Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten

As an entrepreneur you always try to get attention for your companies and projects. I have been working on this for years and have managed to attract all kinds of attention for a lot of our stuff. But recently there has been more attention for me in general and less for the projects I do. I am very easy to please and generally accept any speaking or interview opportunity for any magazine or website. I just always say ‘yes’ when I’m am asked to do an interview or presentation. And it is starting to take more time than I am willing to invest.

Recently Patrick started managing me as a speaker. Now when I receive a request for a speaking gig I reply that in principle I would love to do it and that Patrick will follow up to talk about the details. Patrick then finds out what it is all about and if it is going to be a good investment of time and energy. If it is not, he cancels. He would rather have me in the office than doing a speech on my opinion on the future of fertilizer.

And I do the same with interview requests. A friend of mine with a lot of experience in publishing offered to help me manage my interview requests. Here too I would just simply say ‘Yes’ to every request. But these days I forward (almost) all messages to them and he replies with a ‘Go’ or ‘No go’ within a few hours.

It feels very luxurious to have these two managers helping me with these seemingly simple tasks but now that I have them I can recommend it to everyone. You don’t even have to hire a manager. Just find a friend in the same situation and manage each other. If YOU get an interview request let your partner follow-up and if he gets an interview request offer to follow-up yourself. That way you introduce one check that prevents you from doing stuff you might later regret.

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Want to ask me a personal question? Contact me at boris@bomega.com

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Yesterday I received a Fon router. In case you don’t know; Fon is a company that gives away free Wi-Fi wireless networking routers to anyone who wants to install one and make it accessible to other Fon users. FON received $21.7 million (in 2006) from Google, Skype, and Sequoia Capital to build a free network of Wi-Fi hotspots all over the world. The idea is that you set-up the Fon Access Point in your window and allow other users to access your Hotspot. If they also make their hotspot available to other ‘Foneros’ they can access your Hotspot for free. Other users will pay Fon and you will receive a kick-back.

I’m very interested in this company partly because I set up a similar service in 2003 called HubHop (later re-branded to MiWIFI.nl) which tried to do a similar thing in the Netherlands. HubHop ended up with more than 1000 publicly accessible HotSpots within a year. We had a website that listed every hotspot, a software application to look for Hotspots near you and a lot of attention in the press.

We ended up selling HubHop as a commercial Hotspot operator to KPN which killed the MiWiFI community and rebranded HubHop to KPN Hotspots in 2003.

Based on my experience I am not too optimistic about the future of Fon. I have been reluctant to voice my opinion earlier because my experience gives me insight but might also cloud my judgement. Maybe things have changed or Martin Varsavsky is a better entrepreneur than I am and will succeed where I failed.

Having said that here is my opinion on Fon and the problems, I think, it faces;

1: It is illegal
Although Fon aims to make deals with ISPs to allow Fon on their networks right now Fon is illegal on most networks. My ISP clearly states that it isn’t allowed to share my network with other people than those that live in my house. If I open up my network to the world I’m violating the contract I have with my ISP. Wether the ISP would actually sue me is a different matter as long as Fon isn’t really successful. But you can image the ISPs opinion of Fon will drastically change if people start canceling their DSL lines because they all share one Fon router. And I’m not even talking about reselling your DSL line to other people through Fon.

2: It is dangerous
Wether or not you are allowed to share your DSL line or not either way YOU are responsible for all data that is transmitted over your connection. If your neighbor uses your DSL line to upload kiddie porn you will be held responsible. As far as the ISP is concerned YOU are uploading illegal stuff. Opening up your DSL to the world is like playing russian roulette.

3: It doesn’t work
Wi-Fi in theory is great. You switch on your Wi-Fi router and within 100 meters (according to the specifications on the box) you will be surfing the web with a 11 mb connection. In reality Wi-Fi sucks. Every electrical device in your house limits the signal of your Wi-Fi adapter. Every other Wi-Fi adapter tries to get in the same spectrum as your router and every wall limits your reach considerably. Getting your house covered is NOT easy and requires constant attention. My house in only 22 meters long but I would need 3 access points to get it covered because of all the interference from other sources. Even if every house in the world would have a Fon router installed there still wouldn’t be Wi-Fi access everywhere.

4: You won’t find it
The general idea is that you want to check your mail, open your laptop and (surprise!) there is a Fon router there. In reality 99.9% of people don’t live next to a bar, hotel lobby or restaurant or other potential place where you would open your laptop. With HubHop we went looking for individuals who lived near big squares in the larger cities. But even IF we could find someone willing to help us we often found out that they were just slightly to high in a building or far away from the square to be of any use. I think I am a prototype Fon user; always on the road and opening my laptop all the time in different places all over the world. But so far I have never accidently stumbled upon a Fon access point. My guess is I never will unless I look up an address at Fon and go search for it in some residential area.

In 2006 I met Martin Varsavsky in Paris during Les Blogs and got a change to tell him about my reservations. Although he didn’t offer any solutions he did say that he was confident he would overcome all the issues I came up with.

So why did I order my Fon router? Well, I just can’t resist free hardware and I want to see how the future works out for Fon. I actually hope they prove me wrong and will offer all of us free global wireless broadband access one day.

I just wouldn’t bet my money on it…

UPDATE: Fon just did a deal with BT to give BT users access to FON hotspots around the world. This is good news but doesn’t solve FONs problems. There still isn’t much coverage and access is still illegal on most providers.

PICNIC07 is a ‘cross media festival’ held in Amsterdam this week. It is an international conference with over 60 seminars and workshops, parties, a games festival and more.

One aspect of PICNIC may easily get overlooked, but I am sure it may end up being one of the most interesting parts of the festival and not just because I am involved…

PITCH!; on Thursday 27 September in the morning is a Pitch training session which I am involved in. Entrepreneurs often underestimate the need for focused presentation, and do not realize this is something you can actually train for. There is a spot left, so let the organisation know if you want me to train you!

From 12.30 to 13.00 anyone can join us to witness a series of Pitch presentations. An expert jury, which includes two investors as well as the producer of Fast Magazine, will give their verdict. The best presentation gets a chance to tell their story at PICNIC’s final session - called the Ultimate PICNIC Show.

Interested? You can sign up for free to attend this session, and if you want to Pitch yourself, leave a comment or mail me.

More info here:
http://www.picnicnetwork.org/set-7199-en.html

We ended up buying 15 iPhones in San Francisco earlier today. Then we went straight to the airport to catch our flight to Amsterdam. We carried three extra bags with 5 iPhones in each bag to distribute the weight evenly.

When we loaded the iPhones into the x-ray machine the operator of the machine called over another security person who stared into the screen and then yelled “Oh my god, RUN!!!!”.

First time ever that I met a security guy with a sense of humor.

The stewardesses gave Patrick a special box in their kitchen to stash all the iPhones since most of the normal luggage compartments were full. A few passengers became aware of the iPhones and started asking questions. Flashing an iPhone is a great conversation starter!

When we arrived in Amsterdam we loaded all the iPhones bags on top of a trolley and headed for the customs agent to declare them. Unfortunately (well..) no one was there so we just entered the Netherlands without having to pay an extra import fee. Don’t know what the difference in price is but we felt pretty lucky either way.

At 5 today everyone is coming to my house to get their iPhone and unwrap and hack it together. The following people have confirmed their order and will receive their iPhone today:

Lennaert Ekelmans
Sander van der Vliet
Wouter Broekhof
Menno van der Sman
Robert Gaal
Floris Rost van Tonningen
Oscar Kneppers
Jan Willem Eshuis
Krijn Schuurman
Ellemijn Veldhuijzen van Zanten
Victor Veldhuijzen van Zanten
Matthijs van Abbe
Francisco van Jole (alleen headset)
Alexander Klöpping

We just met Tolga Birdal who is the chief engineer of BeFunky.com. He gave us a few invitations to the closed beta of their very cool service.

Get them while they are hot and still working:

TECH9128763
TECH5698643
TECH8493692
TECH9505856
TECH9513091

Activate them at BeFunky.com and if you use one of these codes please do leave a comment so other people know they are taken.

UPDATE: Tekin Tatar just sent me another bunch of codes. Send me an email if you want a code and I will supply you one. First come, first serve…

UPDATE II (October 10) I received another bunch of codes. If you are still looking sent me an email.

UPDATE III: Here is another bunch of BeFunky codes:

TECH7758381
TECH5609513
TECH3147367
TECH5796714
TECH7723251
TECH9404276
TECH7004710
TECH1514600

As usual, post the one you claim in the comments please…

In 1995 I appeared in a new and controversial TV show titled Waskracht. I opened the show with two short movies in which I gave ‘Tips for a better world’. The idea was that to make a better world I would explain the difference between men and women.

So the first episode was about the female orgasm and the second one about menstruation. (Wonder what that sentence will do for my search engine results)

They are in Dutch and without subtitles and (probably) not suitable for work.

Tips voor een betere wereld 1
Tips voor een betere wereld 2