Cheers !

Ok, I was right ( here and here ). Bush won another presidential mandate "to rule" with tremendouse credit by american people.
Early exit polls were wrong again. Damn buzzy and laying blogosphere ! Dan Rather is laughing now :)
American democratic party becomes joke ! America is redecorated and the fear is , generation will be needed to put American again on the path of a modern society. Stop !
New Zealand is waiting on american students and youth :))

Woof, It seems I was completly wrong. Kerry is winning this elections according to some early exit polls.
Now, it is 00.15 AM here in Croatia, 06.15 PM in New York.
And all this by much wider margin than it was expected. Maybe it is too early, it is not verified trend...Key states Florida and Ohio got Kerry.

Recount

My bet for today's US presidential elections. I don't like betting actually, but I'll make exception here.
I prefer "most likely scenario" phrase, and it's well known I do not prefer Bush as a first choice for the Empire.
Nobody knows who' will win.
Here's a list of the most likely scenarios", in my view:

a.) Bush is re-elected

b.) Recount- voting scandal about irregularities in key regions or ...............House of Representatives is choosing Bush in case of tight results ( neither candidate get 270 electoral votes)

c.) Kerry's clear victory

d.) Booga booga, Al Qaida is allowed to strike again and the emergence situation is in place ( most unlikely)

e.) Will Smith fail to save US from alien's attack and White House is gone, and Croatian ministar Zuzul express deeply regrets for this unfortunate situation :))))

Web marketing myths I heard, yay!

Few mistakes noted when speaking with some PR/ marketing people here in Croatia. I saw an enormouse misunderstanding regarding marketing on the web.
These people are terrible wrong with the nature of doing online advertising and presentation. I am deeply convinced of that.
So many myths I heard from them.

They are deeply in this " banner" web shit. I

t doesn't work for most advertisers on the net. Capito ? Big , well-known companies can use the classical banner/type of advertising on the web as a mean to build awareness for the company on the web as yet another chanel having in mind their marketing mix strategies ( TV, radio, web, print..).
The first and foremost mistake these people are doing is that they just don't understand that internet is not mass media. It's not. No, seriously! I mean it. The web is not mass media, and the people on the web are not crazy about mass messages. Stop.

The second myth I tried to debunk in their minds is pure concept of advertising as known in other media like TV, radio, print.

A type of mindset which is present mostly in middle -size businesses with more growth potential and "easy" marketing budget available for selling growth story in the media ( advertising products and services ).
Often is the case that the plan is to slice the marketing budget pie ( either they'll do it alone or "experts" from PR agencies will do ) and burn the cash for advertising on the web. It's only "advertising " for them. A huge , ineffective ADvertising. Stop. It doesn't work because they are focusing on "space", not search engines,Yay strategice alliances , rich and relevant message...oh, and mostly on the wrong places on the web.

Third, who needs flashy , blinking, loud, and has hippy colors ( and fucking ugly rainbow ) ? Nobody. Ok, some of them think it's cool. It's about taste ,too. But , generaly, forget it ! Consuming content doesn't go with that.
The ad should be cleare, exhaustive, focused, organized...Stop.

Wait a minute, why I am giving and writing this !
I won't anymore.

One day, people will eventually find these misconception alone, by error and trials ;))
There's so many web marketing myths I heard I couldn't belive it.
Yay !

Spleak

I didn't use Spleak, but it sounds very interesting, and it comes from Copenhagen, Denmark. But why is this plug-in only for MSN Messenger ?
Mrrrr...I'm not using instant messegers very often, but ones that imitates natural talk is allways welcome.

PRESS RELEASE: 25,000 People Talking to Spleak Interactive Agent Only a Week After Launch of the First Beta Version on the MSN Messenger Network: "committed to combine instant messaging and artificial intelligence into a totally new interactive medium, where the interface is simple natural conversation. These messages exchanged with the 25,000 people who have downloaded Spleak as soon as the first beta version was released and talked to her through MSN Messenger."

Iranian lawmakers approved the bill over Iran's nuclear activities. This will be huge issue in the months to come, and if Bush wins US elections a lot of various pressures could come to the addres of Iranian ruling class.
Therefore, european diplomacy is this time ahead with the plans for negotiations before State Department starts to dig deeper in their own fashion ;)

``the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran is required to make use of scientists and the country's facilities ... in order to enable the country to master peaceful nuclear technology, including the cycle of nuclear fuel.''

Today I 've started reading Timbuktu Chronicles. Africa is blogging, the voice is heard.

China's cool

Now, who would that thought, China's central bank today raised interest rates for the first time in 9 years.
The implications for this decision could be seen in commodity markets all around the world.
As of now ( thursday, 18.30 croatian time - 10.30 am in US ), gold is down , oil is down, Alcoa ( aluminium maker ) is down.
But dollar is UP !
The reason goes that commodity prices ( oil, silver, platinum..) are rising for many months because of the China's demand for their booming economy.
But related to China, this news ( Yuan peg) could be of the most interest in months ( years ) to come.

Blogger users can make podcasting

Finally, there's an interesting solution for the people who can't alone make feed enclosures ( RSS 2.0 ) for the purpose of Podcasting. SmartCast is announced by FeedBurner three days ago( provider of smart feeds ).

If you're a Blogger publisher and you want to create a podcast, create items that point to your audio file (mp3s or torrents or whatever) in the link element, and then use our service. SmartCast will do what's necessary to make this feed podcast-able!

It's fantastic solution. Look what these folks at FeedBurner done further, they've set up podcasting community at del.icio.us bookmarking service.

Vauuu, although elitist by many counts, podcasting is fast web virus that is spreading before some basic question like copyright, bandwith are answered.

Podcasting is stupid name and it is confusing those who think that this is only for iPod users ( Apple connected) , but it's not, as Jake Ludington made excelent tutorial on how to podcast with Windows Media Player and some other MP3 player.

Little James Bonds

Few weeks ago there was a story in croatian papers about british secret agents ( MI6) exposed in Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia.
It's those little secret spy "power games" that foreign secret services are doing here in the Balkan to gain infuence and promote interest of their country. But they were trapped into conflict.

MI6?s over-riding objective is to protect and promote British economic and political interests in the face of greater economic penetration by its rivals. The Croatian Embassy in the US reports, for example, that the US, Germany and Austria each invested approximately one billion US dollars in Croatia between 1993?2000, whilst Britain invested only $US102 million.

Is there a need to say that some of the most wanted criminals charged for war crimes in the Balkan wars are still on the large despite all these services operating in the region .
A lack of political will ?

Me-To-Me copyfight

Interesting read about the latest push to tighten copyright in digital age. LawGeek blog has a great article about so called INDUCE drafts.
The author mentioned "Me2Me" apps.
It's a strong opinion:

Me2Me technology, however, would be much much harder to outlaw. Many Me2Me uses would arguably be fair or non-infringing uses. For instance, they tend to be private uses involving only family or friends. Many would involve use of media legitimately purchased by both the sender and recipient of the content (i.e. oneself). Thus, under current copyright law, it would very difficult to outlaw any of them. It would also be difficult to chastize them politically in front of Congress.

Today, I am in a great mood for bashing the president of the United States. Tadaaabooom !!
No political correctness please, no, not this time !

Yes, " lovely" George is again at the spotlight. George, God here ...
The world is watching, polls for the American elections are showing tight possible outcome, and we can't surely say who'll be the next US commander in chief.
But the world is clearly against Bush the Greatest- the candidate ;))

The world don't want american dollars as a reserve currency for their needs.
So, in the end, idealogy won't matter but economic reality and social change.
We are not there, yet. But in the meantime we should watch elections parade.
I am guessing, this year US election could be as well decided in the court after the process called RECOUNT.

The old ( and silly) US electoral system is in a tight race poised for another scandal .

Otaku mobile TV

How many times should I repeat to those folks from business skycrapers ( mobile communication companies ) that I don't want TV on my mobile phone. Said that, I mean that, I'll do that.
It's so silly idea and I just can't figure it out why industry insiders are pushing blindfolded these concepts ?
I really can't understand. Am i missing something ?
It's so simple .
This article is so so so so so ( one more time: soooo ) stupid and I am laughing like a mad :)))

For example, when the BBC made its first colour TV broadcast in the summer of 1967, producers and writers came alive to the possibilities of the medium. 37 years later and the mobile phone industry is embracing colour screen technology. Colour screens have had the effect of shifting the perception of the mobile phone from being a tool for voice calls to becoming an entertainment device, and are a key driver in the purchase/upgrade cycle for handsets.

Oh my, oh my...the sky is falling :)) Don't you know that "color screens are shifting the perception of the mobile phone industry" ....:)))))

SMS as a cash cow

Look, at smarthphone blog, great, great article about SMS, and how telecom operators earn money with SMS cause , you know, it doesn't cost them much.
The article tone seems to be appropriate one ;)

SMS really costs nothing, once there is a GSM network in place. SMS is like software - create it once, sell it a thousand times, no costs-per-item involved. So if you pay the telco 8 cents per SMS, they pretty much earn 8 cents per SMS.

Podcasting buzz

There seems to be much noise these days around blogosphere about podcasting. Truly great way for distributing audio content over web. How to...

But for some time it won't be for Mr.Everybody with a lots of bandwith and hosting storage.

At this early stage it's only expensive and have very little add value in my opinion. It 's one of those blogosphere hyped fads. Still, thank god, one should not have iPod to make podcasting and the iPodder sofware is born.
But RSS with enclosure is here to stay.

Podcasting obviously has it's fans who will show all possible applications and plug ins for the practices of distributing audio content over web ( not mobile networks ).

My question is however, how to pay for the bandwith and hosting files as an ordinary web user ?
I think commercial institution will make the most of these concepts of podcasting as the way of distributing their audio content to the end user in on -demad fashion.

It's easy to put ads that way , too.

Again, there will be need for some web based services who will aggregate available audio content and make it easy to navigate for average web user.
Issues about copyright should be resolved before it can be adopted by some mainstream content producers.

And the real "party" could make mobile operators when they offer audio streaming for storage rich mobile devices in the future, and it'll have more broader impact than podcasting. ( recently news are pointing in that direction )

But still, what about battery life ? ;)) What about content producing for a Mr.Everybody and make it accesable to anyone on mobile phone ? Web is more useful for the distribution than mobile networks .
Not yet clear to me.

Social web space for music

It's a kind an interesting social networking hub for music listeners called LAST FM. Today found out about this web service. Here's FAQ.

Didn't try it much, but it enables to connect people with similar music tastes. As far as I can see, members have to build profile and name their favorite tracks and artists so they can be accesible for others ( you can put small icon signed as Personal radio on your blog or web site that will deliver over MP3 player your picked tracks to the visitors who want to listen ).

I can imagine how music critics could use this feature on their personal weblogs/web sites or any music related web space.
Why not recording labels to use this social component for discovering new music and founding what goes and what not ( having in mind aggregate tastes for specific music generes ), or using it like a hub for customer loyalty ?

Last.fm is in beta and it seems they are starving for cash ( they are paying licencing fees ) , so their goal could be subscription service.
And it does not play well for dial -up/modem connection.
It's a toy for western broadband societies :))

Rojo's way of navigating web

Since yesterday I've been playing with the new web service Rojo. It's web based RSS news reader with social netwoking features included and the reputational system possibilities.

Nice thing , but so far have no definitive conclusion.
I'll work on it in days to come.

Above all, would like to thank Thomas for the invitation . Rojo is fresh web service, still in beta , and works invitation-only.
I can give few invitation to those who would like to have it.

This service is still fresh, having in mind it's only few days ago announced during one of the sessions held for Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco.

Film festival

Zagreb Film Festival is under way.

ZAGREB FILM FESTIVAL is a competitive festival that presents and awards new film authors wit their features, short and documentary films, and the FESTIVAL OF THE FIRST establishes the value of debutants' achievements in various areas of creative expression.

Bush's edge

Today, Croatian daily, Jutarnji list, in their foreign politics section concluded " Kerry won all three debates ".
So what ?

I still don't believe Kerry is winning. This latest Reuters/Zogby poll says the same.
The wishes are not the reality, unfortunatly !
In my humble opinion , I think that undecided voters are the key for Bushs victory along with the results in those swing states. The economy is equally important but as US consumer data shows it' not used in debate effectively, and democrats didn't played that well.

Undecided voters are more inclined to vote for Bush. The republicans are more supportive of their candidate as the poll shows ( 89 % of them ) , and the democrats are not so strong behind Kerry ( 79 % of them ).
In this historical voting for US ( and the world I belive ) weights security fear of world wide terorrism that could be, in this post 9-11 world, decisive for the candidate who shows streght in those issues ( although Bush didn't use it 100 % )

Many are aware that Kerry can't pull US substantialy out of global war the Bush administration started. Many are aware , in case Kerry wins, that the foreign politics will be only more sophisticated and not so agressive in cases like building alliances. But, the war goes on.

In case Bush wins, there will be unstopable plans for their ''War on terrorism '' fought on their terms.
Better said, the world will be place of action and reaction to these facts ;))

Dossier Oil

Lately, my favorite subject is OIL. I have been writing and reading much about oil issues. I think It depends a lot on the current war for oil resources that has begun since 2000 with the Bush's and Cheney's entry into White House.
Cheney is today most informed and the most influential person on Earth, he said many times how severe consequences could be if world runs out of oil very fast which is now the case ( demand for oil is booming , and only China's economic slowdown could bring some relief)
Let me quote Cheney's speech to the International Petroleum Institute in London in late 1999:

'By some estimates,' Cheney stated, 'there will be an average of two percent annual growth in global oil demand over the years ahead, along with, conservatively, a three percent natural decline in production from existing reserves.' Cheney ended on an alarming note: 'That means by 2010 we will need on the order of an additional fifty million barrels a day.'

Peak oil theorist are delighted to quote these sentences. I think these theorists are right in a essence but wrong and naive about reality.

It's game, pure and simple said. Although, peak theorists are right that proven world reserves and the dynamic of extracting new oil is lesser than general public is aware ( Royal Shell corrected their reserves estimates down this summer ). What would happen if there's correct accounting of underground and above-ground oil ?
Crash, and seriouse economic reset. It's just a game, and nobody expects it'll happen. That's not even option because it would set up prices at correct value having in mind supply and demand, and the realistic price of oil at current situation would be at about 182 dollars for a barrel.

Financial wizards are starting to wake up to this reality and world's ( foxy ) hedge funds were buying oil futures contracts like crazy for about a year. Oil costs today 80 % more than at the beginning of this year.
The prices of oil will probably break 60 $ for barell this winter but will come down next year although not under 40 $. But nobody knows this things for sure.

Around the world still echoes BBC report from the conference in Berlin this summer.

How will you pay to run your car? How will you get the children to school? How will you heat your house? How much will transported food go up in price?
How will we pay for plastics, metals, rubber, cheap flights, Simpson's DVDs, 3G phones and everlasting economic growth?
The basic answer is, we won't.

Their reporter painted very gloomy picture of the world addicted to the economic growth and western lifestyle as we know it, and with the expections of the new technogies to change the world for better, who is suddenly challenged with high energy costs.
But seems that an old ingredient of economic prosperity will at least for the moment sometime in the future slow down these dreams.

Although I have not finished thoughts on this subject I will stop. Too long article.