About This Blog

I’m Adriaan Bloem, and this is my blog about online, digital, streaming video, social, and content management. That’s a broad array — but then, I have broad interests.

I’m from The Netherlands; was in Law School once upon a time (but never graduated, though I did finish most of my Legal Knowledge Management major); ran my own company, in networking and websites, fS; was project manager at Leiden University; ran my own company again, Radagio; worked for the renowned analyst firm Real Story Group (formerly CMS Watch); and now live and work in Dubai, where I’m manager of digital tech for MBC, the largest broadcaster in the Middle East. By now I’ve worked on internet-related stuff for more than 25 years, but I doubt it will ever bore me — too much to learn!

You can find me on LinkedIn; bursts on Twitter, as @adriaanbloem; or, feel free to send me an email.

My personal stuff is on Facebook, Flickr; Quora, where I sometimes answer questions. You can probably find me on most other social networks, too (yes, including TikTok, Hyves, Google+, Baidu, Orkut, Pinterest, and whatever other flavor of the month), but I don’t use those frequently.

Most of the photos I’ve used on my blog are Creative Commons images from Flickr. I’m running this site off WordPress — which is great for a simple personal blog like this. That doesn’t necessarily mean I endorse using WordPress for larger websites. There is an art to picking the right tool for the job!

I finally got fed up enough with shared hosting that I moved everything to AWS. My domains are on Route 53, hosting is on an EC2 instance, and I’m starting to add more and more of the AWS box of lego bricks as I go along. Did you know that the only way to set up a simple email forwarder on AWS is to use SES, S3, and Lambda? But at least I can control the details now!

In media

Over the years, I’ve been quoted or featured in several magazines; for instance;

Some of my publications

These are mostly from my time as an industry analyst, when publishing articles and writing a blog was part of the job spec. They’re ancient by now! Remember when Bing was a new thing? And when Google had an appliance (a one blade server) for search?

What’s in a name? Deciphering version vernacular
KMWorld September 29, 2010
Authors: Adriaan Bloem

Understanding Content Collection and Indexing
Information Management, November 1, 2010
Authors: Adriaan Bloem, Theresa Regli
The ability to find information is important for myriad reasons. Spending too much time looking for information means we’re unable to spend time on other tasks. An inability to find information might force us to make an uninformed or incorrect decision. In worse scenarios, inability to locate can cause regulatory problems, or, in in a hospital, lead to a fatal mistake.

The Business Case for Web Content Management
Enterprise Technology Management Magazine, February 2010
Authors: Adriaan Bloem

Is Bing a true Google challenger?
KMWorld, July 3, 2009
Authors: Adriaan Bloem

A critical evaluation of MOSS search
KMWorld April 1, 2008
Authors: Adriaan Bloem, Theresa Regli
There will be different ways to implement search. Think of it as a “let many flowers bloom” philosophy. You can use what’s provided in SharePoint, build or assemble a search system from the bits and pieces Microsoft provides, or snap in a third-party solution.

Put to the Test: Google Search Appliance Version 5
InformationWeek, March 10, 2008
Authors: Adriaan Bloem, Tony Byrne
The Google Mini and Google Search Appliance have long offer solid alternatives for Web site and departmental search. Targeting broader deployments, Google’s latest upgrades have brought improved results ranking and an option for “source biasing,” but security and adaptability still come up short for the demands of enterprise deployments.

Presentations, Panels, and Workshops

2018

Advatera Digital Leadership Forum, Vienna, Austria; workshop, “Managing digital projects: The methodology for innovation success. How to select the right technology, the right vendors and the right team for projects”.

AWS Summit, Dubai, UAE. Part of the keynote with Mike Clayville, Vice President Worldwide Commercial Sales and Business Development; talking about moving from servers, to virtualization, to containerization, and then serverless.

2017

MENOG 17, Muscat, Oman; panel discussion, “Peering and Content”, moderated by Marco Brandstaetter, DE-CIX; with Thomas Volmer, Google; Samir Abdel-Hafez, Netflix; Mohammed Yahia, Etisalat; Miraj Rajan, Zain Group; Bassam Al-Drewesh, ITC

IBC, Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Vimeo panel discussion on OTT and VOD, with Jamison Tilsner, SVP of Development, Vimeo, and Helge Høibraaten, CEO, Vimond

AWS Summit, Manama, Bahrain. Part of the keynote with Teresa Carlson, VP, Worldwide Public Sector, Amazon Web Services

BroadcastPro Summit, Dubai, UAE; panel discussion, “The Tech Revolution: Tackling New Challenges in the Broadcast Workplace”, moderated by Peter Ennis, Senior Vice President, Global Services, Delivery and Customer Support, Avid; with Monish Kapoor, VP of IT and Broadcast, Zee Entertainment Middle East, and Peter Van Dam, ‎Technical Advisor – CEO’s office at LIVE HD Broadcast Facilities

2016

Advatera Digital Leadership Forum, Vienna, Austria; keynote, “Keeping afloat in a sea of technology”

Masterclassing Mobile Brand Master Class, Dubai, UAE; keynote, “Mobile Beyond the App”

Masterclassing Content Marketing Master Class, Dubai, UAE; keynote, “Customer Journeys: Closing the Loop”

2015

TV Connect Middle East, Dubai, UAE; keynote panel, “Leveraging partnerships to maximise content offerings with effective industry collaboration”, with Mahesh Jaishankar, Vice President, Datamena & Broadcasting, DU, and Ian Munford, Director, Product Marketing & Enablement, EMEA, Akamai

Webinar, “Real multi-channel: create once, use everywhere”, with Jan Haderka, CIO, Magnolia

2014

Magnolia Conference, Basel, Switzerland; presentation, “From Pages to People”; roundtable discussion, “Mastering Customer Experience Management”

2013

Magnolia Conference, Basel, Switzerland; presentation, “Breaking out of the Page”

IDC Middle East CIO Summit, Dubai, UAE; panel discussion, “CIOs and the Social Enterprise”, with Paul Walker, Program Director, IDC and Sebastien Marotte, VP of EMEA Enterprise, Google

Magnolia Amplify Miami, Miami, USA; presentation, “High Performance and Scalibility”, with Jan Haderka, CIO Magnolia

2012

Magnolia Conference, Basel, Switzerland; presentation, “Magnolia in the Media”; roundtable discussion, “Virtual Presence Management”

2011

Tools, No Fools, Utrecht, The Netherlands; presentation, “Hollywood Operating System”, on what we think content tools can magically solve, and the hard work required in reality

One day workshop on Social Software & Collaboration, Paris, France; for Capgemini and Sogeti CTOs, CIOs, and VPs 

2010

NVBA (Dutch Archivists Association) Seminar Open Source, Kampen, The Netherlands; presentation, “Open Source Enterprise Search”

Mobile Mojo, Utrecht, The Netherlands; presentation, “Managing Mobile and Social”, on the differences and divergence of web, mobile, and social media channels 

2009

Enterprise Search Summit, New York, U.S.A.; presentation, “Help the Users Help Themselves”, on Search usability, Google, and how to get information to users

Seminar Open Source Document Management & Enterprise Search, The Hague, The Netherlands; keynote, “The Open Source Landscape”

Two-day workshop Document Management and SharePoint, Rome, Italy; intensive course on content management basics, and applying SharePoint to Document Management, Search, and Digital Asset Management, for IT executives from major Italian corporations, government, and international organizations 

2008

jboye08, Aarhus, Denmark; keynote, “Search on your Website: More than a Button to Push”; presentation, “What You Need To Know About Search in SharePoint 2007”

Content Management Systemen 2008, Nijmegen, The Netherlands; presentation, “Zoeken in uw site: een zoekknop alleen is niet genoeg” (on how to implement effective website search, and using analytics from the search to improve website usability) 

2007

Gilbane Conference, San Francisco, U.S.A.; presentation, “The Arena: Differentiating Search Products”; presentation, “Integrating Search with your CMS”

Content Management Systemen 2007, Nijmegen, The Netherlands; presentation, “Web 2.0 en Universiteit Leiden” (on social media and its impact on traditional web content management)

cmf2007, Aarhus, Denmark; tutorial, “Search Intensive – Enterprise Search: Architecture and Products”; presentation, “The Enterprise Search Landscape”; moderator of panel with representatives from Ankiro, Exalead, FAST, Google and Microsoft, “Strategic Enterprise Search as a foundation for Business Solutions”

CM Pros Fall Summit, Boston, U.S.A.; presentation, “Web 2.0 and WCMS: Lessons We Can Learn From Web 2.0”

2006

ECM Plaza 2006, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; presentation, “Oil and Water don’t mix – Bilingual Websites”

cmf2006, Aarhus, Denmark; presentation, “Finding a Unified Content Strategy”, on how to combine web and social media in a cohesive strategy

CM Pros Benelux Web 2.0 seminar, Utrecht, The Netherlands; presentation, “Leiden University 2.0 bèta”, on social media initiatives at Leiden University

2005

ECM Plaza 2005, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; presentation, “Decentraal beheer van een doelgroepgerichte website”, on addressing target audiences through decentralized content management

cmf2005, Aarhus, Denmark; presentation, “The challenges of a large website with decentralized editors”

Random Anecdotes

• I first hooked up a ZX Spectrum to a phone (using a speaker, a microphone, and a bunch of foam) to log onto a BBS in the late 80s. My first email was sent over this 300 bit line and relayed in a few days to the US.
• When I was in Law School in ’92, I sent a professor an email. He immediately summoned me to his office, demanding to know how I broke into the University mail system. He was astonished to discover email was a global system, and he could actually send mail to his colleague in Tokyo — instead of sending very expensive faxes.
• The first time I was paid to build a website was in 1994. It was for a law firm, so obviously featured a prominent picture of their office (which they were very proud of). For tax reasons, the payment was a new motherboard, processor, and a scanner, which was a good investment for a budding web designer.
• In 1993, I participated in the contest to design a logo for the W3C. As I recall, first prize for the “logo for the world wide web” was a book voucher of $50. (I didn’t win.)
• If you think that makes me sound old: while I’m Gen X, for some reason, I tend to score very millennial on “how millennial are you” tests. Probably because I spend so much time tethered to the net. I still read books, though, and am surprised by people who don’t have the attention span for this.
• The title from this blog was inspired by the British comedy “The IT Crowd.” I was a sysadmin for a few years, and have worked on an IT helpdesk, so I can identify with the show (I think most people working in tech will probably find it funny). The first tip given to users on this show is “have you tried turning it off and on again.” I sometimes wish online were that easy.
• In my current job, I much more identify with the HBO show Silicon Valley. Even though I’m nowhere near Silicon Valley, we deal with many of the same companies and many of the same tech problems. I’m still trying to find an economical way to improve the Weissman Score of video we transfer from on prem to cloud.