Amazing: http://labs.live.com/photosynth. Will be interesting to see how much of the data enhancement is being taken over by Photosynth and how much you would have to throw in manually.

While I’m writing this post, our government is deciding to lift the retirement age up to 67. As far as I can remember, this age was around 62 in the early 90s. For me, this means that I would have to work 37 more years from now to get my full pension, assuming that there will be no more changes. Which you never now.

How does that make sense? Is paying unemployment benefits cheaper opposed to pensions? How are the chances to still be employed with 67!? The employment rate of older people is currently below 50%. Lifting the age that qualifies you for your full pension actually means cutting the effective rates down. Who is really working to that age? The majority is retiring earlier which decreases their pension rate drastically.

MAD TV created a wonderful political satire you can watch on Youtube: “The Apple iRack”. Watch it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGHty_S0TU0

As you can imagine, it’s a hell of a job to sort, tag, title, enhance, geo tag and upload the photos of a three week vacation. I made some effort and have the first three sets uploaded now containing our Voyage to Koh Samui, the first days on the island Koh Samui and our first days with Greg and Alexis on Koh Phan Gan. This is the start of a sequence of maybe 10 sets, so stay tuned and be a little patient

Suffering from a temperature difference of about 36°C (which comes close to the usual body temperature) I’m back from a three-week-trip to Thailand. My first holiday in South-East Asia really hooked me with amazing region!

I met a lot of great people from all over the world, found paradisaic sites, enjoyed delicious food and drinks you can only dream of in Europe, witnessed the lively city of Bangkok that even scrambled my expectations. Traveling is most probably the best way to spend money…

Since impressions are so numerous, I will shoot out postings over the next days. Same with the over 2000 photos I shot. They will get sorted, commented, well prepared and then show up in my gallery for your delight. Make sure you check back the next days!

An interesting experiment is going to take place on March 24th: How many people are willing to spend a whole day without computer? How many won’t be able? What’s going to happen? The shutdown day is going to figure this one out.

You can leave a statement on their web site whether you’ll survive that day without a computer or not. And why you do or don’t. Some inspiration comes from these guys showing you alternative uses for your laptop.

Meanwhile, some questions arise:

• Does a Playstation count as computer here? March 23rd is release day in Europe which makes me think that some guys will not leave their new piece of high tech untouched!!!
• Is my digital camera seen as a computer?
• What about my Nokia Communicator? Am I allowed to make calls, but not use my synchronized contact list?
• Phone books: I don’t have any since years. What if I need a phone number?

My expectations on the outcome are:

• Overall energy consumption is going up, because people discover TV again.
• Firefighters will have to work over time for helping candle light emergencies.
• Birth rate is going to rise in December. Poor guys who are close to Christmas with their b’day parties

What are your expectations?