How I asked EVERY countrys embassy for flags [119 packages]

Here’s one of the best YouTube videos I’ve seen in a very long time.  In fact, I love is so much, I’ve decided to take in effort beyond just sharing it.  Watch it first, and then I’ll share a list of reasons why I love it.

So, here we go with my own personal reasons of why I love it.  In no particular order, as always.

  1. It’s not about COVID-19/Coronavirus.
  2. It’s positive, nice and kind.
  3. It’s funny.  Not like stupid funny, or stand-up funny.  But it still is.
  4. It has substance.  It’s not a video for the sake of video.  It’s a video about a rather long and complex project, which took a lot of effort.
  5. It bridges the real world and technology, and shows how one helps the other.
  6. It’s very personal, yet very global.
  7. It demonstrates one of my strong believes, that even simply asking for something, even from total strangers, has merit.  Not everyone will respond.  Not everyone will respond in the way you want them to.  But overall you’ll get more than you thought you would.
  8. Cyprus made it high up the recognition list.
  9. Political neutrality.   A lot of the countries mentioned in this video, have a long, complex, and often violent relationship with each other.  Yet, that doesn’t matter for this particular project.
  10. Free stuff.  Who doesn’t like free stuff.
  11. Production of the video.  It’s not over the top professional production, yet it’s not an amateur talking head, filmed on the mobile phone in the car.
  12. Maps.  I love maps, and especially checking them off on the global map.  Bonus points for more than one color for checked out colors.
  13. Flags.  Even though I don’t collect or study flags, I love flags and their designs.
  14. It’s work and family friendly.  Easily shareable with everyone I know.
  15. Bonus point: it just makes me feel good about the world.

Internet Trends 2019 (Bond Report)

Internet Trends 2019 report is the most comprehensive, detailed, and research document that I have ever seen on what’s going on with the Internet, web, mobile, social media, marketing, and security.

This year’s report spans 333 pages and is full charts, graphs, statistics, insights, and references. And if you are feeling nostalgic, there is an archive of the annual reports going all the way back to 1995.

It’s difficult to pick a single fact from such a huge document, but if I had to, I’d go with this:

51% of the global population, or 3.8 billion people, were Internet users last year.

Wow. That’s quite a crowd.

Via Slashdot.

Blockchain : The Freeland Passport

Blockchain technology has been in the news a lot lately. Most of the attention however was on the cryptocurrencies and ICOs. But that’s a very tiny part of what the blockchain is all about.

There are many different applications of the blockchain technology – some we already know and some are yet to be discovered. But there’s this one particular milestone, which I consider of ultimate importance.

Freeland, which is a set of social, technological, and business experiments has recently announced the Freeland passport. Watch the above YouTube video (in English, or this one in Russian), which showcases the passport.

Now, with the quick “yes” answer to your question of “Is this real?”, let me ask you a question in return: is your mind blown yet? Mine is.

I think this is a very important milestone in major social, cultural, legal, technological, and financial transformations that are already changing the world. This passport is a beautiful bridge between the two very complex, yet very different worlds we now live in – the physical and the digital.

This is not the beginning, and this is not the end. But this is one of those moments in history, which a lot of people today won’t recognize as such, yet the generations to come will definitely point out and understand.

Ladies and gentlemen, we are living in the very exciting times!

Technology, Ranked

Technology, Ranked” is the list of the 100 most important technologies ever invented by the human kind. Given how much technology we have invented, I think it’s much harder to compile such a list than to argue the choices and order. Overall, it’s quite a fair representation, with, maybe, slightly biased look towards the USA than the global population.