"Why re-invent the wheel ? Because there is no such thing as a perfect wheel." (in a Linked In discussion about SOA : bit.ly )

Last weekend for the birthday of my lovely wife, we went to Madrid for shopping and party.

A (very small) part of the colorful shopping happened at Custo Barcelona and at Folli Follie. Wa also were impressed by the Telephonica Flagship Store (Gran Via).

The party was at the disco Joy Eslava. At Joy Eslava I found the DJ good but VERY conservative. The best of the music being David Guetta (I got a feeling) and Calle Ocho (I know you want me). I would have expected more special mixes and some new cool sound.

For the rest we enjoyed the good weather (30+ degrees) and the city.

Aujourd'hui je suis en "mode écriture" de ma thèse pour mon Master Program d'Architecte chez IBM.

J'ai recu hier un email de Christian Godefroid -
(c)2009 www.club-positif.com - dans lequel je me reconnais et que je trouve très relevant pour l'instant. Même si ce n'est pas très modeste, mais bon, je suis un Lion après tout...

"...Cela me fait penser aux élèves
et aux étudiants qui sont si
fiers d'avoir travaillé comme des
fous. D'avoir passé des nuits à
réviser. D'avoir refait leur
dissertation plusieurs fois.

Je vais vous faire un aveu: ce
qui me rendait fier lorsque
j'étais au lycée, c'était de
rédiger en 15 minutes, entre deux
cours, la meilleure dissertation
de la classe.

Je me programmais mentalement
pour cela. Je me disais que si
mon cerveau pouvait, pendant mon
sommeil, inventer des histoires
passionnantes bourrées de détails
INSTANTANÉMENT, une dissertation
pouvait être écrite au fil de la
plume et être parfaite."

Christian Godefroid se positionne comme un Gourou du Marketing Internet, un "faiseur de Millionnaires". Vous pouvez le suivre ici :
http://twitter.com/ ChrisGodefroy

jfdeclercq: Mode "écriture" aujourd'hui : bit.ly

jfdeclercq: J ai envie d aller jouer au foot sur la plage...

jfdeclercq: @plosson coupure de courant a Tombeek . He oui, je suis découvert : j'ai recu des sous de Elio pour mettre Gmail dans mon garage...

jfdeclercq: @aleks2401 Catégoriser en 4 types de taches.... www.lowas.be

jfdeclercq: Listening to the Lounge Box 2 while working : The Dave Brubeck Quartet/ Take Five, very relaxing

jfdeclercq: Coupure generale du courant ici a Tombeek. Est-ce que les pompiers vont encore venir ?

jfdeclercq: After lunch I was feeling bad. Was it the Swine Flu ? No After 1 hour sleeping I'm now back to work. Ouf !

jfdeclercq: Les coureurs du la Vuelta n'on pas le soleil de l'Espagne aujourd'hui.... Plutot la drache nationale Belge

jfdeclercq: Check out this SlideShare Presentation on LinkedIn : SoftAtHome at BBWF and IBC 3D experience tinyurl.com

jfdeclercq: We didn't start the fire ! yeli.us

Yesterday (Aug 27 2009) we attended the concert of Soulsister at the Druivenfeesten. The show really exceeded my expectations.

jfdeclercq: Mountain Bike Track in Overijse yesterday... url-ok.com

jfdeclercq: @Kristoff87 maybe I have a picture of you than. What color were you wearing ?

People are Philosophers today...

Jurgen De Bleser : 'We zijn hier om te spelen met elkaar. Dat is wat deze planeet nodig heeft: spelende mensen.'

RT @robinwauters: Hadn't heard this quote yet but it's not bad: "Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react."

jfdeclercq: RT @robinwauters: Hadn't heard this quote yet but it's not bad: "Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react."

jfdeclercq: I have been doing my administration tasks for 2 hours now. I hate it, but no alternative...

Yesterday I uploaded a picture from my phone (via Twitter/Twitgoo) for the first time. It's a picture of the Druiven Koers.

You can find it here: http://twitgoo.com/2pg6f

jfdeclercq: Coaching et PME... coaching.valuecreator.be

jfdeclercq: Yesterday we saw Truephonic @ the druivenfeesten (Overijse)

They just passed in front of my house... (Druiven Koers web site)

Netlash published today "5 tips to a successfull Online Community" (Deutch).

Many times I have tried to set up such communities (Bicycle Club, Work's Intranet, MBA distribution list, family, customers sites). very often those communities have died even before they were born.

There is one principle that I have kept out of all those web experiences : people use the communication tools only when they have a problem and when they are looking for a solution.

This is the "What's in in for me" principle : I have only recorded activities when people get an advantage out of the communication:

• Forums : people asking questions see their problems solved, get information. Answering people raise their visibility. That's why on Linked In you can be flagged as an expert. Another example I saw was during MBA exams: the Forum was suddenly alive.
  
• Distribution Lists are all a sudden used when someone wants to sell his car or quickly organise a barbecue.
• Social networks are useful when you want to see what the others are doing (a kind of voyeurisme)
• Viral marketing is like the new way of telling jokes (or stories). Why do people tell stories ?

I guess you can continue the examples by yourself : People communicate when they hope to get something out of it.

If you understand this "What's in it for me" principle, you understand that the web can be a very powerful tool to quickly find a solution to your problem. The range of problems is very wide : finding love, compiling Linux, buying Viagra, finding the perfect vacation, stay informed, find which WII game is cool and which one sucks... Identifying he community of people who have the same kind of problem than you can only bring you closer to the solution. This is for me the true engine of communities.

I use to say to my wife (as a joke ?) "Everything always comes back to 3 letters : SEX".
But in that logic that there are also 3 other letters : "EGO".

And than I guess there are some things like "Right man at the right place" and "Time to Market" also applicable to Online Communities...