Read iAlja's writing - page 6

Common excuses for not talking to your customers — and how to get over them

As a startup founder, you know you should be talking to your customers more. Every startup book you’ve read is full of examples of how customer feedback has helped shape the products you now love using every day. You understand this on an intellectual level yet when it comes to actually getting o...

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The media is way more dangerous than Pokémon GO: musings on newsworthiness

# of TV interviews I gave in the last week about Pokémon GO: 3

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Why is Pokémon GO such a big hit NOW?

Pokémon GO probably needs little introduction. It’s a location-based AR game that is spreading around the world like wildfire. In less than a week, it managed to attract more active users than Tinder and is even surpassing Twitter in the US. The time spent in the app is off the charts, and it’s n...

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A week with 5 different personal trackers: how accurately do they count steps?

This is a questions I often hear when people find out that I wear a small army of personal trackers 24/7. And what’s the point of being a self-appointed guinea pig if you can’t do fun little experiments on your own quantified self, right?

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How do we go from sensors to making sense? (Part 3)

There is no escaping sensors that monitor your activity. They’re already in your smartphone and slowly taking over our buildings, cars and more. And there are countless apps that can help you monitor everything that isn’t already automatically tracked by your smartphone.

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The wearables and apps I use for self-tracking (Part 2 appendix)

As part of my quantified self series, I also wanted to share a list of tools that I’ve used for an extended period of time in the past couple of years to track my activity, sleep and more. I often get asked about differences among trackers and for buying recommendations, so I’ve also included a s...

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What has the quantified self helped me learn abut myself? (Part 2)

I know exactly how many steps I’ve taken in the past 938 days. And how many hours I’ve slept on each of those nights. If fact, I can compare measurements from multiple sources for a lot of these days, as I‘m currently wearing at least 3 personal trackers at all times (not counting my smartphone h...

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What is the quantified self? (Part 1)

Over the past two years I went from not wearing a watch to always wearing at least 3 (often more) personal trackers that monitor every step I take and every minute of my sleep. And that’s without counting all the apps on my phone.

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Lights on: 1 week and 3 events that filled me with hope

It’s Sunday. I finally got the chance to sleep in a bit. In just a week, I was lucky to participate in three amazing events that were started up by three amazing tech/startup communities. It’s probably not something that will be heavily featured in the news, what with the game of political throne...

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Europe Code Week: Why I want to see every European learn more about how technology works

At this year’s Digital Assembly, me and my fellow Neelie Kroes’ Young Advisors were challenged to pick a common theme to work on. One suggestion was to focus on providing every young European with opportunities to start learning coding. Out of this suggestion, Europe Code Week was born over summer.

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Safer internet forum: lessons learned and observations from an outsider

A while ago, I was invited to join the Safer Internet Forum as a speaker. Huh, me? I am aware of various safer internet initiatives aimed at children, but as I neither have kids nor work with kids, it’s not really something I think about often. Especially because I imagine I can keep myself relat...

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My grandma is now online

I spoke to my grandma over the phone yesterday. When I called, she was just “behind the computer”. I know she’s been taking a computer class at her local center for senior citizens for a while now. But I never expected her to show so much determination and to keep at it. Well, yesterday I was pro...

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