I’ve had a nightmare winter on the rails of Europe – stranded 3 days thanks to Eurostar (and missing a friend’s wedding as a result), delays with SNCF, and mess with a journey to Germany. Yet today, back home in Brussels, everything looks just a little better. Almost 2 months […]
Forköpsremsor. The patter of winter tires on worn tarmac. Blåbuss 3 mot Karolinska sjukhuset. The absence of overweight people. Påfyllning. Drunken happy people on the Tunnelbana. People that say hello to you when you go to the till at a shop. Showers that allow you to set the exact temperature […]
It’s a simple question: do people read Facebook messages and signup for events in the way they used to? The last fortnight has – in my personal case – given me a resounding answer: no. I’ve tried to organise 2 personal events via Facebook – 16 friends in Oslo invited […]
I’m absolutely stunned – I finished in 70th position (among the ‘fitness’ skaters – i.e. anyone except the absolute pros) in the Berlin Half Marathon inline skating 10 days ago, with a net time of 47:01. I knew the race had been OK – that time is 1 minute slower […]
On 7th January 2009, Tom Steinberg (founder of MySociety in the UK – more about them in a moment) penned a blog entry entitled “Top 5 Internet Priorities for the Next Government (any next Government)“. The whole thing is worth a read yet it’s the first part of the first […]
A question was posed at today’s Campaign Clinic at the eCampaigning Forum about niche social networks that I felt did not receive an adequate answer at the time. Now with a few hours to reflect on it, I’ve distilled my thoughts. There are 2 essentials to a good social network […]
I’m at the Advocacy Online session at the eCampaigning Forum where I’ve just listened to a presentation from FullCitizen about online fundraising strategies [more here]. They rather swiftly dismissed the fundraising power of Youtube, Facebook and Twitter in one of their slides – there’s little or no conversion into fundraising […]
Traffic light stuck on amber. For 6 20 days solid*. And no-one has done a thing. A STIB tram passes this light every 10 minutes – it’s at the southern end of Chaussée de Charleroi. At least one police vehicle will have passed it each day. At least one person […]
An interesting debate has broken out in Brussels this week over the declining number of accredited journalists that follow the work of the EU institutions. Charlemagne and Leigh Phillips have differing approaches to the issue, and Julien has a visceral blogging take on these matters. Today on Twitter the debate […]
I’ve just finished reading Who’s Your City by Richard Florida and, in short, it strikes me as intuitively about right. The essence of the book is that where you live is as important a choice as what your job is or who your partner is. Additionally Florida argues that the […]
I’ve been at a conference in Brussels this morning organised by the Foundation for European Progressive Studies (FEPS) and I was asked to give a presentation about Social Democracy in the e-society era – you can find my slides here. But that’s not the topic of this blog entry. I […]
A mother of three has been shot in Uccle and EUObserver is jumping up and down reporting on the crime rates in various Brussels communes. You can just hear the typical EU expat having a whinge at Place Lux complaining about things, about how unsafe Brussels streets are… and then […]
