3D tv that tickles your senses

Japan plans to take tv viewing to a whole new level.

7.2 earthquake struck Japan

An earthquake shook northeastern Japan earlier today, causing massive damage in the areas around Sendai city. A tidal wave warning has been given in Miyagi. The Blog From Another Dimension blogs about the quake.

Kvarken Archipelago stands a good chance of becoming a world natural heritage site

This weekend was the best one so far this summer. I spent the most of it at our cabine out in the archipelago and the weather was beautiful, even at night. We went chanterelle hunting (we found quite a lot actually, thanks to all the rain we've had recently.) and fishing and while sitting in the small boat, I realized that the archipelago and nature here truly is outstanding. As it's around me every day, I keep forgetting that. For instance, have a look at the rocks in the picture. They are very unique, but that's not something I think of a lot. And if I dedicate them thoughts, it's mostly concerning me not hitting them with my boat as they're quite numerous below water surface as well.

That's why I'm truly delighted to read in Vasabladet (article in Swedish here) that Kvarken stands a good chance of becoming a world natural heritage site. This past week, a Canadian expert by the name Jim Thorsell has been inspecting and reviewing the surroundings and his views are of great importance when it is decided if Kvarken will become a world heritage site or not. According to the article in Vasabladet, he was impressed by the new land emerging (the islands and parts of the Finnish coast are rising out of the sea at the rate of approximately eight millimetres per year), the clean air and water and the rich fauna. It sounds promising as I really hope Kvarken could be Finland's first world natural heritage site.

we're getting warmer

Finally, the sun is out, after days of pouring rain. According to a WWF analysis of the climate in Europe, the cities are getting warmer due to increased use of energy and climate changes. As an example, the average temperature in Europe rose by 0.95 celcius during the last century. Specifically for Helsinki, the mean daily summer temperature in 1970-1974 was 15.2 degrees celcius. In the years 2000-2004, it rose to 16.0 degrees.

If this worries you, I suggest you check this out.

Political blogs appeal to Americans

Interesting survey on what interests American blog readers. According to comScore, 43 % visit blogs about politics and news. Life style-blogs and tech blogs were also popular.
[via digi.today]

wiki on the visual aspects of social life

A wiki on visual sociology is born.

Metaphores

If there's something I loathe, it's vague wordings and great numbers. If I come across the like, I usually pose embarrassing questions like "But what does that mean?" or "What concrete consequences does it impose on my life?". If possible, I want it explained visually or as metaphores as I seem to think in an image mode. Some get uncomfortable when being asked to translate the abstract into the concrete, but I think it's essential.

Therefore, I absolutely love to read "A short history of nearly everything" by Bill Bryson as he exemplifies like there's no tomorrow. (I doubt he acually did all the calculations himself, but rather is he citing someone who's done it before him. But still). In the part where he discusses the vast universe, he states that astronoms today believe that there may be up til 140 billions of galaxies in the visible universe. It is pretty hard to imagine that figure. Therefore, Bryson illustrates it to the reader. If galaxies were deep frozen peas, there would be enough to fill a music hall, such as Royal Albert Hall in London. Spot on!

Bryson also illustrates the Avogrado's number that is 6,0221367 times 1023 (23 raised). This is also a figure, rather hard to fully grasp. Thus, Bryson lets us know that it equals the amount of soda cans it takes to cover the entire globe, the layer being 320 kilometers thick (i.e. hight). And it equals the amount of unpopped popcorn it takes to cover the US with a 15 kilometer thick layer.

See? It's much easier to grasp the width of the figures now!

Berners-Lee on blogs and the web

Here's an excerpt from the interview with Sir Tim Berners-Lee, aired last night on BBC 2 (Newsnight). Berners-Lee ponders what the web will be like when it turns 30 and he says that he hopes it will be "more stable, something that people don't talk about." I've noticed that it's starting to be that al ready. Many around me say "I read it in Aftonbladet" for instance, and very few mean that they actually read the paper version of the evening paper. Everyone means the net version and it's understood that this is the case. Berners-Lee continues: "My goal for the web in 30 years is to be the platform which has led to the building of something very new and special, which we can't imagine now."

Also worth mentioning here, Berners-Lee feels that blogging is close to his original idea of a read/write web and he states that "When you write a blog, you don't write complicated hypertext, you just write text, so I'm very, very happy to see that now it's gone in the direction of becoming more of a creative medium.".

Thanks Masse for the link!

Vacation of music

What a great way to start off my first ever vacation with full salary: Iron Maiden's gig in Helsinki last Thursday, and finishing off with a 3 day rock festival in Åbo. About 22 000 people came to see Rammstein play last Friday, and it was well worth while, although their show was almost exactly the same as their concert in Helsinki last October. At the Maiden gig, Bruce Dickinson dedicated one song for the victims of the London bombing earlier that day and swaying lights where everywhere in the crowd.

Now back out in the heat (it's 27 degrees) and off to the concert, Hanoi Rocks, the Hives and Within Temptation are yet to come!

Ruisrock festival blog

Hufvudstadsbladet, which has the widest circulation of the newspapers in Swedish in Finland, has just launched what seems to be their first blog (though the blog lacks certain features like comments and the like but the author calls it a blog) and it's theme is... Ruisrock, a great rock festival in Åbo where I used to live. Super! I just got tickets to it and I'm counting the days to go there. I'll definitely keep up with this blog.

The Finnish dream

I must be getting old. Never before have I even considered listening to a radio talk show where two people sit and dissect the world for half an hour. Now, I’ve even looked it up, twice, at the internet (radio on demand).

I’ve been playing around with ideas about creativity and creative economy lately so I decided to browse around for interesting references. One of the radio talk shows I found starred Pekka Himanen (who obtained his PhD in Philosophy at the age of 20 from the University of Helsinki) who has been giving much appreciated speeches about the creative capital at conferences around the world lately (the radio interview in Finnish here).

Over lunch with the reporter, Himanen explained his theory on how Finland will keep up with the rest of the world. He said that just as the Americans have their own dream (the American dream which is about personal success, according to PH), the Finns should have their dream, i.e. the Finnish dream. This implies a society that is creative but caring. Like a creative welfare state in the midst of the information age. If a creative and caring society is what bodes for a boosting economy then Finland has every reason to smile. Welfare and caring is our middle name and industries like culture and information technology are strong here.

After a bit of googling, I found this account (in Finnish only) of the challenges of the information society that Himanen wrote for the future committee of the Finnish Parliament. I’ll read it as soon as possible, seems interesting.

Nokia Sensor out today

Nokia released "Sensor" today, a phone software app with which the user can create personal pages on the phone. He or she can also scan the surroundings (up to 10 meters away) for other Sensor users, and exchange fotos or messages with them. Could be pretty cool to try this out but the application is not available for my antique phone (demo of the application here).

The blog leads the way

Timo Tuovinen, an adviser at DOORStories Media Content Solutions, was talking at a seminar I attended today about how important it is to know where you’re going, if you want to manage out there in the big, big world. He referred to a Finnish driver who started doing business in Europe about 40 years ago. Back then, the driver didn’t know any other languages than Finnish. Well, in a recent magazine interview, the driver with 4 decades of experience of doing business abroad concludes that you get by fine out there as long as you know where you’re going.

Tuovinen posed the question about the functions of blogs: Blogs, do they tell stories about persons [who keep them and of others] or are the bloggers rather trying to get a grasp of a fragmented world?

In other words, one could ask if a blog is a means and tool in the quest of knowing where you’re going? I’d say definitely. It’s a great way to sort thoughts, and store threads of thoughts. Once written down and visible on the screen, I get a better perspective. Therefore, I’m easier off targeting where I’m going. And if this bodes well for the ability to manage and survive, then all the better! But not to forget, the first part of the twofold question is also correct, that blogs tell stories of persons, perhaps mostly of the one tapping the keyboard.

Interactive movie

This is rather old piece of news but still interesting to me. The audience of an interactive movie prefers having their individual choice taken into consideration (instantly and at several times during the film) over having the audience's majority vote decide the direction of the movie. At least, this is the experience of the writers, Ali Bali and Violaine Meunier. The 19-minute long episode is found here.

Getting back behind bars

I'm taking up my old summer job as a bartender tonight. I realise now that I've missed mixing flavours to the joy of others, and not just for me and some friends. I feel so inspired, actually, that I just might trade the summer beer for drinks this summer. A speciality tonight will be the Japanese Slipper, add a cherry on bottom and voilà, a treat for both eye and taste buds!

And what's the occasion you might ask. Well, just anything you could imagine. That summer's in the air, for instance, or that it's been 50 years and one day since the first public tv broadcast took place in Finland. A reason as good as any to raise a toast. Or that it's only one year until the 50th anniversary of more or less regular tv-broadcasting, both in Finland and in the UK (the first widely available tv broadcast took place in November 1936 from Alexandra Palace in the UK). Or that it is about 830 days left until the switch from analogue to digital tv-broadcasting in Finland. There are thousands of occasions worth attention.

CfP for the 4th Euro ITV

The first call for papers is announced for the fourth European Interactive TV conference. The theme for next year's Euro ITV is "Beyond Usability, Broadcast and TV".

The conference is taking place in Athens May 18-19 next year, which suits me absolutely perfectly as the preliminary date for the final of the Eurovision Song Contest in Athens is the 20th May. Man, I'd love to get tickets to that musical feast!!

Blogs are all around me...

The titel makes me think of the version "Christmas is all around" (a cover of the Trogg's Love is all around) sung in the movie Love actually. It makes me smile goofily everytime I think of it, what a feel-good movie :)

It is true though, blogs are all around me it seems nowadays. Blogs have been a buzz in the news and perhaps therefore, quite a few people have asked me what's the deal with blogs (to mimic Jerry Seinfeld...), why do you write them, for whom and about what topics? Some have also started their own blogs, like Emmi and my former boss, member of parliament Astrid Thors. Welcome to the world of blogging, my friends!

Finland gets bronze medal in IT use

Finland gets the bronze medal in internet use in the EU. According to a recent study by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European communities, the highest level of internet usage in the EU in 2004 was found among Swedes, followed by the Danes and the Finns.

According to this study, the proportion of men using the net is higher than for women. This does not however apply to the Baltic countries and Finland where the surfing is more equal.

theme of the day

The subject of today has definitely been peonies. I woke up and turned on the telly and found myself watching this season's first programme of the gardening tv show Pioni (apparently, the show's been running since 2002 but I've never come across it. Perhaps because I rarely watch tv early Sunday mornings.). In the afternoon, I went to the trade fair that's hit town this weekend. Although the main attraction on the gardening side was orchids, the peonies did a good job in getting people's attention. And half an hour ago, part of the lifestyle tv show Strömsö dealt with a garden where peonies grow.

It is such an appropriate theme for a day like this, as it feels like spring's finally here. The sun's beaming down through the trees and the mercury decided to break through and stopped at 10 degrees. This time of year leaves me bubbling of energy and inspiration and I truly believe that there's nothing I couldn't do. It's a similar situation as when the first scents of your chocolate muffins baking in the oven hit your nostrils. You know that you're in for a good treat (=the summer) after some hard and dirty work (=the winter) and it's only a couple of more moments away (=it's only spring). And according to me, watching the muffins rise through the oven glass is more rewarding than the actual eating.

Baudrillard and Malta

I’m back home from the vacation in Malta, and I keep thinking about what Jean Baudrillard said about hyper reality and simulation. He claims that the images we see in the media seldom represent reality. They are rather phantom images of a reality that gets lost on the way through the media channels to the consumer. What we see is therefore a hyper reality.

The reason why this comes to mind is that in my quest of useful information about Malta before I left, some websites encouraged me to explore the islands by bicycle:

"Put on walking boots, hire a mountain bike and head out from the village squares on the narrow farmers’ tracks."

and

"Highlight: hire a bicycle and explore the Maltese Islands."

Since I’m fond of biking, I thought to myself that “yeah, that’s a good idea, I’ll look into that once I get there.”. But once I got there, I realized that it probably isn’t such a good idea. Why? Because the traffic was chaotic! Few pedestrian crossings, very few bicycle roads, narrow roads and loads of cars passing you by in high speeds. Perhaps I’m over sensitive because I’ve been in two traffic accidents but there’s no way I’d get into the Maltese traffic on a bike. Therefore, the image I got of the conditions of the bicyclist on Malta on the tourist sites and what I finally saw when I got there did not match. I saw only one person biking during the whole week and the Maltese themselves seem fond of their cars, as there are more than 200 000 cars on the island, and about 350 000 habitants. But it's great fun to find out that things are completely different than what I thought. It’s healthy and educational.

Despite the trouble of crossing the roads, I really enjoyed Malta. There were lots of things to do for a film buff like me. There’s the Popeye village, built for the shooting of the movie Popeye, and the Mediterranean Film Studios with two large circular water tanks, where movies like The Count of Monte Cristo, Revelation and The league of Extraordinary Gentlemen were shot. It was pretty cool to visit the places you see in the movies. (This is a picture from the movie The Odyssey and this is my picture)