I kind of already broke my promise about no repeating items as Another Alice was a part of yesterday’s photo too but because this picture is used in an entirely different context, I am going to let it slide. I am somewhat addicted to Alice in Wonderland, I have four (well five now) pullips based on different interpretations of Alice and several other characters from the book represented in doll form.

I decided to do a slightly different take on the standard shot of Another Alice in the promo photos. I kind of ran into a problem because I lack normal playing cards, I have tons of anime playing cards and Hello Kitty playing cards but nothing that seemed to suit my purposes so I ended up using a pack from my Dark Knight Joker Poker set.

It’s AWESOME!!!!

This evening, Electoral Reform International Services (ERIS) hosted what they hope will be the first of many annual receptions, in the Brunei Gallery at London University’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS). As I was lecturing at SOAS immediately before, the event could not have been more convenient. But far more important that that serendipity was the quality of the people present, including a clutch of Commonwealth High Commissioners, my old BBC World Service colleagues Elizabeth Smith and Mike Wooldridge, Electoral Reform types such as Ken Ritchie, Eric Siddique, Michael Steed et al, and of course our host for the evening. former Tory MP Keith Best, who still holds the flame aloft for fair voting (and humane immigration policies) within the Conservative Party. It was also good to see various people from the Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD, for whom I have done assignments in various parts of the world, including Ethiopia, where the British Ambassador at the time was Myles Wickstead, now one of the big cheeses in WFD and of course present this evening. I was heavily lobbied by a group of Iraqis who attended and who were urging that the West (including Britain) do more to foster genuine democracy and an end to corruption in that benighted land, which Tony Blair and Co ‘liberated’ only to create a political vacuum. We learn by our mistakes, I suppose — though personally I have long argued that the one thing we learn from history is that leaders learn nothing from history. Anyway, ERIS is doing great work and if it had some more financial backing, could be doing so much more!

Link: www.eris.org.uk

Below are the slides from my second presentation at DevLearn 2009. I also co-presented this session along with my colleague, John Polaschek. The presentation covers the basics of blogging and describes the advantages we’ve found with using WordPress. We’ve used it internally at Qualcomm and we’re very pleased with the results. Check out the slides for more info!

Have you introduced blogging at your organization? If so, please share a little bit of your experience with us. I’d be curious to hear how it’s going and any tips you can provide to others. Thanks!

Below are the slides from my presentation at DevLearn 2009. I co-presented this session along with my colleague, John Polaschek. The presentation had two main areas of focus:

1. How micro-blogging can be used to help facilitate discussions and knowledge-sharing between employees
2. How Qualcomm is using Yammer to help employees connect across divisions and geographic regions

I hope you enjoy it, even though you won’t have our charming personalities to accompany the slides!

Please leave a comment if you’ve worked with micro-blogging at your organization. I’d be curious to hear how it’s going and any tips you can provide to others. Thanks!

Many individuals contracts with their carrier will come due this holiday season. With that comes a big looming question, espcially in the travel industry. Do you stick with the phone you have as tried and true (and outdated) as it may be. The first thing that comes to mind is what do you really need with you communication device? What are your goals with a mobile/smart phone?

As we move into the era of twittering, facebooking, blogging and texting, It is important to assess your needs before you divest yourself of the phone you have and make the plunge towards a cell phone. The new smartphones combine a phone, web browser, music player, navigation assistant and much much more. Each smartphone has pluses and minuses. Before you decide if you need a smartphone, ask yourself one very viable question, “Do I need to be connected?” What I mean by that is, do you need access to your email, facebook, twitter and blog? If the answer is no, then it is a matter of choosing the right phone with the right feel for you that will give you great clarity, feel, feedback and response. If, however, your answer to the above question is “yes”, then read ahead.

This is a video, courtesy of wireoless week, is very good at showing the differences (basic) between the iphone 3gs and the new Motorola Droid.

http://www.wirelessweek.com/Video/2009/11/Motorola-Droid-Vs–The-iPhone-3GS(2)/

There are tons and tons of PDA/smartphones in the market right now. I picked the iphone and the droid because it seems to be the most talked about on twitter at the moment. If you are on T-Mobile, you will want to go to the store, do some research, find out if the phone has what you need, put your hands on it, touch and feel and ask an experienced salesperson about pros and cons of each phone.

Most of the carriers have a 30 day return policy so if you try it and really don’t like it, you can bring it back. There is no getting around the homework of doing your research. Don’t take my word for it, get out there and try it before you buy it. Tune in to tweets and search droid, 3gs, HTC droid Eris, or Bold 9700 for example and see what others are saying.

Don’t forget to ask questions if you have them. I can be reached @chadbordes on twitter. Hope you are having a great day!

Ah, the final day of DevLearn 2009. It’s been so much fun! But all good things must come to an end…

If you haven’t caught up yet, be sure to read recaps of Day 1 and Day 2. And don’t forget: You can view photos from DevLearn, too!

Keynote: Why New Media Matters – Leo Laporte

Leo gave a great keynote without using any slides at all. How refreshing is that?! His stories were engaging, and it’s clear why he’s been so successful as a radio/technology personality for so many years. Cammy Bean did an awesome job (again) of live-blogging this morning’s keynote. You can see her notes here. Thanks again, Cammy!

I was only able to attend one session Friday morning, but it was a really good one:

Session 706: Sharing Knowledge for Training: Social Networking in Action at Toyota

Rodolfo Rosales presented his story of introducing a social network within Toyota to help encourage employees to share subject matter expertise (ex. product information, car comparisons). Rodolfo and his team used Ning as their social network and it flourished in the first 3 months….until their internal IT department found out about it. As I’ve seen in many cases, IT isn’t always comfortable with rogue installations of software, and they shut down the initiative (booo!). However, there was a happy ending: IT began to see the value of the social network and the resulting data, so they are now working to create an enterprise-wide social network that will be supported at Toyota. Rodolfo’s slides will be available on the DevLearn Resources page. Be sure to take a look.

Side note: Has anybody else noticed that many of the Learning 2.0 / Enterprise 2.0 tools seem to cause disruptions (ex. politically and technically) within the enterprise? I’ve seen it several times. There’s a research project in there somewhere…

Nice to meet you!

I had the pleasure of meeting all kinds of new people at DevLearn. I was also able to catch up with old friends, which is always great. I will attempt to list a bunch of them here, but I know I will forget several. (I’m sorry if I left you off the list!)

• @alwaysbreaking
• @badsquare
• @briandusablon
• @bschlenker
• @crisjolliff
• @dontlookhere
• @espnguyen
• @guildmeister
• @hybridkris
• @jclarey
• @jenebean
• @joshlittle
• @koreenolbrish
• @leolaporte
• @mike_rustici
• @moehlert
• @mrch0mp3rs
• @pipwerks
• @quinnovator
• @schnicker
• @visualrinse
• @writetechnology

Thank you!!

A big Thank You to the eLearning Guild for doing such a great job with DevLearn!! I look forward to attending another Guild event soon.

Day 2 of DevLearn kicked off with a keynote from Eric Zimmerman on Serious Game Design. Cammy Bean did a fantastic job of taking notes during the keynote, so I’ll defer to her on this. You can see her notes here. (Thank you, Cammy!)

Session 401: Overview of Latest Learning Trends: What’s Hot, What’s Not, and Why

This session was presented by Lance Dublin. In Lance’s typical style, it was full of interesting discussion and TONS of open (and often uncomfortable) questions. He covered everything from eLearning basics to all of the new “2.0″ technologies. Some of the questions include: “Why would we use this? Does it really help? What really motivates us to use this tool? Are we over-complicating things?” When covering each iteration of technology, Lance broke items down to their core functionality to reveal their true advantages/disadvantages. Interesting stuff.

Session 506: Exploring the Benefits of Using WordPress for Learning

I presented this session along with my colleague, John Polaschek. We covered all things related to WordPress.com and WordPress.org. Our slides will be available on the DevLearn Resources page next week.

Session 613: Mobile Gaming Models – A Google Case Study and More!

This session was presented by David Metcalf. Julie Clow (from Google) was unable to co-present. (Feel better, Julie!)

Some quick gaming statistics:

• 65% of households play games
• Average player is 35, 40% female
• Teens: 99% of boys, 94% of girls play games
• 73% on desktop/laptop PCs
• 60% on portable gaming devices
• 48% on cellphones or PDAs

David showed several phone-based mobile learning games running on Java, BREW, and Flash. Next, he showed a few hybrid games, which integrate mobile with a full experience that includes full video, a web site, etc. Good examples, including one called MySportsPulse.

Google Leadership Game
Google worked with David Metcalf to create a leadership training program that was a mash-up with 7-8 Google tools: Gmail, YouTube, Google Docs, Google Talk, etc. They called it gLearning. Google used David’s MovingKnowledge engine, which provided a game engine, leader boards, curriculum tracking, and reporting. The MovingKnowledge engine bridged the gap between Google apps to provide a cohesive learning experience. The game element of a leaderboard led to higher retention and completion rates (and added the element of competition). What a cool case study… I would love to learn more about this.

One more day…

Notes from the final day of DevLearn will be online soon!

Dreams and nightmares ooze from her lips. Her dark
Kisses poison and entice; mist settles
Over her skin, a dusky blessing and
A curse. Beneath her gaze, pulses flare – trapped.

Unless you were vacationing this past week on a remote island without newspapers or internet, then we can safely assume you know that the tech news world is universally abuzz over the newly-released Android smartphones from Verizon: the Motorola Eris and Droid.  Some reporters have hailed the phones, specifically the Droid, as the long-awaited “coming out” device of the Android OS, suggesting that it’s the first to offer the interface and functionality that legitimize the hype that’s been building around the new open source operating system and will start giving Apple a run for its money.

With bullish enthusiasm, Brian Heater of PC Magazine finished his commentary on Friday by saying, “Android has arrived” and Michael Arrington of Tech Crunch simply said in his review,  ”It’s droid day; enjoy the moment.”  A more optimistic reception comparatively than most reviewers gave the first Android handset, the T-Mobile G1, in October of last year, which many felt showed Android’s potential, but lacked the “wow” factor they knew consumers needed to see.

No matter your personal opinion about the phones, these new devices—and the hype around them—represent a growing and increasingly lucrative opportunity for Android developers. The open source operating system is a new frontier for innovation, allowing faster time to market and acting as a “muse” to promote and push the bounds of creativity.

Yet, with this opportunity comes challenges, too.  Open source applications can be open to criticism when it comes to quality and reliability since it’s a largely fragmented and self-regulated frontier.  Tricia Duryee of MocoNews puts a fine tip on this point in her article last Friday when she reminds readers that:

“…there are now three different versions of the Android operating system currently for sale, which is raising red flags that the platform could become fragmented…. developers will have a difficult time developing applications that could run smoothly on each platform…since Google is relying on an open source platform, it could be affected by the platform splitting off and having multiple threads, which causes confusion.”

To overcome this challenge, developers need a cost-effective means for testing with handset accessibility, but also the full range of support from automation to recording to management and monitoring capabilities.  Open source OS’—without their rigid management and restrictions– have so many more variables than proprietary systems for developers to adjust to that it’s more critical than ever that developers’ time is freed from testing constraints, and instead they can remain focused on creating original applications.  After all, consumers don’t choose operating systems; they choose devices that give them the wow factor, and right now they’re facing almost too many options in the marketplace.

Innovation is what’s really going to drive consumers to Android and give it a run at becoming the number two operating system in three years time behind Symbian as Gartner predicts (see our blog post from October 23).  Hot apps, streamlined design, an intuitive interface—all offered by multiple handset manufacturers and wireless carriers.  Eliminating redundant application testing can pave the way for this to happen.

I got the phone this week, and may still be a bit too early to give a solid review, but I think have used it enough to at least state that I am totally pleased and blow away by this phone.

Here are some things that I love about this phone.

1. HTC Sense UI – this is really amazing as it makes the user experience on this phone easy, fun, and extremely useful.  For a demo of HTC sense go here (it is the HTC Hero that they are showing, but everything it can do the Eris does)
   1. HTC Widgets – it comes with about 14 widgets everthing from Twitter, people contacts, mail, cool looking clocks, etc.  They are all very useful.
   2. Contacts are seamless as it will integrate your mail and facebook contacts in one location.  It will track all of your phone calls, emails,, facebook updates and text messages that you sent to a person in one location.   Just by sliding your finger across a set of icon you can chose what you want to see.  Again see the video to demo this.
   3. Scenes – Scenes are like setting up different views of your lifestyle.  Each scene is capable of holding up to 7 desktops or views. So far I have defined 3 of them, Home, Work & MyLife.  It is cool because you organized them based on how you live.
   4. Calendar integrates perfectly with Google Calendar.
2. Android has come a long way and I think they are totally ready to compete against the iPhone.  The only people who don’t think so are Mac fanatics.  I promise you this, that if the iPhone doesn’t expand beyond it’s exclusive deal with AT&T it will not remain the #1 App Phone on the market.  The OS is solid, and works very well.  My phone is running Android 1.5.
   1. Yes Android currently has 12,000+ apps, and iPhone has 100,000+ apps, but who even needs 12,000+ apps?  Why anyone needs more than that is beyond me.  So far I have not found any problems finding an app for something that I want to do.
   2. Gmail works awesome on here, as well as all of the other preloaded apps.
3. The Size.  It’s smaller than the iPhone with a 3.2 inch screen which fits perfectly in my pocket, but not too small where the screen is useless.  It is thin, and looks really nice.  It makes the iPhone look like it’s fat sister lol and we all know that “thin is in”.
4. The soft touch finish on the actual phone looks and feels real good, it’s this sort of metallic matte finish.
5. I do like the 4 touch sensitive buttons, and also the two phone buttons that it comes with.  I can live with out the track ball, but it does come in handy when typing if you need to make a correction, it allows you easy precision.
6. Music player is also really good.  I had heard that it was lousy compared to the iPhone.  So here is my take on it.  I think the music player is really good.  The complaints were that you can’t just plug it in and transfer music via iTunes.  Whatever, I plug my phone via USB and I drag and drop my songs to the Eris, and that’s it.  It’s that easy, and it’s faster because I can just drag a whole directory filled with songs.  The transfer is super fast (sorry don’t have any tech numbers for you), but trust me it is really fast.

There is a lot more I can say so if you have questions feel free to ask.  The last thing is the cost.  You can get it for $99 (once you get your rebate).  Since I have been a long time Verizon customer I had a $100 credit towards any phone, so all I had to pay was taxes and whatever surcharges, plus I still got the $100 rebate so that covered all my costs.  My Verizon rep took care of all of this for me over the phone and had them FedEx to me (no charge).  Great service from Verizon!  Now he is our representative at my job, so maybe that is why he was able to do everything over the phone.

I also got my son the Droid the one that they have been advertising.  That phone is incredible.  I would have gone with that phone as well, but I was already sold on the HTC Sense and since this is not an HTC phone it’s not available.  I with they would have gone with the motoblur on this phone, then I might have went for it.  But he loves it!

DevLearn 2009 is off to a great start! Yesterday was the official opening day of the conference, and it was jam-packed with a fantastic keynote by Andrew McAfee, several great presentations, and plenty of breakout sessions/bootcamps (ex. the Social Learning Camp). So much good stuff!

Social Learning Camp

Mark Oehlert has dedicated 99% of his time at DevLearn to the Social Learning Camp, and we should all say a huge THANK YOU for that. Mark is leading (almost) non-stop sessions on all aspects related to social learning and social technologies. Crowds gather around for each session, and I’ve heard a ton of great conversations there. Here are some of the key points I picked up in discussions yesterday:

• Within organizations, most issues around social media and social learning are directly related to fear, control, and trust. Companies fear new technologies (especially ones that they don’t understand); they try to control every aspect of the user experience; and they don’t trust their employees to use the tools (ex. they try to implement approval processes, instead of just letting employees use the tools).
• Related to the trust issue, Mark gave a great example: Companies trust their employees to make critical decisions, use expensive equipment, interact with customers, etc., but they’re terrified of having them use tools like Twitter and Yammer. Too funny.
• Social media and social learning destroys hierarchies of knowledge (not management). Upper management often hoards information, and new tools flatten the organization, knowledge-wise. People find that they can get answers from each other instead of having to work up the chain.
• Mark posed an excellent question, and he asked us to keep it in mind for the rest of the conference. Related to our work in learning and training, "How would you design things if you could start with a blank slate?" Then, when we get back to work (and back to reality), we should start to reverse engineer things until we can get as close to that new state as possible.

Enterprise 2.0 Keynote – Andrew McAfee

Wow, this was a great keynote. Andrew spoke on a few key themes:

• Things have definitely changed; new technologies have drastically improved some of the ways in which people work/collaborate.
• A key concept of Enterprise 2.0 is altruism. People want to help each other.
• Our role is to give people the tools/technologies to do this. If we do this, good things happen.

Here are my notes from the keynote:

Enterprise 2.0 means that there are new ways in which technologies are being used, but (oftentimes) people on the business-side don’t care. They just want things done better, faster, cheaper. You don’t need to paint a grandiose picture of technology transformation – just get the work done.

Altruism
People want to help each other. We need to stop obsessing about risks when deciding on the uses of new technologies. (People deciding on technologies jump to this too quickly: “What might go wrong??!!”). Seriously, what’s the worst things that can happen? “Somebody tried to sell a used car on the discussion forum.” Big deal. Bottom line here: Lower the barriers to altruism.

Process
When it comes to capturing and sharing knowledge, beware of the ‘one best way’ approach. Build technology that lets people improve on their own. Ask: “How much workflow is necessary?” Usually, not much. Keep it that way. Use tools that let structure appear over time (ex. linking, tagging, voting/rating mechanisms).

Innovation
Innovation is the new strategy. Example: Innocentive is a clearinghouse where people can complete to solve complex problems for large companies like Eli Lilly and Procter and Gamble. Expertise is emergent. Don’t limit yourself to only certain sources of expertise. Consider crowdsourcing, both internally and externally. Question credentialism! Nobody cares where you went to school! Anybody can help solve a problem, and unique perspectives can be a huge help.

Intelligence
Crowds can be very wise – but you should enable peer review (ex. Wikipedia). Experiment with collective intelligence and see if it is a good fit for your organization (internally and externally).

Benefits
So, with Enterprise 2.0, what do these technologies allow you to do that you couldn’t do before? The tools help you make connections with people that you did not know existed. Better collaboration is not the only goal: Now you can also find new people to collaborate with. Advice: You should narrate your work via blogging or micro-blogging. This makes it easier for others to find you and connect with you.

Impact
We need to continue to look at technology with fresh eyes. We’re not going back to business as usual (economy-wise). Things have to change for us to be successful, and it’s important that we understand what’s going on.

Keynote Summary

• Don’t declare war on the existing enterprise. That will end badly. You won’t make friends this way. Organizations need structure, we need to figure out ways to work around/with this.
• Don’t allow walled-gardens. Otherwise they’ll stay ‘walled’. You lose the possibilities of great connections between divisions, departments, locations, etc.
• Don’t accentuate all the bad stuff that can happen. Maybe you can point out issues, but don’t dwell on them.
• Enterprise 2.0 technologies won’t replace email!!! Don’t tell everyone this will replace email, or they’ll think you’re crazy.
• Don’t fall in love with features. It’s not about bells and whistles. People just want things to work (simply and well).
• Don’t overuse the word ’social’. It has negative connotations for most executives. People don’t want business to be more social. People want it to be more productive. Execs: “I’m not running a social club.” Social = hippie-talk. Think and talk in business terms and you’ll get much further.

Be sure to check out…

• Andrew’s book: Enterprise 2.0: New Collaborative Tools for Your Organization’s Toughest Challenges
• Andrew’s blog
• Andrew on Twitter

Session 114: Delivering Low-cost Mobile Learning Solutions

This session was presented by two guys from T-Mobile: Mark Chrisman and Jeff Tillett. Here are some notes from their session:

• They use the approach of “Dream big, but stay scrappy.”
• We need to be ready for Millennials. They use their mobile phones ALL the time, and they’ll likely be more willing to use mobile learning.
• Mobile learning offers more accessibility, availability, and adaptability.
• T-Mobile uses mobile learning for Pre- and Post-training at the moment. This may change with time.
• The mobile web is the easiest way to reach a variety of devices. Consider building content in Dreamweaver using HTML, basic images, and .3gp video.
• More and more user-generated content is coming. How can we tie this into training?
• Have a heart-to-heart conversation with your LMS vendor about mobile learning. See if they’ll ever integrate mobile learning into their product.

Session 207: A Case Study of Micro-blogging for Learning at Qualcomm

I presented this session along with my colleague, John Polaschek. Our slides will be available on the DevLearn Resources page next week, and the lovely @julieastd took great notes during the session.

Session 315: Hacking SCORM to Gather Social Metrics for Online Resources

Gary Hegenbart presented a great session on how to use a guerrilla method of SCORM-hacking to record user opinions about eLearning tutorials and courses. Gary walked through steps to show how he added the following questions to his eLearning:

• Did you find this tutorial/course helpful? Yes | No
• How would you rate this module? 1 2 3 4 5
• Would you recommend this module to co-workers? Yes | No

Gary had the interesting idea of storing answers to this information in the existing SCORM data model, using these elements: cmi.score.scaled, cmi.score.raw, cmi.score.min, and a few others. If all this SCORM-talk hasn’t scared you away, be sure to take a look at his examples/code. It’s definitely a clever approach.

Ok, I’m going back for more…

I’ll post an update about Day 2 soon!

Jusqu’ici tout va bien, pas plus de cris ou d’angoisse que d’habitude. En dépit de la félicité affichée, Zeus ne pouvait s’empêcher d’être nerveux. Ça lui avait pris un temps fou pour organiser ce banquet. La dernière fois que tout le monde était réuni, c’était sur l’invitation de Tantale, et on sait comment ça s’était terminé… Impérieux, le premier tyran de l’histoire regardait la foule de pique-assiettes rassemblées pour fêter les noces de Thétis et Pélé. Il repensait à tout ce qui avait provoqué ça:

Encore une fois, il avait trouvé la femme de sa vie, une jeune néréide innocente prénommée Thétis. Pas de bol, son grand frère Poséidon, l’agité du bocal, s’était également entiché de la jeune damoiselle. Ils étaient sur le point de se taper sur la gueule quand Prométhée, plus enchainé mais à jamais déchainé, leur révéla que le fils de cette nymphe serait plus puissante que son père. Ils eurent les mêmes pensées: Ouranos, castration, Cronos, vomissement, épisiotomie ventrale. Gentiment, Poséidon proposa à son petit frère chéri de lui laisser la place pour qu’il puisse enfin connaître le bonheur. Zeus, lui , se rappelait du bordel que ça avait été avec la naissance d’Athéna et la gueule de bois qu’il traine depuis. Bref les libidos de ces divins lubriques avait été calmée. Pour éviter qu’un dieu s’unisse à ce boulet qu’était devenue l’ex ingénue, ils choisirent un gogo pour la foutre en cloque et se débarrasser de la menace. C’est comme ça que Pélé se dévoua et après avoir ramé comme une bête, pu conquérir Thétis. Les dieux furent d’autant plus heureux de leur décision qu’ils apprirent plus tard que la douce jeune fille était en fait une virago ingérable.

Sortant de ces pensées, Zeus jeta un un œil vers Poséidon. Celui-ci était installé à ses côtés. Ce dieu à l’apparence de vieux mérou faisait des ronds dans son bocal et tenait dans sa gueule son trident, tout en jetant des regards menaçants vers ceux qu’ils soupçonnait avoir des velléités de pèche. Il faut dire qu’il a toujours eu un sale caractère, d’où son surnom d’agité du bocal régnant sur les eaux.

D’un côté Poséidon, de l’autre Hadès le taciturne, son autre grand frère tendance dépressif infernal. Il ne disait jamais rien, ne sortait jamais, sachant que de toute façon personne ne lui parlait ni ne l’invitait. On ne peut pas dire qu’il était très populaire. Personne ne savait à quoi il pensait. En ce qui concerne les autres dieux c’est simple: boire, manger et tirer leurs coups; mais lui? Personne ne savait mais tous seraient surpris de savoir que son rêve secret est d’être chanteur! Ben ouais, c’est pour ça qu’il avait accédé à la requête d’Orphée, question de respect entre artiste! Sans que personne ne le sache, son altesse seigneur des enfers avait installé un studio d’enregistrement aux enfers et s’apprêtait un sortir un single. Hélas pour lui, il ignorait à l’époque que la guerre allait débuter et que de fait, il aurait un surcroit de travail qui l’obligerait à ranger à tout jamais ses projets au fin fond du Styx. Une seule chose le consolait de sa solitude et sa frustration artistique: sa femme, Perséphone, qui d’ailleurs venait d’arriver.

_ Regarde qui j’amène mon chéri! C’est maman! Lui dit son épouse avec un grand sourire.

Fais chier, pensa Hadès.

_regarde maman! C’est mon chéri d’amour qui nous attend! Dit l’éternelle jeune fille à sa mère.

Fais chier, pensa Déméter.

_Hadès. Salua celle-ci

_Déméter, répondit-il.

_je suis surprise de vous voir ici. Vous avez donc pu vous libérer de l’enfer? Demanda-t-elle.

_vous y serez toujours la bienvenue, fît il remarquer.

_mon gendre.

_belle-maman.

Un long silence suivi qu’essayait d’occuper Perséphone qui s’était assise entre les deux et qui tentait de détendre l’atmosphère.

_tu ne trouves pas qu’il a bonne mine? Demanda-t-elle à sa mère

_pas trop mal pour un déterré, répondit Déméter tout en regardant ailleurs.

_vous me flattez belle-maman, rétorqua Hadès avec un sourire pincé.

_et maman, elle est pas toute belle avec sa nouvelle toge? Prît à partie Perséphone son époux en lui suppliant du regard de dire quelque chose de gentil.

_bien sur, on compte tous sur elle pour exciter les foules en ensemençant publiquement un champs avec un bellâtre de passage, rappela en persifflant le gendre cet incident gênant lors d’un banquet précèdent où sa belle-mère avait trop bu.

_Jean-pierre! Haussa Déméter.

_Endora! La surnomma Hadès

_Quel beau banquet! Cria Perséphone. On va bien manger!

_surtout ta mère si elle ne perd pas l’habitude bouffer tout ceux qui bougent! Faisant référence au banquet de Tantale et à l’épaule de Pélops.

_sale violeur de sac à merde des enfers! L’insulta Déméter

_vieille pute alcoolique exhibitionniste! Lui hurla Hadès

_au moins ils recommencent à se parler, murmura triomphalement Perséphone à l’attention de Zeus qui observait atterré toute la scène.

Le même Zeus se dit qu’Hadès aurait plus mal tombé puisque sa belle-mère était en même temps sa grande sœur. Elle est adorable d’habitude, sauf quand il s’agit de sa fille. Non, vraiment, la vraie terreur de la famille c’était leur grand mère à tous, Gaïa. Il se rappelle des punitions qu’elle assénait à toute la famille quand elle n’était pas contente. C’était, parce qu’elle est passée de terreur céleste à chignon serré et règle dans la main à celui de vieille peau un peu perchée. Il jeta un coup d’œil inquiet vers elle. Il avait bien fait: elle était entrain de raconter toutes les anecdotes sur ses enfants et petits enfants aux convives lèche-bottes assemblés autour d’elle. Avant que trop de dossiers ne ressortent, il accourût et dispersa l’auditoire.

_grand-mère! Tu vas prendre froid ici! Je vais te conduire dans un endroit plus confortable et qui sied mieux à ta stature! (et isolé de tous!) lui proposa-t-il en mettant la vieille man ridée de sa mamie sur son bras.

_Oh! Comme tu es gentil! Tu as toujours été mon favori! Même si tu as toujours été un peu coureur! Dis à voix haute Gaïa de sa voix éraillée de petite vieille ratatinée.

_Oui oui c’est ça… Répondit passablement gêné Zeus en jetant des regards inquiets vers Héra qui heureusement était occupée.

_Et la petite Ino, qu’est ce qu’elle dévient? Et Europe? Et Séléné? Je l’aimais bien cette petite pute… continua la vieille folle tandis que son petit fils la faisait discrètement sortir….

_Grand-mère part déjà? Lui demanda Héra soupçonneuse tandis que Zeus revenait.

_ heu… hum… elle était un peu fatiguée.

_mouais… on en reparlera. Lui promit sa régulière avant de repartir en pleine discussion avec Athéna et Aphrodite.

Épuisé par cet affrontement, Zeus se rassit lourdement sur son trône. Que de soucis! Il aimait Héra mais il la trouvait un peu trop contraignante. Si au moins en discutant avec Athéna elle pouvait acquérir un peu de sa sagesse… Ha! Athéna! Sa fierté de père! Sa favorite! D’accord elle avait un sale caractère. C’est vrai que tout le panthéon l’avait surnommé le lieutenant colonel, à l’inverse d’Arès, son fils raté, que tous appelaient le « sous-off’ de mes couilles » (mais que pour ménager sa susceptibilité on appelait « de mes couilles ») Pourquoi sa chouchoute? Surement parce que ce n’est pas tout le monde qui accouche de sa fille par la tête. Et puis son enfance n’a pas été facile, elle a quand même vu toutes ses amis mourir! Et ce n’est pas parce que c’est elle qui les a toutes tué que sa peine n’avait pas duré au moins deux jours!

Aphrodite c’était une autre histoire… Une véritable beauté mais qu’est ce qu’elle était cruche! Une véritable amphore! Il se la serait bien tapé mais il n’était pas sur de savoir s’il était le père. Normalement c’est Ouranos mais il y avait un petit doute. De toute façon elle est la chasse gardée du bossu, le fils qu’Héra avait fait toute seule. Le dernier qui avait couché avec s’est retrouvé avec de gros soucis. En parlant de lui, qu’est ce qu’il foutait encore?!

_De mes couilles! Pardon… Arès! Arrête de jouer avec la lance du lieutenant-colonel! Tu sais très bien que ta sœur a horreur qu’on touche à ses affaires! En plus tu vas encore te faire mal! Rugit Zeus en direction du seul fils qu’il avait eu avec Héra.

Tout penaud, celui-ci reposa la lance et partît bouder dans un coin.

Les enfants; une éternelle préoccupation. Il avait fallu dresser une table pour tous les enfants de Zeus sous les regards furibonds d’Héra. Distraitement il les dénombrait pour voir s’ils étaient tous arriver: 1…. 2… 3… 10…50….125….

Une heure plus tard, Zeus vît avec satisfaction que tous étaient là. Il avait toutefois du mettre les points sur les i avec certains d’entre eux, notamment avec les jumeaux qu’il était allé voir quelques jours plus tôt…

lorsqu’il s’est rendu chez Artémis, il fût accueilli par une bordée de flèches et du esquiver plusieurs coups de massue.

_Oh! Oh! Ça va pas non?! Qu’est ce que j’ai fait pour être accueilli ainsi? Demanda Zeus

_Vous m’outragez père! Cria Artémis à son encontre.

_Quoi?! Fût stupéfait le seigneur de l’orage

_Vous venez pour profiter de mon innocence! S’indigna sa fille

_je viens juste te dire bonjour et t’inviter pour un mariage! Se défendît le père.

_Vous êtes comme tous les hommes lubriques qui ont outragé ma vertu en posant les yeux sur ma nudité! Clama la déesse chasseresse!

_Bordel de moi même! Alors arrête de te baigner à poil dans les parcs publiques et ça évitera que les promeneurs et les chasseurs tombent sur toi! Plaida Zeus franchement énervé!

_Pourquoi tant de dureté avec ma douce sœur? demanda Apollon

_Ha ben tu tombes bien! Le prit à parti le père. Je vais pouvoir vous inviter et vous donner les consignes! Et je ne me répèterai pas: toi Artémis, je te confisque tes armes. Hors de question que tu assassines tous les hommes de la soirée parce qu’ils t’auront dit bonjour. Et toi Apollon, tu te tiens à carreaux avec les jeunes filles et les jeunes hommes qui seront là! Tu ma fais honte à te prendre des râteaux! Tes seules conquêtes tu les as violé ou tu leur as offert des cadeaux contre leurs faveurs! Ton dernier truc c’est d’avoir offert le don de divination à une gamine et même avec ça tu t’es fait jeté! Entre parenthèse je sens que cette histoire va nous foutre dans la merde! Alors vous y allez mollo! OK?! Alors dites que vous avez compris et venez faire bisou!

Tout timidement, les jumeaux répondirent un petit « oui, papa » et lui firent un bisou.

Juste après ça, échauffé par sa colère, Zeus se rendit chez Dionysos, défonça la porte de son temple, lui ordonna d’ouvrir pour aérer un peu, de ranger ce bordel, fouilla toute la piaule et confisqua toutes les drogues qu’il pût trouver. Et rugît avant de partir à son fils qui pendant tout ce temps n’avait pas décroché de sa musique infernale:

-je te préviens que tu seras fouillé à l’entrée! Hors de question que tu profites de la soirée pour faire du trafic avec tes potes lotophages!

Sur ses mots, l’impérieux panthéiste sortit en écrasant une larme de dépit. Dionysos était si mignon, petit, quand il était encore Zagreus. Être démembré et ressuscité ne lui avait pas réussi.

Sortant de ces pensée, Zeus posa un regard bienveillant sur la réception. Jusqu’ici tout allait bien. Orphée animait la soirée avec les neufs muses. Ses enfants se tenaient à carreaux. Les dieux s’amusaient bien. Le mariage avait été célébré sans encombre, et la menace d’un sale gosse bouleversant l’ordre céleste était écartée. Les mariés étaient heureux. Pour arriver à ce résultats, il avait tout donné. À l’entrée du Panthéon, il avait posté Médée comme physionomiste. Avec elle, son grand fiston Héraclès servait de videur et tenait en laisse Cerbère pour écarter d’éventuels trouble-fêtes.

Régulièrement, Hermès lui faisait un compte rendu. Il avait quand même fallu refoulé Odin, Thor, Osiris, Sangoku, Seth et pas mal d’autres personnes avec qui il s’entendait bien d’habitude mais là c’était un mariage quand même! Excepté avec Bouddha qui l’avait très mal pris, il n’y avait pas eu d’embrouilles. Satisfait de lui même, Zeus pu enfin se détendre, commanda une coupe d’ambroisie à son petit Ganymède et s’apprêtait à porter un toast quand surgît une couille. Pas Arès, une couille plus grosse encore. Jusqu’ici, tout allait bien…

Qui avait laissé entrer Eris?! Les consignes étaient pourtant claires: il était hors de question que la déesse de la discorde soit de la partie! Ils vont m’entendre à la sécurité! Se promît intérieurement Zeus. La foule entière était tétanisée. Avant que quiconque n’ai pu réagir, furieuse, Eris lança au milieu de la salle un objet et disparût dans un grand rire. Il s’agissait d’une pomme d’or avec l’inscription « pour la plus belle ». pour désamorcer les tensions qu’il sentait venir, Zeus dît à l’assemblée:

_je serais d’avis qu’en ce jour solennel, cet objet aille à notre belle marié du jour que les dieux ont honoré de sa présence… vous m’écoutez?… hey… je parle… allo?… je suis là… allez vous faire foutre….

Il se rendait petit à petit compte que personne en l’écoutait. Tous étaient plus occupé à observer le combat qui avait commencé entre Héra, Athéna et Aphrodite.

_en tant que représentante de l’expérience, c’est à moi que devrait revenir cette pomme, proposa sure d’elle Héra

_tu retardes mamie. C’est marqué à la plus belle, pas la plus fanée. Donc cette pomme est à moi, rétorqua Aphrodite

_ta gueule pupute. Tu sais que c’est marqué ça parce qu’on te l’a dit, lui répondit le lieutenant-colonel en la soulevant par le col de sa toge et en l’envoyant valdinguer dans les bras du « sous-off’ de mes couilles » (pardon, Arès) l’intelligence et la détermination sont la réelle beauté de ce monde, assura virilement Athéna.

_écoute gamine, on ne va quand même pas filer un symbole de beauté à une conductrice de char! Retoqua Héra

pendant ce temps, Zeus se lamentait. Il préférait ne pas écouter les insultes qui pleuvaient entre les trois déesses. Il releva la tête subitement lorsqu’il entendit l’une d’elle clamer: « alors ce sera la guerre! » Il vît Héra rassembler ses partisans en tant qu’épouse du roi des dieux, Aphrodite séduire tous les autres contre la promesse de faveurs que de toute façon elle accordait facilement, et Athéna chausser ses Nike air de combat, enfiler son casque portant l’inscription « seiya forever » et lancer son cri de guerre: je me donne la force!…

Jusqu’ici tout allait bien, pour une fois une réunion de famille aurait pu se passer sans encombre, Zeus rêvait de ce qui aurait du se passer quand il réalisa: merde! Non seulement on est dans la merde mais j’ai oublié ce connard de paparazzi, Homère! À tous les coups il va tout raconter!

Mais ça s’est une autre histoire….

HTC lanza otro móvil Android, dentro de la gama Droid de Verizon, en Estados Unidos.

HTC Droid Eris

El Droid Eris está disponible por 99$ con dos años de contrato y un descuento inicial.

En cuanto a sus características, es practicamente igual al HTC Hero pero con otro acabado externo. Cabe destacar que aunque esté en la gama Droid de Verizon, no trae Android 2.0, sino Cupcake (Android 1.5) y al igual que los terminales que traen la interfaz Sense, no se actualizará a Donut (Android 1.6), teniendo que esperar a Eclair (Android 2.0).

Fuente de la noticia

So, the Motorola DROID, and the Droid Eris from HTC launched! So what do you guys think of Verizon’s first two Android devices? What do you think of Android 2.0? Leave your thoughts in the comments!

DevLearn 2009 begins this coming week in San Jose, CA, and I thought I’d write a quick post containing tips and suggestions for both attendees and people who wish to participate remotely.

One of the most important things: The hashtag for DevLearn 2009 is dl09.

To track all things related to DevLearn, you’ll want to:

• Watch Twitter for all messages tagged with #dl09, devlearn, etc.
• Check WordPress for blogs mentioning dl09.
• Keep an eye on Flickr for all photos tagged with dl09.
• …and most importantly, keep checking back here! I plan on blogging as much of the conference as possible.

Here are a few other helpful links:

• How to Get the Most Out of a Conference
• Posts from DevLearn 2008
• Brent Schlenker’s blog, Corporate eLearning Strategies and Development (lots of good DevLearn info here)

As I mentioned in a previous post, I will be presenting two sessions at DevLearn (one on micro-blogging and one on WordPress). Please drop in if these topics interest you. I’m always happy to continue discussions after the presentation as well, so don’t be shy!

Cell Phones

Motorola Droid and Droid Eris

Verizon Wireless

Droid = $199 on site and Best Buy. $149 on Wirefly.com.

Droid Eris = $99 on site/Best buy. $49 on Wirefly.com.

Biggest difference = Droid has Android 2.0. Eris has 1.5.

Benefits of Android OS = Free navigation with Google Maps. Many free apps. Open development for apps. Flashy interface.

Verizon (s vz) has been all over the Android (s goog) news this week, with two of the hottest phones finally arriving on the scene. The Motorola (s mot) Droid, a stylish phone almost as thin as the iPhone but with a sliding QWERTY keyboard, debuted Friday. Early reviews are not finding the keyboard to be much of a bonus, but it’s amazing to find one at all in a thin handset. Verizon is also offering the HTC Droid Eris for just $99 with a contract. It’s shipping with the HTC Sense interface on top of the stock Android UI, making it the cheapest phone thus equipped.

Some Droid phone reviewers have taken note of the Verizon Channel in the Android Market. This channel offers apps that have met Verizon’s approval before offering them to customers. T-Mobile announced its own channel for the Android Market this week. Both channels allow customers to buy apps and have them charged to the phone bill, eliminating the need for a credit card transaction.

Meanwhile, two recently announced e-book readers could have more than the Android OS in common. Spring Design this week sued Barnes & Noble (s bks) over the Nook reader, claiming it has features the bookseller gleaned from information Spring Design shared with B&N under NDA. It has requested an injunction to prevent the Nook from being sold.

The Android platform from Google is wasting no time becoming a force in the cell phone market. The HTC Droid ERIS and Motorola Droid are the first Android platform phones from Verizon. Verizon know for being a little slow with new phones hopes this will give them a boost in the PDA/Smart Phone market. Both phones feature a 5MP camera, Wi-fi, and touch screens along with access to the Android market. There are a few differences. The Droid ERIS features a 3.2 inch screen, virtual qwerty keyboard, and runs on Android 1.5 while the Motorola Droid has a 3.7 inch screen, a slide out qwerty keyboard, and runs on Android 2.0. So if you have Verizon and are looking to upgrade you finally have some good choices.

HTC DROID ERIS Key Features …………………..  MOTOROLA DROID Key Features

TO FIND TRUE CHARACTER RUN YOUR HARDEST AGAINST THE WIND.