It’s getting close to the end of the year and everybody is thinking about New Year’s resolutions and what to change next year. Let me recommend you something. If you are looking for something to have a real impact on your personal or business life, read the books of Keith Ferrazzi and his blog. You might already know “Never Eat Alone” so go ahead and give his new book “Who’s Got Your Back?” a go. Let Keith explain what it’s all about:
And if you are still thinking about if all this social media stuff like Facebook and Twitter is worth it, read this amazing story of Keith how Twitter let him connect with people he didn’t know in Guatemala and how they became friends.
So, my recommendation for 2010: Get you a Twitter account and follow Keith Ferrazzi @keithferrazzi
To start a tradition I organized this year a little Xmas dinner and invited all my friends working in the wedding industry to the first WCS (Wedding Crashers Switzerland) Xmas Splash ‘09. It was awesome to see how many wedding photographers, designers, second shooters & assistants showed up, coming from all over Switzerland. The perfect occasion to start some networking!
We spent a great time chatting, eating & drinking, with David’s photo booth and Jeanine’s Xmas cookies :-) Thanks for the help to make this lil’ GTG a success! It was definitely not the last WCS event. Stay tuned!
As you might know I am a paraglider pilot. Since I am a child I was always fascinated by flying. When I was 16 years old I took several lessons with an instructor in a little airplane. Well, actually I was able to fly before I was able to drive a car :-)
I live in Switzerland and was always fascinated by the mountains. And paragliding seemed to be the best way to fly, the ultimate combination. You’re in the mountains, sitting in a flowery meadow, breathing fresh air. The sky is blue, the sun is shining and you hear the bells of the cows (yes, the cows have bells in Switzerland). And when you enjoyed it enough, you take your little airplane from your rucksack and fly down, silently, just the birds and the wind accompanies you. Wow.
With the paraglider you don’t jump from the mountains. You take off. Like a plane. Base jumpers, they jump. And they are very common near the place where I live. The Lauterbrunnen Wall in the Bernese Oberland is world-famous. Not only because it inspired Tolkien when he wrote “The Lord of the Rings”. Because the mountains are so steep in this U-shaped valley it is the perfect place for base jumping. Every year several base jumpers from other countries die in an accident. The authorities are discussing if they should forbid base jumping in the valley, but as they know they would do it anyway they decided not to do it.
I have seen many base jumps but nothing like this. This is really sick!
I’m the owner of this image. So what’s all the fuss about copyright?
Readers of my blog noticed that it was quite calm here lately. The reason is that I started using Facebook and Twitter and was more active on these social networking platforms than on my blog. As I found out they were good tools for networking and sharing with photographers, clients and friends. If you didn’t want to be a member of several different social networking platforms, I thought it was best to just join Facebook. It’s free, so everybody is there and it’s not just business or not just private like other platforms. Facebook gave me a good mixture between business and private life.
Now if you are my friend on Facebook you might have wondered that I am not in your friend’s list anymore. Do I hate you? Did I cancel our friendship?
No, not at all. I just left Facebook. That’s it.
The reason: Recently it was in the news that Facebook doesn’t make enough money and that they were thinking about selling the personal data of its users.
Wait. Whaaat?
That was some time ago. Now it got worse. Facebook already did change their Terms of Service (TOS) at the beginning of February this year. Without telling their users. What if you don’t agree with the new TOS? Don’t worry. You don’t have an option. And it’s already too late anyway.
As a professional photographer you just can’t agree to Facebook’s new Terms of Service. As a photographer you always did care about your copyright. You have to protect your work, that’s what you live of. And of course you want to protect your personal data. But from now on everything belongs to Facebook. Right. Everything. All your personal data. All your pictures, images, videos. Everything. And the best: FOREVER!
If you were a facebook member and didn’t leave before February you’re lost. You belong to Facebook. Even if you decide to quit now and delete your profile, Facebook won’t delete your profile and your personal data. With the new Terms of Service they keep the right to sell everything now and in the future.
Actually I am not that much affected by the new Terms of Service than others. I’m used to read the fineprint and I am always aware of what it means to share personal data on the internet. So I didn’t have much on Facebook that was not public on my blog or website anyway.
More on the subject on today’s news program “10 vor 10″ on the Swiss National Television:
The good point about the Facebook desaster: My blog is going to get a revival. Instead of investing a lot of time into Facebook I will post more regularly on my own platforms, my blog and my website. Everything is under my control, on my servers. And for connecting with my friends, I just call them more often. Good times to come :-)
[UPDATE] After all the worldwide protests Facebook returned to their old Terms of Service. Now they will take a bit more time to carefully develop new terms and also include member feedback in the process. Read more about it in these two blog posts by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg:
Faire-part à part relaunched their website! If you are looking for a designer for invitations, decorations or cards for events like weddings, newborns etc. you should definitely check them out. Located in the heart of Lausanne with their beautiful little studio, they work nationwide. Visit the new website at www.faire-part.ch
