Like Google Buzzzzz but Better?

@ least that's what they say themselves: a Dutch startup company is launching an application called Inbox2 (yawn) that aims at uniting different kinds of communication flows into one solution. It's not build like a software app but as a platform. Users can add whatever service they want to integrate.

Sounds better than Google Buzz which, let's be honest, focusses primarily on keeping you within Google.

Inbox2 claimes it can handle mails from Gmail, Yahoo Mail, Hotmail, Outlook, Microsoft Exchange, AOL and any other IMAP- or POP3-account. On top of that it links to social platforms (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and, being Dutch, Hyves).

Want to try it out? For now the beta version is free but users who'll want to use and synchronise web, desktop and mobile will find themselves paying a fee. Which, if this thing does what it says it does, would not even be too much of a threshhold.

Manaos: devilishly delicious

I owe it to the name of my blog to honour the 'Manaos', a small salad sold by Exki, the (a bit too expenive) healthy food store.

Manaos contain bio-quinoa, sojabeans, tomato-pesto (made of tomato, rapeseed oil, celeriac, onion, parmesan, almonds, potato, red pepper, ...), peas, coriander and parseley.

I had never heard of quinoa, which has a special texture and a fine taste. Mana'o means 'thought' by the way. In Hawaiian.

Jamie Oliver's TED Prize wish: Teach every child about food | Video on TED.com

Jamie Oliver's TED Prize wish: Teach every child about food | Video on TED.com

collective mourning for a lost colleague

It is now official. One of the18 who perished in the train crash is our colleague. Our thoughts are with his family, who had to endure more than 36 hours of incertitude while waiting for official news. Our workplace, unified in mourning, will never be the same again.

How a dramatic event can stop you literally in your tracks

Yesterday two passenger trains collided south of Brussels and during the day we found out that one colleague (who hadn't shown up for work and takes that specific train) had indeed been injured and was hospitalized.

This morning we found out that not only were there two people with the same name aboard that train, the one in hospital is not our colleague. Which means there is no news: he will be either very heavyly injured or will not have survived. Another colleague was on the train that derailed because of the debris on the rails, yet another one ... any accident on any of the important commuter lines to brussels at that specific hour would have involved people working here.

The really sad thing is that this missing colleague barely survived a near-deadly motoraccident a couple of years ago and has undergone multiple operations over the years to deal with backproblems and other stuff. It never ever diminished his joie-de-vivre, his charm and his sense of humour. He seemed indestructible. Today, it's all we can hope for.

Why does someone get involved in a serious accident twice in his life? How is that possible? What does it mean?

(picture courtesy AP on numerous websites)

No more excuses: buy art!

Admit that this picture breathes a very strange atmosphere and is very beautiful. I picked it up on a site called www.eyebuyart.com, offering a selection of artworks in different price categories. This one is by Marshall Byrd Sterling. I suppose most, if not all of these artists are young and unknown but their work certainly deserves attention.

Google going social?

Posted in the Wall Street Journal today: Google to announce some social feature linked to Gmail allowing users to share media and even update statuses? The least you can say they don't create this irritating hype announcing something ages beforehand.

On the other hand: I don't mind creating status updates for my Facebook account on a (nearly) daily basis but do I want to see status updates on everything I do? Absolutely not.

The reason FB has remained this much fun is because most of the status updates I see in my friends' circle are witty, funny, serious, provocative ... no day-to-day 'i'm having coffee now and after that I will start doing the dishes' kinda stuff. But on my Google mail? And what is Google going to do with that? Run text analysis, sentiment analysis, semantic analysis and get me analyzed to bits?

I don't think so.