The German website dotcomtod is back online as Boocompany. It’s purpose is to publish news about „exit-oriented“ companies. Posting a „BOO“ about a crashing new economy company was very fashy in 2001. The current „BOOs“ are mostly about offline companies. Let’s see when the internet companies are leading the list again! 😉
(via Netzeitung)
Jeffrey Zeldman from A List Apart wrote a rant about Web 2.0:
But nothing […] was as exciting as the scent of money. As the first properly valued “Web 2.0” properties began to find buyers, a frenzy like the old one popped hideously back to life. Yahoo spent how much? Google bought what? Here was real blood in the water.
But how to persuade the other sharks in the tank that this blood feast was different from the previous boom-and-bust? Easy: Dismiss everything that came before as “Web 1.0.”
His suggestion: Skip that and go directly to Web 3.0. But maybe he just made that title up to attract all the hype-lemmings. 😉
Lycos just launched a new question & answer service (user-to-user) and calls it Lycos iQ. It has a lot of features which are part of the current „web 2.0“ hype (e.g. social interaction, tags, Trebuchet font… 😉 ).
But in the registration process Lycos iQ is not Web 2.0 at all. It is far too curious:
Bitte gib dein Geschlecht an.
Bitte gib deinen Vornamen an.
Bitte gib deinen Nachnamen an.
Du hast unseren AGB noch nicht zugestimmt.(asking for gender, first name, last name, acceptance of terms of service)
It gets even worse a few lines further down:
Ich möchte die Lycos News nicht erhalten [ ]
„I don’t want to recieve the ‚Lycos News‘ [ ]“ (unchecked check box at the end of the line)
And another mean question:
Ich möchte auf mich zugeschnittene Angebote und Informationen von ausgewählten Lycos Partnern erhalten, welche mir entweder von Lycos oder direkt vom jeweiligen Partner postalisch und per eMail zugeschickt werden. () Ja () Nein
„I would like to recieve personalized offers and information from selected Lycos partners, who will be sent directly from the particular partner to my postal or by e-mail. () yes () no“ (yes/no radio buttons at the end of the line)
Is this kindergarten or what? I thought the times where I had to go through these trick questions are over!
I would give you my personal profile for free if I get anything meaningful out of the service (as I do on del.icio.us/holger for example). But I do not want to recieve anything which smells like „special offers and information“ or other spam!
(via Werbeblogger)
I changed my flight ticket to Germany today. I will arrive in Frankfurt on March, 14th at 7am. So I’ll be in Berlin in the early afternoon. Before that I’ll have a 14-hours stay in Bahrain. Let’s see what I can do there. 😉
Changing a flight date with „Gulf Air“ was really a hassle. I tried their website first and expected some online tool to change a flight. But there wasn’t even a phone number on the website. So I asked my favorite travel agent where the office was. I had to go there four times:
Take five minutes to hear what the famous guru Osho has to say about the word „fuck„. I didn’t know gurus had such a good sense of humor!
A few weeks back I met a Danish journalist at his car (with German number plate) in Church Street in Bangalore. Yes, it is very unusual to meet somebody who made it from Europe to India by car. He drives around the world and sends his reports and interviews back home to Danish newspapers. He was on the road since two months and planned to visited about 40 countries during his trip.
I asked him what the most useful tool was for him so far. I expected something like a Swiss army knife or a satellite phone, but it was much simpler: He said he found it most convenient that there were Internet cafes all around. „Also in Russia and Iran?“, I asked. He smiled and said: „Sure. And it’s just so convenient to send the articles and photos back home instantly. And the people in Iran are so nice and friendly!“
For a moment I seriously considered to hitch-hike back home, it just sounded so easy.
The MSN Messenger comes with Windows XP and launches on start-up by default. If you don’t plan to use it, you might want to get rid of this annoyance. Unfortunateley the MSN Messenger does not show up in the „Add/Remove Programs“ list. But there’s an easy way to uninstall the Messenger:
Click on „Start“ > „Run“ and then enter this one line:
RunDll32 advpack.dll,LaunchINFSection %windir%infmsmsgs.inf,BLC.Remove
(via tacktech)
Does someone know the personnel (not HP) email address of Jesus??
(found in the bangalore trainees yahoogroup)
I just booked an incredibly cheap airline ticket at jetstarasia.com!
From Bangalore to Singapore for 8800 Rs (169 Euros)! So Eva and me will have a closer look at that clean city from March 6th until 12th.
I saw an advert in the Times of India newspaper yesterday saying 2999 Rs but of course that was not true. I wonder why the airline companies don’t advertise at least somewhat correct air fares – since 8800 Rs is still very very cheap for a 5.5 hours flight.
Talking about Hypes, here’s another one:
Rumours say Google may start selling personal computers for $200 each, with their own operating system. Let’s wait for the announcment on Friday, 6th. (Source: The Guardian)
Update January, 7th: Google announced a cooperation with Motorola, a video marketplace and a software pack (which is already available for free in the internet anyway). It was just another hype.