blog.aka.me -
November 13, 2009
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| ego | web life |
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One Week At Work

Monday

  • met with Mapion about using TAB API
  • tweeted for TAB
  • sent dimension of TAB ads to a client
  • updated balance sheet of TAB Shop
  • updated GPS of new TAB venue
  • answered emails about TAB upcoming iPhone app
  • relayed new TAB Shop orders to shipping company
  • sent email to advertisers for the 2010 Tokyo Art Maps
  • sent news about the party to our sponsors


Tuesday

  • met about new advertising space ideas for TAB
  • met about a flash animation we're making for a AQ client
  • updated link to Facebook fan pages from top of TAB/NYAB sites
  • met about a logo we're creating for an AQ client
  • sorted out pics of Tokyo Designers Week 2009
  • relayed new TAB Shop orders to shipping company
  • answered emails about TAB upcoming iPhone app
  • sent some advice about MailChimp to a AQ client
  • sent news about the party to our sponsors
  • advised a client on how to design his banner ad for TAB
  • checked out submissions to Mashup Award 5 that used our TAB API
  • tweeted for TAB
  • talked to a TAB staff who's leaving soon
  • sent an email to find a new TAB staff
  • started work on new TAB advertising documents


Wednesday

  • answered emails about new items for TAB store
  • worked on new TAB advertising documents
  • created a sitemap for one of AQ's clients
  • went home early for "Daddy Wednesdays"


Thursday

  • dealt with a spam issue on TAB event comments
  • welcomed new TAB temp staff
  • answered email about our Party
  • tweeted for TAB
  • relayed new TAB Shop orders to shipping company
  • answered email about our TAB API with a new partner
  • helped with a sitemap for one of AQ's clients
  • prepared & sent the latest TAB Newsletter
  • worked on new TAB advertising documents


Friday

  • had a quick meeting about the day's mission.
  • worked on new TAB advertising documents
  • updated team on some AQ-related client work
  • yaritori emails related to a couple AQ projects
  • finished draft version on new TAB advertising documents
  • answered a lot of random emails before the weekend.

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November 2, 2009
Viewed 7220 times
| ego | kids | top10 |
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10 things that will happen after your kid is born

With the experience of the birth of our first child last January (and chats wih other daddy friends), let me share a few points on the life of a new dad for my friends with due dates on their mind:

  • Your wife's head will look a lot bigger (looking at your tiny child's head all the time makes everything else look huge)
  • Changing diapers really is non stop (at least the first month)
  • It will get very hard to talk about anything else but your baby (sorry guys)
  • You'll notice babies and kids all around you all the time and won't believe Japan ever had a falling birthrate.
  • You'll need to be more creative in bed (it's not recommended to have sexual intercourse for 3 months after birth -linked to ovarian cancer, infections...)
  • You will never have been so happy to have your parents or in-laws close by.
  • Your wife will forget you are her husband and just call you "papa" or "daddy".
  • You will act like you own the sidewalk and people should give you priority on everything.
  • You will think of death, pain, helplessness a lot more than before.
  • You will want to build a house with your own hands.

Anything I forgot? The comments are yours!

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August 3, 2007
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| Art Beat | ego | hitotoki | just launched! | news |
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Recent News

Hitotoki Tokyo has launched in Japanese, after the successful launch of the English version. We have a few stories up there already so go have a look.
We will also open in New York in September and are currently looking for submissions.

I have published an article on how to make better presentations at Pecha-Kucha Night events. It is up on the AQ blog, where I work.

The 3rd collection of our TAB T-shirts has just been released in our new online store. 5 designers have donated graphics illustrating their love of Tokyo to help us promote the city as a lively and happening place, as well as support our Non-Profit Organization team (paid staff and volunteers). The Shop has been entirely redesigned and includes a new bilingual cart system, interfacing with Paypal.

TAB has redesigned. A slight redesign with a more modern look and a wider frame to provide us with elbow room for future growth. How do you like it?

We have also relaunched TABlog, TAB's event review blog, with an entirely new look and feel, closer to that of an online magazine. More visual and structure on the front page allow us to promote more varied content and do so independently of its publication date.

Finally, TAB is hiring... We are looking for a new event data editor.

--

In unrelated news, my friend Kevin has finally launched his wonderful One Life Japan eco-business. They specialize in fun, intellectually stimulating, physically satisfying, and environmentally sound educational bike tours in Japan.
I will be joining one of his tours in the next few months.

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June 12, 2007
Viewed 1512 times
| AQ | ego | just launched! | news |
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The new AQ site is live!

AQ, the Tokyo-based little webdesign/print studio I work with has a fancy new website.
I am really pleased with its looks. Simple, not geeky and with cute little illustrations to accompany visitors.
We do Japanese & bilingual web design, localization, usability testing, graphic design and consulting.

Check some of our selected works, and bookmark our new blog.

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April 6, 2007
Viewed 384 times
| ego | news |
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I'm a coin maker

Just for personal reference on terms I made up and would like to see used more:

Nicolas Nova says:
A "100Gb evening" is a term coined by Paul Baron to refer to, as he says, “events where I have discovered so many things that I want to research more”
referring to that meeting with Adam Greenfield and Fabio Sergio in February 2003.

As a caption for this February 2007 photo on Flickr I said:
oh, and they have spermalinks: (for many baby readers)

Should I dare rename all the "permalinks" as "spermalinks" on this blog?

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February 27, 2007
Viewed 913 times
| ego | GPS | holidays |
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Hong Kong pictures

I have finally sorted, tagged, geotagged and uploaded pictures I took last October in Hong Kong when I joined my friend Kallen for a week of holidays there.
Here is the set on flickr
Here are the geotagged pictures on a map.

For the curious ones, here are the tools I used to geotag the photos:
• The little Sony GPS CS1 GPS tracker. Switch on, attach to your bag. It records a time-stamped trail of your location as a text file.
• Import your photos and your GPS track into PhotoGPSeditor (donation-ware). The software is the most complete I have seen for the mac osx people. It will compare the time stamps in your tracks and your pics' and match them. You can then adjust each picture's location perfectly using the embedded Google map widget. The location of each picture is saved in their EXIF tags.
• Then use the excellent 1001 Flickr uploader (donation-ware) to tag, add captions and titles to your pics and upload them to flickr.
• Finally, use Wackylabs' GeoReTagR script to automatically register the geolocation of those photos in Flickr and you're done! (or just set up correctly your Geolocation-related upload options on Flickr... duh!)

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October 4, 2006
Viewed 569 times
| ego | Flickr | GPS |
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Flickr Maps

If, like me, you have been tagging your pics with location data for a while (a practice called Geotagging), then you will be happy to learn that Flickr recently released a new geotagging feature allowing you to place all your pics onto a world map.
However, the location data of my pics is embedded in their EXIF tags by the mobile phone I use to take the pics and the new feature doesn't read them from there, in the case of pictures added to Flickr before this new feature was released.
Thankfully, Sam Judson has released GeoReTagr, a little script that will import geotagged pics' EXIF data into the new location fields that Flickr uses to place the pics onto the map.
Thank you Sam!!
Here are my geomapped pictures on an UGLY Yahoo map!

UPDATE:
aemkei has released a delicious little bookmarklet that lets you tag any pic onto the nicer Google maps, from within any of your flick photo pages, without the need of an external script or application etc... (and it works with most browsers) and it also lets any person view your pics mapped on a nice Google map when they visit you Flickr pages or even as a standalone version:
here are my geomapped pictures on Google Maps with a delicious interface!

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August 29, 2006
Viewed 534 times
| Apple | ego | FAIL |
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On fire!

1st burn mark
So my PowerBook G4's battery was recalled this week (Thank you SONY!). I am not alone though, 4 of my close friends also got their batteries recalled. bummer. I complied though and immediately stopped using it, after having applied for a replacement through the Apple site.

2nd burn mark
6 to 8 weeks!!? What the hell am I supposed to do for 6 to 8 weeks! This is a laptop computer! It goes to work, it goes to meetings, it goes to cafes, it goes places...

3rd burn mark
Of hell with it, I'll be a nice dog and go get myself a new battery from the Apple store in the meantime, so I don't have to move my adapter and a power station with me when I go places. 15,000¥ (130$) damnit!! And once I do eventually get the replacement one from Apple, I'll sell it to a friend who also got recalled but is not so docile (nor concerned by the risks)

4th burn mark
What do you mean you have them in stock?! So I have to wait 6-8 weeks for a new battery when Apple could probably put a replacement plan in place whereby I could bring my battery to an Apple store and exchange it immediately for a new one!

5th burn mark
WTF! For the hell of it, back home, I check whether the battery I just bought FROM AN APPLE STORE is actually recalled to, AND IT IS!!

6th burn mark
Oh, you claim that the list of recalled battery changed since yesterday and that this battery probably slipped through you careful check... What a mess...

So, could you maybe offer me spontaneously a discount on that battery or something for MY troubles... 6-8 weeks wait, ¥15,000, 2 trips to the Apple Store in one day... no?!
I AM ON FIRE.

Update: Funny how some people (yes you, and couple others) didn't get the humour in that post; indeed, I did my best to make it sound like the best Blogs have to offer. ;-)
And I got my battery after 4 weeks.
Anybody wants to buy a new battery? ;-)

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January 7, 2006
Viewed 475 times
| design | ego | just launched! |
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New Portfolio

To allow me to keep on taking care of TAB and work on my next super secret project, I have decided to go back to freelancing.
I have therefore updated and relaunched the portfolio area of the site (Am I the only one on the planet using Flickr to show my portfolio?)
So if you love me, give me some work... print, web, usability/interface...
Get in contact.

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May 5, 2005
Viewed 333 times
| ego | news |
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Thank you!

Thanks to Raphaël (who's still looking for some internet-related short-mission job opportunities in Tokyo), my Axis of Evil weather news on IN-duce's front page, my AD-duce photos of Tokyo RSS feed and a few other bits and pieces here and there are finally working again. So enjoy!

Thanks to Long-Long, my sister might be able to find a cheap flight to come and see me in Tokyo mid-May on her way back from Canton in China where she spends weeks at a time for her work.

Thanks to Matt, we enjoyed 2 relaxing days outside of Tokyo near Suwa in a very old-style Japanese house that could fit our Tokyo flat 3 or 4 times.

Thanks to the TAB team for trying their best in making our booth at the forthcoming Design Festa (14-15 May) a pleasure to visit!

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