Yes, I know, probably one of the worst matches I have seen played by Spain. I know at any other given point in time the victory would have been more than possible, but in a time where things didn’t seem to go right, and after some tough luck, I guess it had to be Russia’s turn after what happened earlier on today when Spain beat Russia in volleyball back in Moscow. Funny thing, eh?

I guess we are even this time around, folks, although I would have wished to win the gold medal in basketball instead, because what are the chances of being the world and European champions once again? Probably very slim.

Either way, I am extremely happy that we are European champions of volleyball for the first time in history for Spain, and silver medal (For the sixth time ever!) in basketball. I know that we all wanted to have plenty more, but when you come to think about it, that is just such a huge achievement!

You bet we will be back again! This great generation of talented players, who play like a real team and who demonstrate game after game what teamwork is all about, is not going to give up just like that. It just won’t happen. They are all truly remarkable and this has just been one match. They are still my team. Now and the next time, and the next. And the next. Forever.

Congrats to Russia for taking away from us that Crown of Europe that I think we all thought was going to stay home. Perhaps next time…

Tags: Europe, Crown of Europe, Spain, Russia, European Championships, Finals, Volleyball, Madrid, Moscow, Basketball, Champions, Eurobasket, Eurobasket2007

There are lots and lots of things that I could say about him, about how special he was, about how gifted his voice was, about how such a natural he would ever be in all of our hearts. However, I am not going to do that. I am just going to let you all go to YouTube, and start witnessing what is going on in there! Lots and lots of video clips with his various performances are going up sky rocket in the last few hours with thousands of people watching them through. Quite a remarkable tribute to someone who we all know was rather unique on his own.

As I said, you may be a very big fan of Opera (In which case I know that most of these words will just be obvious to you), or not. The thing is that Pavarotti has been one of those incredibly inspirational folks who can give you goose bumps any given time of the day by listening to him, and in most cases it will make you cry with tears of passion, full emotion and remarkable natural talent.

So here is a small and humble tribute to someone who has made me cried with tears of joy and content by witnessing some of his best performances ever. Now you tell me, after watching the links I have shared below, who cannot sit back, relax, and enjoy such a wonderful experience.

Luciano, wherever you may well be now, you shall never be forgotten. Ever. Thanks much for those little precious moments that certainly made us as human as we could be. We are all more than grateful to you for sharing your talent with us and for helping us partake from these emotions:

Nessun Dorma

Ave Maria

Caruso

Miserere

(Like I said, goose bumps, tears of full joy and intense feelings)

Tags: Luciano Paravotti, Pavarotti, R.I.P. Opera, YouTube, Tribute, Talent, Voices, Life, Nessun Dorma, Ave Maria, Caruso, Miserere, Performance, Ovation, Unique, Singer, Opera Singer

You would remember how a couple of weeks back I mentioned that this coming Wednesday I was planning to take some vacation and head over to Barcelona, hoping to be able to meet up with a few folks who I have met in real life or on line in the past. Alas, I am afraid that I will have to wait for another opportunity, because over the course of last week a personal emergency has kicked in and shifted around all of the different plans and priorities. So much so, that earlier on this morning I cancelled the hotel reservations and had to postpone the holidays for a later time. Yes, I know. A bummer.

I cannot talk much about that particular personal emergency, other than mentioning that things are going all right, although with a slow recovery process (Don’t worry, it is not me), but I am hoping that once it is all over I may be able to share something over here on the kind of impact this experience has been having on all of us over here. Stay tuned for some more.

I am not sure when I would be able to make it to Barcelona again, but I am hoping that perhaps some time in October or thereabouts I would have the opportunity, so if you would still be around by that time I will let you know, just in case. For those folks who contacted me to get together, I have been twittering the main cause of it and know you would understand why I had to cancel it. I am hoping though we would be able to meet up at some other point in time and catch up. Thanks for sticking in and for all of your understanding

So, I am not going to go to Barcelona after all, and I surely was looking forward to it. What can I do in the mean time to console myself? Well, I may have just found it. I do know that this is completely off topic, like it was exactly a year ago, but I just couldn’t help mention, even if it is just briefly, how over the next few days I shall be enjoying one of my other passions in life: basketball (Or like a well known wise man would say — BA - LON - CES - TO!!!).

And all of it because of this particular event that got started today and, of course, because of these guys:

Pictures courtesy of Kaplan DF

Our warriors!

(Good luck to everyone and let’s play!!)

Yesterday was kind of a very busy day, both at work and on a personal level, so in the end I didn’t get much of a chance to create a post over here, so I thought I would go ahead and share this one today for a special event: Happy Blog Day 2007! Yes, that is right, today is Blog Day 2007, an event in the blogosphere that would help everyone promote those different weblog posts that even though they may not be very very popular they still provide some really good content. So I thought I would play the game and do my fair bit of homework on it.

And that is why in this weblog post I am going to follow the rules of this special event and share five different blogs that I read on a regular basis and whose content is just superb, hoping that you may find them useful as well and may have a chance to subscribe to them if you would wish to. So let’s get down to business:

1. Knowledge-at-work by Denham Grey: Yes, I know, this is not really a new blog at all, since Denham has been blogging already for quite some time. However, things have gone a bit quiet since beginning of the year and I am hoping that with this post I may get him to pick things up and get blogging again. If you browse through some of the different blog posts he has been sharing thus far, you would be able to see that he has got something to say about Knowledge Management, don’t you think? For those folks who may not know, Denham is one of the first folks who was thinking about KM when none of us were even busy with it! Thus, Denham, ready to come back? Please?

2. Engineers without fears by Matt Moore: And here we go now with something quite the opposite. For a good amount of time Matt has been relatively quiet over at his blog and over the last few weeks he has gotten started with blogging on a much more regular basis and just as insightful and thought-provoking as ever. Matt’s blog posts are those that would make you think about KM related topics twice. Always looking for that twist that differentiates what he has to say from whoever else. If I would have to summarise what you would be able to find over there I guess I would be able to do so by just saying: refreshing! (And worth while a subscription!)

3. Acidlabs by Stephen Collins: In the past I have been referencing a number of different weblog posts from Stephen and by now you probably already know what he is up to. Remember Knowledge Worker 2.0? One of the best presentations that I have seen to date around the subject of Knowledge Management 2.0 and already introducing the concept of knowledge worker 2.0 for the next generation of the workforce. And that is exactly what you would be able to find over at his blog: some really good insights on where we are with Knowledge Management and where we are going, which is perhaps the most exciting part of it all. Another worth while subscription, to say the least!

4. eme ká eme by Miguel Cornejo Castro: For those folks who may have hanged out at several KM and Communities of Practice related forums, there is probably very little that I can say about Miguel. He surely knows his stuff about the topic of KM and CoPs. So when I saw that he was getting started with his own weblog I was very excited, because everyone out there would be able to see what he is up to.

However, there is also one thing to note about his blog and that is the fact that Miguel is one of the very few blogs on KM sharing articles both in Spanish and English and somehow I feel a bit guilty (In the good sense of the word, of course) that I am not following his example. Perhaps this particular weblog post would help me get the final push and be a bit more prolific with my Spanish related posts. Let’s see. Miguel can have that kind of influence, you see?

5. And, finally, here is the fifth link that I am going to be sharing with you. This time around from a fellow IBMer: Wonderwebby by Jasmin Tragas. Jasmin has gotten started blogging externally just recently and if you browse through some of her blog posts you would be able to see her excitement about virtual, distributed collaboration and how Knowledge Management can help in this space.

At the same time you would be able to see how she gets to explore social computing and social software tools in order to help improve the way knowledge workers get to collaborate. But if there is something else that you would find rather interesting is how she is exploring virtual worlds, like Second Life, and their impact on eLearning. to help improve the way we get to acquire new knowledge and share it with others. Some pretty interesting stuff (Also if you would want to find out what IBM is doing in this particular area).

And that would be it for now. Five blogs worth while looking into as part of Blog Day 2007. I do hope that you get to check them out and perhaps subscribe to one or two as you may see fit. Time now to celebrate! and get started with the weekend!

Have a good one, everyone!

And while we are still recovering from some of the fatal consequences from the recent fires developed in Gran Canaria, that wiped out in a matter of days thousands and thousands of years of nature doing what she knows best, here we go again. Canarias7, as usual, is doing a superb job in keeping us updated by reporting some news from earlier on this evening on a new fire that got started around 8.30pm local time in Ingenio, Gran Canaria, around the area of Pasadilla, close to Guayadeque (Guayadeque being one of the most emblematic and charismatic spaces from the entire island!) and which by the time I am writing this down it looks like the fire is under control and has not been progressing for several hours already.

However, it has not been extinguished just yet as the firefighters are still doing their magic in helping keep it under control. A couple of bloggers, Miguel, from Canarias Bruta, Reena and Esther, from Atarecos, have already been commenting on the situation, but it looks like not much more has been mentioned thus far. Something that could be taken as good news, in the sense that the fire may not be as serious as the one that took place a couple of weeks back.

The number of hectares potentially affected has not been mentioned just yet, as they are probably still evaluating the reach of the fire and ensuring it is extinguished as soon as possible, but you can already have a look into this thread of opinions from people all over the island sharing their thoughts about what is happening. Link is in Spanish, I know, but you would be able to see some of what is going on with 9 pages of commentary and growing!

I just hope that we may have learned something from our previous grievous experience(s) and, like it is mentioned in this particular editorial, we need to ensure everyone gets the message that it is the task of us all (Administrations, firefighters, special units, etc. and us, the common people) to take care of what was given to us without asking for anything in return. And the least we could all do is just that, take care of it to be able to pass it on generation after generation:

“Ahora, solo cabe esperar que las administraciones tomen buena nota de la sabiduría popular para restablecer el orden ambiental y social en la isla, porque ellos, los campesinos y los habitantes de la reserva de la biosfera saben mejor que nadie cómo preparar la tierra para el futuro.“

Like I said it back then, my dearest paradise is burning again and it hurts. It truly hurts…

(Picture courtesy from Canarias7)

If you would remember, a few days ago I created a weblog post where I was pointing to a recent video cast that Robert Scoble did with one of my fellow IBM colleagues: Drew Clark where Drew got to talk about some of the awesome stuff that is going on inside IBM and which would certainly help provide an awareness to outside folks on what is going on there. If you have listened to the interview, you probably heard the "We are not your father’s IBM!" statement and therefore I am going to go back for some more, since it looks like plenty of folks who think that IBM is still the same of what it used to be. Well, think again.

Yes, that is right. It looks like Scoble has been a bit busy at the IBM house lately, because he has put together a couple of interviews with two other IBMers that I can certainly recommend, to help you get an idea of what is going on in other areas from this 370,000 employee large enterprise.

The first interview I would want to point out to you is the one he did with Mike Moran, an IBM Distinguished Engineer and Product Manager of IBM’s OmniFind search software, who gets to talk over the course of nearly 15 minutes about Marketing and how social media has changed the way we share information out there in the public along with some of what IBM is doing on the subject. Pretty good for a distinguished engineer, don’t you think? I mean, who would have thought about that, right? Well, listen to it.

The second interview that I would want to point out to you is another one he did recently with Irving Wladawsky-Berger, with Larry Magid, from CBS News, chiming in as well, in which Irving (Recently retired after 37 years of service! WOW! I wasn’t even born when he joined IBM!!) gets to talk about the huge impact that virtual worlds, in general, are going to have beyond the immediate impact we are seeing in the gaming world.

Irving gets to talk about how those virtual worlds (Second Life amongst many others) will help shape up the way we interact with other knowledge workers to conduct business and drive revenue out of it. In fact, he also touches base, roughly, on the recently published IBM Virtual World Guidelines that Roo Reynolds gets to describe superbly further so well over at Eightbar. I tell you. An interview worth while the nearly 22 minutes that it lasts! Lots of good stuff in there and I just wished they would have continue talking some more. It was just starting to get really good when they had to go. Sigh

Oh, and if you didn’t have enough with that, and want to find out some more as to why this IBM is not your father’s IBM any longer, check out the super fine job that the folks at Redmonk.TV have done interviewing several other IBMers on various different topics:

"Its not exactly live TV, but the content is online now- interviews with Ali Arsanjani (IBMs approach to business / IT service modeling and “World is Flat?”, Robert LeBlanc (turning IGS into an automated services company rather than a body shop) and Sandy Carter (using the latest cool media tactics and tools to educate people on SOA. T-shape people, technologists taking up the cross?)" (Excerpt taken directly from James Governor’s Monkchips blog)

Disclosure: I work in *that* company

As the news items about the recent fires in both Gran Canaria and Tenerife are starting to die out, now that they are all under control and it would be just a matter of hours for them to be completely extinguished, I thought I would share something over here that I think it would be a good time to mention, since it is hardly ever covered most of the times.

Most people who know me would probably tell you how fond I actually am about the T.V. series “Heroe”. I love it, I have been religiously watching episode after episode ever since it came out and will probably do the same for season 2. However, after the last few days, I must confess that the word “Heroes” has turned around into a new, and special, meaning for me. And I guess by now you know where I am heading.

Yes, that is right, they hardly ever get the due credit for a well done job where mistakes can be rather costly (For everyone!); they hardly ever get the recognition, respect and admiration they surely deserve from day one from all of us; they hardly ever get the gratitude from those who they save their lives or their most precious belongings and memories, so earlier on this morning I thought that this is the least I could do for a good bunch of folks (Firefighters and members of the UME special unit and all of the different volunteers who have helped in the extinction of the fires!). My heroes:

(Courtesy of Noticias de Navarra)

(Courtesy of El Pais)

(Courtesy of Canarias7)

Thanks ever so much, guys! You probably do not realise much of what you have just done in the last few days, but one thing for sure is that we would always remember what you have saved not just for ourselves, but also for our children! Thanks!

Oh, and talking about a token of gratitude, from here I want to sincerely thank as well the online edition of Canarias7, which has been an inspiration for us all on how crises like this one should be reported to the general public, both in the Canary Islands and the entire world. They have done an incredible amount of work reporting by the minute the different updates on the fires, they have been receiving a bunch of comments from various different folks out there watching through the news anxiously and share with us some of that drama, and they have been sharing some incredible pictures that people have been taking over the course of the last few days and share them as well with us all to give us a sense of what the disaster was like.

A couple of my fellow bloggers (Links in Spanish) seem to agree with my thoughts as well, I am glad that has been perceived that way all over the place, because they surely have been fundamental in keeping the local population informed, and involved, in everything that was going on during those tragic moments. So, from here, my most sincere congratulations to Canarias7, and in particular to Esther Pérez, for the superb piece of work done throughout showing us all that it is possible to be timely, accurate, responsible, and involved in delivering news to whom it matters. Us. So thanks a bunch for that!

As far as the local T.V and whatever other traditional news media sources, I think they need to catch up a lot with Planeta Canarias. Sigh.

This is probably one of the very last weblog posts that I would be creating where I would be massively linking to a number of different stories that keep popping up both from within the traditional media as well as within the Spanish Gofiosfera on the recent tragic events where one third of the entire wooded area from the island of Gran Canaria is now gone after the fires have all been under control. And a similar situation, thank goodness, is starting to emerge in Tenerife.

There was a reason why I was linking to a number of different resources, more than anything else, it was all due to the fact that I wanted to share some of the grief that most of us is going through at the moment. That painful experience of seeing how one good chunk of you is taken away just like that in a matter of hours and without any further questions.

Back at the beginning, when I was first writing the initial blog post from this series I mentioned how it hurt, how painful it surely was to witness that tragedy taking place and myself not been able to do much on the subject. Now a few days have passed by and still feel the same, like something that I was part of was taken away from me very abruptly. For good.

In one of my twitterings earlier on today, I realised that most of the pictures from the collage that I have for my Twitter background are actually from several of the different places that are now completely devastated by the fires. Yet, there they are, as impressive and stunning as ever and with a strong message that at one point in time they will be back! Just like in the good old times, but better. Way better! I am not sure if I would be here still that long, but if I am, you bet that I am going to enjoy the time quite a bit where I will be capturing those precious little moments that will remind me of what it all once was and where we have moved on to: onwards!

Because there is no other way to go. Now more than ever we need to move on, we need to learn from our past mistakes, we need to ensure that events like this one would never happen, at least, at a similar scale, of what we have witnessed since Friday last week. I, for one, would be incredibly excited about when that time would come, because I know it will be coming back again, and at that point I would be as much proud as I used to be (Still am very much so, in case you are wondering!) of one of the places that accepted me back three years ago, with no questions asked, like if it was the prodigal son coming back home. Finally! I never left home. I know now. Perhaps too late. The beginning of a new dawn starts now! Want to join me?…

And here you have got a couple of pictures that different folks have been taking thus far:

Courtesy of Canarias7:

Courtesy of tonyatlantico:

I know that over the last few days I have been sharing a number of different weblog posts that do not have much to do with the main topics that I get to discuss over here, but I hope you can understand what we are all going through over here. Catastrophes of this proportion should not, must not, be forgotten. So, today, nearly six days after the fires started in Gran Canaria, I am very happy to share with you all, just in case you may have missed it, that the fires in Gran Canaria are now officially “under control”, according to several news items.

The one in Tenerife is still being stabilised and the one in La Gomera is now also extinguished. It has not been a pretty sight all along for the last few days, having over 35,000 hectares of woodland (Pine trees, mainly) being wiped out between Gran Canaria and Tenerife (Around 20,000 in Gran Canaria alone, one third of the total woodland area from the island!). Yes, I know, the proportions of the disaster are just tragic, but there is light at the end of the tunnel, the horizon is starting to look closer and closer than ever before. And I am very happy to see that. About time, too!

Yes, we all know that things would never be the same. They just won’t, but life goes on and the sooner we recover, the better. I am sure that in the next few days a whole bunch of conversations, discussions, analysis of the situation and whatever else would be put together (I may be able to share some thoughts on those at a later time), but in this weblog post I just wanted to share with you as well some of the magnitude of the disaster at the same time that I would place a whole bunch of links in here around what the international press and media are saying about the last few days.

You would have to remember that the Canary Islands are a very popular holiday destination with over 12 million visitors per year approx. so it is of no surprise the extensive coverage that the fires have been given all over the place, considering that very soon plenty of those tourists may be heading back here again to spend their vacation, specially during the winter time.

It surely is very nice to know that plenty of people out there are thinking about these tragic events and are wishing us all getting back on track soon, including nature doing what it knows best, so for all of that I would want to give a special thanks! for being there and for the support. It is greatly appreciated, to say the least!

So let’s have a look at the international press coverage of the events:

Irish Times, Innovations Report (Germany), Vakantie.PaginaBlog (Netherlands), Trouw (Netherlands), Fok (Netherlands), Handelsblatt (Germany), derStandard (Austria), Die Zeit (Germany), Aftonbladet (Sweden), Aftonbladet (Sweden), Corriere della Sera (Italy), Alice Notizie (Italy), Corriere della Sera (Italy), Le Monde (France), Le Figaro (France), France24 (France), The Times Online (UK), Faz (Germany), IlMessaggero (Italy), Diario de Noticias (Protugal), Bild (Germany).

As you can see from the above links, quite a bit, actually. In the mean time, the blogosphere keeps coming up with more and more updates, some of them with some incredible video footage as well!In this particular link from Canarias7 you would be able to check out some of the different pictures that have been taken over the course of the days that relate to some of the kind of impact this tragic set of events will have on the islands. Just below I have shared a couple of them, courtesy from Canarias7, while I am awaiting for more to come through the Flickr group.

So, the good thing is that fires in Gran Canaria are now officially under control, there would be lots and lots of work that would need to be done, but, at least, we are finally starting to see the light. And that is good news. Now off to the next challenge: bring the entire island to what it once was. A paradise!

(Still is…)

And while the reactions and different news items keep showing up all over the place with folks sharing their thoughts on this tragic set of events, it looks like things are starting to become normalised, to a certain degree, that is, because we cannot say just yet that everything is under control. Not yet. The struggle continues. The fight is there, active, more than ever, to try to put an end to it all. And we are getting there, for sure. Slowly, but steadily. Hopefully, one more day. Just one more day. Tomorrow. Fingers crossed. Best of luck to us all.

Weather conditions have improved quite a bit with temperatures around the 30 degrees Celcius and with hardly any wind, at least, from this side of the island. Definitely, not as windy as in the last couple of days. So there is plenty of hope that everything would be back to normal soon, if we could say that because I doubt things would ever be the same again. Not after watching this catastrophe for over 5 days now.

The first evaluations, editorials, extensive opinions and reviews, reservations, etc. etc. are starting to flourish now, and perhaps I will talk about them some more later on, but I just thought I would leave you for the day with something that I have found incredibly amazing and a life-changing experience, for sure.

Check out the impressive Flickr set of pictures that tonyatlantico has been putting together, where he has been covering what Ayagaures looks like after the fire. A place which is just about 20 minutes by car from where I live. Then also take a look at a couple of pictures I took from the same place some time ago in all its splendour.

All I can say at this moment is that it still hurts… and quite a lot!

(Oh, and don’t forget you can keep up with what the Spanish Gofiosfera is thinking about over at Planeta Canarias)