So who uses Twitter?  Ok, I’m kidding.  Have you used Topify though?  I have been using them for months now.  Topify is a service that intercepts the half baked emails that Twitter sends you and spices them up.  When someone adds me on Twitter I get an email from Topify alerting me to this and giving me a bunch of info about that person.  I see their stats, their bio, and a handful of their most recent tweets.  If you aren’t using the service you should head out to Topify.com now and sign up for it.

Why am I telling you all this you ask?  Well, because I think Twitter is going to buy Topify.  Twitter has the money and Topify is ripe for the picking.  They can’t grow all that much beyond what they do already in terms of servicing Twitter (their are always other services they can support).  They are a huge benefit and Twitter wouldn’t have to program any of it.  Lastly Twitter is loaded right now.

So Topify, this is a compliment, I think you are going to or at least should get picked up by Twitter.  Twitter are you listening?

I’ve been using Pikchur on an off for many months until recently when I became a full time user.  As soon as they started supporting Ovi Share I was converted.  Pikchur is like a few other picture dispensing sites except for the fact that they do a really good job in geo-tagging my pics and one other major aspect that made me a convert.  They have great customer support.  I wasn’t going to include this but I decided to finally just before publishing.  It may sound funny but Pikchur just keeps me coming back.  I’m inexplicably attracted to it.  It just has the “it” factor in my eyes.

I’m not a complicated guy by any means.  They have a superior product in my opinion and their customer interaction/support is second to none, why would I look anywhere else.

They have a Pro account I will have to look into but their free version is definitely enough to get almost anyone started.  Upload locations include Ovi, Twitter, Facebook, Identi.ca, Jaiku, Tumblr, FriendFeed, Plurk, Posterous, Koornk, TotSpot, BrightKite, and Flickr.  Don’t hesitate to give them a try, you can set up an account at www.Pikchur.com.  Enjoy!

I viewed this presentation titled “What the F**k is Social Media: One Year Later” and think it’s brilliant.  I agree with Marta to a T and she presents this so well.  If you haven’t watched it you should and if your company is considering Social Media jump on it ASAP.  Feel free to ping me about SM if you have any questions or just want to learn more about it.

Watch and enjoy


Mobile phone and brand app stores have reinvigorated the internet and it looks like a small version of what it was before the bubble burst.  I was just reading Ewan Macleod come back story (great guy by the way) and I’m thinking about his Mobile Industry Developers TV and I’m thinking, it’s back to the little guy again.  People are building widgets in coffee shops and I recently watched an interview the BBC did with a developer building his app on a MacBook Pro in his kitchen.  That’s it, we are back in business and apps are what’s going to save the mobile industry until it can catch up to where I feel it should be.  I just realized it.  Apps are it.  People like Jan Ole Suhr @JanOle who created Gravity the single best Twitter app for S60 has the number 1 spot on the Ovi store right now.  Jan Ole developed the app all by himself.

Janole is a great example of how apps are going to revolutionize the net, yet again.  We are going to have a big swing back to guys grouped together in a coffee shop whispering and typing like mad on their computers.  It will be like 1997 all over again but instead of being all about apps for your computer that sits on a table it will be for your mobile phone that is almost able to everything an average desktop can.  We are seeing a revolution started when Apple opened the iPhone app store.  There are many many people that I never figured to be mobile phone app developers cranking out their inspirations.  Out of work developers/programmers are finding inspiration and evening and weekend developers are doing it to.  We are going to see a controlled “Wild West”.  Controlled by the app stores but hopefully open to all kinds of apps.

I’m hoping it gets really wild and that the app stores support their developers who make the stores stores.  Give them a good revenue model and give them the freedom they need.

On your marks get set GO!  It’s a gold rush mixed with the wild west and we are all going to witness it, don’t miss it.  Good luck developers and make us some useful apps.

I think there’s some some potential for Twitter to come  out of this sad and scary Swine Flu ordeal with shining colors.  Twitter could easily be a united global communications tool.  Like during the horrific attacks in India a few months back or a plane landing in the Hudson River in New York.  Twitter brings us news before it even hits the wire in many cases.  I have personally Tweeted that an earthquake was taking place while the ground was still shaking.

Twitter has the potential.  I’m just thinking here but maybe if @EV and @Biz the 2 creators of Twitter set up accounts for many of the public organizations and governments around the world this would get them to use it and keep their followers informed.  For example the World Health Organization could be @WHO and I for one would follow them immediately.

Anyways, I am not panicking but please take precautions and if you are sick, don’t be stoic, stay home.  Even if it’s just a cold you may have a lowered immune system.

You can follow me on Twitter I’m @JebBrilliant.

I want to thank Nokia and WOM World for  so graciously loaning me a Nokia E71 to review.  Now that they have it back (it’s been a few months now, I’m slow to publish sometimes) I am left without a work horse, everyday device.  I have been using a Nokia N78 but there are vast and meaningful differences between the N series and E series of phones from Nokia.  I would really like to have another E71 and rumor is that AT&T may start selling it, if that’s the case I would purchase one without hesitating.  I know the E71 is for sale on contract with a bunch of carriers around the world and if anybody out there is considering purchasing one I would highly recommend it for most people.  Anyone who does much emailing, Twittering, or sms from their handset would probably like it.  I personally did a great deal of reading email and responding to some of it.  Nokia Email has really made the device even more useful.

I’m not sure where this post is going but I guess I just wanted to share my sadness.  Anyways, go out and purchase an E71 right now, you won’t be sorry.  I hope something comes in the mail soon to fill my void, preferably a Nokia E71NAM (hope my wife reads this).

I flew Iberia airline earlier this week and again was very disappointed in the airline.  After having issues with our boarding passes at the airport we were told what terminal to go to but not what gate we would be using.  We were about 2.5 hours early for our flight and were told to wait an hour before the TVs at the airport would display our gate.  This is ridiculous when I’m told to be at the airport 3 hours in advance.  We had no idea what gate to  wait at, I can’t tell you how annoying this is when you have an (almost) 2 year old that needs to chill out but also be able to get up and run around.  A restaurant wasn’t a good idea either.

Once we were on the flight we were told only one of us had a vegetarian meal.  Are you serious?  Really?  Only one of us got veggie, what kind of stupidity is this.  Ok, maybe it was just a one time thing.  Nope, our second meal on the flight was the same thing, only one veggie meal instead of 2.  Plus the meals were beyond bad, one meal was boiled garbanzo beans and foul spinach.  I don’t have high expectations for airplane food, but it should not repulse the flier.

I sat next to a collage freshman from Morocco who was trying to get to the US for classes but had his flight canceled due to weather but didn’t get on another flight until Monday.  He was put up at a local hotel by Iberia but was not given his luggage.  He was stuck in the same clothing from Friday until Tuesday when we landed in Los Angeles.

Sadly I felt grateful that my luggage actually arrived, that’s pretty pathetic.

I will say there was one redeeming aspect to our flight and that was the stewardesses on the flight.  They were very nice and helpful.

After flying Iberia Airlines and American  Airlines I am hugely disappointed.  Portions of our trip was operated by American Airlines and part by Iberia.  Both airlines really showed a dark side, I have been a loyal One World flier for years and always try to fly with AA or one of their partners.  I’m not sure if that is going to continue.  I have to fly to Barcelona, Spain in a few weeks and Iberia seems to be the cheapest but I’m really not sure I’m going to fly with them.

I’m curious if they read what people write about them on the internet, in blogs or on Twitter.  Iberia or American, if your listening it would be nice to hear from you, just to  know that you are listening.  I can be reached via email at info at BrilliantExpos.com and on Twitter at @JebBrilliant.

When the US Airways flight 1549  crash landed in the the Hudson River earlier this week it shocked the world.  My question is, how did you hear about it?  I read it on Twitter and immediately turned on the TV to find no coverage.  So I went back to Twitter for the next 10 minutes to read about this miraculous event.  After a while I checked the TV again and they had some coverage rolling in slowly.  It dawned on me that day that the world is totally flat and that time of day makes no difference anymore when it comes to spreading the news.  I know this isn’t new but it really dawned on me that barriers are falling every day and there are fewer limits in communications then ever before.

I am on Twitter as @JebBrilliant.

So I am going away for 3 weeks this winter.  I will  be visiting the beautiful country of Israel.  I am trying to line up my technology in advance for this trip and trying to keep it as light and little as possible.  I will have a handful of phones with me including the Nokia N78, N95, and my trusty yet dated E61i, I have a review netbook at the moment.  It is an Asus Eee PC 901 and I am loving it.  I also have a Proporta battery pack, which will keep my Nokias charged everywhere.  As for connectivity at airports and around the city I have a Boingo account that should keep me connected at the 4 airports I will be visiting and I hope lots of other locations around Israel.  I am concerned though that I will run out of juice on the netbook mid flight.  I am planning on making it a video  player for my daughter and I don’t want her upset the battery died mid Elmo episode.  I wish I could get a tip for my Proporta charger to use with the Asus.  I am considering purchasing a converter for use in cars and on the airplane to plug the Asus into.

I now have to start thinking about my connectivity to the grid.  I already have an Orange Big Talk sim card to use for my voice needs.  I am now looking into data so I can stay connected to email, IM, Jaiku, Twitter, and mobile maps and search.  I count heavily on mobile connectivity and being able to search and look up maps whille I’m mobile.  I am hoping that I can add data onto my Orange sim card but don’t have high expectations.  Last year when I was in Israel I had the sim in a Nokia N95 and it was not able to access the data I paid for.  My contingency plan for data is using United Mobile.  I have to check on the data rates but they usually pretty competitive.

Two of my favorite services I use everyday are GrandCentral and Truphone.  I take all my calls via GrandCentral and forward them to Truphone.  I can either answer the calls via Truphone or forward them to my current GSM #.  When I change sims upon landing in Tel Aviv the Truphone app on my phone will ask me if I want to forward my calls to my Orange sim versus my AT&T sim I use in the US.  This means I can have all my calls forwarded to my Orange sim in  Israel and not pay a penny for the service or to receive calls on the Orange sim.  If this is getting confusing to you imagine how I feel, but it works and it works quite well.  I did the same kind of thing when I was in Barcelona earlier this year using a Yoigo sim card.

Great news coming from serial Irish entrepreneurs and buddy’s of mine Pat, Sean, and Parisian Florian. Twitterfone investor and Cubic Telecom President Pat Phelan has launched what’s destined to be a great service called Twitterfone. Basically it allows you to call a number and lets you leave a message that’s translated into text and posted as a Twitter of yours. Genius Pat. I’ve known this was coming for a while now and I’m very happy for Pat, David Marcus, Florian Seroussi, Sean O Sullivan and Ivan MacDonald. From what I hear (on Twitter), the invites are flying off the shelves so if you know someone that can get you one I say jump on it and use it like crazy.

Congrats on what seems like a very successful launch already.

By the way, I’m @JebBrilliant on Twitter, feel free to add me.