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It’s strange sometimes how things come and go (and come back) on the internet these days. After having been tagged earlier this year by Helen and Enrique, I blogged previously 5 Things you might not know about me. Recently, I got tagged twice again, but now with 8 Random Things by Heike Scholz and Jonathan Greene, so I digged up my 5 Things again and added another 3

So, here are the rules of the new 8 Random Things tag game:

• We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.
• Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
• People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
• At the end of your blog post, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
• Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.

And here 8 Random Things About Me:

1. I played the saxophone in the early eighties. I made it to Mr. Shiseido’s (himself) private club in Tokyo to play there for week with Elisa Waut, an at that time popular Belgian jazzy pop band. I was playing the alto-sax. BTW did you know that the saxophone is a Belgian invention from Adolphe Sax (patented in 1846)?

2. There exists a picture of me with Dennis Hopper when hosting the Brussels Film Festival in 1998 at the Cybertheatre, I was managing at that time - If ever the photographer who took that picture reads this, please send me a copy The Brussels-based “CyberTheatre” was a precursor of the now classic cyber café idea. Based in an old movie theatre, it was renovated to a three-floored space including a graphic-design workplace, a 3-D studio, video and sound producing facilities, and giant-screen displays with a trendy club and restaurant. All events happening in the CyberTheatre were tightly meshed with the Nirvanet web site (offline now), constantly providing it with fresh content. Our web team won the UNESCO award Web Prize in 1999 and many other prestigious awards. We also hosted the first online live streamed concert of The Simple Minds. Many “cyber” artists like Jaron Lanier , Stelarc, Atau Tanaka, etc. peformed at the CyberTheatre, we even had a 2.0 version back in 1997

3. Before that I managed ‘Le Beau Bruxell’, at the time the most cosmopolitan cultural centre in Brussels. I remind organising great concerts with now legendary soul artists, such as Isaac Hayes, Afrika Bambaataa, Gil Scott-Heron, Junior Walker, Rufus Thomas, and many others…

4. I fell in love with technology when I got the chance to work with a Macintosh Plus, when working at Les Disques du Crépuscule. My passion for mobile started while working in Helsinki in 1999 with Mindworks. In that period, I saw my first mobile video on a Nokia. In 2001, with RandomOne, we introduced SMS to TV in Spain. We went live on TV early 2002 in a talkshow with Jordi Gonzalez, a famous TV presentor over here. We managed to convince the popular Jordi to dialogue with live SMS messages send from the audience through a moderated screen - this dialogue became so popular and led to numerous spontaneous fun scenes and became an important part of the show that run for 2 years on CityTV before the presentor went national (again).

5. My all time artist is Miles Davis, which leads me to my favourite quote of him: “Don’t play what’s there, play what’s not there…”, and that’s still what I’m trying to do every day

6. I co-founded MobileMonday in Barcelona. I’m running this now with Carles Ferreiro and the help of Barcelona Media. You can check out which topics we covered and who spoke at our events the first season (including downloading presentations). Our Flickr Group here. MobileMonday has been a lot of work but very inspiring and rewarding, I met a lot of great people through this global network. A lot of exciting stuff to come next year too!

7. I quit smoking on January 6, 2004 with the help of SMS text messages. Together with Juha, Kasimir, and founders Javier Creus and doctor/writer Miguel Masgrau, I was part of the original development team that worked out the whole concept of Dr. Masgrau’s ideas to quit smoking with the help of the mobile phone. Basically, smokers could send a date they wanted to quit smoking to an SMS short number; one week before you wanted to quit, the system tracked your smoking habit -> every time the user lit a cigarette, he/she needed to send an SMS, then the system sended back a text message preparing the user to quit; when the user finally quit, the system send back a kind of positive ‘haiku’ text message supporting the user in this process; after a week the system knew your habit, thus pushed an SMS to the user at crucial moments. This went on for a week and afterwards on regular times whenever the user needed support. I was the first to test the system and simply quit After delivery, I don’t know how come the project never got out of Spain, I thought it was really great and I still believe it’s one of the better mobile projects I was involved in. Some original press release available here and a website of the current project conelmovil.com (both only available in Spanish!)

This one actually to just give a thumbs up to Darla

8. I was born in Bruges, also called the ‘Venice of the North’. One of my favourite songs, called Marieke by the Belgian Jacques Brel, describes the environment and spectacle of the nature between ‘Bruges et Gand‘, the area where I spend most of my childhood. Afterwards I lived in Ghent and Brussels - maybe next time I have to write 8 Random Things I still like about Belgium I moved to Barcelona in 2002 and enjoying it still… By the time this tagging game gets to 11 Random Things, you might just want to knock my door and get out for a drink with me to know more about me

I’d like to tag: David Harper, Ajit Jaokar, Daniel Appelquist, Mike Rowehl, Russell Beattie, Carlo Longino, Xen Mendelsohn and Judy Breck (just let me know if I’m I too ambituous here

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