NijFinster at Evoluon

Great, it's Friday. We're driving home on the motorway. Yesterday, the mobile Vodafone network was down completely, today the KPN-netwerk tries to do worse. Well, nice and quiet, no Friday afternoon emails to handle and I try not to think of twittering. With my SMS service I can tweet comments, in any case.
We got into the car Tuesday afternoon, on our way to the Domotica fair of the Dutch Smart Homes Foundation. A 260 kilometer drive to Eindhoven, to crew the stand of eHealth consultant NijFinster Inc.

Colour TV

Evoluon, from the forth inner ring. Picture by Gijs van Hesteren

That same Tuesday evening my wife Inge and me had erected the NijFinster stand, at the upper, fourth ring of this remarkable Evoluon building. Our actions had taken some patience and inventivity, because of the long lines waiting for the elevator and the complicated staircases. But I prefer to speak well of the building: when the Evoluon was still a technology museum in the sixties, it was there that Inge as well as I saw our first colour television set. And the kids were allowed to turn the dials, which was unique those days. Today, the Evoluon functions as a congress and exposition centre, nothing wrong with that.

Hotel
We spent three nights at the Eindhoven Sandton hotel, at recommendation by the Smart Homes Foundation. Nevertheless, the hotel pretended more than it could deliver. Our room was situated outside of the hotel. We could reach it only after walking along the street. The bathroom was rather smelly, I think something was wrong with the plumbing. There were some unexpected animals in the bathroom. When I tried to choose a breakfast table, a member of the crew snarled: "Other table!" Okay, okay, I'm leaving already. Anyway, the other crew members were all right. For the money charged the hotel was not up to its standards, I think. No second visit for me.

UFO
For two days we worked in the flying saucer. Hundreds of people walked past the NijFinster stand. The second day seemed busier than the first. Both days, the public
seemed very interested and knowledgeable. For me, this turned out to be a fine event. Al this talking got me a dry throat, but the catering service was as good as ever. Try that at any other fair!

Meetings
Nice, to have the stand of Sharecare near us. The owners of that company are old friends. Their concept of a virtual care community fits into the strategy of the North east Frisian region: innovative use of ICT, internet, social media, to improve the quality of living in rural areas. It would not surprise me if a web based application like this would be carried by our prototype videophones with touch screen.


Sharecare-owner Saskia Vermeulen explains to me her thoughts of our videophone with touch screen. Picture: Inge van Hesteren

A funny thing: I spoke to a Frisian guy who moved to work in the southern province of Noord-Brabant. Later on I met someone who was born and lives in Brabant - he wanted to move to Friesland very badly. The grass is always greener...

All on the wings of video communication and innovation. During the fair, I discussed intensely its ins and outs, I was brought to new ideas and received a lot of food for thought. Nevertheless, we can still be proud of what we have done recently with the NijFinster projects. For example with the screen-to-screen project of a hundred home care clients, or with the Spider Award nominated Virtual Policlinical diagnosis. at the Dokkum hospital De Sionsberg.