There's a war out there

... and it's not between vampires and werewolves.

Well, not the war to which I'm referrring.

It's the social networks versus business networks battle and it might get nasty.

The BBC news website posted a link Skrentablog which has an article about how people are switching to Facebook from LinkedIn.

A couple of weeks ago I received an invitation to join Facebook from an old friend. As in, not a young friend. As he is older than me I was surprised that he was on a social network which seemed dedicated to teens and young adults.

Anyway, if it's free it's for me so I joined. I then found other friends on it too.

It's rather nice. There's an immediacy to it; thanks to its Web 2.0 functionality you can see what your friends are up to. And that gives it a currency which you don't get from business networks like LinkedIn and Xing. Those have a file and forget feel to the contacts you amass. At least compared to Facebook.

Anyway, now - in the last month - it seems that Facebook is being taken more seriously. People are using it to maintain potential business contacts. At least that's what Skrentablog writes. But I can see it happening.

Nevertheless I'll keep using LinkedIn and Xing as well as Facebook.

By the way the comments are as good as the article itself.

How much?

So that's where all my money went?

Germans I know say that "Munich is zo expensive".

I tell them that actually it's quite cheap.

They reply "ah but you are having ze madness, nein?"

"Actually", I retort, "I used to live in London".

"Ah zo", they concede, "you are having the right, Munich is cheap".

And it is. Today the Mercer list of world's buggeringly expensive cities was mentioned on the BBC's news web site.

London is the second most expensive city, just after Moscow.

Helsinki is 22nd and Munich is a pathetic 39th. That's cheaper than Glasgow, Madrid or Amsterdam.

So, I don't want to hear any complaints about the cod-accents I used above. If Germans moan about Munich being so expensive they deserve all the mocking I can be bothered to give them.

Planet Meetings

Last week I was in Sweden.

Well on Monday.

On Tuesday I flew to London.

There I attended a meeting which lasted three days. At one stage I felt I should have worn flight socks, as I was sitting around all day.

In the evenings I met up with friends.

At first I found it difficult going back to London. It's just not very nice compared to Munich.

But on Thursday and Friday I rediscovered the vibrancy against which Munich cannnot, and does not really want to, compete.

Still, they could clean up the place.

Well, that was a complete waste of makeup

Went to the airport.

Checked in.

Went through security.

Sat in the departure lounge close to the gate for the aircraft. I was a bit peeved that my travel to the airport was so smooth I had loads of time to kill.

Mobile rings.

It's my colleague phoning from Sweden. The trip to China has to be aborted.

Er ... ok then.

Try and eventually leave the departure lounge. Not easy.

Go to the office but can't do much as there's a spate of public holidays in Europe this week.

Now going for a curry in Munich. I hope that isn't cancelled too.

That's a relief

Yesterday I had to be in the Swedish office for an announcement.

I was a little bit worried by the use of the term "announcement". Tends to be associated with the word "redundancies". And having just joined as a contractor ...

Anyway the announcement was made by the CIO. It was his strategic and tactical vision for the IT department worldwide.

After about 10 minutes he said that this new strategy wasn't a cover for redundancies. In fact, his problem is finding people. The department remains in a state of growth.

Phew.

Now flying off to Beijing.