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Archive for March, 2005

Catching up - GOR 05 conference in Zurich

I came to Zurich on Sunday morning and Raph was waiting for me at the airport. It was really nice to see her again. We had loads of stuff to catch up so we kept chatting and chatting and chatting. We did a lot of work (I was still working on my presentation, she was preparing her lessons for her Monday classes) and a bit of walking around.

Monday: In the morning, Raphaela went to work and I worked a bit more, too. In the afternoon, we took a walk thru the city and visited few shops. We were meeting Vesna and Katja at about 3 pm. The nicest coincidence happened when I ran into Vesna immediately when entering a specific shop we both like;). So we waited for Katja, had some quick lunch and did some more walking around. And, me and Raph finally got to buy our sleeping masks so we eagerly tried them on when going to bed after some relaxation with SATC.

Tuesday: The first conference day. I got to registration desk and again ran into Katja and Vesna (good, we didn’t have to phone). After a keynote speaker, I went to listen the session on The Social use of Weblogs. It was really interesting, with five presenters. First one being was Martin Welker, who talked about The journalist’s use of blogs. In the beginning he presented some statistics, like that there are much more blog readers than blog writers, that in Germany, 65% of internet users don’t know what blog is, that only 3% of German users are actually writing blogs and that 80% of blogs terminate after one month or so. He posed some provoking questions like: Are mass media and gate keepers losing their power over publishing? The most frequently asked question Are bloggers journalists? This is quite unproductive question and we rather need to ask: Are journalists using blogs for their reporting?

The second speaker Nicola Doring talked about moblogs. Most interesting! Moblogs are mobile blogs, short text and photos published from wireless mobile devices. She suggested to check out some links: http://bubus.ch, http://belly.textamerica.com (collective moblog), http://stopbush.textamerica.com (political moblog) and a very creative http://www.09h09.com (the author uploads pictures of himself every morning at exactly 9.09 am). In 2004, 16% of mobile users use cam phones, and that influences on expansion of moblogs. Many mobloggers are also conventional bloggers. For searching thru moblogs we can use http://icerocket.com search engine. To sum up and make a distinction, moblogs are a form of communication about every day life, really small things, usually very personal things – some call it data garbage.

To be continued later …

By Nana | March 31, 2005 | Topics: Conferences, Les Voyages | No Comments »

Updates soon …

I got home from Zurich yesterday, where I had the most fabulous time: me and Raph had a great time plus the conference was really good (with wifi and great sessions, nice coffee breaks, very nice conference dinner with delicious dessert … so very close to perfect). I’ll say more later today or tomorrow, right now I have to rush …

By | March 25, 2005 | Topics: Uncategorized | No Comments »

Busy Busy

I am still around, haven’t escaped from the blogosphere yet. I am just so busy busy writing up papers for all those conferences. I always have the same problem when I sit down to write something. It’s a quite routine procedure:

Ahhh, what a pleasant escape, this blog, and I have just written 334 words in a blink (if only was so quick when it comes to papers). I should get back to my paper …

By Nana | March 15, 2005 | Topics: Conferences, Research | No Comments »

Seriously Endangered by Earthquakes?

There has been a long history of earthquakes in Slovenia, and Ljubljana, as I already mentioned in this post. Seven years ago a beautiful area of Julian Alps (Bovec) was badly damaged by a hit of an earthquake.

Quite recently (on February the 6th), there was a slight earthquake (by magnitude 3.0) only a few km from where my mum lives. On the same day, there was a slight earthquake near Bovec, the place in Julian Alps that I mentioned above.

So now, there is this Russian scientist, who claims that Slovenia will soon encounter with catastrophic earthquake. As he tells in his predictions, it will happen in a two years time. Slovenian seismologists says he is talking rubbish and that no one can possible anticipate and predict an earthquake. Acording to them, all he did was taking a look at the map of earthquake risks in Slovenia and there he goes. Well, the guy seems to be pretty much worried about our lives here, since he sent two warnings to our environmental minister, first one on November 16th 2004 and the second one on January 20th 2005. Our Ministry of the Environment, Spatial planning and Energy didn’t take him quite seriously, since he didn’t reveal any crucial information, such as the exact date of the upcoming earthquake, exact location, and its magnitude. Then, on the February 18th 2005, the Russian made a step forward. He came up with more “detailed” prediction. He is awaiting some 700 000 Euros (hm, maybe he is not thaaaat worried) from our minister to make an exact prediction of magnitude more than 6,0, three days before the earthquake on a greater area of Slovenia (cca 100 km). But our Ministry still doesn’t buy it. They say that all we can do to prevent a huge catastrophe is to continue exclusively with seismic-resistant building. They are pretty certain this is the only effective way to fight earthquakes. And I support them on this one. Just remember the tsunami catastrophe. Wouldn’t someone have wanted to prevent it if there had been a slightest chance?

So, I am wondering. Is this Russion gonna let us all die here for lousy 700 000 Euros (assuming he really can do the exact prediction)? Why selling such an information that can prevent thousounds of lives? Isn’t it that to warn fellow human beings is a fundamental obligation of another human being? Oh, Bojana, that’s capitalism for you!

By | March 8, 2005 | Topics: Uncategorized | No Comments »

Too Tired …

to blog.

Gnite;)

By | March 3, 2005 | Topics: Uncategorized | No Comments »

Who Is That Freaking Planner?

If you ask my boyfriend (who doesn’t read my blog, btw, actually he pretty much resist reading it and he doesn’t even let me mention him in my posts but I have just done it;)) which are the characteristics he doesn’t like so much about me, he will probably start with two of them. First one being is that by his standards I am incredible clumsy and every time I get close to HIS guitar, HIS digital camera, HIS pocket PC, HIS desktop PC or on short – anything that he thinks could be damaged he fears I will destroy it as soon as I put my fingers close. Which I don’t think it is true; I haven’t destroyed any of mine so far. But here he has his little theory …
The second thing that quite bothers him is that I tend to make plans in my life for nearly everything (mostly now I am doing it for teasing him cos I know he’ll get quite unfavourable to my plans).

But today, when I made an overview to what am gonna do in the next year, it made me wonder whether he even might have a point.
There are five conferences, waiting on the short term:
1) General Online Research (GOR 05) Conference, Zurich from March 21 to March 23 (but I am gonna be away from 20-24, visiting my friend Raphaela, who lives there);
2) Philosophy of Management Conference, Oxford, July 6 to July 10;
3) Mixed Methods Conference, Cambridge, July 11 to July 12 (good timing to the previous one, huh);
4) 3rd ECPR General Conference, Budapest, September 8 to September 10;
5) Consumer Personality & Research Conference, Dubrovnik, September 20to September 24.

But this isn’t yet all to my planning. After finishing those two conferences in England, I plan to rent a room in a flatshare in London for a month or so to be a good girl, studying in the LSE Library and try to make some progress done on my PhD. Well, I know, this is going to be a hard one, but I hope to manage to rent a room. Ideally would be from some foreign student, who’s going home for the summer. So if anyone happens to know anyone like that, please let me know. I will be most grateful.

But also that isn’t all yet. Then I am gonna be a visiting researcher for January and May/June 2006 at UCL, Louvain, Belgium. But after that, I have to complete my PhD by fall 2006, and by the end of it, just before the defence I plan to get pregnant to have a baby just a few months after the defence - but when am I gonna get married … JUST JOKING! That’s how my planning syndrome can look like.

So, I think I have the best boyfriend in the world, to tolerate all my selfish planning (I wish he would read this but I know he won’t, sniff, sniff).

By | March 2, 2005 | Topics: Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

Numa Numa Hysterics

Have you already watched this hilarious clip (mind the speakers) of a New Jersy guy lip-syncing? Take a look, it is highly entertaining. And I am not being mean. Actually, I think it is quite felicitous, despite NYtimes and News.com (tho only copying the NYtimes article) attempt to make some kind of misfortune and pejorative story of how the guy got caught into his own trap by uploading the clip on his web site.

They even call him ‘an embarrassing talent’, but I think there is nothing to be embarrassed about. He put the clip on his web page, then back in December the world discovered it, and “Good Morning America” happened. The clip was broadcasted on CNN and WH1. There had been more than two million hits on the original website. So ok, people might make fun out of it, but let’s be honest here: the guy make all us laugh out loud. He is a big success!

So, Gary Brolsma, you rock! And all noisy and spiteful journalists, let him enjoy his fame, instead of going around and molesting his parents, teachers, friends, former classmates, and even grandparents about how they feel. That’s mean. That is definitely mean!

(But most of all, I can’t believe journalists do make such a big deal out of it by all other important things, happening in the world and yelling to be covered.)

By | March 1, 2005 | Topics: Uncategorized | No Comments »