinctive features. So now I am playing with lumping feeds roughly together (a group of hills there, a wood there) while rigorously trying to avoid categorization. The latter would destroy the ability to look for patterns in the entire list of feeds.
I'm in the middle of this stage now, and I will let you know when I find a modus that works for me.

Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack (2) (posted by Ton Zijlstra at April 19, 2005 09:28 PM)

BBC Launching Archives, Some Rights Reserved

The BBC is finally launching its creative archive project, with the adoption of a new licensing scheme based on the creative commons concept of “some rights reserved”. The licence also has the backing of Channel 4, the British Film Institute and the Open University.

Via Jonathan Marks

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) (posted by Ton Zijlstra at April 11, 2005 03:06 PM)

Creative Capital Conference Evaluation

Apparantly I was not alone with my observations on the form of the Creative Capital Conference. They have now published the results of their evaluation, including the qualitative answers. Interesting reading! Am curious to hear their own reaction to this.

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) (posted by Ton Zijlstra at April 11, 2005 01:43 PM)

VoIP Uptake

I spoke to a very good friend of mine who works for Agile, out of Switzerland. Agile is in the process of switching over to VoIP entirely for their intense international telephone usage. Telco's beware; it's not just a possibility or trend. It is happening.

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) (posted by Ton Zijlstra at April 10, 2005 08:20 PM)

Modern Times?

Smart Mobs: Snapping the dead pope on a camera phone Sign of the times? Cameraphones to picture the body of the Pope. People probably wouldn't have done that with regular sized camera's, but it seems less obtrusive with your phone. Unless you do it all at once, that is.

I wonder how many of them have send the pictures back to their family and friends or posted them?

There is at least one up on Flickr.

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) (posted by Ton Zijlstra at April 7, 2005 09:39 PM)

Skype Dialer for Outlook

Peter Kalmstrom has created a plug-in for
integrating Skype with Outlook. It also requires IE as your browser. While this is not interesting for my desktop, and Linux-box at home, it is potentially useful for my business laptop, which is fully MS as it is integrated with our company's back-office. Skype and other tools like RSS, IM etc. have been taken up by my colleagues since I joined them last year at a steady pace. Offering a way in which it really connects with our default working environment supports that.

Via Terry Frazier, who saw it at Stuart Henshall's.

Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0) (posted by Ton Zijlstra at April 3, 2005 08:53 AM)