barcelona

Bad wifi SUCKS

Sorry about the shouting but I need to get it out of my system. While I am attending the most interesting conference for a long time (Personal Democracy Forum) it is located in a sub-standard technical environment. While this is sad it can be explained by the inability of the venue to deliver what they promised to the organizers.
But this is not what is really pissing me off. This is the second (or maybe third?) time I am at the University of Barcelona and staring at the wonderful Eduroam network. Eduroam is

eduroam (education roaming) is the secure, world-wide roaming access service developed for the international research and education community.

eduroam allows students, researchers and staff from participating institutions to obtain Internet connectivity across campus and when visiting other participating institutions by simply opening their laptop.

The system works everywhere I have come across it and I have been able to rely on it in several places in Sweden, Austria & UK. It is an amazing initiative and a fantastic idea. But my irritation is aggravated by the fact that Eduroam NEVER works when I visit the University of Barcelona. Why is this? What have they got against visitors? Why do they even have Eduroam if they don’t what to use it to its full potential?

There is nothing worse than implementing technology badly. Unless of course the point is to cause the users suffering and frustration…

Posted on by mklang

Free Culture Forum Barcelona

I always think its a good idea to be in Barcelona. But unfortunately I will not be there this weekend. But for those of you who are in the area this coming weekend, you should seriously consider attending the Free Culture Forum:

FC Forum

Across the planet, people are recognizing the need for an international space to build and coordinate a global framework and common agenda for issues surrounding free culture and access to knowledge. The Free Culture Forum of Barcelona aims to create such a space. Bringing together under the same roof the key organizations and active voices in the free culture and knowledge space, the Forum will be a meeting point to sit and put together the answers to the pressing questions behind the present paradigm shift.

Representatives from Creative Commons Spain, Students for Free Culture and Wikimedia will be in attendance (among many others), so it’ll be a great opportunity to meet plenty of people in our community. Registration is free and open to the public, but there are more details on how to get involved here.

(via Creative Commons)

Posted on by mklang

Anne Frank "live"

Anne Frank is a tragic symbol of the effects of evil on the innocent. When walking in Amsterdam today it is impossible to understand how her fate could ever had occurred. It couldn’t, it shouldn’t… but it did. The worst thing is that it can again (and in variations it still does in many places around the world). I was reminded of Anne Frank when walking around Barcelona and came across Plaça d’Anna Frank:

The graffiti worries me that we are ready to forget the gravity of barbarity. The rest of my Barcelona photo’s are here.

This via Neatorama

The only known video images of Holocaust victim and diarist Anne Frank have been circulating YouTube. Lisa Gutierrez writes in the Kansas City Star:

The 21-second, black-and-white video, filmed on July 22, 1941 about a year before Anne and her family went into hiding, shows the front of an Amsterdam apartment building where Anne and her family lived.

Nine seconds into the film you can see a brief glimpse of Anne, age 13, leaning out of a second-floor window trying to catch a glimpse of her next-door-neighbor who just got married.

The authenticity of this film has been verified by the Anne Frank Museum.

Posted on by mklang

Disruption in Uppsala, Memory in Barcelona

Despite needing sleep the presentation in disruptive technology presentation in Uppsala went well. The discussion focused on integrity and social networks and presented some of the early early results of the emerging research project. Now its onwards to Barcelona for the 6th Communia Workshop Memory Institutions and the Public Domain… This is going to be really good.

Disruptive technology: Social Networks and Integrity (Samhällsomstörtande teknik: Sociala Nätverk och Integritet)

Posted on by mklang