Release 4.0

Thursday, June 05, 2003

Blogger's block (from Sochi)
Blogger’s block

As a new blogger, I am learning that the only way to do it is to do it regularly; otherwise you end up pitting back-clog against current events, and you postpone everything to another time… I need to remind myself that a blog is just a list of pointers with annotations.

And then of course here in Sochi (on the Black Sea coast in Russia) I’m limited to dial-up, although it’s the first place I seem to have a moment to relax. (On the other hand, I’m beginning to realize why WiFi is so useful to blogging, even though in theory it should be irrelevant: it’s just easier to do this if you can be online all the time and go update your blog during those inevitable dull moments, checking on URLs as you go.)

I’m at the key conference of the year for the Russian computer/software/Internet market (modeled on my own PC Forum, FWIW!) – 160 people, which comprises the critical mass of this market. The formal sessions start today; yesterday was tennis and frolicking by the pool and intense hallway discussions. I’m expecting to see lots of progress since last year. There are now about 150 installations (in various stages) in Russia, and it has become fashionable to talk about business processes. The country isn’t quite at the Cluetrain stage yet (!), but there’s an interest in efficiency and effectiveness now that was rare just a couple of years ago.

Some back-clog: Just over a week ago, I was in Venice – yes, on business!! Amazingly – visiting Terry Glen Phipps, the cio of Benetton , to talk about their efforts in RFID. I also got to the meet the new ceo, Silvano Cassano; Benetton is at an interesting stage as a company overall, with new management taking on more of a role from the family founders. And yes, Venice was everything you may have read or seen: Terry took a group of us out to dinner; we arrived in Venice by boat and toured around certain half-deserted waterways on a warm, somehow tourist-light evening… the result is at www.edventure.com .

Now that I have broken the blogger’s block, I hope to have more soon.

posted by Esther 6:56 PM