The Dublin Tweasurehunt is back on June 12th at 2pm. More clues, more prizes, more teams, more fun.
Measure it! is on this Wednesday in The Academy Plaza. Realex Payments, O’Leary Analytics and Barry Hand will be giving presentations before those attending will be given a task to solve around social media measurement.
Pól Ó Conghaile’s Ireland Uncovered blog is a handy resource of curated information for those that like to travel. Nice post on the best Irish campsites.
The Opening Ceremony of the 2010 Special Olympics Ireland Games is in Limerick on June 9th. Tickets are on sale now.
RIP aka Rock Indie Pop RIP is: “Dublin’s newest alternative for indie kids, rock chicks and pop tarts.” The first is on Friday 18th June 2010.
DirecteBooks.com is seeking an Internet Sales Specialist to coordinate and further develop our online sales and marketing efforts
Neal Stephenson and chums create an interesting multimedia story/narrative for iPad, iPhones? Is this one of the future of books?
You’ve probably all heard about the crap Google got into in Germany when it was found out (after initial denials by Google) that they were doing more than taking pictures of cats in the windows of homes. They were also (and they never informed the public of this) scanning all WiFi networks, logging on if they could and taking snapshots of whatever traffic was passing through the network. So bits of emails, images from websites etc. were logged against your GPS coordinates and your WiFi network name.
In February I asked Google to remove where I live from their Streetview database as per instructions from the Data Protection Commissioner. Being a human and not someone that spends big money with Google, I was ignored. I’m sure if they made money from me I’d be listened to and get a free Nexus too. So now I need to ask the same for my Wifi networks? Great.
The issues here are still being found out, for example in Germany the authorities investigating this serious privacy breach asked for the data that was collected but handing over the data breaches data privacy laws! But do they breach the Data Retention Directives? where countries including Ireland can demand an ISP store data on Internet usage. It’s great data for a Government to have. The location of every WiFi network in Ireland and the name of the network. What if someone was uploading an MP3 when being scanned? Could IRMA go after Google?
This is not like the screaming hysteria around Facebook where people sign up to Facebook and then give it data. This is Google coming into your neighbourhood and scanning your WiFi, aggregating it and other data around your location and then storing it in a database or databases. Where are these databases?
This whole story shows that even if this was an error in code it shows that now 30 countries are affected by it. Chinese hackers got into Google systems, imagine if they got this data or they themselves injected code in it. The arrogant grandstanding by Google, hiding behind their “do no evil” mantra, letting us know that they know better is not good enough in this situation. When technology like this, where a simple error can affect the privacy of potentially millions of people then maybe it’s up to the local data protection entities to examine the data gathering process to make sure it’s clean and safe.
Next time a political party comes to your door, even if you never voted for them, they are still accountable to you since you and I bankroll them so heavily.
Free Workshop from EI. Top 10 Mistakes Made When Pitching Investors…And How To Avoid Them. “Nathan Gold is also the co-author of Giving Memorable Product Demos and a 2-time winner of the distinguished DEMOgod Award.”
Think Google and others know this? It seems websites can access a hell of a lot of your browser history.
IADT’s business training and mentoring programme Create is open to recruit 10 companies in their early stage of business development.
How to become a Youtube Hero, 23rd June, Griffith College, Dublin. Course from MediaContact.ie
OpenFM will be Ireland’s first gay culture radio station. Temporary licence seems them broadcasting for 90 days from June in Dublin.
Organised by Donal Skehan and facilitated by Bord Bia, the Irish Food Bloggers event last Thursday was superb. It was great to be there, even if toast is the best thing I can er cook.
It was fantastic too to meet so many of the food bloggers I’ve been reading for years. More blogs too to add to FoodFight.ie I was going to call Caroline the grand dame of Irish food bloggers but she’s far far too young for that. She has a great summary of the day, a good deal of which comprised of Irish Pork. I think it would be good to have regular foodie blogger get togethers and get such creative talent (both in the kitchen and on their blogs) to network more.
Lorraine Fitzmaurice of Blazing Salads kicked off the practical demos and showed how to make spelt bread and miso pesto.
Then came Pat Conway from GMIT on butchering some Irish Pork. I think his demo was a favourite of many, well except the poor veggies having to watch as he showed the art form of butchery. I got up close and recorded him doing his magic, ten minute video embedded:
Maire Dufficy of Bord Bia then did some cookery demos with various types of Irish pork, minced pork was new to me. This demo was tough as it was nearing lunch and the smell wafting through the room was a killer for most people.
I was up next to talk briefly on marketing your blog and suggested (selfishly as I was starving now) we move me to after lunch but the kitchen wasn’t ready, so I wittered on fo 10 mins about marketing and getting yourself attention.
Then lunch, guess what we had? And then dessert:
Eoin Purcell from Green Lamp Media then gave a great quick talk on what publishers want and also what areas are underserved in the cooking book industry. Some brilliant tips were shared. One main takeaway is that a pre-existing audience and even a mailing list of blog readers makes selling books and getting a book deal a little easier.
After lunch there was a talk on food styling and photography from Erica Ryan and Jocasta Clarke. Eoin mentioned in his talk that food bloggers with great photos have an advantage in terms of book deals so this talk proved very valuable. Again, loads and loads of tips were shared.
And then some nice swag was given away as the day wrapped up.
The day was good in many ways, it brought the vibrant food blogger community together, some meeting each other for the first time. It gave Bord Bia a nice opportunity to meet opinion formers and sharers and to tell them about the quality processes around Irish pork. It also was a nice training day for people passionate about food allowing them to up their game. Hopefully there’ll be more of these events for food bloggers, I’d love to see a food fair showing off Irish produce to food bloggers for example. This event is a perfect example of earned media, with the likes of Bord Bia not marketing or broadcasting to a community but working with them and helping to enrichen it with knowledge.
The Contemporary Music Centre is running a conference called The Future of Music in the Digital World on Friday, 11 June 2010 in Dublin Castle. Given the lineup there’s sure to be a few fights between dinosaurs and iPad users or something like that.
NDRC have launched the next version of Launchpad. What is it? A three month accelerator programme targeted at emerging start-up promoters with strong academic links.
Declutter is a handy bookmarklet from Paul Conroy to get rid of crap off a webpage including Foursquare updates on Twitter.
Have a look at You Book In – an Irish web service that allows you and your clients to book your time. Must give it a proper go soon, something I definitely will see myself using.
Via the Easy to Use Design Awards with Arthritis Ireland and Pfizer is The Kug. Two Irish design students have come up with this simple but clever concept. Kettle, mug. Kug:
Milk 2010 – Ireland’s Gay and Lesbian Music Festival – 14 August 2010
Kerry Bicycle Festival has kick started. 13th – 22nd May
Some fun stuff inc: Bike Polo, bike short films, Nature and History cycle and a 5 course meal in with a course in 5 different venue with a cycle in between.
Some great great tips from Barry Hand on using Facebook. Are you using Facebook Insights?
