Bavarian Food: Not a Light Feast: #bavaria #munich

While food was clearly not my on my high list of kudos in Germany this past week, I managed to sample a cross selection of traditional German food in beer halls, restaurants, cosmopolitan bistros, pubs, markets as well as the renown Dallmayr exquisite food shop along Munich's Dienerstr.

A few shares for your virtual taste buds below.

Amsterdam's PICNIC Festival

PICNIC Program Director Kitty Leering talks to me about their upcoming PICNIC event, held in Amsterdam, Holland every September. Think of PICNIC as more of a festival or a cross-discipline platform for creative discussion and collaboration than a conference. Bringing together art, technology, innovation and culture, its unique festival format covers strategy as well as hands-on workshops and matchmaking sessions. Learn more from Kitty below.

Zwirbeldirn Treats Us to Bavarian Song

Zwirbeldirn plays and sings Bavarian music at this past week's DLD Conference in Munich.

Sensuality in Germany? How You Wonder? #munich

Click below to energize your senses with the aromas of homemade German chocolate. Tucked away on a side street not far from Munich's food market where you are mainly faced with sausage, sausage and more sausage, a little gem called Sama Sama sits.

The building itself on Westenriederstr is crooked and crammed inside, every corner filled with homemade delicacies oozing with combinations you are unlikely to have tasted.

Not only do they use the best quality ingredients to create dark and milk chocolate masterpieces but they incorporate pistachios, cherries, lemons, ginger, amaretto, pepper, lavender, violets, roses, blueberries, vanilla, strawberries and more.

Allow yourself to surrender to chocolate everywhere you travel on this magical globe of ours. In one video, you will also see the chocolate in process as well as the finished product.

Dr. Gino Yu Raps on American Integration 20+ Years Ago

Dr. Gino Yu from Playlab in Hong Kong does a short rap number he wrote twenty years ago in his college years. (about being Chinese and studying and working in the U.S.). It's endearing and amusing at the same time.

Nokia's Platform & on Partnering - #dld10

Nokia held an event at DLD last week to bring folks up to speed about what they're working on and how to more effectively work with them as a partner.

A main takeaway was a move away from generic and towards "highly textual," and better understanding of geo-local behavior, i.e., what are people searching for and doing in Munich at 5 pm every day? What is their behavior? What is the connection between the two?

They're focused on building applications that are relevant right now. Contextual apps are generally fast, one that can be built in a week or two, take a consumer a few minutes to use, i.e., 3 clicks on their phone before a result.

As for the mapping and geo-local side of things, they have a context-aware publishing platform. The goal is to build quickly so consumers can take immediate action.

We went into context-aware as it relates to social networks. For example, you build a large feed of stories over time by commenting on and contributing to your Facebook page. Stories by their nature, generate interactions.

The key to those interactions, whether its on Facebook, Twitter or a mobile app, is deciding when and where you interact and in what context. When on the go, it's about thinking about Facebook from a mobile perspective rather than thinking about creating a specific mobile app for Facebook.

Summit on Climate & Faith Change Brings Global Leaders Together

Earlier this month, Faith leaders from around the world took part in a Summit without leaving their borders through use of client Zorap’s digital-rich collaborative technology.

One month after the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Summit leaders logged in from London, Washington, Nairobi, Jerusalem, Geneva and the Pacific Island of Palau, using Zorap, to discuss important issues around climate and faith.

Bishops and other faith leaders around the world encouraged people around the world to use Zorap to interact, discuss and collaborate on the topic of climate and faith change, rather than having to get on a plane to fly to London for the event. Zorap enabled countless more important leaders to join in a global discuss in real-time that couldn’t have happened otherwise.

Faith Climate Connect housed the various pieces of technology that were used during the event, including Zorap. Using tools like Zorap to engage on important topic matters such as the climate and faith, encourages leaders and the public to embrace technology to assist in decreasing their environmental impact, such as using virtual video conferences and media-rich chat instead of flying to events to meet with each other.

A facilitated video conference using Zorap was used for an interactive conversation between six significant leaders of the three different Abrahamic faiths located in different countries around the world.

The goal was to learn about, discuss and share their ideas about faith and information contained in the scriptures regarding caring for the environment. The Zorap conversation was projected onto a large screen for the audience in London and was live broadcasted through the Faith Climate Connect website for people to watch around the world.

There was also a question and answer session involving the audience posing questions to the faith leaders around the world. Each of these different elements highlighted how technology, particularly Zorap, can bridge geographical divides, bringing people together to learn from each other and decreasing their carbon footprint.

The Summit is the brainchild of the Bible Society, whose hope is to raise public awareness about the Biblical references and support for caring for the environment.

Mug Shots & Moments from DLD10 - #dld10

Photos from the DLD Conference have now been uploaded to Flickr and to the blog. I'll be sharing some of my favorites in the next several days.

Zorap on Graveline America

Client Barry Spencer, CEO of Zorap talking to Dave Graveline at CES earlier this month.

DLD Kicks off Tomorrow During a Cold Munich Week #dld10

The DLD Conference line-up looks amazing. More from the ground after the kick off tomorrow, post museum tour (Munich has a few amazing art wonders) and a working lunch.