whatleydude

Operation Concrete, at its core, is a collaborative media project. It brings together the aesthetic and audio qualities of art and music around the power of the written word to provide the viewer, listener, reader, with a complete experience.

Operation Concrete is also, at its core, a fantastic experiment by good friend of mine, Rich Galbraith. I guess I’ve known Rich properly now since September last year when he was part of the team that ran the Nokia OpenLab event in Helsinki that I spoke at. Back then he was telling me about Concrete Operational, the book behind the project…

Germany Germany, a man who was free, a man who loved, now an instrument in their machine. They have turned him into the very thing he hates, what he and everyone he loved fought against, the world’s greatest celebrity, a tool in the subjugation of man.

.

But the memories of freedom and love remain, and he will fight and change the course of human history for the better, but at what end?

.

As humanity progresses and turns to face the eternal black of the universe, the questions of free will and fate, of love and peace, of the riddles of time itself will arise and Germany will be called upon. But is his will strong enough, his his mind ready to breach the void and provide us with salvation?

All of this aside, Rich is great guy and when he invited me to the launch party of the exhibition as a whole, I was over the moon. Alas, I will be out of the country that night and am unable to make it along.

However, I am in the country RIGHT NOW and fortunately enough, so is Rich. I caught up with him at lunchtime earlier today so he could tell me more – what I didn’t know, was that Rich had had the first of the limited set of project boxes made up with him…

It’s very nice… and I want one.

If you’re free this coming Thursday, November 26th. Get yourself along to Vibe Bar on Brick Lane in London’s Shoreditch from about 8pm onwards. Rich will be on hand to tell you all about the book, the bands and the art…

Be there.

Hey there folks!

Can you believe it?!
We’re not two months into the start of 2009 and it’s already time for the next…

Mobile Geeks of London!

- WOOP WOOP -

I can’t believe it’s come round so quickly. It seems like only yesterday that we were all meeting up for the last gathering of 2008…

But No!
It wasn’t yesterday! It was November! Bleedin’ AGES ago!
Let’s crack on with it shall we?

This time round, with Mobile World Congress still fresh in the memory there should be lots to talk about, drink to and of course secretly discuss… Heh.

I know I’m bringing a whole host of phone-based toys to play with, what are you bringing?

If you’re new here then you’ll find all the details you need on the facebook event page.
If you want to keep up with future events then by all means join the facebook group page to stay in the loop.

However, if you’re not a facebook person – and I know some of you aren’t – the basics are as follows:

Date: 26th February 2009 – That’s TONIGHT!
Time: 18:30ish – 23:00ish
Location: All Bar One
Street: New Oxford Street (nearest tube: Tottenham Court Road)
Town/City: London Baby!

If you like beer and you like Mobile then you are very, very welcome to join us.

“lt’s not about buying stuff.
It’s not about selling stuff.
It’s about mobile geeks having a genuine discussion about using stuff…”

See you tonight boys and girls.

Ps. If for some reason you can’t make it along. Keep an eye on the Qik video window on the top of the right hand coloumn over there —–>

I’ll try and take some video for you

See ya!

Yes folks, it’s that time of year… Mobile Geeks of London is upon us!

- WOO! -

It’s been just over four months since our last meetup and well, it’s about we had another shindig! If you’re a facebook person get yourself over to the event page and sign up now…

If you’re not a facebook person then the details are as follows:

Date: 26th November 2008 – That’s TOMORROW folks!
Time: 18:30ish – 23:00ish
Location: All Bar One
Street: New Oxford Street (nearest tube: Tottenham Court Road)
Town/City: London Baby!

Like Beer? Like Mobile? Come on down!

As I’ve always maintained:

The Mobile Geeks of London is exactly what it says on the tin.

It’s not about business development, nor is it, to an extent, just another networking event.

It’s about genuine Mobile Geeks coming together and sharing an evening over beers, talking about the thing they love to geek over most…

MOBILE!

Industry and non-industry folk, mixing it up.
Nice.

So leave a comment if you can make it, hell leave a comment if you can’t!
Just let me know either way…

Also – as well as the usual top sekrit gadgetry that may or may not be on show at the meetup – word has reached my ears that a certain Ben Smith from Mobile Industry Review will be in attendance…

- Pic by Joshr via Ben Smith -

That’s Ben there on the right, (as seen with yours truly at the last event – MGoL IV), he’ll be there along with the rest of the Mobile Industry Review team I’m sure, drumming up support and selling tickets for “MIR Christmas Presents.”

A quick word about that:

If you don’t know about MIR Christmas Presents already, I suggest you jump over and read up. It’s a fantastic way to support two amazing charities – The United Nations Foundation and Childline – and you also have a (rather large) chance of winning some awesome prizes too (seriously).

You don’t have to come to MGoL V to take part you can literally get your ticket from the website right now… But I did take the liberty of dropping Ben a note earlier on today to see if he was doing anything special for the MGoL members and he said:

Hey Dude, thanks for inviting me along – any attendees who buy MIR Christmas Present tickets at tomorrow’s MGoL event will automatically be entered into a special mini-draw to win a few bottles of something (Whisky and Champagne so far)…

Woo! More alcohol!
Nice one Ben.

So there you have it – Mobile Geeks of London V.

Tomorrow night.

Be there or be square.

Whatley out…

It’s fast approaching…

- IT’S TONIGHT DAMMIT-

…and can you believe there is currently, at the time of writing, 119 people down as confirmed as coming?!
(don’t even ask me about the ‘maybes’)

Amazing.
Really.
I am completely and utterly overwhelmed.

Who’d have thought it huh?

It’s been just over a year since our very first meet-up way back when, upstairs in the Bricklayers Arms…

- Dodgy Lookin’ Bunch -

20 of us or so, all gathered round a table, drinking beer and coo-ing over the first generation iPhone.
What a sight we must have been.

From there Mobile Geeks of London, (or ‘MGoL‘ as it has become to be known) has gone from strength to strength. The MGoL facebook group is now 354 members strong and, as you can see – as time has gone on there has been a really lovely increase in the turnout for each event -

17 <>  61 <> 73 <>119

Just – awesome – really, really awesome

This year of course, also marked the first time we took MGoL: On Tour.

Starting (and ending – hehe) in Las Vegas and timed to coincide with the start of the CTIA Wireless Conference – MGoL, along with some help from the team at Brilliant Expos, set a new precendent in the history of the Mobile Geeks and laid down the template for any future events that take place under the ‘On Tour‘ banner. Of which, I can guarantee, there will be more coming soon… Watch this space.

So.. Here we are… Let’s do it shall we?

Ladies & Gentlemen… Presenting:

Mobile Geeks of London IV

The Time: 6:45pm – 11:30pm
The Date: July 31st – Today!
The Place: All Bar One, New Oxford Street
Nearest Tube – Tottenham Court Road
Google Map: If You Must

“I don’t wanna buy it, I don’t wanna sell it; I just wanna play with it and use it…”

See you there folks!

Hello all,

Following on from an earlier post – allow me to tell you a story…

It started as a simple question ‘Hey, we both live in London, do you fancy a drink sometime?’
That question was asked from one avid Jaiku fan to another.
(Yours truly and a guy named Romek)

From there – it snowballed…
We found a channel on Jaiku specifically for UK Jaiku users – called JaikUK

Then – upon finding that channel – I decided that’d be a great idea if we had a Facebook Group too.
And so Mobile Geeks of London was born…

It was, at first, made as a ‘base of operations’ if you will for me and a few fellow ‘mobilists’ who I knew lived in and around our great city to come together and chat…
And then, word got out that two of the members were meeting for a beer.

“Sod it!” I thought “Why not make it a full-blown facebook event?!”

And so I did.
Next thing I knew – SMS Text News picked up on it and ran it as a story – and overnight the group went from around 10 members to 110!

The Date: Thursday 26th July
The Event: The first ever Mobile Geeks of London meet up
The Place: A Pub in London
The Attendees: Mobile Geeks!

It. Was Great.

The whole evening had this kind of unofficial theme of ‘Show & Tell’

Some folk were there showing off new software – some other folk were throwing new mobile ideas around and some folk were just showing off their various handsets… an iPhone even made it along!
Hehehe…

However, I must admit, I think that was probably the main lure for peeps coming along in the first place!

Everyone wanted to touch it!
Hehehe – Here’s some photos from the evening folks – enjoy!

Geeks – Phones – Beer – Heaven

James Body. He of Truphone fame.
With my iPhone and his E61i.
Which one do you prefer?

My new friend Peter (aka Romek).
He was the guy that originally asked me out for a Mobile Geek drink!
It’s all his fault I swear it!

iPhone-tastic!

All in all the night was a resounding success and I’ve received lots of messages of praise for organising it all.

I couldn’t have done it without my good friend Technokitten who was on hand to offer assistance when the whole thing started getting a bit out of hand!

So – if you’re a Mobile Geek and you live in London – why not join the group and maybe we’ll see you at the next meet!