You can always change this.

During today’s interview with Henrik Hansson, I produced few bright ideas for which you can quote me (paraphrased, the original will be soon online, hope not):

R: “You go twenty kilometers away from Joensuu and there is nothing.” – when comparing North-Carelia with Africa.

H: “Is there any special characteristics a phd student must have?” R: “Let me think for a while…hm, no.”

R: “If I don’t hear anything from a student in one week, I start to be afraid he might be sick!”

H: “How did you select the topic of your thesis?” R: “Well, we were building a usability lab, that’s how it happened.”

Traveling is always nice. I enjoy getting surprised and affected; smelling new scents, interacting with strangers, learning how a toilet works, finding a way. All new and contrasting, but lot of same and similar, just done in some other way.

On my way to Ireland and PPIG’09, there were few moments of contrast-’aha’. Seeing the chaos at the Charles de Gaulle airport after the organized and effective Vantaa and Joensuu airport (“can I check you boarding pass?” is phrase I heard today first time at CDG and then about 10x again and again at CDG, when changing terminal, when entering the queue for bag scan, before getting scanned, when boarding (1x before the bus, 1 x at the aircraft! (“I want to make sure, sir, you entered the right plane”, “no no, I wanted to fly to Honolulu with this miniature aeroplane for 50 people” I thought) ;in Helsinki nobody asked for it, people just orderly show it when boarding the plane, and that’s it). Do you by the way also share the feeling that many male flying attendants are not always 100% straight?

At the same place, however, seeing how smile (nearly everybody) and short joke (bartender to get more tips out of 5 euro) can make a difference; while in Helsinki the guy who cashed for my lunch at the sky-high price of 15 euro even haven’t looked at me.

The cab-driver here at Shannon, Ireland, was quite surprised that I wanted to jump into his seat. “Oh sir, left please.” Again, forgetting that things can be different trapped me into a funny situation there, but cost me eight bucks for forgetting the right mains electricity adapter at home and buying it from CDG.

Oh yes, and they still check passports when you arrive to here, let long live the EU.

According to news, Lapland’s entrepreneurs tremble for safety should phone-lines be dumped . The transfer of by-wire services to wireless is a process going on for a while in Finland. Especially in scarcely populated areas, the cost of keeping 50 000 lines up are high, while the transfer to gsm and wireless services is not.

It is a logical step from the operators. However, conventional phone is often the only connection a grandma living alone in Kainuu area has with the rest of world. Previously during this year we have been doing some usability research with computer users of age 70+, living in Kainuu area. Seniors use the traditional phone, all of them have serious troubles using a mobile phone (not mentioning using a computer). Answering a mobile phone-call is maybe ok, but anything behind that is a pain. Now, the lines will one day become deaf, and the only alternative is a mobile phone?

Consider this anecdotal situation we witnessed: a grandma loses her mobile phone at home. She uses her normal phone to phone her son to phone her back on her mobile phone so she can find it when it’s ringing. This illustrates the attitude well, a super small, hated, mobile phone, left somewhere. Soon, it will be the only connection to the rest of world.

PS: I hope there is a thick line to Justus’ office.

Yes, same here :( So in the chain of troubles, what is this number?

However, this was not the last one. After the fan was fixed, spacebar started to feel kind of dumb on the sides of the key….

“….Now, I ask those members of audience with fair-hair to ask custos for floor and leave the room.”

The board behind the current Elections of the Representative Council of the Student Union spent great efforts convincing people to go voting. For example, it was possible to vote electronically in advance.

One thing that made me wonder for a while, however, was the motivation presented on the advertisement flier: “ONLY BY VOTING YOU HAVE A CHANCE TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE”/”VAIN ÄÄNESTÄMÄLLÄ SINULLA ON MAHDOLLISUUS VAIKUTTAA”. I am no language fascist, but don’t you also feel that thinking about people as having no other option to make a difference is a bit misguiding?