Words by Maria

I sent a new picture to skyltat.se today. The notice is actually written by one of my neighbours :)

Update: The notice are top voted at skyltat and is now at Pusha. Feel free to push it :)

As long as I can remember, there have been issues of Dagen in my parents’ home. For me, Dagen is the Christian Newspaper my grandparents subscribe to and my mother reads at night. There has been a constant expression at home “mummy reads the day at night.” It doesn’t make sense in English, but anyway. To this day my parents are still taking over all the issues of Dagen when, now only my grandmother has read them. I have to admit that I have never been an enthusiastic reader of Dagen. I’ve just browsed it through sometimes and read an article now and then that I have found interesting.

Since my mother started using the Internet more frequently, I sometimes get tips from her by e-mail about articles at Dagen.se. I always read the articles she suggests – my mother knows me and what I’m interested in – but during the past six months, I have not had to read the articles she has suggested. Because I have already read them. And that is not because I have become more devout during the past year.

Nah, the reason why I have started to read articles at Dagen.se spontaneously is from the beginning because of Emanuel Karlsten and his energetic twittering. But the more I have read Dagen.se the more I have felt the presence of the editorial staff by my side. Oops, now I was maybe overly spiritual, but what I mean is that they have succeeded in creating a relationship with their readers in a way I can’t really put my finger on.

Dagen.se seems responsive and modern, not nearly as dusty as the Christianity itself sometimes can be seen. They have made a name for themselves far beyond the Christian communities in this country. When it comes to the web they have made their way up to the same levels – if not even higher – as the biggest newspapers in Sweden. Thanks to Emanuel Karlsten they are also well known and read by the “social media bubble”. Therefore, I wasn’t very surprised today when Medievärlden nominated Dagen.se for “Newspaper of the year, digital dedia”. They are well worth both the nomination and the prize in my opinion. I can only say Big congratulations to Dagen.se and its editorial staff.

Skyltat.se is a Swedish site with photos of funny signs, which sometimes can be very entertaining. This week I have contributed with two photos to the site.

In the entrance to the house where I am living there is a notice board. I found a notice there last week which made me smile a bit.

When I lived in Sundsvall there was a little flower shop in my neighbourhood. They used to have this sign outside. That picture is at least 6 years old but it wouldn’t surprise me if they still use it.

Two days ago Andreas Ekström was in an interview in the Swedish tv-programme Agenda about Google and how they practically “own” the Internet. During the interview he said that he wanted 1st of September (today) to be the no google day. I didn’t feel prepared for this, I know I am addicted to Google and some of its features and didn’t have time to experiment with alternatives today. And Andreas Ekström himself failed before time was 7am by opening his Google calendar. Anyway… the no-google day turned to another level tonight when the following happened.

This is what is facing me at the moment when I try to access my gmail.

Google is using twitter ofcourse to inform their users.

And in case you wonder why the pictures aren’t centred proportionally, I don’t know. Do you?

It’s been a week since I posted last weeks, worth to read articles or blog posts. During the last week there are three bloggers who have distinguished themselves a little extra in my eyes. So I would like to share some of their posts. I post them chronologically.

• Twitter is my living room, Facebook my kitchen… – Erik Starck about how he uses different social networks. This one is older than a week but I hadn’t read it before and I can’t agree more so I had to post it here.
• Domen slår mot det fria Internet – Very good written about when the Swedish court forced TPB’s isp to close the site by Mikael Zackrisson.
• This is the Internet: Sweden Social Web Camp – I know I posted a lot of sswc posts last week but this one is so brilliantlty written by Erik Starck that I just have to post it.
• När jag debatterade med Monique Wadsted – After Mikael Zackrissons post he was invited to a debate in Swedish TV4, read what he writes about it here.
• daßlog papier – Sofia Mirjamsdotter aka Mymlan about her blog paper project. Pretty nice idea I must say. Makes good blog posts live longer.
• Birro gör en Mogi – Sofia Mirjamsdotter again about Marcus Birros parody of Mogi

Now gogo read the bloggers who are more creative than me.

According to the CEO of Spotify Apple has approved their application to iPhone. It makes me want to have one more than ever…

I have read some good blog posts and articles during the last week that I want to share with you. Most of them are in Swedish so bare with me Danes, Dutchmen and Aussies, (I don’t know but maybe I have readers from other countries as well?)

• Aftonbladet är ingen martyr – de glömde göra sitt jobb – Emanuel Karlsten about this weeks  most discussed article in Sweden.
• Lider du av uppdateringssjukan? – Sandra Carlsson about Social Update Anxiety.
• The Pirate Bay Taken Offline By Swedish Authorities – Enigmax at TorrentFreak about when the Stockholm district court tried to take TPB offline.
• “Skriv ett hyllningstal till Marcus Birro (utan sarkasm och elakheter). Han är också en skön kille… – Alex Schulman about Marcus Birro, without being mean for once. If he’s serious that is.

Last weekend was also the weekend when sswc took place. Since I’m not old and experienced when it comes to  social media I didn’t even think of going there the first time I read about it. But the week before the camp I felt like I wanted to go there as well (but since my brother turned 30 I probably would’ve had problems to go anyway). Here are some selected posts about the camp that gives a hint about what seemed to be a very successful weekend.

• Min blogg hamnade i tidning – #sswc dag 1,5– Emanuel Karlsten was blogging live from the camp
• Sweden Social Web Camp – Ännu ett fantastiskt möte – Joakim Jardenberg was looking back at a fantastic weekend when he came home.
• Tältmöte = Kärlek – Sofia Mirjamsdotter aka Mymlan is writing her own reflections shortly and linking to other posts about the camp.
• SSCW – Social aktivitet och statistik – Fredrik Stenbeck posted the statistics about the activity on the web during the camp.

In less than an hour I am taking the train to Norrköping. From Norrköping I’ll go with my parents to Värnamo where my aunt and uncle lives. We’ll just stay there over the night and then carry on to Helsingborg and my brother. And tomorrow we’re going to celebrate his 30th birthday… wait… did I just write 30? I think I did, and that means we are getting old. My “big” brother and I. So, we have grown up, we live 555km from  each other but… it was like yesterday we were running around in the garden by our summer cottage or played tennis outside the house in Haga where we were living. And it was like yesterday I beat him in computer games at our C64.

Me, my brother and the C64.

That my blog looks like crap with Internet Explorer. Why hasn’t anyone told me? I know I have readers using ie.

Yesterday I twittered “Looking for a cheap hotel in Barcelona. Any ideas?” Today when I came home I had four new followers on Twitter and I had also got replies to my tweet from hotels and booking companies. Since I booked my hotel already yesterday evening I had no use for those tweets and I didn’t even check out their prices. But I didn’t expect that response really. It seems like the travel companies have understood how to use Twitter for marketing.