Organizing the Foursquare day meetup in Yerevan #4sqday

When writing this post about a year ago, I could never imagine that I'll become one of the "ambassadors" of Foursquare in Armenia. Being an early adopter and a geek willing to try everything new, I'm somehow influential in the tech-related things among my friends and they often consult with me for new services and gadgets (like Kindle, Android phones, apps, tablets, geolocation services, etc).
Throughout last year, I made a presentation on Geolocation services and Foursquare during the BarCamp Yerevan 2010, appeared on Yerevan.ru promoting Foursquare, and Banadzev production's Interactive program, then my own PanARMENIAN.Net interviewed me about the meetup.

It somehow happened that I became the organizer of the annual Foursquare Day meetup in Yerevan (4sq Day).

Celebrated on April 16 of each year, Foursquare Day (4sqDay /4 squared = 16, hence 4/16!) is a chance to get out and connect with others in your neighborhood and around the world. 

I began following the official 4sqDay twitter, read the blog and howto's for organizers to make the most out of the meetup. I created a Facebook event, since it was easier to promote than the meetup page, in our case. I submitted the information about our meetup in the local meetups database. I also set up a Twitter account for coordination of our Foursquare activities in Yerevan - @4sqYerevan.
I also filled a form to request a swag from Foursquare, even though in order to receive it, we had to have 50 confirmed participants on the meetup.com page by April 4.
Couple of days ago parents called me in the afternoon to say that I've got a package delivery home from Fedex. Turns out it was full of Foursquare goodness! A huge banner, stickers, badges as buttons and other stuff.

By the way, Foursquare has been encouraging the meetup organizers to approach our city mayors and ask them to proclaim the April 16 an official Foursquare Day in our cities.
Today we learned that mayor Bloomberg Proclaims 4/16 as Foursquare Day in NYC!
Somehow we thought that it won't be possible in our case.. and could take forever to reach our mayor, but maybe we should try next year? ;)

In case you are interested to learn more about the Foursquare, there's no better chance than coming to the meetup on Saturday, April 16, 19:00 near Cascade.
71 people are already "Attending" according to the FB event and 38 people confirmed participation on Meetup page.

If at least 50 people check in at the same place around the same time, everybody will get the "Swarm" badge for the first time in Armenia! and of course, the special 4sq day 2011 badge too.

• Confirm your participation on the meetup page: http://www.meetup.com/foursquare/Yerevan-AM/88180/
• RVSP on the FB event: https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=200849073282283
• Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/4sqYerevan and the hashtag #4sqDay.

there were 2 "4SQ Day" t-shirts in the package and i reserved one for myself:) who wants the 2nd one?

Breaking: an Armenian guy found a big security hole on Google

I'm kinda proud and happy to share this while it's trending!

Vahe G. (an Armenian 21yo guy), installed a JS code in his blogspot blog (now closed by Google) and if you visited it while logged into your Gmail (even from an incognito window), you would receive an email from him. Creepy?

He has tried to reach Google for this but got no response. Then a friend suggested to write to Techcrunch, so he did. Now he's making headlines all over the interwebs.

Google has already shut the blog and responded: “We take potential security issues very seriously, and our team is actively investigating this one. We’ll share more information soon."

I don't personally know him, but he's been following and commenting me on buzz and twitter, for which I'm now pretty proud! :D

Seems like Google will have to hire him finally. Or maybe Facebook?

Hey Google, know Armenian guys ! Hovik, your brother is really cool! :)

Yerevan Street View? Already there!

While some hundreds of us are keeping up with the latest tech news, some of us light candles.. others desperately try to find a good contact in Google (Maps) to finally get it done... turns out some folks have already implemented it quietly.. without much any publicity ! Yerevan Street View is a reality!!!

Very accidentally I stumbled upon it on Yerevan Municipality website and couldn't believe my eyes. An interactive map of Yerevan, showing the bus and marshrutka routes... it even does have a Street View!!!! all the underlined streets are available for viewing in 360° angle. But it's not the full story yet.

http://maps.yerevan.am

It's possible to rotate and go forward thru the streets using the arrow, however it's not very smooth like in Google Maps. It even has a directory (with search) of businesses, addresses and places! 

Seems to me very useful.. if not only that 'nostalgia' for 90's in the design... :/

There might be many other useful features that have to be discovered. Check it out yourselves!

It's far from being perfect (the usage flash is often irritating here), images quality is overall satisfactory and we can note that a huge work has been done. Here in this snapshot we can see the shadow of a car with the camera on top.

here! our office building and the lunch place of some of our photographers :P

From the images I've seen, i concluded that most of the shooting has been done in autumn 2009, and some of it during the Erebuni-Yerevan day celebration in October.

It wasn't hard to find out the authors of the project - it's menq.am aka Aviainfotel systems, the one that has created the airport flight information website.

Wouldn't it be more reasonable if they partnered with Google on this? Seems like they didn't lack resources (including administrative) and could easily organize it. And why almost no one knew about this yet?

In addition, on their website I discovered the multilingual dictionary project. If not the flash, it would be priceless.

Introducing Foursquare in Yerevan

Geolocation is the Trend for 2010. I already enjoy Google Latitude and occasionally post buzzes from my cellphone (even if it's an old-style non-touchscreen and without GPS) but my new "crash" is Foursquare!

I wasn't using it for a long time since i didn't know it would be possible with my cellphone. I wish I had an iPhone, Android phone like Nexus One or Blackberry to use the full functionality of Foursquare, but for now i'm doing good with the mobile version for all other "less-trendy" (or less-smart) devices.

So what's Foursquare?

foursquare is a cross between a friend-finder, a social city-guide and a game that rewards you for doing interesting things.

In my words - foursquare is a game you play with your friends, it's about discovering new interesting places in the city and competing for becoming a "mayor" of a certain venue, for reward points given for check-ins and attractive "badges".

Below you can find the basic "ideas" of foursquare:

Check-ins
4sq user checks-in when goes to some venue that is on the map (4sq uses Google Maps), if the venue is not listed, user can add it and check-in there.

When you tell foursquare where you are, that's called "checking-in". You can check-in from parks, bars, museums, restaurants... really anywhere. When you check-in we'll let your friends know where they can find you and award you points and badges based on your adventurousness.

Mayorship

If you've been to a place more than anyone else we'll crown you the "The Mayor" of that place. We see lots of bars and cafes now offering "Mayor Specials" - a free coffee or appetizer or maybe a special discount to the mayors of their venues.

 

Badges

Badges are little rewards you earn for doing checking-into interesting places. For example, staying out late on a school night or frequenting too many karaoke bars. 

Example of badges unlocked by a user

Points

Most foursquare checkins will earn you points. You can earn points for your first checkin at a certain place or by adding a new place to our listings. We display a list of the users who have racked up the most points on the "leaderboard". The idea is that the more you experience, the more places you visit, etc. the higher your score for that week. The leaderboard resets every Sunday at midnight.

Tips/To-Dos

Every foursquare user has the ability to create both "Tips" and "To-Dos" for places. Tips are generally things you'd recommend to other ("Go to PDT and try the bacon-infused Old Fashioned") while To-Dos are more "notes to self" ("Remember to come back and try the pesto noodles"). 

Foursquare in Yerevan
As for what i know, there are so far 4 of us who actively use 4sq in Yerevan. It's me, Yervand A., Harut M., Matthew A. Many others are registered with few check-ins, and probably will start using it soon :)

Some statistics on Yerevan active users
Number of check-ins: Yervand - 69 Harut - 52 Matthew - 44 Arpik - 33	Most friends: Arpik - 17 Yervand - 12 Harut - 10 Matthew - 6	Most mayorships: Yervand - 8 Arpik - 5 Matthew - 4  Harut - 1

I'm now excited to unlock as many badges as possible and become a mayor of at least 10 venues (to earn a certain badge). It's not always obvious how the badges are earned. In fact there are many city-specific badges i will never earn unless i go travel in the US. I found this interesting list of foursquare badges and their "unlocking" methods.

There have been lots of buzz around Foursquare in all popular blogs on Social Media and not only.

• Each year on April 16th (04/16) the world celebrated the Foursquare day :)
• Recently there has been a race for the North Pole check-in!
• And it was announced that 1,000,000 foursquare app downloads were registered few days ago.

P.S. I'm thinking of doing a small presentation of foursquare on the upcoming BarCamp Yerevan ;) And I'm sure the number of active users from Yerevan will increase by then.

"OMG it's Yerevan" Tumblr blog

Goodness from the "Armenian internets": OMG, it's Yerevan tumblr blog. Tumblr-style images of Yerevan with some inscriptions showing the beauty of the city :) Totally LIKE!

Some selection of my favorite pics:

Music and the web. Last.fm description for music-addicts.

Music has an important place in my daily routine and is in my top of motivational things' list.
I like to discover new artists and songs and challenge my musical taste. I like to be the first one to discover new songs and to share it with others :)

I never forget where i first heard the song and who helped me with the discovery.


by archwaves

There are several means i use to discover new music.

• Movies. I like soundtrack music and ending songs. When I hear some song in a movie, I look at its soundtrack page on imdb.com and search for downloading. When i'm not sure which song is it, i just try to remember several words to google later.
• Radio. I don't listen to radio much, but if i do (in a taxi or supermarket, or when my sister listens to it loudly at home) and i hear some nice tune I haven't heard before - i'm trying to remember some words and google to find it.
• Charts. Sometimes when i see a new band/artist in a chart and hear about it sometimes in the news, read in blogs, I just open its last.fm page and listen the preview.
• Similar artists. There's time when i'm being tired of all the music i'm listening to at the moment and want something new - new artist or new style. I use artist radio feature on last.fm (read about it below) or similar artists feature. For example i like Sigur Ros and wanted to listen to similar icelandic bands - I discovered Amiina and Mum that way.
  

Generally, last.fm is the best music resource on the web. If you live with music like me, you should definitely register there.

So what is last.fm?

Last.fm is a music service that learns what you love... Every track you play will tell your Last.fm profile something about what you like. It can connect you to other people who like what you like - and recommend songs from their music collections and yours too.

So how does it know what music do you listen and what do you like? Last.fm has a small application that you download and install in your computer and that collects information about the music you listen on your players - Windows media player, Winamp, iTunes or other. It's called - scrobbling.

Here's how my last.fm client looks like:

On the left menu I have the stations - i can listen to music with this client. Like listening to artist stations (if i type Madonna, i will have a playlist with music similar to Madonna's. Or I can listen to recommendations station which has music recommended by last.fm based on my music taste. Below, there are my recently played tracks, ones that I loved (this is how you teach last.fm about your taste), hated, how I tagged the music... friends' and neighbours' music and history of radiostations I've listened to.


Key facts and features:

• It doesn't upload your music, it just sends the songs' information and if you want - downloads artist description and artwork so the traffic it consumes is not significant.
• Taste-o-meter: a cool feature with helps you to find people who share the musical taste with you. You can open any profile on last.fm and see which artists you have in common and how high is your music compatibility.
  

• In last.fm you have your music library that consists of the songs you have played.
• Neighbours: Just like in real life - neighbours are ones who listen the music you are listening (if you have it enough loud :D). In last.fm, you can quickly find people with similar taste by clicking the Neighbours tab in your profile.
  
• Charts: You have your weekly, monthly, 3-month, 6-month, yearly and overall stats of both artists and tracks.To be scrobbled, the tracks you listen must meet the following criteria: 1) be longer than 30 seconds, 2) have vaild meta information for both track and artist names, 3) track must have been listened to for more than 50% of its length. If the song you are listening isn't being scrobbled, it means that either the ID tag is missing, or your scrobbling is disabled.

• You can recommend your good music discoveries to last.fm friends with the Recommendation feature.
• Events: This feature helps to find concerts near you (you set your location) and you can confirm your attendance and meet other people that might be attending.
  
• Last.fm, as a social network has a an internal messaging system, wall in a profile, groups and journals too.
  

Tips: 

• It's important to have your music tagged correctly - with the correct artist/track. Winamp has an auto-tag feature that helped me to entirely organize my collection. It's not 100% useful for all tracks (especially Armenian and Russian) but helps significantly!
  
• Check your stats regularily and don't let your younger sister listen to backstreet boys or other music you wouldn't like to appear in your charts :-) Luckily you can setup different user accounts and switch between them in last.fm or just disable scrobbling. You can usually delete scrobbled tracks from your stats page for the last 2-3 days.
• Paid subscription: Basically you get all the described features for free, but you can also become a subscriber that let's you have a sexy black square on your avatar :D (as last.fm describes it). But that's not just it! It costs just 3$ monthly, and the major benefits are:
  

• No Ads: You won't see any ads on your and others' profile and other people won't see on yours,
• Profile Visitors: You can see who visited your profile recently.
• Personal playlists: You will be able to build unlimited personal playlists.
• Loved tracks: You will have your loved tracks' radiostation.
• Scrobble from your portable player! You can scrobble music from your iPod or phone player too !  When i'm outside, walking and listening to music, i want it also to be counted!  I wanted to have something like this for a long time and finally found it ! For s60 smartphones there's a nice client - Mobbler. You just install the application on your mobile and you can practically do everything you can do with the windows last.fm client - scrobble played songs, listen to radios, playlists etc... If you, like me, don't want to use phone's internet traffic, you can generate a log file with scrobbled songs information and later upload it to last.fm from PC using one of applications described here: http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/LastFMLog. I am using QTScrobbler, since it works with protocol 1.2 and scrobbles the songs from phone, even when i have listened and scrobbled other songs from PC after that (protocol 1.1. doesn't support it)
• Widgets for websites and blogs: Last.fm offers lots of cool widgets that help you to show off the music you listen - last tracks or overall top artists, tracks and so on.

If my post was useful to you, register there and add me as a friend :)
Here's my profile: http://www.last.fm/user/arpik

I like it's interface language - very fun and live :)

How i fixed my phone and became an experienced Nokia user :)

I'm a happy owner of Nokia 5700 XpressMusic. As i read in some reviews, it is "For those not obsessed with anorexic phones" :D It's a smartphone with advanced music features. It fits my needs since I'm a music person and a geek :) I use it as a music player when I'm out and walking by myself, I use it to check my gmail and browse something on the net, I even have office applications that let me read word, excel, ppt and html files :) I watch videos when I'm in a public transport and bored, and i use the photo camera to take photos of some new clothes and shoes that i try on in boutiques, but hesitate about buying them. So i make their photos to review them later and decide to buy or not.
I use notes to write down thoughts and i use calendar for my schedule. So i use it fully and i can't imagine my life without such gadget :)

That's why i was so desperate when it died 2 days ago. A friend called me home (!) since i wasn't 'picking' the phone. In fact, i didn't receive any calls and when i tried to check it, it suddenly froze. I switched it off (normally, from the menu) and couldn't turn on again. It wasn't going further after the initial white screen with Nokia logo and didn't react at anything. It also refused to turn off normally, i had to take the battery out for that. I took it to the service center on Lusavorich street. The customer service guy was nice, he asked what had happened and i described.
Luckily it's guarantee expires in June so i could have it fixed for free. He told that they'll call within 3 days and also told that they might format it and reinstall the firmware so all the data will be lost. I was lucky to backup it couple of days ago. I wanted to install an audiobook application (Audible) and downloaded the latest Nokia PC Suite (7.1). It installed normally and i did the full backup of my Contacts, Address book, Notes and Calendar memos and the phone settings just in case.

 The backup process with Nokia PC Suite

The next day morning they called and i went to pick it up. It had a new firmware installed and i happily took it home and started to restore my data from the backup. In the middle of restoring the phone suddenly restarted and the same story with the white screen with logo happened. I was so upset! I had to took it back there, and maybe also the backup file asking to reformat it restore it again. The problem was that the customer service guys supposedly wasn't the one fixing it and he was passing it to other technical people, and when i was telling him about PC suite, backup etc, he was looking at me as if i was speaking Chinese. Oh and he called the memory card - "chip". I hate it :D I had to get in touch with technical people and ask to perform the restore themselves and identify the problem.

1. Then i tried googling about it and found other people having the same problem. I found different discussion boards with some solutions offered. Mostly they were recommending to format the phone and reset the factory settings by pressing "* + 3 + call" and switch the phone on.

I tried it, but my phone didn't react. Some hours later, when i was about to take it to the service center again, i tried the  "* + 3 + call" again and it worked !!!!!!!!!!
I got a newly formatted phone with factory settings. It asked to select the country, date and time :)

And i tried to restore my data again - with the PC suite content copier, this time only the contacts. It stuck in the middle again, the phone restarted with white screen with a logo. I did the reset of factory settings again and started to find alternative ways of recovering my address book. I realized that the problem might be in the backup file and not the phone.

2. I downloaded the Nokia software updater and tried to update the firmware of my phone, which turned to be up-to-date.

3. I browsed for the backup file in my comp., and it had ".nbu" extension. I searched for .nbu extracting software and found Noki. It is sharewere and i could extract only limited amount of data. I downloaded the latest version 1.7.

So i tried to extract the backup file but it failed. Noki returned an unknown error :(
4. Then i tried doing another backup of my nearly empty phone and extract that backup with Noki. It returned the same unknown error :) so this time it could be a problem with Noki.

5. I googled again to find other applications that could extract the backup and in one discussion thread in Nokia forums, I read about another client - "NBU parser" made by Russians :)
I looked for it and seemed like all the links were broken and the only place that it might download from - was some vbulletin forum which required registration for downloading files :(
I hate registering for a single-time purpose, but it seemed like the only solution for me. I registered and it turned out that i should wait for the confirmation from administrators :(
then i tried to yandex for that application, since it was mentioned to be russian :) and i found many links!
i downloaded it and it looked strange :D

However i could orientate in the buttons thanks to the help file that contained a normal screenshot :)

6. I exported the contacts in .txt (the first button) and they contained the descriptions in russian :/ So they wouldn't go well in my phone with english interface.
Then i tried exporting them in .csv and the same story with Russian :(
Then i tried the .vcf format, and it turned to be the one i needed :)

 

.csv (comma-separated values) opened with Excel

 

.vcf format in a notepad 

7. Then I imported the files with Nokia PC suite's Communication Center.

Importing .vcf files with Nokia communication center

So the most important part was done, i recovered all my 176 contacts to the phone. The messages from inbox could be recovered with NBU parser, but they were in .txt format and didn't go back to the phone with similar way. The messages tab of Nokia Communication Center didn't had importing messages active for some reason. And they were in .txt so it wouldn't display normally as before (with the correct sender, dates etc). I decided to keep them as an archive in the computer and not to try to put them back, i didn't have any message to be kept in phone.

8. Then i tried to do something for the notes. The Noki application was crashing and i searched for other versions of it. I found and downloaded an older version - 1.6, and it extracted all perfectly :) The messages were in .vmg format, recognized by the PC suite. But still i couldn't put them back (though didn't try hard for that), and there were only 50 of 270 messages. Noki is sharewere and extracts a limited number of messages at the trial period. But i exported the Notes and Calendar entries in .txt. I put back the notes by copying them to the phone. As for the calendar entries, i didn't try to put them back, since there were not important.


So that's it :)


After this, i did a backup of the phone again and started to customize and put the settings. I browsed for themes and found my recent addiction - "House M.D." tv-series theme ;)

I spent the whole day fixing my phone and some hours after midnight - customizing, but i don't regret any bit :)
My phone is working great again! :)


Hopefully my description will be helpful to somebody else.

Conclusions:

1. Always have an up-to-date backup of at least the Address book of the phone
2. I was happy to have bought the phone from the authorized dealer, so that i had the 1-year guarantee and the normal customer service. 
3. Before taking the phone to the customer service for alternative solutions :) some things can be done easily at home, like reverting the factory settings. Google for the similar issues.
   
4. Never stop trying, even if it seems useless.
5. Don't install suspicious applications or at least backup the phone before.
6. There are other search engines :D When google can't get the right page, better to try alternatives, and especially for the Russian content, yandex.ru is the best :)
7. In case of the encoding problem with an application, try to open the help file, it should contain some screenshot :-D

I google you! ...when i have nothing else to do...!

Did you ever google your name? I do it once a while and even get surprising results sometimes :)
Did you google other people? or search in facebook? or in odnoklassniki.ru? I got this habit of doing some small research on people, if they interest me :) or if i have to meet somebody (client, partner, friend of a friend etc..) i know only the name... and get some basic information before the meeting which is so handy ;)

I found this funny song:

I Google you
late at night when I don’t know what to do
I find photos
you’ve forgotten
you were in
put up by your friends
I Google you
when the day is done and everything is through
I read your journal
that you kept
that month in France
I’ve watched you dance
And I’m pleased your name is practically unique
it’s only you and
a would-be PhD in Chesapeake
who writes papers on
the structure of the sun
I’ve read each one
I know that I
should let you fade
but there’s that box
and there’s your name
somehow it never makes the pain
grow less or fade or disappear
I think that I should save my soul and
I should crawl back in my hole
But it’s too easy just to fold
and type your name again
I fear
I google you
Whenever I’m alone and feeling blue
And each scrap of information
That I gather
says you’ve got somebody new
And it really shouldn’t matter
ought to blow up my computer
but instead….
I google you

and a live performance by Amanda Palmer.

but seriously, this lyrics reminded me of own experience so much!

I also found that there's even a movie entitled "Google me"...I will look for it :D

So what are you doing now? about micro-blogging, twittering, status messages etc...

This question should be answered differently depending on who's asking or what is the time frame of the question.

--If it asked my friend who I'm chatting with quite often, who's aware of my daily life, i'd answer:

• reading a project management literature related to the recent changes in my company.

--If it was asked by a cousin whom i meet on family occasions - birthdays etc, i'd say:

• I'm on the same job - managing website projects.

--If it was asked by my course-mates whom I last saw 2 years ago on graduation, i'd tell them:

• I'm working.. mid-management position, right by profession. Not married yet :)

--If it was asked by school-mate, whom i encounter once in several years, i'd answer:

• Graduated with Master's, working! Not married yet :) /don't get surprised, 90% of this kind of people asking about myself actually want to know if I'm married and have kids already/
  

--If it was asked by smb whom I met for the first time in my life, i'd probably reply:

• None of your business! :D ,- but seriously, i always get stuck by this question trying to guess what activities does the 'interviewer' expect to hear me telling about...
  

so what is twitter?

 

read about it here.

some twitter fun :)

 

  

  

  

  

  

  

About dreams, reminders, in short - dreaminder!

Dreaminder is a free tool that helps people remember what we want from our lives. Reflect on your life, your dreams, your vision for yourself and write it into the box on the website. Then set the date when you want to be reminded.

Here's how Dreaminder helps you remember your dream:

1. Write down what you want out of your life
2. Send it to yourself in the future
3. Start working towards your dream

On the day in the future when you receive your dream, you can see how far you've come. You can congratulate yourself, or revive your dream and continue on the path that is right for you.

www.dreaminder.com

I did so exactly one year ago, and today in the morning I received what I wrote then. It was a strange feeling :)

I've written some goals I'd like to reach in a year and now I'll copy them here almost the way i received... just a bit translated from my language.

• I have traveled a lot, I have lived sometime abroad!
• I developed many soft skills.. I'm much more fluent and confident in Italian and English...
• I have a high self-esteem !
• I have many opportunities....
• I am needed.
• I have a person whom i trust my life..
• I have a clear picture of my future...

I found out that i've completed most of the goals by the first quarter of the year...
So in general I've completed about 89% (raw calculation :D) of my goals ;) which is COOL!

This time, together with my friend Tata, we decided to write down our goals and dreams for 1 year and read them together meeting in our favorite cafe :)

See you on this page in a year ;)))

Misheard lyrics (Hoppípolla by Sigur Rós, Disturbia by Rihanna, Believe by Bilan)

Recently I discovered a new sort of fun in YouTube - called misheard lyrics :)

it's the lyrics of a song (usually in other language than English) 'heard' in a funny way and sometimes with a graphic presentation :)

i laughed a lot at Hoppípolla (Sigur Rós) Icelandic song's English interpretation:


another version:



Misheard lyrics of Disturbia by Rihanna:



and this one is for those who know Russian, it's EXTREMELY funny :D

"Что на самом деле пел Билан на Евровидении"


upd: a bonus from Dragostea din tei (O-Zone)