Europe needs to come together
I was just reading a news article about the (already ridiculous) ban of liquids on board aircrafts. Today that ban is five years old and the European Commission is now relaxing that ban. Say you fly from San Francisco to Belgium. If you’re like me and fly Star Alliance chances are that you fly to either Frankfurt or Munich first. With the current ban I could not buy any liquids in San Francisco because I would not be allowed to take it on the connecting flight to Belgium. By relaxing this ban this would now be possible.
That’s great, right? Well.. Yes… If it weren’t for the fact that some European countries have already decided to maintain the existing rules. If you have a connecting flight in France, the UK or yes… Belgium you won’t be allowed to take the liquids you bought abroad on board. If you fly to Germany or The Netherlands it won’t be a problem.
It saddens me that Europe can’t seem to agree on the simplest things and can’t seem to agree on one European wide set of rules.
Now let’s apply this to technology. Some of my US colleagues were actually surprised when they heard that Europe doesn’t have something like Netflix or Hulu. Heck… the majority of Europe doesn’t even have movie purchases/rentals on iTunes. Why is that? Simple… Because there is no one European copyright law. If someone like Netflix would like to start operations in Europe they’d have to negotiate copyrights in every single country. You already see this happening with Spotify for instance. Spotify is only available in 7 European countries. iTunes movies are only available in 2 or 3 countries. And we only have copyright laws to blame.
Europe needs to come together in order to not get left behind…
Update: And yes… (Thanks Cyril for reminding me) we’re not even talking about things like European roaming rates, VAT, etc…
European flat fee for data coming soon
Earlier this morning Vincent Van Quickenborne (Belgian minister for ICT, telco, economy and reform) moderated a debate with Neelie Kroes (Vice President of the European Commission responsible for the Digital Agenda for Europe). Vincent Van Quickenborne was asking his Twitter followers for questions he should ask her. I asked what her plans were for the outrageous data roaming charges in Europe. Her answer sounded like music to my ears:
This is fantastic news!
Most of the European carriers are owned by only a handful of big telcos (like France Telecom, Vodafone, …) and this should be a no-brainer. But they obviously make a lot of money from roaming and if no one tells them to change their price structure, they won’t. Now that Neelie’s on the case it looks like data roaming across Europe may soon/finally become affordable.
PS: It’s great to see Neelie Kroes on Twitter!
Introducing: Flash Coffee Meetups
If you’re anything like me, you probably drink a lot of coffee, love Flash and enjoy talking about geek stuff… Blend all of these ingredients together and you get “Flash Coffee“!
Join Adobe Platform Evangelists from across Europe for a cuppa, an espresso, a double non fat latte or whatever your chosen caffeine jolt is and see what’s new with the Adobe Flash Platform. Ask some questions, see Flash Player 10.1 running on Android devices, see what’s new with Flash Builder 4 and Flash Catalyst, show what you are working on…
These meetups are informal and small, taking place at various coffee shops around Europe. Come along and join us for a drink and a chat! We’re limiting the numbers per meetup depending on the location so register early!
I just added the first two dates and I hope to see you there.
- Flash Coffee Amsterdam – June 9th – Beurs van Berlage Café – Raffle prize: a Google Nexus One
- Flash Coffee Antwerp – July 7th – Starbucks Antwerp – Raffle prize: Flash Builder 4 Premium
(You have to attend to be eligible to win the raffle prize!)
Keep an eye on http://bit.ly/flcoffee for more dates.
Europe needs a European wide network carrier
Here’s a thought: For this mobile web to really work, we need a European wide network carrier.
If I was living in the US, I could pick one of the big carriers like AT&T, T-Mobile or Verizon and use their service across all states. In Europe… No such thing. There are some alliances between some carriers but there is no such thing as a European wide carrier and frankly they don’t do a very good job at promoting these alliances.
I travel all over Europe and thus I always need to be aware of the fact that I am always roaming. And roaming is still freaking expensive. Sure, Adobe does pay my mobile bill but that doesn’t mean I don’t care about how much it costs.
Most of the European carriers are owned by only a handful of big telcos (like France Telecom, Vodafone, …). It is definitely possible to make this happen. I honestly don’t know why we don’t already have a European wide carrier… But then… I guess that these big telcos don’t mind making truckloads of money from frequent travelers like myself… *sigh*
ColdFusion on tour – SOTR Europe
After a very successful and fun tour though the UK, SOTR is now going to mainland Europe. Most of you know that my love for ColdFusion is growing with every project I do using it. I think you can really only appreciate ColdFusion after getting a taste of it and SOTR is the perfect place to get that taste. With SOTR Europe being a free event, there really is no excuse to not be there. ;-)
Hope to see you in Munich, Zurich, Milan, Amsterdam, Brussels or London!
More info and free registration on http://www.scotch-on-the-rocks.co.uk
Feel free to follow me on: 
