Archive Page 94

Installation Party at IBM Forum

The first time I heard of ‘installation party’ was 2 months ago, in a pre-event meeting I had with Nir Simionovich, the CTO of Atelis. Apparently, the ‘parties’ were a known event at the Technion CS department, were the CTO graduated from, and drew a large crowd.

Anyhow, on March 27th IBM Forum Israel (IBM solution and conference center) hosted the first face-to-face annual event of Asterisk – open source for VoIP. The driving force behind the event, and the entire Asterisk community in Israel is Atelis, an ISV (independent Software Vendor) of IBM GTU (Global Technology Unit). The event drew over 80 developers, who came with their PCs/Laptops, to hear, share, network and install open VoIP clients.

The developers could install the new version of AsteriskNOW, which is a full communications solution, built on Web Services and AJAX, running Linux (of course), and allows for all the usual communication services of a switch board or call center.
I am not a technical person, but even for me, it was inspiring. It showed the true power of the community – this was the first face-to-face event, and all the developers knew each other from previous events and meetings. There were kids, around 16-19, configuring systems, explaining to the people the improvements in the new version – amazing.
I’m definitely buying my kid (still single, but thinking ahead…) a PC to play/break a part with.

You can read more on the Asterisk Developer Event here (Hebrew article).

Utilize your ‘assets’ to the max

Just back from a short vacation to the north.
I had a birthday recently and decided to take some time off with my girl and go up north (near Tzefat) for 3 days for some r&r.
Since I was on vacation, I left my laptop at home, for some r&r of its own, although I’m sure I could find a free wi-fi spot if I searched…
I always have a camera with me, either on my cellphone (Nokia 6233 – 2MP) or my Sony DSC-P73 (4.1MP – 3 years old..). I often find the Nokia camera more available, since I usually have it on me, and taking a picture is a 4sec thing, nothing more.
Why this long intro? and what’s the connection to the title? be patient, it’s coming.
I like good food, especially meat (what can I say ;-), and I eat about once a week outside, with friends usually. There are excellent places in Israel, but most of them are gathered in and around Tel Aviv. If I go up north (way north, near the border with Lebanon) I search the web for the good places in the north.

I went to eat dinner at Doris Butchers, a specialized restaurant for meat. Only meat.
It’s hard to differentiate yourself in the restaurant business, and the life span of most places isn’t something you can brag about, but Doris Butchers have made it. They have only 2 branches in Israel, and oddly enough, the 1st one was established up north, in Rosh Pina, some 3 years ago, and the 2nd one in Tel Aviv, 6 months ago.
In each location, there’s a large window at the entrance, with the ‘merchandise’ – the meat (look below).

There’s no mistaking where you are – if you don’t like meat, that’s not the place for you. And I’m not talking about Burgers/Hotdogs – I’m talking 1/2kg minimum, average serving size is 1kg ! That’s a lot. Good (1st) example of how you can take advantage of your current assets, in this case – the meat!
The 2nd example of utilizing your assets I saw on the road, on the way back. There aren’t many 18 wheelers in and around Tel Aviv, so I didn’t see it before, but this is superb! I took my phone and snapped a picture, right away..

The truck belongs to Neviot, one of the water companies in Israel (like Evian), and they sell water in several ways: bottles of 500ml/1.5L or 20L for home/office use. They started a new line recently, for smaller offices, 10L bottle, and on top of the usual marketing tactics and media, they found a way to use their marketing pipelines – the trucks.
For those who can’t understand Hebrew:
On the back of the truck, an 18 wheeler truck, there’s a sign saying: “small, but ahead of you”, and a number for reservations. Simple and smart.
An excellent example of using an asset you have, and creating a different ad, with a hint of humor.

Brand yourself !

In 2007 there are over 1 billion people surfing the web, +140 million of them have MySpace pages and more than 70 millions are blogging. That’s a lot of web pages. A lot. Which leads one to ask “how do I make myself notable? different?”.
The answer is simple: brand yourself.
There have been numerous articles on the importance of self branding, and a quick Google search would bring you some 1.5M results to browse through.

I read the recent State of the Live Web report (April 2007) and started thinking how can I make myself notable? What makes my blog different from the other 45 millions out there (deducted the spam bloggers..)? I guess not much, and that’s fine by me. I know my place in the blogosphere, and quite pleased with it.
But still, how do you know what others think of you? Google yourself of course, that’s how people find you.. So I did just that, and I’m quite pleased with my results. 8 out of 10 results in the first (and most important) page are about me, leading to this blog, to comments I made in other blog and to reviews I gave in forums. I even appear on the 3rd and 4th results pages.. nice.
I’m not a lists kind of guy, but here are some tips, from one ordinary person to another:

  • Create a blog. If you use your name in the url – even better. URLing your name can pretty much nail you that coveted 1st place in the results page. And the posts will most likely also appear on the first page.
  • Comment using your name. If blogging isn’t for you, but you like reading other people posts and commenting, use your name. As a blogger, I like to know who’s commenting my post, other than John Doe…
  • Everything is public. Be careful what you say on the web. Everything can find its way to the internet, and if there’s something you don’t want people to read/know, keep it offline.
  • Freedom of speech. The internet allows people to say pretty much everything they want, but there are still laws to uphold. If you feel a certain post is misleading, or a pure lie, don’t sit quietly. Demand the owner to remove it. Not everything is bound by the freedom of speech.

Catching up on some feeds

Happy Passover everyone..
You know how it is – holiday, vacation, dinners and lunches and all of a sudden your RSS reader is going nuts.. too many feeds, too many posts…
I’m at home today, keeping the work/life balance my employer encourages, and what a better time to read some posts than when you’re sitting in your living room, listening to some music.
Thought I’d give you a little roundup of some of the feeds I track. Here they are, no specific order:
Turbo Todd has couple of interesting posts:

  • The first one is about a new web 2.0 sports site, Ballhype.com, a Digg-ish style aggregator for sport fans and junkies. When will someone create a Digg-ish site for pictures? ’cause Digg can’t get a hint…
  • There’s also one about a recent BusinessWeek cover story, “Is Google too Powerful?” I read it – highly recommended.
  • IBM developerWorks site just won the Jolt Hall of Fame award. I don’t have much interaction with the site (after all it’s for developers, and I am, well, not a developer), but the site adhere to the needs of its viewers (developers), and the award only strengthen it. Congrats !
  • Last but not least is a post about a recent web 2.0 survey that was conducted by a security firm, Clearswift, on the productivity and sanctity of corporate data. Did you know that 50% believe that they are entitled to use corporate computers to access web 2.0 content during work? Entitled. However, only (yes, only) 46% have discussed work-related issues on social media sites and services (IM, forums, communities, blogs and web-based email apps). Fellow readers – start sharing… you should be ashamed of yourselves. only 46%..

Garr from PresentationZen is one of my favorite blogger on the web. His posts are insightful, eye-opening at times. It’s not the shortest of posts, but it’s worth the time. In his recent couple of posts he talks about the maximization of choices – good or bad? Can more choices make us happy or sad? is the freedom to choice really liberates or only complicates things? Free up some time before reading, it’s not your usual feed..

Pronet Advertising is another blog I like to follow, ’cause I can always find some interesting video or picture that serves as the best proof that marketing sells. Like this post from last week, on how to illustrate your value proposition: I think the image says it all.

And of course, can’t finish this wrap-up without Guy Kawasaki’s How to Change the World blog. Current views, interesting posts and insights on the latest and hottest in the blogosphere, and that’s not an easy task. Here’s a recent post about an interview with Google CEO, Eric Schmidt.

I think that’s enough for now. Although it holiday, but I have other things to do.. like having coffee with friends in the sun outside.. and I can’t bring my laptop, it’s not social.. 😉

Passover is here

Passover (Pesach) is upon us, and the Seder is in 2 days, coming Monday.
Passover is to commemorate the exodus of the Jewish from Egypt, a journey took 40 years according to the Torah.

You can read more about Passover (lots more) at Wikipedia.

« Previous PageNext Page »




Mobile & Media Consultant. I help startup companies launch products to the consumer market. Reach out: dvir.reznik [at] gmail.com
Website
About

Archives

Disclaimer

This is my personal blog. The postings here do not represent the thoughts, intentions, plans or strategies of my past employers or of my clients. It is solely my opinion.