In the Denmark theme, I was clued into this awesome tool by Lars the GMail Drive shell extension. Basically gmail can now be protable storage.
it must be Copenhagen. This little house in Christiania epitomizes the critical Danish value of "coziness."
I arrived Saturday night from Oslo, and have been comfy in Caroline and Lars' house, the Danish IA and Programmer couple who have caring for me in the most lovely healing way possible- red wine and home cooking, and a cozy bed near a wood stove. The travel wearyness has been vanishing from me quickly, though tomorrow I'm back to the road, off to Aalborg.
Yesterday Caroline showed me Copenhagen, and we walked through Christiania. It's a fascinating place, a squatter town in the heart of Copenhagen made up of hippies, with the cannabis and colorful decor (and preponderance of brown rice) that goes with it. It was born in the 1970's and the residents consider themselves a separate country of sorts, in which they pay no taxes, and have their own self-ruled society, which does a excellent job of staying environmentally friendly, providing for all residents and raising families collaboratively.
entering Christiania
leaving Christiania ("you are now entering the EU")
Caroline tells me the city government is trying to remove them-- the land is too valuable to leave to hippies who paid not a dime for it. And this would be a sad thing, as it is both a tourist attraction and thus a source of money, a fun corner of the city that has a unruly almost anti-Scandinavian lack of orderly design and a good break for the residents, and provides some wild areas with nature which all cities need. As well as some quirky hand built houses (though maybe not so quirky to those of us who drive around the hills outside of Silicon valley, where the last of the magic bus folks still reside...).
This one seems ready to resist attack, built up on a stone foundation with ladder access on the side.
This one I would be happy to live in... looks cozy!
Official site of Christiania
it must be oslo.
I had a wonderful time with Superlim in Oslo. The Norwegian hospitality is all they say and more. I'll speak more on this later... in the airport, and a bit tired. Off to Denmark next.
It must be stockholm.
The problem with making stuff for the web is all things are temporal. This page I was once quite proud of, and has been replaced by a new design. sigh.
I love the treo despite its numerous faults. I checked mail, SMS'd philippe, took a photo, am blogging, will listen to sanseverino on the train with one device!
I leave my cozy and modern NH hotel in Brussels for Amsterdam tomorrow. Where to sleep? If someone knows of a reasonable centrally located hotel, please drop me a note. Hotel Area's website is a bit off putting, but I'm open to putting it back on the list.
I just reinstalled Plaxo, in order to get my address book back after my laptop died. I updated my business card. Little did I know, Plaxo emailed all my contacts. I was not warned, I was not told I should double check my spelling or information before sending it out... nope, Plaxo just took it upon itself to spam everyone with the new card. This program's bad UI choices has now endangered relationships. I am steaming mad, and cannot figure out how to counter this amazing faux pas of software, except to uninstall Plaxo and warn everyone else I can find not to use it.
update: Be sure to read the comments
President of AIfIA and my clever partner Victor Lombardi has published a call to IAs and desingers in hisAIFIA | Editorial: The Best Sourcing of Information Architecture. Wake up people, it's not "if my job moves to India," it's "when my job moves to India (or china, or Russia)" what wil I do? And when your job moves, do you know what your next job will be? Or are you assuming it can never move? Because you are wrong. Moreover protectionism doesn't work; it's better that people learn to continually grow into the next oppurtunity.
There was an excellent article in the October HBR on why we will not only lose jobs to the emerging countries, but we won't be thinking up good new ones in America's Looming Creativity Crisis ($$).
Description:
The strength of the American economy does not rest on its manufacturing prowess, its natural resources, or the size of its market. It turns on one factor--the country's openness to new ideas, which has allowed it to attract the brightest minds from around the world and harness their creative energies. But the United States is on the verge of losing that competitive edge. As the nation tightens its borders to students and scientists and subjects federal research funding to ideological and religious litmus tests, many other countries are stepping in to lure that creative capital away. Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark, and others are spending more on research and development and shoring up their universities in an effort to attract the world's best--including Americans. If even a few of these nations draw away just a small percentage of the creative workers from the United States, the effect on its economy will be enormous. In this article, the author introduces a quantitative measure of the migration of creative capital called the Global Creative-Class Index. It shows that, far from leading the world, the United States doesn't even rank in the Top 10 in the percentage of its workforce engaged in creative occupations. What's more, the baby boomers will soon retire. And data showing large drops in foreign-student applications to U.S. universities and in the number of visas issued to knowledge workers, along with concomitant increases in immigration in other countries, suggest that the erosion of talent from the United States will only intensify. To defend the U.S. economy, the business community must take the lead in ensuring that global talent can move efficiently across borders, that education and research are funded at radically higher levels, and that we tap into the creative potential of more and more workers. Because wherever creativity goes, economic growth is sure to follow.
Is a dumb strategy: More on Walgreens
China faults Bush on Iraq is a damning statement. Mostly I'm stalking about saying "damn, damn..."
W Ketchup™
Sometimes adsense birings us little joys on days like this. I cannot believe this is not a parody.
