One nice thing of being a blogospheronaut is that it is easy for people to catch up with what I am doing, and that it is convenient keeping up with friends and acquaintances in some detail about their life, universe, work and experiences. This becomes especially interesting when they are doing really intriguing and interesting stuff like travelling to cool places. And I mean cool 🙂 .
I met Johan Ernst Nilson in a comfy hotel in Copenhagen. Next thing I heard about him was that he would climb the highest mountain on every continent. Seven Summits. Yep, some people really really have too much time ;-). And on the 16th of this month Johan was quietly blogging from the top of the Mount Everest, using his pda, an Anoto digital pen and a high-tech satellite phone with build-in Bluetooth wireless technology. Blogging on Mount Everest. That must be a world record Web 2.0 experience. A smack of people made it to the Everest top (the only reason for me not going is that it is too crowded ;-)), but admit, you do not see them blogging that often up there. So kudos for Johan Ernst Nilson and his team, and the wizards who got that wireless equipment and technology robust, trustworthy and easy-to-use enough to work in even the hardest conditions. See, it is harder to communicate using historic communication channels, like snail mail, pigeons, pony express or fax on Everest than it is to blog. I knew it, communication 3.0 rules. Hehe
Actually, there are a number of world-class climbers who are blogging about their experiences directly from the earth’s summits. For example, an Italian named Lorenzo Gariano is attempting to complete the Seven Summits this month, and is blogging about his trip up Mount Vinson Massif in Antartica. He has also blogged about his summits of Mount Everest and Carstensz Pyramid, using technology similar to Johan’s – a handheld computer, a satellite phone, and a digital camera. Lorenzo’s blog also includes podcasts, in both English and Italian.
http://7summits.open.ac.uk/vinson/sounds/list.php