Fun Fact: Did you know that Milanuncios means 1000 ads in Spanish?

Then you can follow through to pages with information about dog breeds and also cats. I’m not much of a Cat lover so the Dog section is of particular interest to me.

The information on the individual dog breeds is very thorough and much better than many of the other pets sites out there. The design is great and the photos are really nice. You can find useful information on such things as

Height, Weight

Oh I why is my apartment so small and my work hours so long!!!

Again the main site www.ebayclassifieds.com

If you look at the history of these sites that bust out you find that they all hit a certain inflection or “popping point” where their curves change direction from horizontally up to vertically up and sites that were good sites turn into sites that become phenomenons.

A couple of sites that have hit their “Popping Point” recently

Facebook

Twitter

In both cases you can see where each site hit a tipping point of popularity and “bent their curves”. As you see the change from facebook which took about 3 years until it hit it’s popping point (Mid 2008) to twitter which took about 2 years until it hit it’s popping point (early 2009), the ttpp (time to popping point) is getting less and less.

Anyway, I think the next one to pop is Spotify

What is Spotify?

Spotify is a new “legal” way to listen to streaming music on the internet. Some of the labels they are associated with include the big guns Universal, Sony Music, EMI, Warner Music plus others such as Merlin, The Orchard and CD Baby. Although many have tried to do it in the past spotify is legit and it’s UI is pretty damn good. Although it is only available in certain parts of the world at the moment, there are “ways” around it. I suggest you give it a go.

And as for my guess for spotify’s popping point in popularity, taking into account the rate of ttpp inceasing, i’m guessing it will be in the next 1-4 months. Don’t be surprised if you start to see mainstream media saturation by the end of the year.

Cheers

Dyke

Anyway, we are here for the SMX Advanced conference which is something I have been dying to go to for the last few years. I’ve been to the regular search conferences in Australia and the Netherlands … and well… they suck big time. They are always aimed at bringing new people to the world of search and having agencies sharking around for new business. Hopefully, hopefully, hopefully (crosses fingers, toes and eyes) I will actually learn something new here. I think the chances are pretty high.

Also i must introduce you to my new travelling partner in crime. As you know I never use real names on this blog but my new buddy looks a lot like this guy

That’s right, Sid, from Ice Age.

So after a day of sight seeing, Sid and I are ready to get down to business – starting with drinks tonight Also we are really looking forward to hearingabout Microsoft’s new Search Engine – Bing ( www.bing.com). Is it actually going to be the phase shift in Search it is marketed to be or just another Cuil style hype that will be let down by unworthy product?

When we first saw that Microsoft was the big sponsor of the conference, our first instincts said …”What the hell? How do Microsoft have any relevance in the search game today”. We saw that they were supplying the event’s main speaker and that the evening shin dig was also sponsored by them. Add that to the fact that the conference is in Seattle – Microsoft’s home territory – and we started thinking that something fishy might be up. Obviously that was before bing …. now the cat is out of the bag so that leaves us here eagerly awaiting something special from Microsoft. I hope it’s a Badda Bing and not a Badda Boring!

Anyway if you are looking for Nike Air Max in Amsterdam look no further than the Netherlands greatest website – Martkplaats.nl

Minicorn-Mr-Bubbles-MiLai

Mr Bubbles MiLai

Mr. Bubbles MiLai is famous for getting upset that his father is away and often causes trouble for his mother by creating sparks that fly off his hooves from all his crazy bucking. Whilst only a young Minicorn, Mr. Bubbles MiLai is destined for great things. Watch this space for more Mr. Bubbles MiLai updates throughout the year.

In any case, welcome to the world of the minicorn … all the corn without so much uni!!!

Ok, lets consider this a “soft relaunch” of the dyke in the dam blog. After a 6 month hiatus (after only 3 posts ..) I’m back. There have been so many things happening in that time, that my life has changed completely but I will reserve that topic for another post.

The topic of this post is to let you all know of a great website I have found for Aussie expats living in Haarlem, the Netherlands – though it’s not just limited to Aussies, there are many nationalities that make up the group. This site is called www.MyHaarlem.com has a great number of resources, but especially great are the social gatherings that happen quite regularly. The next event is at Cafe Fidel on the Lange Veerstraat 3 in Haarlem – see the blog http://myhaarlem.wordpress.com/ for more details.

The sun over the Canal Houses

Our new digs are on the Amstel river in Amsterdam. The Amstel is a big river that runs through Amsterdam and is a great place to watch life go by. The Amstel River is actually how Amsterdam got it’s name, and Amstel Dam turned into the Amsterdam it is today.

We live in a canal house on the Amstel and our view is pretty amazing. We overlook the “skinny” bridge or the Magere Brug – translation is skinny bridge. The bridge was made in 1670 and it opens up for all the ships coming up and down the Amstel. At night it looks so pretty, being lit up by over 1000 lightbulbs. Apparently Queen Beatrix comes here every year for  V-E Day or in Dutch ”bevrijdingsdag” and there is a concert held for her.

The Skinny Bridge – The Magere Brug

Also it’s going to be a good spot for Queen’s day. On this day you are allowed to sell anything on the street so I am thinking about pimping out my toilet for a Euro per visit, but that could also get a bit messy due to the amount of partying that happens on that day. Perhaps selling beer at overinflated prices could be a safer option, though knowing me I’ll be buying rather than selling.

Here’s some photos I have been taking. We get a different view every day depending on the weather.

 Canal House on the Amstel

Canal House in the Amstel Sunset

Amstel River Canal Houses

Canal House Skyline

Born: Jan 2008
Birthplace: Bruges, Belgium

This dude here is Horace Saw  

For those of you who aren’t into grossly overused violence in horror films he is the doll from the Saw movie franchise. The movies, which will never win any praises from motion picture critics for being examples of cinematic art, are part of my favourite film collection. The two writers of the film, James Wan and
Leigh Whannell , are actually Australian guys from Melbourne.

So in the footsteps of Tim Nevo, who had his jaunt around Europe in 2006 and saw the soceroos play in the World Cup and from the makers of the overused touring icon we would like to present … Horace Saw. 

We don’t know the real name of the little effer, except “that doll from the saw movies” so we decided to give him a name. The last name was quite easy and we derived his first name from “Horror” which is the genre of the movies. 

So far Horry has been a busy little bugger. 

Here he is here at his birthplace in Brugge, Belgium

 here at Antwerp

in Germany

with the Fernsehturm Tower in Berlin

at the Brandenburg Gates in Berlin

with the Eiffel Tower in Paris

at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris

and here he is just stylin up and waiting for the ladies
 

I agree that the pictures are quite scary, which I like, but I really wish everyone could here this sound

(squeek, squeek,squeek) when they look at the pictures (the same way my mind plays it every time) to get the full effect.

P.s Da Hoff, Flash and Folls – if you wanna send a story and some photos of Horry’s little cousin, Timbo through, I can give him a post!