chat roulette from Casey Neistat on Vimeo.

The video above (via alt1040) explains Chatroulette better than I would.  My experience with it has been mixed, but it reminds me a lot of the old BBS/ICQ free-for-all 10 years ago.  I’ve read metaphors comparing it to TV zapping with people, but I think it’s more akin a people player in shuffle mode.  Some of the nice people I’ve found (after nexting all the flying male body parts) included:

• A bored Filipina (at 3 a.m. her time) asking what music was I playing (Nortec Collective, of course).
• A Dutch law student with a great sense of humour.
• A German dude interested in banking for development (we were chatting about Muhammad Yunus)
• Random male stranger asking questions on existential philosophy (my conclusion is he had watched The Matrix too many times).
• A Texan in his 50’s very interested to know my views on the Mexican drug violence situation.
• A French literature student just interested in a chat, also with a really nice sense of humour.
• A young Indian female doctor waiting for her night shift to start who gave me a couple of nice suggestions of Indian indie after I mentioned I collect “local rock” from all over the place.

Serendipituous, yes. Extreme, sometimes (but you can also next them or even better report them, jerks!). An interesting study of the human condition, absolutely.

By now everybody and their mother have heard about the “balloon boy hoax“: a kid was feared to have flown away on a balloon kept in his family’s back yard who garnered huge media and law-enforcement attention until it was found that first he was not there in the balloon and then that it had all been staged.

More than anything, I think it is a commentary on the length to which some will go in order to attain “fame”, even at the cost of everybody else.  They got their 15 minutes, but could end up with a 2 million USD fine and 6 years in jail.

You know the result, you probably also watched the game.  The second consecutive win for Mexico against the US in just a few weeks featured this time the A squads from both sides playing at Azteca Stadium in Mexico City.

The interesting thing for me as a Mexico fan was not only the win, but the way it was achieved.  After the tactical incompetence of the Hugo Sánchez years and the endless tinkering of the Sven-Göran Eriksson times, it was nice to see a team that had a solid base of players based in Mexico and Europe who understood each other.  Furthermore, we saw that some of the U-17 champions of 2005 have made the transition to the senior team well after a shaky start.

The most important lesson, however, was the way this team finally showed (and used) the patience and maturity to win matches against hard-as-nails opposition.  While any other Mexican team would have started to panic after going one goal down against the Americans at the cradle of Mexican football, these guys kept their cool, followed their game plan, moved the ball around and finally scored.  Maybe Rafael Márquez not being there actually helped as he has a long sad history in situations like these with the national team.

El Tri wouldn’t be in this situation if it were not for the complete lack of long term planning by the Mexican Football Federation, but this victory comes at the right time to steady the ship and qualify for South Africa.  We don’t need this rollercoaster the next World Cup cycle, please.

• In the United States, social media helps elect presidents.
• In Iran, social media helps organise protests against the government.
• In Mexico, social media helps candidates smear their opponents.

One of the topics I was discussing with friends is how while in the New World being American, Canadian or even Mexican is more than anything else an ideal that can be aspired to and achieved, being Finnish, German or Italian requires you to be born into it.

If this is true, then for the sake of argument we could assume that the current debate about the need for immigrants to adapt and blend into society (what I sometimes jokingly call soppauttaminen, a play on the Finnish words for soup and adapt) is asking for the impossible, simply because the only way for them to be regarded as to be fully part of society is to be born there, which at least their first generation cannot do.  Further down the road it might happen, but is not automatic.

One could argue that this is exactly what happened to Turks in Germany, where until the change of the citizenship laws this decade, the children and grandchildren of immigrants were not allowed to become citizens of the country where they were born.  It is documented that even today they live in very tightly knit communities with little contact with the outside world.

In France, on the other hand  you have the values of liberty, equality and fraternity that are cherished by all and ensure that everybody who adapts the French language and values will be deemed as French at least in theory, but in practice it might be a little bit more complicated, as the situation in the banlieues shows.

Trying to apply this to my experiences, I have been trying to understand if there is an idea of Finnishness that I can make my own, that would also be accepted by society and followed through. If the perunasuomalaiset and other Finnish politicians really want to take the situation of immigration head on, they should ask that question. A person who has no investment in and no part in society will not be interested in his development within it.

In my recent trip to New York City I stayed at the Hudson in 58th street, as the location fit my needs to the T. The experience, however, was not that pleasant even if the staff were really attentive: basically, that architect (renowned Philippe Starck) should have been fired as the place is absolutely not user-friendly even if it is designed to be chic.  Don’t get me wrong, I am not against good design (after all, I live in Finland, cradle of Alvar Aalto where the touch of the Nordic movement can be seen almost everywhere) but in my book good design has to be both aesthetically pleasing and functional.

On arrival (at midnight and completely jetlagged) I couldn’t find the hotel as there is no sign with its name at the entrance, only a “hole” with two lamps made to look like torches on its side.  Going inside there are no signs, so I had to guess that the check-in was to be performed in the big desk that looked more like a bar.  On reaching my room, I realised it was not small by NY standards but positively tiny as there was only space for the bed and my luggage didn’t even fit, and noisy to boot.  I asked for a change due to the airplane-grade noise coming from one of the machines outside and got to a less noisy location, where I realised that the sound insulation was terrible anyway and I could hear pretty much everything (and I mean everything) coming from my neighbouring rooms and walkways.

With that I fell asleep, but my surprises continued in the morning when I realised that my legs were too long to be able to sit in the loo (and I’m only 183 cm./6 ft. tall!). That was too much for me and I asked for an upgrade or a change of hotel.  Later that week I found out that the lobby bar is a favourite location with the hipsters of the city, which means there is a lot of noise every weekend before you escape to your room.  The hotel does have a couple of very nice bars, even if beers are 9 bucks a pop.

• + Location, staff, chic factor (for those who care)
• - Design user-friendliness, noise, room sizes
• Recommended for: teenagers and young adults.
• Not recommended for: business travellers, families
• Would I stay there again? Only for the right price as now I know what is the catch.

TheBlueVipersofBrooklyn.com

Lo interesante de este comercial, estarán de acuerdo conmigo, es que en lugar de utilizar servicios de doblaje simplemente tomaron a la misma persona de su versión en inglés y lo pusieron a hablar español, con resultados aún más cómicos que el comercial original (abajo).  Además, estoy seguro que el mismo comercial en español no funcionaría fuera de Estados Unidos porque sonaría demasiado raro a todos aquellos que no están acostumbrados al acento de un angloparlante.  Creo que  es obvio que para los vendedores de este producto el mercado latino era lo suficientemente importante.

I’m currently in New York on business.  Plenty of what passes as insight in this blog will be available as soon as I have time to write.  In the meantime, you can see what I see.