BarboraZychova.com Blog - English Version

listopad 2007 - Posts

• "HALF THE PLANET" HAS MOBILES

  There are so many mobile phones in use nowadays that it would be enough for half of our planet's population. The first mobiles appered 26 years ago. According to the latest survey there are 3.3 billion phones in use worldwide today. Of course, it doesn't necessarily mean that every second person on Earth owns a mobile phone. The reason is that it is common to have two or even more devices per person in almost 60 countries while there are no phones at all in some parts of the globe. People don't use their phones for-calls-only anymore. Also devices with Windows Mobile system are becoming increasingly popular. When I'd visited Redmond campus (Microsoft headquaters) I was lucky enough to be introduced to the musician who composes ringtones for these mobiles. Benjamin Bethurum is one of the coolest and most energetic people I've ever met. You could've come across his music also on the Czech radio station - Radio 1 few months ago. Benjamin is going to release a new CD soon and it is going to compete also in one of the Czech hitparades.   Posted XI 30 2007, 04:56 odp. by barzych with no comments Filed under: mobile, music

• DEVDAYS 2007

  I´m sitting on a train right now and heading back to Prague. I´d spent last two days in Ostrava city. I was the host and one of the speakers during the Developer Days 2007 conference. There were about 400 people attending this event. I was staying in a nice hotel on the Stodolni street that is famous for dozens of great bars. As I´ve realized it wasn´t the best idea to try to get a good night sleep in such a location. Various drunks kept me awake until 3am. No wonder that I´d decided to reflect this in one of my demos. I was showing Windows Live Messenger and the possibility to chat with various agents/bots. When Encarta asked me "How are you?" I was honest - I admited that I´m tired. The agent recommended to me to have a rest and assured me that it will be waiting for me once I´m ready again... Apart from Messenger I was also talking about Windows Live services. The most amazement caused demos of search engine Tafiti and 3D collection of Piazza San Marco in Venezia created in Photosynth. I´ll share all these demos with you shortly here - but not yet since Developer Days conference continues in Prague tomorrow. Posted XI 20 2007, 02:47 odp. by barzych with no comments Filed under: conferences

• ZUNE "GALLERY"

  Here is a way how to be truly original. Dress up your player into some nice piece of art. Zune Originals is a new website that will be launched tomorrow where you can find 27 original art works created by 18 international artists. These are designed to be engraved onto the back of the device. Visitors of the site will be able to customize their Zune by size, color, illustration and also with up to four lines of text. This all will come free of charge. If you can´t wait till tomorrow and want to see some of these pictures today have a look here. Posted XI 12 2007, 04:19 odp. by barzych with no comments Filed under: Zune

• HAVE A NICE WEEKEND!

  It's Friday. Again. This one's being quite slow and sleepy. At least here in Prague. It's cold, it's raining, people are not nice neither to themselves nor to others... Therefore I was really pleased to find out that among all those new blogs that are emerging each day is at least one that wants to make people laugh. David Salaguinto has started this brand new blog in a bit untraditional way - it's a web comics. Have a look at it, start smiling and enjoy your weekend! Posted XI 09 2007, 02:06 odp. by barzych with no comments Filed under: humour, Halo3

• SOCIAL NETWORKING PHENOMENOM

  Business Tuesday session I'd attended this week focused on the social networking phenomenom. LinkedIn, Facebook and XING seemed to be most popular among the audience. Most controversial topic was Second Life. Presentation about this unique virtual world was shown by a mayor of the Czech city called Bohemia - Martin Dvorak. This is a place where mainly Czech and Slovak communities get together. It's one of those where I teleport myself regularly during my visits to the Second Life. Another favourite place of mine is a beautiful Strawberry Island with beaches and lots of fun stuff to do. It belongs to a friend of mine who keeps working on it whenever he gets a chance. He also hosts regular Sunday party nights and keeps creating special secret invitation-only places. One of his recent creations is the Magic Forest. He's made it for a very special event - his wedding. Have a look at this beautiful couple on the photo above yourself... Posted XI 08 2007, 12:10 odp. by barzych with no comments Filed under: SecondLife

• CHAT WITH YOUR READERS

  Barbora@live.com is my new email address. I don't really need one but I've come across the opportunity to have a free email account with a big chance to name it the way I wanted and so I've decided to take this opportunity. If you'll be quick enough you might get a name you fancy yourself. In case your registration doesn't go smoothly - change your language settings to English and your region to the US. However, you might fill "Czech Republic" in the form itself. In this article by Sarah Perez you might also learn about an interesting way e.g. how to be in touch with readers of your blog just simply by adding Windows Live Messenger directly to it. Whenever you are online they can be in touch with you instantly. New email, Messenger, blogging on Spaces and much much more is available for free under Windows Live services umbrella. Posted XI 07 2007, 03:07 odp. by barzych with no comments Filed under: WindowsLive

• AMAZING OLD TECHNOLOGY

  Term „amazing technology" usually translates to „latest technology". But it doesn't have to be necessarily this way in all cases. Let me share a story I had experienced recently. Assoc. Prof. Michael Meadows - my former lecturer and also a Head of Media School at the Griffith University in Australia came over to Europe to do his research. I was pleased by his choice to include Czech media in his work and also about the fact that we could meet again. Michael's focus was on public media therefore I took him for an excursion to the Czech Television and also to the Czech Radio.  Director of one of its stations - Radio Praha (broadcasts in 6 languages) Miroslav Krupicka and also chief editor Gerald Schubert were very well prepared and we'd spend several hours together in the end. According to the profesor the equipment of all newsrooms, studios and editing rooms were very similar to those ones in Australia but what really grabbed his attention was - apart from excellent language skills of Mr Schubert (native Austrian able to speak six languages including perfect Czech) - a paternoster. This is a unique cyclic elevator and Michael has never seen anything like that before. Gerald Schubert has found a story written by one of radio's reporters about it for us. You might find the story behind the paternoster amazing as well. Posted XI 01 2007, 03:35 odp. by barzych with no comments Filed under: media, technology