Man! It was tough even finding time last week to think through an entry much less post one. =( But lots happened on the work front and I managed to sneak in and capture photos where I could.

Had a fantastic dinner at Hachi with Debbie and Adrian on 15 June - not something to do every week but I wouldn’t mind 8 course meals every month or so…*yum*

Nokia Connection happened the week of 18 June. Have some shots taken; not sure about the pre-event ones though, on whether I can post them. What’s the deal anyway – anyone know? Can you post up shots taken of pre-events by vendors without permission?

Here’s what I have…all pictures taken with a Nokia N95.

Attended iX 2007: Academic Forum organised by the TDM group. It was a rather cosy affair, held at the SMU Admin Building. That place looks and feels like a maze but the auditorium is pretty cool – with plugs and LAN points in their seats. I wish I was a student again! NUS – are you paying attention?

Anyway, they had a good set of speakers ranging from Podtech.Net, Adobe, Lynda Brown etc. who raised some rather good points although perhaps coming from a tech background, I felt like I’ve heard them said and repeated dozens if not more times!! However, to many in the audience, I bet that it was a “ear-opener”, if not at least someone confirming what they might already have known.

Importantly though, such industry/academic exercises are valid and critical to establishing the nature of the community sharing platform/trend. Asia and by virtue, Singapore, is in a really solid position to be on par with the US in terms of being Web 2.0-ready (for want of a better term). By the end of this decade, there will be more bloggers/community-sharing type people in this part of the world than in the US. China, although not often included as part of Asia-Pacific, will weigh in with their trends and cultural habits on the Internet. How will people share then? How do people share now? These consumption habits and thought patterns will be different as cultural shifts take place. 

What TDM is doing is an essential part of any developing sub-culture that will move into mainstream. And I am willing to bet, in a shorter amount of time as initially projected by anyone following the Web 2.0 trend. Congrats TDM team!

Got into the main iX 2007 seminar on Thursday – tks to one of our own senior mgmt figures speaking. The only thing I walked away with that morning was that the Google CIO/VP for Engineering is a great speaker. The fact that I could almost hear him mentally counting “1 face audience, 2 turn around click slide, 3 mention point X, 4 spin sround, look smart’ only tarnished the shine a tiny little bit. Overall, it was OK.

And that nearly ended my week of technology and Web 2.0. Friday was in the office and hibernated over the weekend with 3 new games – FOD (go google it if you aren’t sure what it is), AOE 3 Expansion and ShadowRun (Xbox 360 – now I got to go Xbox Live damnit). btw, I think that Xbox 360 games should have better game descriptions on them about whether it is a single player with storyline or a stupid LIVE game that you need to pay money for. I like playing solo. Shouldn’t have wasted $70 at Challenger on ShadowRun.