The Willow Garage team programmed one of their PR2 robots to play pool and PR2 not only has a blast doing so, but its accuracy seems to be remarkably better than the Willow Garage’s engineering team. Go PR2! Go ROS! (an open-source system for robots)
It was 34 years ago today that black students protested the apartheid policy of teaching classes in the Afrikaans language. The riots that day marked the beginning of the Soweto uprising, which in addition to drawing the attention of the world helped put the African National Congress (party of both Nelson Mandela and the current president, Jacob Zuma) in a leadership role in the struggle against apartheid, ending white rule within a generation.
The boy being carried in the photo to the left was killed by a police bullet that day. The Hector Pieterson Museum, which commemorates him and the struggle, is a moving and essential visit if you are in Johannesburg.
So it was appropriate that among other events to mark the day the South African soccer team played their second World Cup match this evening. Here is a video with Graeme Addison, a South African journalist who was at the scene on June 16, 1976.
Horatius, in San Francisco’s Potrero Hill, is an art gallery, bistro, event space, wine bar and culinary specialty shop. It is also one of the few places in San Francisco open for the 4:30 a.m. matches from South Africa, and offers the biggest screen in the city on which to watch them.
Horacio Gomes, founder and CEO, has like others given us a gift by
sharing his passion for soccer, especially the Portugese variety. This
morning Portugal played its first match of the 2010 World Cup, against
the Ivory Coast. The match started at 7 am but by halftime most of the
seats were taken by a crowd that included at least a few fans of Cote
d’Ivoire’s Elephants.
The space is more like a gallery than a bar or cafe, lit by candles on either side of the large screen. Folding chairs take up most of the floor and there are couches along the sides if you get there early enough. Farther back are tables where you can set up a laptop and eat breakfast.
Though the match was scoreless it was entertaining, with much artistry, and the crowd appreciated the drama and flow. Here is a short tour of the space, followed by an interview with Horacio (his last name is pronounced GOMSH, not Gomez, as it was mangled in the video). He’ll be here every day, for every match. Come share a few.
Fotobabble Teams up with iVillage on the “iVillage I love my…” Contest, which encourages
women to share their beauty & style secrets.
In this campaign, talking photos serve as an innovative social media tool to drive user engagement, brand awareness and traffic. The contest, which is currently underway and will run through midnight of June 30, 2010, encourages users to create Fotobabble-powered Talking Photos to start a community dialogue around the products and clothing they love, and express their personal style.
To participate, users simply sign up (takes a few seconds), upload a photo and then click a button to record their own voice and share their secrets for style and confidence. Participants can then share their Talking Photos (or Fotobabbles), with friends and family through email, Facebook or Twitter. Fotobabbles with the top views are eligible to win a $500 gift card from Sephora.
The Fotobabble Platform can provide deeper brand exposure and increase traffic to a site. Easier and faster than video, more engaging and dynamic than photos and easy to embed anywhere on the web, Fotobabble provides companies and individuals a powerful and engaging way to connect with their customers and further extend their reach into popular social media networks such as Facebook and Twitter.
Click play below to learn more about the contest and see a fabulous example of how established brands are using unique social media platforms, such as Fotobabble, to increase fan and customer awareness and engagement.
Linchpins Everywhere, Linchpins Everywhere — dive for cover!! Seth Godin’s latest book: Linchpin which I am 75% the way through, is one of his best. It is written in Seth’s usual free flowing style with conviction and passion throughout but manages to call you to action on every page. I plan to post a book review once I turn the very last page.
As always, he’s straight forward. There are chapter subheads like: Where do you hide your brilliance? When did the resistance take over your life? Where do you put the fear? And, who are you trying to please?
He’s also funny: Would Shakespeare blog? From Superhero to Mediocreman (and Back Again), The Problem with Bowling, Throwing Yourself Under the Bus, and Why the Lizard Brain Wants You to be Stuck?
Tony Robbins uses a figure eight metaphor to refer to our “stuck-ness”. There we are climbing the ladder towards brilliance, creativity and joy and just before we get there, we sabotage yourself because emotionally, it is as much as your ‘lizard brain’ can handle). In order to feel safe, sabotage sets in and down you go back to the bottom of that figure 8 circle until you’re so bored, frustrated, sad and pissed off that you fight your way back up again until lizard brain takes over and the cycle repeats itself.
This week, I decided to go to an unofficial Linchpin meet-up because frankly I love Godin’s work, his writing, his thinking and this damn book. It turns out and little did I know, that 819 of these events are scheduled across the world and many have already happened.
Below is a video I shot at the end, where individuals came to the front of San Francisco’s Georges’ bar and pitched their “linchpin” project in 60 seconds to attendees. By “linchpin” project, I am referring to their passion, the thing that brings out their talent and brilliance, the thing that calls their authentic voice, and the thing that makes their hearts sing. The group was a combination of entrepreneurs, bloggers and non-profit evangelists. Have a listen:
Argentina won its first 2010 World Cup match on Saturday, beating
Nigeria 1-0 on a goal in the first several minutes. Lionel Messi spent
the rest of the match showing us why he is the best player in the world
but Nigerian goaltender Vincent Enyeama had the answer every time,
including a couple of truly spectacular reach saves.
But never mind that. What really matters is that there is a place in
SOMA where soccer fans of any country can come and watch matches in a
setting that was built for the World Cup from the heart. Check this out.
Urns of water and coffee, a free beer for anyone dedicated enough to
arrive before the 7 a.m. start. A yummy “chicken or egg” breakfast
wrap. Lots of TV screens. Here’s an interview with Andrew (left) and
Aaron (right).
They’re open for the 7:00 games every day and expect to open for the
4:30 Argentina game next week. Come share the lunacy and love.
Loic and Geraldine Le Meur give us a taste of what is coming for this year’s LeWeb in Paris at Les Docks, slated for December 8-9, 2010. This year’s theme is platforms and they plan to cover the platform spectrum, from browsers, mobile and PC to the iPad, TV, and social media. They have a great line-up of speakers confirmed already and it’s only June.
TechCrunch turns 5 and has an anniversary party at Twilio & SocialGold on Folsom Street in San Francisco. While I didn’t really see any TechCrunchers there (they may have been mingling but I just didn’t run into any), over 400 people showed up to take part in the celebration that a handful of start-ups sponsored.
Taking part meant PPT karaoke, free beer on one side of the room, boxes of pizza on the other and three hours into the event, a dozen or so bottles of champagne popped open — all at the same time.
Two other things worth mentioning: Yet again, Foursquare was on the fritz and it took me several attempts to check in AND I ran into people who were either from or had lived in the following countries: Czechoslovakia, Russia, Korea, VietNam, China, Sweden, England, France, Germany, Turkey, Australia, New Zealand, Poland, Japan and Bulgaria.
Last week at The Israel Conference, I interviewed Meir Feningstein about this year’s Israel Film Festival, coming to Los Angeles from October 20 to November 4, 2010 and New York from December 2-16, 2010. They’ll also be holding one in Miami in February 8-17, 2011. We learn about some of the highlights and what you can expect. Join us.
I learned a bit about Gideon’s product at this year’s Israel Conference. Gideon is an easy to use online application, updated weekly, that helps you diagnose infectious diseases and stay up to date on the latest trends in epidemiology, treatment and microbiology. More in the video below.