It’s gonna take me some effort to arrive there in time, but tonight is the Bwards event in Antwerp, and I’m looking forward to it! It looks like Jeroen has created a fun party for those of us with a URL and an opinion. The place to be is Het Paleis, and here is how to get there: clopin.be.
Continue reading ‘Tonight: Bwards in Antwerp’
Archive for the 'Belgium' Category
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Bloggers love lists. Bloggers adore lists of bloggers, certainly when they’re featured in the said lists. I started making top 30 and 60 lists of Belgian bloggers a way back, and somewhere in Nov 2005 Bruno took over the position as ranking specialist. He has just finished making a new list based on Pagerank, Technorati backlinks, Bloglines subscribers and some other indicators. I came out #3, which proves that the bribe worked as expected.
Let’s take a look at only 2 of those indicators for the top 20: Pagerank and Technorati backlinks (using the Pagerank checker)
Two surprises jump out:
- the good position of U2U’er Patrick (#11) which must be deserved through some other indicator, because a PR of 0 and 24 backlinks aren’t to write home about (*)
- the low position of Flanders’ premier shockblog (and provider of premium bootie) Zattevrienden (#13). They go through all that effort collecting pictures of crashing bikers and naked blondes, frame those delicately in contemporary culture through intelligent conversation, but are not sufficiently rewarded for it. Oh well …
In any case: if you want to meet some of the bloggers in the top 20 and buy them a drink, talk about interesting stuff or maybe even get a back link, put the following dates in your agenda:
>> March 23rd, Bwards, Antwerp
>> May 5th, Barcamp Brussels, Brussels
Smoking John says there is no proof that smoking causes cancer. I wouldn’t take his word for it.
Continue reading ‘Smokeban countdown: 2 days to go’
A strong advertisement from France:
“You are young, you’re healthy, join ToxicCorp and become a ‘replacement smoker’! Every year, 270.000 courageous and motivated youngsters are willing to become addicted to nicotine, and absorb formol, cyanide and more than 50 carcinogenic substances in order to sustain our profits. Like them, take this opportunity and replace one of our deceased faithful smokers. Your future is in your hands, don’t hesitate.
Tobacco kills 1 in 2 smokers. The tobacco industry counts on you to replace them!”
Why am I so looking forward to the smoking ban in Belgian restaurants? Let’s compile some reactions from abroad, when the smoking ban started there:
Argentina:
This weekend I remember leaving AcaBar, a restaurant/bar in Palermo, with some friends and I realized how much different the experience was from just 5 months ago when I went there with this same group of friends. The last time, the place was so smoke-filled that you could hardly see across from one end to the other. I remembered that after I got home, I had to strip off all my clothes and take a shower just to get the smell of smoke out of my hair.
expat-argentina.blogspot.com
Then it happened. The impossible. Buenos Aires went smoke free. Signs are up all over the capital. “Buenos Aires libre de humo.” (Buenos Aires free of smoke) Restaurants posted smaller versions, versions of the law. All over the milongas, bars, and restaurants, signs prohibiting smoking were posted.
On Oct 3 the local paper Clarin had a story of how 250 police were hired to patrol the city to make sure the law was being followed. Only 2 patrons in a bar in Recoleta were cited. Over all people and places were observing the law. I think many of us were shocked.
tangospam.typepad.com
A campaign from the French INPES
- En fumant dans la meme piece que lui, j’augmente de 25% le risque qu’il meurre d’un cancer de poumon. Ce n’est pas rien. Mais je ne le sais pas encore. Moi non plus.
- En fumant a cote du serveur, on augmente de 50% le risque qu’il ait une crise cardiaque. Mais on ne le sait pas encore.
- Quand je fume a cote de mes enfants, j’augmente de 70% le risque qu’ils aient une infection pulmonaire. C’est enorme. Mais je ne le sais pas encore. Moi non plus.
- (on screen) C’etait hier. Aujourd’hui vous connaissez les risques du tabagisme passif.
In TV campaigns the theme of animals smoking has been used to evoke the fact that smoking is far from normal.
Even a dog would be smarter
via smoking.visualizor.com
Continue reading ‘Smokeban countdown: 6 days to go’
Bad habits never go down without a fight: the Belgian horeca, probably lobbied by Big Tobacco, has created a website comprendo.be where they explain what is and is not allowed under the new 2007 smoking ban. They propose a 4-label system, of which three indicate that smoking is still allowed under one or other form. The used colors are such that “no smoke ban at all” is green, and “smoking completely banned” is red. That is a dirty psychological trick: it gives the restaurant owners the impression they are turning people down with the red sign, and are being more hospitable with the green one.
Continue reading ‘Smokeban countdown: 7 days to go’
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