The reason why blogs will die.

If you have ever this blog you might have wondered - why have I suddenly stopped posting? Have my life been boring and I had nothing to write about? Have I lost my arms in an accident and could not write? Have I moved to country without internet connection? Does such a country even exist?

Well none of these is true. The reason is simply PRIVACY. I always thought that Internet is a safe place where you could write about your life and no one will care that much about you. Well that was all true until my last posts.

Believe me, when someone starts STALKING you throughout all day, you don't want to give out any of your private life to that person. This happened to me and it was one the most disagreeable thing. I felt I could not post on the blog anymore or I will never get rid of this person - the stalker.

I guess that this will sooner or later become more of a danger on a large scale. I foretell that blogs will vanish as a result of natural progression. New generation will rely on social networks such as Facebook or Orkut to communicate about their private life only with people they accept to know about those information.

If you don't think I am right, just research on the problem. You will ne surprised how many children, women or teenagers have been contacted by someone over the Internet who has then abused them or tried to lure them out to take advantage of them. I have seen one documentary about a team of adults that go to chat rooms and pretend to be kids so they catch all the psychos and sickos looking there for their victims.

Kids for multicultural tolerance

Czechs kids are going to be taught to respect and be tolerant to multicultural and national differences of social groups living in their country. Schools will benefit from internet flash presentation called CzechKid which features virtual characters with different backgrounds.

I have tried the site and laughed terribly when I have found that one virtual buddy is actually Slovak boy Jožo whose parents came to work in Czech Republic because of better economic conditions :)
However, the young generation of Czech university students, at least the majority of those studying at University of Economics in Prague, might stop being racist against Slovak students (about 10%).

Okay I am having fun but I appreciate this kind of effort and wish it success. Personally, my piece of advice towards promoting tolerance would be to send EVERY student/politician/person to study abroad program like Erasmus - the opportunity to drink together with multiple national, religious, ethnic, language-speaking groups totally makes you forget stupid xenophobia!

PS1: Respect to facebook which I have been surfin' often recently. I have discovered many of friends from my Erasmus stay last year in France. It just feels good knowing that they are doing well + keeping in touch a little!

PS2 for Empty, Satankay, Vjerka: Check out Pavla virtual character at CzechKid. Notice the resemblance to one particular person ;) When you finish laughing, check Hassles "Trable - Občas se mi smějou, že jsem socka..." ;) After you finish laughing, check this pic I made like 4 years ago and compare. I guess I had an epiphany...

But behold of my great Photoshop skills! 2003 Wallpaper which resembles a condom in time spiral ;)

Free stuff in NYC

Everybody loves free stuff. I love free stuff only when it is useful. Like this initiative of NYC. What a cool souvenir!

http://nyccondom.org

Actually, the initiative is fighting against the HIV/AIDS in the city. According to my sources, NYC has one of the highest AIDS cases rates in the country, "with more AIDS cases than Los Angeles, San Francisco, Miami, and Washington DC combined.". So remember to wear one of those when you are sightseeing there. NYC themed condoms are a hit, the city has given away 5 millions of packages in a month (compared to 1,5 million usually). Posters on the streets are both in English and Spanish.

The letters on the packet are type using NYC subway lines, I guess everybody noticed. In Prague, all they can do is teach us the alphabet. So unfair!

Principles of economics, translated

If economics was taught this way at my university, I would love it!

Did You Know; Shift Happens - Globalization; Information Age

Another video, this time much more serious. Worth watching though :)

I would just change the phrase in the end, for me it is "Shit happens"! :)

Guys Skis Down Tube Escalator

Hehey this is great, the title says it all.
Can you believe someone placed a sticker to that escalator later on, saying "No skiing"?

Brilliant. Happy Easter!

By indexed

How to remember

I found amazing site called MNEMONICS GUIDE which will help you to remember a lot of common things you always forget!

Like how many days a month has, names of tropics, wonders of world etc. Also many more interesting things. Did you know that:

February has a smaller "leftover" amount of 28 or 29 days because pre-45 B.C. it was the last month of the Roman calendar year which started every March.

Or that weekdays are named after sky objects? SUNday, MOONday, and then 5 bright Roman
planets - Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. This works for French and Spanish while English used the Norse gods/godesses.

The site has amazing stuff, just see it for yourself!

Progress

Yesterday I finally quit my job so I have time to finish my thesis. Multitasking ain't working, you know? When you do 2 things at once, you don't do either of them perfectly.

So select the thing you really have to do now and focus on it until it's done. Just like me.

Nice deed was that I got three free tickets for evening concert of teenage german rock band Tokio Hotel. Nothing special, just the tickets were for VIP skybox lounge in huge Sazka Arena stadium. What can I say - room comfortable sofas, bar with chilled Stella Artois beer (on my boss, of course!) frequently replenished by a hostess, LCD screens, private bathroom. .

It was like a flat which I could live in! ;D

Google offers Google Paper Service!

1st April 2007 will be the day in history when Google introduced off-line archive version of Google Mail.

Just select mail which you want to be printed out by Google and delivered to you, including photos which are printed on glossy photo paper. There is no limit in number of emails and the whole service is very environmentaly friendly. Follow the link below.

About Gmail Paper

Very helpful web "things"!

These days I've become really addicted to these Google tools:

1. Google Reader - web application of the year!!! Dangerously addictive. Add RSS feeds of your favorite blogs and save your time just using the mighty Reader which shows the updates. Any post that you read and like, just "star" it and you don't have to bookmark it or lose it. Reading in this perfectly designed app is what I am doing all day instead of writing my thesis!
   I recommend subscribing to "photography" blogs combo and my dosmojitos RSS since I don't post really often.
   
   
2. Google Notebook - has received new fancy look just yesterday. I have created few notebooks like Music, Quotes, Travel, Personal etc. in which I keep things for which I don't have time now but definitely don't want to forget.
   Install Firefox add-on and just select anything on a web page and send it to your Notebook instatly!
   
   
3. Google Calendar - all time favorite. Organize your life so you can use your time more effectively. Share your calendar with your friends and family so they know what you're up to.
   If you want to synchronize your calendar and use it offline-online, download Calgoo.
   
   
4. Google Documents - the spreadsheets are just cool to share information with your friends. I use them for sharing data online, for example phone numbers of my friends who play squash. I also keep track of friendly squash tournaments I've just started to organize every weekend!
   
   
5. Picasa Web Albums has 1GB of free web space and very convenient upload directly from Picasa, the greatest and easiest photo software ever.

This is the Google world, if you are interested in this stuff, have a look at Zoho Notebook or Scrybe... and wait patiently until Christmas :)

Computer Virus Mafia

I have just spent half of Saturday locating and removing a nasty virus on my laptop. It is called Winfixer or Vundo and randomly opens Internet Explorer with a link to buy some anti-virus software. Also, I was not able to put my laptop to hibernation, which really really sucks.

So I have downloaded some 10 different utilities, spyware removers, anti-virus applications and read at least 10 forum posts to fix the problem. I was offered to buy some premium software but since I am principled I have used just freeware. Fortunately the infection is gone and I can hibernate again (even thought the winter is gone:)

I still think that there must be a hidden conspiracy - programmers who develop computer viruses are own employees of anti-virus software producers. The system works like Italian mafia - you have to pay for their "protection" but the threat originates, surprisingly, from themselves.

technorati tags:virus, conspiracy

Creativity killers

Yes, they exist.

When I come to the office of the PR agency in the morning, switch on the PC, my creativity is rapidly starting to fade away. When I run ANY program from Microsoft Office - word, powerpoint and of course, excel, the creativity which has been left in me from my yesterday's dreams is gone for good.

I wonder if you also perceive the same phenomenon? Is it the sterility of office environment, sitting on a chair in front of a computer with all this ergonomics, typing instead od drawing which is causing this? If you work in banking, there is absolutely no problem, but in marketing and PR, it is really a huge one.

The solution I would propose is to have one kind of room in EVERY company - a living room! One with nice comfy couch, table where you can put your legs, magazines, TV, stereo, table football.... Anything that helps employees to reduce the focus from time to time, to see new horizons, to think outside the box.

Funny story today

These days I am spending my time in PR agency titled PR Point doing my short-term internship. The work is interesting and people nice and there is just one man employee in the PR office besides CEO. He is Account Director and sometimes he is making a delivery boy for my lunch, I am getting used to this service too much... I even don't mind that when I press a "w" key on the PC I got here for work, it types letter "p" instead. Sometimes this causes comic mistypings... like: I don't work too much - because I pork, my last will - my last pill, I'm not weak - but at peak, you don't wander - better ponder, I don't waste time - I (copy) paste, etc. :)

The funny thing that has happened today is that I have ordered a chilli-con-carne for lunch from the restaurant with golf theme in the local district. It is called Magic Green, nothing special, but they have a hole in the carpet where you can play until your meal is ready. The specialty of the place is called "Putting game". If you "put" the golf ball into the hole on your very first attempt, you get a free bottle of wine! Second and third successful attempts are rewarded with a drink.

The story goes, today, in my lunch box from Magic Green, delivered to me by Account Director of course, I have mistakenly received gnochi with spinach and mozzarella! But I have accepted it with gratitude and finished eating the gnochi in less than 3 minutes :)

Ten minutes later, another colleague from the agency has returned from the restaurant and has brought a heavy lunch box. Handing a box to me, she has said: "This is the chilli-con-carne you have ordered, chef says he is terribly sorry. Bon appetite."

Yeah I know this is a stupid story but it feels like that the restaurant chef is doing PR internship too. Yummy... and he is doing well! Good pork!

14th February in History

Every year people celebrate today for the same reasons - feelings of love, hurt feelings, They buy the same red roses, red hearts and sweets wrapped in red tin-foil.
This year, since I am single although really happier than ever, I am not going to write boring stories about unfulfilled eternal love, cruel loneliness etc... I am going to educate you what else could you understand about today and smile wide because of the small silly things you know!

Ingenuous Wikipedia will help me greatly in the trip through history.

Today, but in 1876, Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Gray each filed a patent for the telephone. Which of them was more successful we know already, but thanks to both you can -now- pick up your phone and call somebody really really far away and tell him/her something nice. If you pick up your mobile phone, then let me tell you a small story about Jozef Murgaš, a Slovak inventor who contributed to wireless telegraphy and thus helped to "develop mobile communications and wireless transmission of information and human voice." Don't worry, this was the only boring sentence part.

This guy, who was originally a Roman catholic priest, was born in a small village Tajov in Slovakia, right next to the city I live. It was already in 1905 when he achieved a radio transmission over 30 kilometers in Pennsylvania. Imagine that the American president Theodore Roosevelt visited his lab in Wilkes-Barre, PA and T.A.Edison paid great attention to his experiments. What a honor it must have been!

Jozef Murgaš was also a painter and you can still see his painting in the church in Wilkes-Barre and also in Tajov, Slovakia. I think this is a very great way how to leave a small mark of your existence in history and ensure immortality. When anyone is looking at those paintings, he must be certainly thinking about the remarkable life this man lived 100 years ago!

Another Wikipedia entry says that today in 1989 the first of 24 Global Positioning Satellites (GPS) was launched into orbit. Valentine's effects? You will never get lost anymore while on a trip with your partner and you can also use this topic for romantic babel on stars up in the sky.

More:
Today but in 1989 a fatwa was issued on Salman Rushdie for his book Satanic Verses. - Does Islam recognize Valentine or not?

Today but in 1924 IBM has been founded. Probably the founders were single geeks and had nothing to do and no date. But they made a lot of cash and now they can buy any girl for a wife. Different approach to getting things, I would say.

Today but in 1779 James Cook, my favorite explorer and a noble man, was killed by the natives on Hawaiian Sandwich Islands. - Since then the Hawaiians became peaceful so they give you flowers and condoms when you land on their land.

The final and funniest article is about Ballantine's Day. In Norway, single persons buy a bottle of Ballantine's whiskey and drink it with other singles while discussing how ridiculous Valentine's Day is.

Happy today! :]

Happy new Bond's year 007

Yeeee, so there it is, we all get another chance to have fresh new resolutions! Another chance to be more self-confident, successful, friendly, meaningful, affectionate, fair etc. Aim high this year, because the power of magical numbers will make you succeed like you are a movie star in that action movie who dodges all the bullets (and even if the bullet hits him/her, he/she is bulletproof). Yeah, in 007 you are like a James Bond!!!


Just keep this in mind and eventually every challenge you take will have a bigger rate of success. If you are a guy, you get Bond girls, if you are a girl you get Bond. You just have to believe it. Now go since this year of miracles has 364 days left and you still won't get nothing for free.

BTW good that 1st January is over, I always have in mind that what you do on that day will happen during the whole year. So this is the day of the year when I am trying to be that good that it is not me anymore :)