A Time to Relax?

I write this from the “parental” area inside the Flying Fortress, a childrens indoor play area the size of a small country. The children are happily off playing whilst me and the good lady chill out with with a book (her) and the internet (me) as our companions for a few hours. It is of course interspersed with sporadic visits from hot and tired children often requesting liquid refreshment or worse, chocolate.

All in all, this wasnt how I envisaged the start of my 9 day holiday, but then English weather is never kind when you want it most.

I have to admit, I am a nightmare when it comes to holidays, or rather breaks from work, which is really what this is. It’s been terrifically busy at work recently, so the break is a welcome one, although I am finding it tricky to switch off and stop worrying about my clients and their SERPS, but I guess that comes with the job. Only this morning I found myself checking a few positions, just to make sure the work we had undertaken recently was paying off. Fortunately, they are moving in a positive direction, so less worry, but I really shouldnt be worrying on my week off at all, SEO does that to you though, especially if you care and I do.

My eldest daugher joked this morning (when the 3 year olds were running around like loony bins throwing food at each other and generally making every room they visited look like a bomb had been dropped on it) that I would be glad to go back to work for the rest! I won’t tell her and as much as I love spending time with my children and adore them to bits, she might just be on to something…

I’ve recently added a couple more photo’s to the ever expanding collection on flickr if you get time to check them out. This week may even provide some opportunities to add to the list further, I can but hope.

The Communication Age

This morning I was contacted by a customer by email, then a text message, a phone call and even a twitter mention, all from the same person. It struck me that 20 years ago, he would not have been able to get hold of me on any of those communication platforms. Indeed, it would only have been more impressive had he also left a Facebook wall message and commented on one of my photographs on flickr!

You could argue, he would have been able to contact me by phone 20 years ago, but not on the mobile he actually called me on and in any case, back in the “old days” calls to work were kind of limited.

We really do take for granted the exceptionally clever ways we can communicate these days, with the plethora of social media platforms, mobile phones, the internet in general and numerous other ways we can chat, discuss and argue the days hot topics. In some ways its a shame that the local park has been replaced by MSN or the local pub has been replaced by farmville, but what is important is that we are cable to harness all of this communicational power and yet still dont.

I have a lot of friends who I rarely see on a day to day basis and yet even with them sitting on my Facebook account we still dont talk anywhere near the amount we did 20 years ago. Why is this? Well, although we have a multitude of different outlets to communicate these days, we are still shockingly bad at doing it. Not everyone you understand, but certainly my generation of 30 somethings could do a lot better.

My eldest daughter however was born in to a world which already had ipods, internet and msn and she see’s these things as a means to an end, they allow her to talk to her friends at all times of the day (and usually night) whenever she feels like it. There is no arranging to meet at a certain time, specific place and taking appropriate funds to do so, its just hopping on the laptop and seeing whos about.

This generation will be the first to fully harness the power of the internet and the communication tools it affords us and when that happens, what we think of as being huge now (facebook and twitter for example) will be a mere drop in the ocean compared to what the next generation of internet users have up their sleeves and in their brains.

When challenged recently to answer the question of “What age do we live in?” now, I was hard pressed to answer. Especially when you consider things like the industrial revolution in the 1800’s or even further back to things like the bronze age, but this week, I can comfortably say, we are at a the dawn of The Communication Age.

Category: Rantings  One Comment

Another week goes by…

After last weekend’s jaunt off to Belgium to work with ESL TV, this past week has been a little odd. I had two days of sickness, the first time I have actually been physically sick in about 5 years thanks to some horrid little gastro bug, which also seemed to get my youngest daughter too. Luckily no one else had to suffer from it though.

The TV show was ok last weekend, it was great to work with the ESL guys again, something I never thought I would say 4 years ago when I first worked with them. They really have it down to an art now. They turn up, roll it all out, produce something on a stage and then just pack down and go home. Typical German efficiency you might say, but they also love what they do and its a marvel to watch.

It was the first time my eldest daughter has seen behind the scenes at an event or TV production and although she was bored stupid for most of the time she spent in Belgium, she did seem to enjoy it.

Back to my day time job and the world of SEO continues to amaze and astound me in both positive and negative ways equally. It seems completely at odds with the dictum of not flooding the internet with useless crap when it comes to article spinning, even if I totally understand the reasons behind it, doesnt mean I have to like or enjoy it.

I’ve also found a little time to up some new pics to my flickr account including one i’ve had for a while that I shot at London Docks over two months ago. I am now up to photo number 99 and I want to make upload 100 special. I will either find or take a photo in the next week that will be spectacular or i’ll post a photo which means a lot to me of someone that means a lot to me. Either way, I should have something to post this week as I am heading to an air show later today, if the weather holds. Oh and the lack of F1 stuff here? Its the summer break!

This weekend = Belgium & TV

This weekend will see me travelling to Belgium to host, present and commentate on the ESL Asus European Nations Championship, live on ESL TV. Antwerp Esports Festival

This is just about the most prestigious tournament for nations anywhere on planet earth and this weekend coming will see the battle of the lowlands with the Netherlands (Holland to you and me) taking on Belgium in both Counter Strike and Counter Strike Source. ESL TV will be bringing you live coverage, streamed via IPTV with full on site production of both major games on Saturday.

The matches will be played out at the Antwerp Esports Festival taking place in (oddly enough) Antwerp at the same time.

We will also be giving away prizes and goodies at the event and who knows, probably have some fun via Twitter.

I will also have Corin Cole alongside me providing the colour commentary which means you can expect plenty of dry wit analysis and jokes aplenty between the two of us!

flickr Update

Just a quick one to say that I have begun going through the photographs from last weekends trip to the farm. It was a farm with a difference however, as you will be able to tell from the first photograph uploaded.

I have literally just updated flickr with the Totem Pole photograph (don’t ask!). Wizz over to my flickr account for the pic http://www.flickr.com/photos/redeye-/4817554983/