May 9, 2008 at 2:43 pm (14:43)
Filed under Inspiration, Personal
On October 4, 2007 I blogged about the fact that I had given up on television. I had accidently cancelled my cable connection so although the television itself was still working it didn’t show anything. We got used to not having tv pretty soon. Occasionally people will talk about something which I can’t place and then it turns out to be a commercial I dot know about or a television personality I have never seen. But besides those little inconveniences we do just fine.
Now I have another confession to make. I have been reluctant to talk about it before. The interesting thing about not watching any TV is that to some people you become more interesting and even seem more intelligent. I’m afraid my new diet will scare away those same people who applauded me for getting rid of my TV.
My new diet doesn’t concentrate on calories but on information. As a result I have stopped reading newspapers or any other general news. I do keep up to date with the bigger (and smaller) news stories by talking to people a lot. If something important happens I tend to know about it pretty quick.
Of course I do spend a lot of time reading about news about my work. I follow 200+ blogs about Internet, technology, start-ups and innovation. My diet is not simply about consuming less but more about consuming smarter. I want to know more about less so I consume more targeted information.
But still:
- Not watching any TV is considered smart and even hip
- Not reading any newspapers is considered stupid and lazy.
I wonder why that is and what the effect will be for me personally. Will I become disconnected with the world? Will the fact that I don’t exactly know what happens in Africa or any other part of the world make me less intelligent? Do I have a moral obligation to stay informed about the world around me?
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May 1, 2008 at 12:41 pm (12:41)
Filed under Business, Personal, Press
Made it to Techcrunch with the Virgle.com domain: “Virgle.com - how Google and Virgin forgot a domain“. I wonder how this story will develop. Will post updates here.
UPDATE: Virgle&Google ‘not amused’ with Techcrunch coverage. Caspar Wenckebach steps in to prevent me from saying stupid things.
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April 19, 2008 at 9:24 am (9:24)
Filed under Business, Fun, Inspiration, Party, Personal, Travel, Vacation
“Your city is remarkable not only for its beauty. It is also, of all the cities in the United States, the one whose name, the world over, conjures up the most visions and more than any other, incites one to dream.
Georges Pompidou
This Sunday Ernst-Jan and I will get on a plane, sleep for 11 hours, and then wake up in San Francisco. We will attend the O’Reilly Web2Expo and every party we can talk our way into. We will be staying at the Handlery Union Square Hotel
Our itinerary on Tripit.com
You can follow our itinerary on Tripit.com. In fact; I invited so many people to my TripIt account (via the one-click LinkedIn import) that a few days ago I could crash the TripIt server just by visiting my profile. This what the Tripit helpdesk mailed some of my friends:
Apparently, someone you know was so gung-ho about TripIt that he started inviting all his friends. :) This seems to be causing real performance issues for the invitees and him.
Forget about the Digg effect, here comes the Boris effect!
Is it Blogable or Bloggable?
To do a little promotion for The Next Web Blog we decided to print some stickers. I made a few drafts and asked everyone in the office to pick out the best one. Everybody liked the “This object has been marked: BLOGABLE” one so I ordered 1000 of those. Then when they arrived someone asked me “Isn’t Blogable spelled with two Gs?”.
Oops…
Since then I have talked to a lot of people and have googled the issue extensively. The consensus seems to be that Bloggable should be spelled with two Gs. Fortunately for me even native english speakers seem divided on the issue so I think I will get away with it. People who don’t notice the spelling error won’t mind. People who do notice it have an extra reason to remember it.
Parties and events:
Here is a list of all the parties and events we are planning to visit. Have an interesting start-up that should be featured on our blog? Don’t hesitate to approach us and tell us all about it. Read the rest of this entry »
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April 10, 2008 at 3:13 pm (15:13)
Filed under Fun, Party, Personal
Well, you show them the booty…
The story: Daniel J. Ashes was doing a photoshoot in my house with SpaceKees, Turk and Jiggy Djé (Noah’s Ark label) and asked me to entertain them for a minute or two so he could make a few photos of them laughing. I had to improvise but my guess is they enjoyed my jokes…
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April 9, 2008 at 8:41 am (8:41)
Filed under Drinks, Fun, Inspiration, Party, Personal, Press, Speaking
A few weeks ago I spent a few hours shoeshining (Story and Photos) at the New Tailor shop in Amsterdam. This Friday we are going to repeat the same event but we will start at 4pm and have some drinks with it too.
If you want to join us just leave a comment here so we know how much champagne to buy! And, free shoeshines by me for everyone!
Dutch Invitation:
Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten komt schoenen poetsen
In navolging van de eerdere succesvole zaterdagochtendsessies kunt u aanstaande vrijdag 11 april van 16.30-19.00 uur kennismaken met en uw schoenen laten poetsen door Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten, serial entrepreneur van ondermeer thenextweb.org, fleck.com en in het verleden V3 Redirect Services en HubHop. Onder het genot van goede espresso, de lekkerste taartjes en een glas champagne vertelt hij graag over zijn successen, flops en zijn voorliefde voor maatpakken van New Tailor. Laat u inspireren en kom langs!
De Amsterdamse vestiging aan de Honthorststraat 2a, tussen de Paulus Potter- en de PC Hooftstraat heeft die ochtend specifieke stoffen van alle Boris pakken voorhanden. Boris staat bekend om zijn gepoetste schoenen, witte hemden en flamboyante maar altijd geklede driedelige ruitpakken.
Boris: “Net als ieder ander heb ik een hekel aan netwerken. Dat schichtige geleur met je visitekaartje op een avond waar de meeste aanwezigen zich het liefst verstoppen achter een glas bier. Terwijl je koortsachtig probeert uit te vinden wat je in godsnaam aan iemand hebt dreunt diegene zijn standaard verhaal voor je af waarna je hopelijk zelf ook even mag. Helaas merk je na 3 seconden al dat je netwerkpartner ongeduldig over je schouder kijkt op zoek naar de volgende netwerk opportunity. Netwerken is net werken.
Me @ work:
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