On 19^th of June I went to Stelea, Cetățuia, Nămăiești and Slănic Orthodox monasteries for a pilgrimage organized by Monica BRÂNDUȘESCU. See the poster of the pilgrimage.

Below you’ll find some photos I took and two videos that I’ve made.

2010.06.19 Orthodox monasteries – Stelea, Cetatuia, Namaiesti si Slanic (see in full-screen)

2010.06.19 St. James Catholic church in Câmpulung (see in full-screen)

2010.06.19 Photos with small animals (see in full-screen)

2010.06.19 Flowers at a pilgrimage (see in full-screen)

2010.06.19 Landscapes in Romania (see in full-screen)

Two videos that I’ve made:

I recently went to Bacău and Neamț counties. Below you’ll find some proof of this activity.

Some photos I’ve made:
(see fullscreen)

(see fullscreen)

And some videos:

First of all, to understand the problem, a photo generally has 1-3 MB right from the camera. Even if compressed to 80% quality JPEG at a maximum 1600 pixels resolution, the picture still has a few hundred kilobytes (the compressed folder had 350 Megabytes, quite big). The problem is, thus, uploading large amount of data to Facebook (it takes time).

But Facebook is different – it only allows you to put pictures with a width of 720 pixels, and a height of 720. Thus, all I had to do was doing a batch resize (I used Irfanview, but there are plenty of other options) of all the pictures, with a maximum resolution of 604×480. With some 80% JPEG compression, at the end I had this result:
1,000 photos with 58 Megabytes!

Thus, it was very easy to upload the photos – only 58 megabytes of data for 1,000 photos.

PS: If you don’t know how to batch resize photos using IrfanViews, see this tutorial.

Update: The old resolution of 604×480 has changed to 720×720. Cool.

Click Planners has a Facebook group and a web site. Here are some photos at the event:

Participants included: Ionut MUNTEANU, Romeo SEMENIUC, Mihai ANDREI, Sorin DRAGHICI (and me).

What I learned?
a. Click Planners (mostly via Google AdWords) belong to a community;
b. There are some hard-to-learn acronyms in the industry;
c. A good event requires a good strategy.

Here’s a link to the presentation held by Ionuţ MUNTEANU.

You can see another follow up on Click Planners blog.

A. Day 1

Some pictures:

Monica BRÂNDUŞESCU – event moderator
(HotNews.ro, Blog, LinkedIn, Twitter – protected)

George IVAŞCU – About the fear of being yourself
(Metropolis theater, Port.ro, Cinemagia)
- What’s the risk of technology? Solitude / alienation;
- I’m a failed physicist; My failure went into being an actor;
- life is like an electrocardiogram – it has lots of pulses, and, in the end, they’re the ones that matter most;
- a theory Alfred ADLER: man is born free;
- all our lives we find out about our limits – “You are not allowed to …”, “You shouldn’t …”, “You mustn’t …”;
- (a definition from a student of his) monologue is not what you say, but what you can’t hold within you anymore;
- Our focus should be on:
a. What? Why? – the subject, rather than on:
b. How? – the method for getting to the subject;
- strength comes from being you, rather than wearing masks;
- we are the fruits of our own thoughts;
- there few major events in your life;
- What is art? To enrich the beauty in yourself;
- love is not chemistry, it is alchemy, it transforms you; sure, there is some chemistry too, but you should focus on the alchemy;
- acting with power is a different thing than acting with force;
- E = m*c² in real life is translated into: m = our bodies; 1^st c = our heart; 2^nd c = our mind;
- (citation) actors are sculptors in snow;
- for one year he has seen classes from other teachers, only after this he taught;
- there are two ways to reference to the world:
a. Egocentric – everything is done from you;
b. Institution – you are an NGO into a capitalist world;
- all our lives we are children; we need stories; Pro TV won audiences because it told stories;
- I can’t give advices, I can only tell you that I do this or I don’t do this;
- Not having enough money? That’s good!
- today we try to build capitalism with communist tools;
- we have forgotten the meaning of words; we communicate with expressions;
- equilibrium is the key to harmony;
- any kind of excess leads to problems;
- I watch these on TV:
a. News;
b. Discovery channel, History Channel; I think their ratings are increasing;
- a current trend in Romania is soap opera – Why? Because it tells you a story (no comment on the quality of this);
- an actor has the ability of being a permanent child;
- there is no such thing as “You must do …”;
- invitation to Metropolis Theater;
- there are no ugly or beautiful persons; it’s all on how you imagine things; our imagination is very active;
- try to make fun of bad things to overcome obstacles;
- a role has, at its roots, a meaning of vocation / aim – these are more important;
- a character is a mask / a form;
- a person dies when no one speaks about him;
- Romanians still tend to buy, rather than invest;
- (quote) Follow your dream!

Irina WAGNER – The story of the passion for art transformed into a success brand: Wagner – beautiful arts and fairytales
(Wagner Arte, LinkedIn, Facebook)
- it’s great to be very good into your own field;
- although there is a general image we have about our client, the people that usually buy from our store are very different;
- there is little competition in our field;
- branding helped our business a lot;

Radu TUDORACHE- Investment into spirituality
(Montero, Money Express interview)
- I went to a College of Mathematics;
- “Each day we must be able to conquer the ideal” (Arsenie PAPACIOC);
- spirituality is something practical;
- personal development is done through other people;
- it’s impossible to change the population as a whole;
- there are four levels into someone’s life (like a pyramid):
a. Spiritual;
b. Rational;
c. Psychological;
d. Physical;
- on the physical level, there are:
a. fasting;
b. some form of prayers;
c. positions during the church services;
d. pilgrimages;
- Way of St. James is the pilgrimage to the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, Spain;
- on the psychological level:
a. Having a confessor:
i. as a partner in life;
ii. Giving psychological advices;
iii. Knowing the personal / family history;
b. integrating into community;
- there are some very good monasteries in the North of Oltenia: Frăsinei, Bistriţa, Dintr-un Lemn, Iezer, Pătrunsa;
- on a rational level:
a. reading the Church Fathers implies using the mind;
b. recommended reading: Mistagogia by Saint Maxim the Confessor;
c. Gregory the Dialogist has some very good writings: The Rule for Pastors;
- on the spiritual level:
a. Regular praying;
b. Praying whenever necessary;
c. The Seven Sacraments, around which life is centered;
d. Communion with the saints;

Monica TATOIU – Consistency – the enemy of failure
(Oriflame, CV , video interview on Capital)
- I always feel the need to provide examples to what I’m saying;
- when you make a choice, you also assume the responsibilities that derive from it, not only the rights;
- extra authority and rules are not a solution for a better society;
- you have to determine your competitive advantage;
- How can one do personal development?
a. Readings;
b. Being informed also about the fields that you don’t value as much;
- in life you don’t necessarily do the things that you like;
- life is hard;
- you can develop competency by working, not by studying things at school;
- the job for which you prepare in school is not really the job that you’ll end up doing;
- NGOs are launching pads for wise guys; NGOs do great in the US, not that good in Romania;
- you should first focus on your own development, only after this you should care about the persons around you;
- Five life principles:
a. Knowledge doesn’t mean information; the Internet is the biggest weapon through which the new generation is being brainwashed; knowledge is a state, while information is sequential;
b. You should be consistent in winning competencies;
c. You should have convergence – focus on one direction only;
d. Family is important; marriage is a bilateral partnership with rights and obligation and force majeure; The role of the family? To transmit to the new generations the values of the society that generated that family;
e. Belief in a spirit;
- next year, starting with January, the economy will be awful;
- Why should you work in a multinational company?
a. Very clear rules;
b. It is a very large organization;
c. There is a procedures’ manual;
d. There are financial reporting systems;
e. Flowcharts? Yes!
- if you join a certain system, you will learn very good procedures;
- there are bits & pieces you can only appreciate in a multinational company;
- in December 2009 the expenses for Christmas, the bad weather of the winter of 2009-2010 and the end of elections will cause large layoffs in the State system; Why? IMF (International Monetary Fund);
- recommended reading: “Ada or Ardor: a family chronicle” by Vladimir NABOKOV;
- recommended reading: “Clair de femme” by Romain GARY;

Delia BURNHAM – Authenticity and honesty – the secret to professional fulfillment
(CVO Recruitment, LinkedIn)
- I run CVO Recruitment Romania;
- we do specialized recruitment services;
- Why am I in Romania? I wanted to experience another culture;
- the CV (Curriculum Vitae) is not the only thing that matters;
- When you write a CV, you should take into account:
a. Relevancy to the job;
b. Write it correctly;
c. Think of it this way: “What does my CV says about me?”;
- Two types of CVs:
a. General CV;
b. A CV custom made for a job;
- the work experience itself is more important than volunteering;
- Romanian hasn’t yet seen the worst part of the crisis;
- How can you find out things about a company prior to getting hired in there:
a. Ask the recruiting company;
b. Talk to present day employers within the company;
c. Search the Net;
d. Ask some friends (with caution, due to the fact that they’ll emphasis only certain aspects);
e. Read / search the press (but filter the information well);
f. (my suggestion) DespreFirme.com;
- at the interview, top questions should include clarification on the job itself;
- a thing that matters a lot is what you want for yourself;
- unforgivable errors: orthography errors in official documents (not only CVs);
- What’s the process of hiring someone?
a. Long list of candidates;
b. CV filtering;
c. Phone interviews;
d. Face-to-face interviews;
e. Short list for clients;
f. Company interviews (from one to five);
- interviews are crucial to the selection process;
- ideally, employers wouldn’t need to pose trick questions, they are to be avoided;
- you should study things for your own pleasure, but you should pick with great care the value of the things you learn;
- about Master Degrees, think about it this way:
a. Do they bring real value?
b. Is it only a diploma?
- if you wish to get a job to McKinsey Europe, you’d better have an MBA;
- still, there are jobs with flexible approaches;
- what you mostly need in a CV: good job performance;
- rather than doing an MBA, you should consider reading books; still, if you find an MBA with good value – you should take classes at that MBA;
- more important than the knowledge is what you can prove you can do;
- the approach theory – work experience is different now in Romania, but in time this will change;
- recruiting managers may not have the time to see hundred of applications; Reason for this:
a. It’s a crisis, little time for recruiting;
b. A lot of employees randomly apply to a lot of jobs; (and there is a correlation between a. and b.)
- It’s very appropriate to have a direct approach:
a. You should contact the companies;
b. Contact employers on social networks;
c. Directly contact the recruiters – HR (human resources) managers;
d. For a small company, you could even contact the general manager;
- some major multinational companies may have rigid procedures into recruiting;
- there are also companies that don’t appreciate the direct approach;
- Regarding asking for a salary at the interview:
a. Try to be as informed as possible about the salary range for your position;
b. If there is a new field and you don’t know the salaries, you should tell the truth: “I don’t know how much to ask”;
- There are differences between:
a. Large multinational companies (they generally have salary ranges);
b. Small companies (very flexible, but you will have problems asking for salaries much higher than those of the rest of the team);
- if, at an interview, you have a physical problem (you feel sick), you should state that and maybe ask for a second interview;
- it’s important to have a relaxed attitude at an interview;
- it’s great to know yourself – what you like about life, what you do with passion, what you’re good at;
- You’re a company, a freelancer, an artist? That’s fine! Just be authentic; (very difficult to do)
- 75% of the time at work you should be happy;

Daniela FUGARU-KAMMRATH – Be your dream!
(121.ro, Radio Lynx, Green Report interview, LinkedIn)
- what motivates you in life?
- a lot of the questions that seem to have no answer, in reality they do have an answer, we’re just afraid to express it;
- These are permanent questions:
a. Who are you really?
b. What do you want to do?
- A SWOT analysis for a personal brand:
a. Helps you see yourself in the mirror;
b. Makes you see the details of yourself, to know yourself better;
- it’s important to analyze yourself, to know what you wish for;
- it’s hard being authentic – ask your best friend for feed-back (he knows he won’t jeopardize your friendship by telling the truth);
- Cinderella had a personal coach;
- we are more scared of speaking in public than we are of death;
- a brand (iPod) is more than a product (generic mp3 player);
- if you build a certain image, you attract certain persons to you;
- any construction, with time, becomes a brand;
- the people around you see you as a brand;
- it’s very important to choose what you know consolidates you as a brand;
- when you make a choice (not decision, choice has a motive) stop making that choice again and again – this is madness;
- a choice defines you as a person;
- it’s important to know you tried;
- recommended reading: “Blue Ocean strategy” by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne;
- you can defy the system when:
a. You know who you are;
b. You trust yourself;
- money stops you from making choices and makes you pick a certain road in life;
- money is one mean by which you can get where you want to get;

B. Day 2

Some pictures:

Florin GLINŢA and Anda MARIAN – Career decision: emotional choice or fulfilling your own potential
(Talentgate.ro, blog, LinkedIn, Facebook, LinkedIn, Ziarul Financiar)
- great place to find a career profile – Talentgate.ro;
- career is strongly related to motivation;

Alexandru CIOCHIA – Is your dream effective?
(Radio Lynx, LinkedIn, blog, Facebook)
- people help you, you can receive a lot of support;

Andrei POPESCU – We and the community!
(HotNews.ro)
- when you want to do something with your life, you are not alone;

Doina RUŞTI – The right decision
(website, Wikipedia, Librarie.net, Ziarul Financiar)
- most people come to conferences to speak, not only to listen;
- when you make a decision, there are a lot of factors (communication, diversity, things to be done) that influence that decision; Therefore, the society around you makes that decision;
- recommended reading: “Les chemins de la persuasion: le mode d’influence des media et de la publicite sur les comportements” – Jean-Noel KAPFERER;
- right now you have the option to place yourself right on the line between two fields, you can postpone the final decision for later on;
- good school: College of Anthropology;
- good school: College of Language (a mix between Mathematics and Letters);
- There are specializations that allow you to:
a. Get rid of society’s prejudices;
b. Take into account these prejudices;
- you should take a decision based on your talent; Any human being has this talent;
- in our genetic pool there are things that someone is gifted to do;
- there are things which you do well, even if you don’t like them that much;
- Based on your talent:
a. Decisions are being built;
b. Your future life is being built;
- if you are successful in one field, and you switch to any other field, you can apply the learned skills from the first field;
- great people in one field only do the thing at which they are professionals;
- What’s important to find out? The small thing, very pragmatic, abilities you can use in your future job; example: being an expert at chopping vegetables, both with speed ant patience; this mix can be easily be transferred into writing books; after finding those small things, you can apply those abilities in other fields;
- When do you take a good decision? When you have a problem;
- in theater you can make all the possible experiments; I recommend this education of emotions, if you have communication difficulties;
- if you look for a solution to a problem, it doesn’t even matter if you succeed right from the start; experimenting in great!
- try to experiment first of all;
- don’t wait for someone to notice you, you should take action;
- any decision you take, it’s a good one;
- a decision implies diversity;
- decisions require a major talent and they are contexts that mean you can take into account prejudices;
- Decisions take into account:
a. Knowing yourself;
b. Knowing the future;
- the most important decision is related to the future job;
- decisions are related to a plan; (make one)
- being persistent is the most dreadful enemy of someone who picks his path in life;
- persistence kills the beautiful essence of life;
- by being persistent, nothing of what you do until the end gives you satisfaction;
- you don’t have to be persistent if you’re not good enough;
- symbols are connected to the education (you can’t be connected to a symbolic area to which you have never been connected to);
- all of the symbols come from education;
- there is a basic character in you, no matter how much you try to model yourself; there are native predispositions;
- when you take a decision, each time you know you’ve either taken a good or a bad decision;
- Constantin BRÂNCUŞI said (of his master) that he was a tree in the shadow of which no grass would grow;
- you shouldn’t remain in one activity in which you are even 10% unhappy;
- the only decision/thing that matters in life – having no master; (entrepreneur)
- you should get jobs in as many workplaces as possible;
- learn as much as you can;
- the way in which a job system works within a company – same for all companies;
- you should do a lot of things, in order to learn what you can do very well;

Lia PERJOVSCHI – Free talk around the vocational theme subject
(News in Gândul, 9AM, ICR)
- How do you choose two colors? Generally speaking:
a. The first option is a cultural one;
b. The second option is a personal one;
- it’s good to have two career plans – A and B; optimal would mean having them from A to Z;
- when you accumulate information, you have multiple options;
- art is a great option, if you wish to avoid having rules;
- nothing is easy in life;
- what comes easy in life has a price – you are losing yourself;
- if nothing is easy, you should at least do something you like, it will make it appear easier;
- people don’t have bad intentions, but they can be very little interested in you;
- it is important to be a fighter until the end; equally important is to change yourself constantly;
- you should have an overview of the world you live in;
- It is important:
a. Where do you live;
b. What happens;
c. To know yourself;
- learning never stops;
- each person is important;
- children live in an environment without masks, relaxed, like a pleasant game;
- In order to have a fresh mind, you need:
a. A lot of thinking;
b. Action; (and some equilibrium between the two)
- if you are calm and equilibrated, everything seems to make some sounds around you;
- a mistake in the educational system – we learn rules that are not valid;
- you can do art in lots of ways:
a. Painting / sculpting / etc. – yourself;
b. Buying and selling art;
c. Making theories (writing about art);
d. Organizing events (expositions for example);
- at a very big art exposition, a cook brought a creation – he was an artist;
- I don’t believe in:
a. Bloody revolutions;
b. Provocation of the masses; (even if it is for a good cause, it involves manipulation, and I hate this; I only appreciate the people that think);
- I want to do something? I do some searching! (and from this a career might evolve) From searching, research ma result; From this you can write a book;
- while I was a teenager, I wanted to change the world;
- if something doesn’t work, you should leave it aside;
- our mind has formed some basic patterns while we were teenagers;
- if you are curious enough, you will find answers;
- Monica BRÂNDUŞESCU: if you do your job with a clear conscience, if you give 100%, you will find allies;
- we are forced, for ourselves, to give what we can from ourselves;
- we never lose the information we learn from life;
- (quote) “In the next life I would like to be a rock, so that I will be calmer”;
- we know little not only about the Universe, but also about the small stuff;

Alexandru CIUCU – The influence of family tradition in choosing the career
(Website, Wall Street interview, Facebook)
- There have always been these two things in my life:
a. Costumes;
b. APACA (in Romanian Atelierele Publice Autonome de Confecţii ale Armatei; English – Public autonom ateliers for confections of the army);
- If you work with your relatives, you know:
a. They are very unlikely to steal from you;
b. Even if they do steal from you, you are not sorry about this;
- a downside of mixing family with business – when you come from a club at 2 AM, and the next day you are not fresh at work at 8 AM, some problems might appear;
- in any business you do, you should check if:
a. People understand what needs to be done;
b. Things work great by themselves;
- in taxis as a business, in Romania, beating is often a motivation (you will get beaten if you do some bad things);
- in one business of mine I had this problem: I couldn’t control all the taxis;
- in 1997 there was no Romanian brand regarding costumes;
- in the business world it’s great to have a brand name;
- those who buy a product and assimilate a brand gather experiences (positive, hopefully);
- Samric is one of our business with good and not-so-expensive clothing;
- as a personal observation, generally speaking the things for which you work a lot and have a good quality are cheaper;
- Why are we a good brand?
a. It’s a niche brand;
b. We are one of the few who do clothing by order;
c. Good PR (Public Relations);
- business lesson: you do best what you know to do well;
- a brand must always have the same quality; it’s a very bad business if you do things sometimes excellent, and sometimes poorly
- when your clothing is presented at a fashion presentation, you must come either with something extraordinary, or with something innovative (colors, matching accessories);
- custom made classical costumes have the great advantage of details;
- I’m very interested into people liking what I do;
- I prefer people to see me as a friend, not necessarily see me on a pedestal;

Sandra ECOBESCU – How to chose a vocation with your soul and how to do your job as good as possible with your mind?
(yes, finally a long title!) (Evenimentul Zilei and RRI interviews)
- For the major choice in life and career, you should pick with your soul, not:
a. Think too much on it;
b. Follow the family’s tradition;
c. Be guided by the financial aspects of the decision;
d. Go with career patterns;
- Why is the Faculty of Letters beautiful?
a. There are interesting and smart people as students and teachers;
b. A lot of opportunities arise;
- in Greece, half the time there were strikes;
- Why do people working in multinational companies spend money? Because they don’t have time for themselves and they wish to compensate somehow;
- if you do work for a few years into a corporation, you learn how the world functions;
- in big companies you learn mechanisms that you can apply in your own company;
- we have not been thought to discover talents (parents & schools don’t help either);
- one of the biggest qualities a man can have – common sense and politeness;
- joy is a real thing; Happiness? Not that sure it exits;
- Monica BRÂNDUŞESCU: passion is contagious;
- if you are under a lot of stress, you need new things;
- No stress? You need little things;

Cătălin MITULESCU – creativity and involvement in cinema production
(Wikipedia, Mediafax interview, CV, IMDb)
- I had a lot of jobs until now;
- it’s important to have various experiences, to try new things, but you also need the relaxation to be able to give up;
- you can have the adventure to try all sort of new things;
- What is a film-maker? It is a person who likes:
a. To tell a story;
b. To see the reaction of the people around him to his stories;
c. Listening stories is also fine;
- What is a producer? Someone who:
a. Listens to a story / reads a story / sees someone telling a story / reads a book / sees a story on the street and …
b. Wants to share the story with others;
- there are many roles in a filming team, you can do a lot of things;
- What is being superficial? To think about this;
- I dislike culture of a certain level, seeing things from above;
- no one from the new wave of directors would have existed without the Cannes Festival, even if it can be a bit superficial;
- I had great satisfactions from:
a. Going from script writer to director;
b. Events as a director;
- in the fashion industry you can enter a sort of prison as a model;
- maneaua is a phenomenon strictly related to creating things (and then selling them);
- sometimes manele singers are authentic;
- listening to a few songs doesn’t transform you into a listener of that kind of music; (doesn’t give you a label)
- my job can get you closer to the things that interest you;
- I like knowing, seeing challenges and problems;
- filming is often mixed with life – you don’t really know the exact boundaries;
- I don’t have a TV and don’t like TVs;
- the first movies you make (no matter if you make them as a director or as a producer), stick to your head;
- in the past it was very easy to meet with someone and see a movie; nowadays, problems arise – “I don’t like that movie, let’s not watch it”;
- I liked best producing the Ryna (2005) movie;
- Romanian audience is very demanding:
a. They feel when you are not natural;
b. They feel when you are exaggerating things;
- in the end, a movie is a show;
- you have to like movies in order to make them;
- with time, people tend to think in patterns, a sort of sclerosis, a lot of clichés;
- there are some people who wish for lesser pessimistic movies about Romania;
- There are two things when doing a movie:
a. What I say? (the story is important)
b. How I say it? (the method of saying this) – nowadays, this approach is more important;
- you can have many stories, but you have to have the ability to transmit them;
- It can happen to you:
a. Have no inspiration at all (blank mind);
b. Have contradictory ideas (think of the two opposite scenarios; which one to choose?);
- in order to create something, you have to help your mind with a concrete thing around you;
- there were some film makers in Romania who had problems with the sound and image in some Romanian movies;

Mihai IORDACHE – Life as a journey
(Punctulzero, Pathzero, Facebook)
- in some Asian countries, you can talk from man to man, or from man to a family; talking from one man to one woman is tricky;
- generally speaking, there are cases in which a woman can’t talk with a man who is not a 1^st degree relative;
- we should have no hobbies, in everything that we do we should have the same passion as a hobby;
- There should be a congruency, as a whole, between:
a. Myself, as a human being;
b. Thoughts;
c. Words;
d. Actions;
(going from c. to d. is mostly shaped by education; The rest? More complicated)

C. Thoughts

What have other written about the event?
See messages by: Mihail MUŞAT, Cătălina MURARIU, AEGEE Bucureşti, Florin GLINŢA.

What speakers I liked best?
1. George IVAŞCU – great use of case studies, examples; and, my oh my, so entertaining;
2. Doina RUŞTI – the way in which she played with ideas, the way in which she thought about the world – oh, so great;
3. Alexandru CIUCU – I like him; he’s funny;
(honorable mention): Mihai IORDACHE – for perfect use of you-re-not-here-only-to-listen-you-re-here-to-get-involved techniques;
If you look at the list above, you see that George IVAŞCU did a lot of theater, Doina RUŞTI and Mihai IORDACHE only for some time, while Alexandru CIUCU once dreamed about being an actor; oh, that’s too much for me to bear, I must see what’s so cool about being an actor; Theatrical (amateur) companies of Romania, here I come!

What I took home?
(besides a nice diploma and a hard-anchored into reality symbolic gift)
i. George IVAŞCU said this
“the focus should be on:
a. What? Why? – the subject, rather than on:
b. How? – the method for getting to the subject;”
What I understood from this – focus also on How?, not only on What?; I think the “how?” idea is not as developed on me; yes, you’re right, he said exactly the opposite;
ii. Monica TATOIU said: “in life you don’t necessarily do the things that you like”, and this translates into “avoid eating sweets”;
iii. Doina RUŞTI said: “in theater you can make all the possible experiments; I recommend this education of emotions, if you have communication difficulties;”
I intend to follow her advice;

Some final thoughts on the conference
1. Some speakers were wonderful, some speakers were great; No speaker was bad;
2. I learned a lot both from the content (the ideas that were flying in the air) and from the atmosphere (the way in which things were said);
3. Networking? I had the pleasure of meeting very nice, interesting and kind people;
4. Speakers went home with a small gift; I’ve only seen such a behavior at a HR Club conference;
5. The usual stuff (promoting the conference, catering, schedule keeping, having a good location, asking for feedback afterward, providing a follow-up, creating an online community with the participants) went also fine.

____________
Bottom line: one of the best two-days conference I’ve ever seen.

What did I learn at the conference?

Note: WP = WordPress; CMS = content management system;
Most of the links lead to Romanian pages, sorry about that;

Day 1 (see the pictures I made for day 1)

Nikolay BACHIYSKI: News about WP
(video I made) (see his presentation online)
- words to describe WP: power, freedom, confusion, income, ladies, gentlemen;
- WP is more of a cultural thing, rather than a software thing;
- WP project started due to sharing;
- WP has a GPL (General Public License);
- sharing has become an integral part of WP community;
- there was a community pressure on WP;
- everyone can make a piece of software, but it is the sharing of contributors that gives WP power;
- Wordcamps are an excellent method of sharing knowledge;
- through sharing, even if you give some of your time away, you will learn more things; you may even give yourself a bigger gift than to others;

On WP MU:
- MU = Multi User;
- for blog hosting
- totally open source;

BuddyPress – a social network in a box;

bbPress – forums in WP style;

Backpress – management of software projects (web based);

P2 – when you write something on the blog, it appears in real time (instant blogging);

WP 2.9:
- will allow moving to trash (instead of instant and permanent deleting);
- in the future:
a. better documentation (hand books);
b. photo albums;
c. will try to be a good framework for more development of features;

Lorand MINYO: Hosting for blogs
(video I made) (and another video) (see his presentation online)
- Orădeanul (the blogger from Oradea) should have held this presentation;
- Webfactor hosts a lot of blogs, even some from Top 10 ZeList;
- WP is of great help to hosting providers;
- Cabral shared his user and password in public;
- a lot of people hacked his blog;
- WP is scalable;
- are there problems with updating WP? Solution: the hosting provider should do the update;
- for very popular bloggers there are problems on things such as: hacking, flooding (database interrogations);
- one year ago, less than 1% of web sites used WP as a CMS, now it’s about 40%; most surprisingly – this applies not only to individuals, but to companies (using WP as a CMS);
- what do bloggers want: uptime, performance, scalability, low costs; yes, all four in the same time would be great;
- you shouldn’t use poor plugins;
- you should update WP CMS as soon as possible;
- avoid using WP hacks;
- types of hosting:
a. shared hosting;
b. VPS;
c. dedicated hosting;
- caching data? Perfect solution;

Alexandru NEGREA: How to choose a WP theme?
(video I made) (see his presentation online) (see the author’s thoughts on the event)
- there are a few types of themes:
a. Free themes;
b. Paid themes, but with author rights (links in footer, for example);
c. Paid themes, made exclusively for one blog (no links in footer) – not recommended if you don’t blog professionally;
- for the free themes:
a. there is not a readme.txt (how do I change a picture in the theme?);
b. free themes? Not recommended by Alexandru NEGREA;
c. You usually can’t find a perfect theme;
- today’s free themes are not really that good (design, programming, support);
- premium themes with author rights (links in footer) are an excellent option for users;
- recommended web site: ElegantThemes.com;
- any blogger should have a PayPal account;
- TemplateMonster.com has great options for buying themes: unique themes (expensive) and generic themes (much cheaper);
- the classical WP theme has no appeal;
- do you have a niche blog? You need a clear visual identity;
- own a personal blog? Your blog needs personality / identity;
- a paid theme has a better structure of information;
- green and orange, used for communication purposes, are very effective colors; (they suggest a call-to-action)
- SmashingMagazine.com – great place to look for themes;
- on a side note, don’t search on Google, it tends to provide results which lack value added; Solution? Search on Twitter;
- Alex BUGA sold his blog theme to a museum; the best WP theme in Romania?
- it’s perfectly fine to start designing a theme from the default theme;
- there is a WP plugin that makes a WP theme look great on mobile phones, also;

Andrei ROŞCA: Team blogging
(video I made) (see his presentation online) (his own blog post on the presentation)
- you should take community very seriously;
- team blogs and niche blogs may be more valuable than a personal weblog;
- this is a great world (nice blogs and Web 2.0 are based on this) – but all these require a community:
a. open society;
b. unrestricted access to knowledge;
c. unplanned and uninhibited association of men for its furtherance;
- in order to make money from blogging, you have to have good quality publishing;
- it will be very hard to make money from a blog if you’re alone;
- there is a book exchange initiated by BookBlog in a lot of counties;
- from many perspectives, an online business is similar to an offline one;
- what would the value of BookBlog be? A blog with a similar content, with no team, with no board, could cost from 80,000 EUR;
- the price for a paid book review on BookBlog is 80 RON (this is the amount authors receive);
- types of incomes for BookBlog:
a. advertorials;
b. RSS advertising;
c. banners;
d. paid book reviews;
- (gotta love this) efficiency means doing things with a good result (good performance), while efficacy means doing the right things;
- you shouldn’t tell your team about money; it’s all about goals, and values, and dreams and future;
- it’s great to have offline meetings for online teams; you can’t force people to be friends, you can only provide a context;

Cristina ANDREI: SEO vs. Copywriting
(see her presentation online)
- normally, you shouldn’t have to pick between SEO or copywriting, they should coexist;
- copywriting is a persuasive text (used not only for banners and ads) that should convince readers to read the text (i.) and forward it (ii.);
- in the Romanian blogosphere there are some misconceptions:
a. Keyword stuffing (in titles, meta description, h1, ALT, link title) is fine;
b. Link exchange;
c. SPAM comments;
- you should comment on blogs with relevant ideas, rather than spamming with comments;
- how to promote a blog post? Twitter, ProBlogger, FTW;
- recommended plugin: All in One SEO pack;

Costin COCIOABĂ: Niche blogs
(video I made) (see his presentation online) (thoughts on this)
- journalists, TV stars, singers, even responsibility actions – they are the ones with the most traffic on ZeList;
- magazine styles WP themes – make a blog similar to a big publisher;
- a niche blog can attract the right audience;
- when you have a blog, you’re actually a publisher;
- in Romania there are not good niche blogs: auto, finance, etc.;
- tips on making money out of a blog: RSS advertising and affiliate marketing;
- if you want to become a successful publisher, you have to be informed;
- niche blogging require permanent testing;
- there was no plan behind refresh.ro;
- main communication theme for refersh.ro – objective communication;
- you should use tags on your blog – mostly for people and actions;
- motivations based on money are not that important;

Day 2 (see the pictures I made for day 2)

WP Themes
Pavel CIORICI
(video I made) (see his presentation online)
- I can’t work 10 hours a day for a theme, so in two weeks time I can do a WP theme for scratch;
- there is an open forum with help for themes; We answer 2-3 times per day to the topics;
- the reason our themes are bought is mostly customer support, but also the unique design (the theme won’t be common on other web sites) and functionality;
- IE (Internet Explorer) 6 has some rendering problems with themes;
- we offer 25% commission to our affiliates; there are 300+ other blogs that mention our new themes; the affiliate system is very good for us;

Alexandru NEGREA
(video I made) (see the author’s thoughts on the event)
- it’s a great thing to be able to live out of selling themes;
- freelancing may be a good method of doing things;

Răzvan TÎRBOACĂ
(video I made) (author thoughts)
- Strategic web site needed a CMS;
- we tested Drupal, Joomla! and WP as CMS; WP was best;
- the main requirement was ease of use to non-technical users; this should also be the USP (Unique Selling Proposition) of WP in front of other CMS;
- clients need specific solutions from WP, and this is the thing you should sell;
- WP is free and it’s not fair to ask for money for it; Instead, custom services are great;
- you should sell WP as a CMS, rather than as a blog;
- case studies are great solution when selling something;
- you should use tags a lot;
- web site architecture should be incorporated into design, rather than programming;
- a web 2.0 approach – using tools from other providers;
- rather than selling WP installing (done easily), you should sell custom themes and programming;
- put some emphasis on hosting and security;
- when asked for supplemental security, you should require an extra payment and provide hosting with firewall, for example;
- on a side note, it may be fine to start a company in Cyprus, due to fiscal laws in that state;

WP Development & Plugins
Cristi BURCĂ
(video I made) (see his presentation online) (thoughts)
- taxonomy is a way of classifying things (both blog posts and blog pages); it refers to making some compartments for easy finding of information later on;
- in WP there are two types of predefined taxonomies: categories and tags;
- in WP you can have multiple set of tags;
- for advanced use of WP as CMS you can use advanced taxonomies; there are plugins dedicated to that;
- the permalinks look great on taxonomies;
- taxonomies are nicely stored in WP database;

Dan ŞTEFANCU
(video I made) (idea 1 , idea 2)
- custom fields are not that complicated;
- custom fields are neither tags nor categories;
- instead they are additional fields used for adding extra information;
- for a real estate web site, you can add custom fields with information about each property;
- you can adapt the WP dashboard to use your very own custom fields;
- custom fields are easy to use, a lot of them can be added to any post, they are store in a personalized way, they can be shown everywhere (even in feeds);

Alex MIHĂILEANU
(video I made) (see his presentation online) (his own message on the blog)
- you should give your themes an easy design and coding;
- coding things in a good manner right from the start means less work later on;
- less plugins? Great! Lesser server load;
- Piticu has a slow server due to a widget in the sidebar;
- you can edit the plugins to get only the code you need it;
- WP is so easy, anyone could learn how to use it;

Ciprian TURCU
(video I made) (see his presentation online) (blog message)
- WP recently hit 50 million downloads recently;
- WP is an extraordinary environment for designing web sites;
- if you have knowledge with PHP, MySQL, CSS, HTML, you will have an easy life with WP;
- when designing plugins, there are ways to call already written functions (hooks) for a lot of things;
- there are a lot of plugins only compatible with early versions of WP – this is a problem, but also an opportunity (you can do an updated version of an old plugin);
- when working at a plugin, you should take into account name functions – giving original names for functions (FTest48Original3name), rather than generic ones (FunctionName) would help prevent compatibility problems;
- there might be version problems with other plugins or with WP;
- a lot of plugins might encounter problems with design – there are differences in the CSS of the blogs, sidebar width, things of this sort;
- there is little feed-back to plugins – why someone uses a plugin? It’s not that easy to register at WP, creating an account, posting a question; you can’t post anonymous comments and feed-back;

Călin DON: WP MU
(video I made) (see his presentation online) (see more about Călin DON) (see a blog post on this)
- initial server configuration (1+ year old) held 10 active blogs: 196 MB RAM, Apache server, PHP Fast CGI configured;
- current configuration includes 1.2 GB of RAM, nginx, PHP FPM;
- the current configuration requires few RAM (8 MB of RAM can process 1.000 queries);
- some requests can be processed via a caching system;
- you can send files in accelerated method (they are sent automated by the web server);
- PHP FPM (PHP’s Fascia) works as an application server (you can separate the web server from WP); it allows running process with different rights (per blog for instance);
- we try to fully use the system resources of the server;
- recommended plugin: WP Super Cache; you can run up to 30 times more requests from the server;
- we also use APC;
- we started the blogging platform as one made for our friends; when the user count become too large, we installed WP MU;
- our current version, we have a svn-core (for WP installation), svn-plugins (WP plugins), svn-mu-plugins (plugins specific for WP MU), svn-themes (the themes users can pick);

Managers blogs
Mircea SCĂRLĂTESCU
(video I made) (see his presentation online) (thoughts 1 & thoughts 2)
- in 2006 I started reading some blogs I liked; I liked Zoso’s blog; I had only a few posts;
- in 2007 I started writing more for the business area;
- June 1^st 2007 gives the first link from Orlando NICOARA;
- on August 1^st 2007 I got on a first fight with Zoso;
- today I have a big influence, and not that great traffic;
- I earned no money from blogging;
- personal branding might be a very good reason to start a blog; it’s one good reason to start a blog;
- most of the money in blogging will come from the networking starting from the blogging;
- it’s very cheap to get press coverage via a blog that has a good readership;
- you can easily be taken into account by important players in the online world;
- blogs can make relations between humans more personal;
- competition will also take a look on your blog;

Bogdan Theodor OLTEANU
(video I made) (see his presentation online) (blog post)
- why blog?
a. experimenting social media
b. know online people;
c. learn communication techniques;
d. an extend pool for recruiting;
- in PR (Public Relations) it is important to have a good team;
- choosing WP as a blogging platform was the decision of an IT person;
- via social media you can transmit information about the company team, team culture and managing style;
- thousand of potential employees have social media accounts; you can see a person’s behavior online;
- in five years time, PR might move online;
- there is no such thing as total sincerity, neither online nor offline;
- if you are realist, you realize there are masks that people wear;
- especially multinational companies use social media, mostly due to an overall direction given by mother companies;

Radu GEORGESCU
(video I made)
- Adriana IORDAN said that there are things to be said on a blog; they belong neither in a personal blog, nor in a company blog;
- in Romania it would be useful to have a community of IP (Intellectual Property);
- IP is a business with exponential growth, compared to the invested resources;
- in software development, internet dot com portals, social media – after an initial investment, it is very easy to grow;
- in Romania there are three examples of successful companies which are frequently provided: BitDefender, Softpedia, GeCad; but the list is much longer;
- online advertising in Romania? It had a premature death, perhaps it even didn’t start;
- ideally, you should find another way of monetizing the blog, rather than by advertising;
- blog to read: Marriott on the Move – Bill Marriott‘s Blog;

Company blogs
Silviu TOMA
(video I made)
- you can’t really tell what would be people’s reaction prior to launching a blog;
- a good approach to negative comments would be solving the presented issues;
- it would be useful for a whole team to be present on a company blog;
- campaign – “Write something so that you will receive a book”; main idea – promote Nemira’s values; the campaign helped raising awareness of the blog; in 3 months a community of both commentators and bloggers was created;
- prior to starting a blog, you should create a good atmosphere in the company regarding blogging itself;

Daniela DUMITRICĂ
- Paralela 45 worked hard for a new blog;

Adriana IORDAN
(video I made)
- how can you attract with your marketing campaigns the trust of some companies? Tricky question; Another one: how can you promote the implementation of an IT solution in a company?
- Avangate offers software vendors an eCommerce platform;
- GECAD ePayment is an online payment solution;
- on the international market there was a lot of competition;
- how to promote a business solution? Become an expert in your niche; the expertise of someone can be easily spotted;
- we did some SEO for keywords;
- our focus was content marketing;
- we identified online communities that could help promoting our business;
- after a good online presence, we found good ideas about some blog articles to create;
- cool blog: MyAdobe; Also Balsamiq Blog;

Other readings

About this event others have written:
Dupa bloguri, Ziua Constanta, Mihai IRINEL, Cod Rosu, Chinezu, Auras MIHAI, Lamaie, Sorin RUSI (+1), me, w2 (+1), Stiri IT, Marius TUDOSE, Razvan CRANGANU.
Also, see the Twitter page of the event and a Twitter hashtag.

About the event itself – feed-back to the organizers

What I liked about the event?
Wordcamp Romania had good speakers, nice room for the event, plenty of participants.

What would I do better next year?
Longer days, better presentation systems.

Who were the top speakers?
1. I liked a lot Adriana IORDAN’s speech; Imagine hearing a person talking on SEO (search engine optimization) using white hat techniques, natural growth, all that on a large company; With results, a good case study, funny speech; About this speech – content (of the speech) was king;
2. I also like Costin COCIOABĂ’s speech; Funny, straight to the point, with key facts and real life examples; Very entertaining, he went for some raise of hands; About this speech – a lot of courage;
3. 3^rd place is shared equally by Radu GEORGESCU, with good good and valuable information, and Andrei ROŞCA, with a very pleasant to see speech and in the same time good content.

Would I recommend you to participate next year?
Yes, Wordcamp Romania was a very nice event overall.

Short bio: Kenneth STURDIVANT is a US citizen with over twenty years of hands-on international business experience. He spent most of his carrier with Coca-Cola where he started in 1982 as Group Operations Services Manager for Coca-Cola Europe, Africa & Asia, gradually advancing to the position of Deputy General Manager, Vice President – Sales & Operations for the Coca-Cola Korea Bottling Company. His managed multiple franchises, acquisitions and mergers, day-to-day sales operations for a $500 million annual operating budget, $100 million annual capital budget, approximately 6,500 employees and industrial relations. After retiring in 2002, he now spends his time consulting on management operations, lecturing on business operations, and playing golf.

Some pictures at the event:

And this is a video I made at the event.

Some notes I took:- you should be impatient with normality;
- a learning environment is an environment where you share knowledge;
- computers changed a lot of things in the industry;
- everybody wants to advertise their ideas as innovation;
- three paradigms:
a. Change is good;
b. Business needs change;
c. People don’t like change;
- if one gives away responsibility, this doesn’t imply also giving away authority; you have to take authority on your own; how? You build this over time; small successes lead to this;
- “control” (a word applicable during the 1970s and 1980s) is a bad word; “mentoring,” “coaching,” and “motivation” are good, more modern words;
- rules don’t mean “control;”
- a thing about the future: you will never be safe; from now on we will live in a form of continuous change;
- one will give you as much responsibility as you can take, but you have to take authority on your own;
- logistics imply flow of information; information is power and money;
- procurement is difficult to outsource, since it’s too much related to cash flow;
- “customer service” (old school) => “customer care” (new school);
- acronym: “SC Focus” = “Supply Chain Focus”;
- squeezing the SC means compressing time; when doing so, one expects the same or better quality;
- a justifiable technology is the one worth investing the money into;
- change is going to impact your job;
- every day, when reading the paper, you know something new is going to happen;
- if a thing doesn’t add value to your business and it’s difficult to handle, then you should outsource it;
- you cannot predict the stability of the country;
- Chinese and Spanish are good languages to learn; Indian? Maybe;

I particularly liked this idea: if one gives away responsibility, this doesn’t imply also giving away authority. You have to take authority on your own. How? You build this over time. Small successes lead to this. Very smart thought, made me think a lot. Extrapolating things, I conclude that in order to lead, you have to be a bit pushy. If you want to change something, you will disturb things a little. One will give you as much responsibility as you can take, but you have to take authority on your own. Great words!

_________
Bottom line: this was my first MBA Master Class with the CEU Business School. It was engaging, lots of things to learn, good insights, the audience was fine and a great place for networking. Thanks

A few notes:
- Contemporary gnosis is the synthesis of knowing the past;
- Samael Aun WEOR studied the past thoroughly.

Some pictures:

Here you have some pictures at the event:

, and I even made a clip in Romanian with the participants.

Some quotes from the banners:
a. The syndicate of E additives laid off by Tymbark;
b. Tymbark fired us, he didn’t care about us;
c. Tymbark dismisses the preservatives.

Note: this is a non-commercial blog post, I just thought it to be funny.

I took three pictures while at the subway in Bucharest.

How do you feel about them?

Pictures in the dark I see …

And they let the light in.

These were taken at a summer school. Lovely.

Beautiful aspects on orthodoxy: from lights falling down on me to beautiful scenery.