Category: Internet

De Correspondent – Dutch Journalists’ Crowd Funding Success

De Correspondent Logo

De Correspondent – Dutch News Crowd Funding Success

We all know the paper press is in Dire circumstances. To Paywall or not to Paywall your content? What about the Paper Guidebooks apparently going down the drain now that Google has announced to ditch the paper Frommers Guidebooks. What will happen with the Lonely Planet Guidebooks? We all know there is an ongoing battle between Travel Journalists, Travel Writers Travel News sections of paper press and so on and so forth.

The more refreshing is the outcome of this experiment:

Target met within 8 days

De Correspondent- First Masthead
Only 8 days ago a group of Dutch reasonably known journalists, column writers and bloggers (see the above picture of their first “masthead”) teamed up and launched a membership site De Correspondent with the intention to source 15,000 members who solely based on the good name of the founders and a promise to start an alternative only online news presence, without a very clearcut idea of the form or the content….

Within 8 days more that 15.000 Dutchman have signed up and have paid their membership fee and the number is fast going up and counting (at the moment of publsihing this post the counter shows 15.239.

Very interesting to see how this experiment will go on.

Update

The final number of members after 30 days:
correspondent_counter_end_result

Counter copied from their blog post.

No Beard? No King! – Dutch getting Viral about King to be Willem-Alexander

King to be Willem-Alexander and Abdicating Queen Beatrix

Currently H.R.H Prince Willem Alexander of The Netherlands (left) is clean shaven. He will be the first King in over 100 years after his mother H.M. Queen Beatrix (right) will abdicate in favor of him on April 30, 2013. However according to a funny FacBook page Zonder Baard Geen Koning (i.e. No Beard? No King!) which started yesterday and collected some 20,000 likes in its first 24 hours, Willem-Alexander has still 90 days to grow a nice beard.

Shocking: Booking.com attempts to Hijack Dot Hotels gTLD

ICANN Logo

Booking.com Seems the Sole Candidate to become a .hotels Registrar

A twitter friend pointed me to a French site Tendance Hotellerie that found out Booking.com is the sole candidate to distribute the dot.hotels top level domain when ICANN signs off on Booking.com’s application.

If that will be the case, it is clear to me that other hotels or hotel chains will not be able to obtain any .hotels extension anymore, because I simply doubt that when Booking.com B.V. gets the registrant status It will grant any hotel chain a .hotels extension.

This seems not in line with the aims of ICANN with the new TLD’s to offer the users more choice, more competition and to make the internet more transparent.

Here is the application of Booking.com B.V.

Even from the application it is clear that Booking.com wants to control this whole TLD:

Given the fact that the Applicant is a hotel reservation agent, it has a vested interest in giving its visitors and clients a clear and predictable naming scheme in the .hotels gTLD. Since visitors and clients are mainly looking for hotel
reservations on the basis of their geographic destination, the Applicant may
indeed develop plans in order to register domain names that exclusively contain
geographic names (country names, city names, names of regions, etc.).
However, if such domain names will be registered, the Applicant will do so
considering the following confines:
(i) these domain names will be exclusively registered in the name of the
Applicant ⁄ Registry Operator, and not in the name of a third party that is not controlled by the Applicant ⁄ Registry Operator, unless agreed upon otherwise with the authority competent for giving its consent in accordance with
Specification 5 of the Registry Agreement;
(ii) where consents are required prior to the registration and use of a domain
name referred to and in accordance with Specification 5 of the Registry
Agreement, the Applicant will obtain such consents before actually registering,
delegating and using these domain names…..

It is clear for instance  hilton.hotels will be registered by booking.com B.V. and not be available for Hilton to register….

Objections?

Yes! As an independent hotel owner I object and I will file an objection.

ICANN-(ICANN)-on-Twitter-2012-10-01-17-15-35

By coincidence ICAN’s Twitter account @ICANN mentioned a link to file objections today.

Objections can be filed on several grounds. Here is a Icann Brochure that makes it a bit more clear.

When Domotica in your Hotel Fails…

Geek and Poke

When Domotica in your Hotel Fails…

…You may get this reaction as Geek & Poke describe The Internet of Things. Off course it is a lesser inconvenience.

More

Post Inspired by Hofstijl, a Dutch language blog I contribute to.

Russia: Agent Provocateur Caught with its “Pants Down”?

Pants Down

“Pants Down”?

It appears that the sexy frilly lingerie brand Agent Provocateur has provoked its Russian fans. While launching a whole new site for Russia, Agent Provocateur has blocked access to its international sites from Russia. Allegedly the prices for its products on its Russian site is 50% to 100 % higher than on its international sites. Effectively it has significantly increased its product price for its Russian fans by way of modern internet censorship. While baring in mind their products cannot be said to have a lot of “substance” anyway, I would say this, when true, is a big Internet Marketing #FAIL.

Update

Take for instance the brand’s Mazzy Bikini
Mazzy-Bikini-on-pret-a-porter-com
On Pret a Porter dot com it costs UK pnd 171,-
Mazzy Bikini on Agent Provocateur dot RU
On Agent Provocateur dot RU it costs UK pnd 259,-

Last edited by GJE on March 9, 2012 at 11:15 pm