Last week I had the honour of being the guest of Silke in her live streamed radio show Radio Roggermann. It was great fun and you can listen back to it here (including the music). Show is in German, though.

Despite some personal problems within the family during my trip to Brighton, which made me worry, I had a wonderful time at this year’s Patterns Day. It was the third time this event took place and once more it was great to meet old friends and make new friends during the day.

Took me a while, also because it is only 8 weeks until beyond tellerrand Düsseldorf, but here are a few impressions of how it was …

A longer time ago (11 years to be exact) I started to shoot what’s in my backpack bevor I took off to event adventures. I did not shoot many of them, but always liked the idea and brought this back now.

This time: Patterns Day in Brighton.

Packing my Bag

I stumbled over the artwork by Andrew Scott on Instagram. I like that he uses the whole thing, you attach to your wall as an art piece and not just what is in the frame ;)

Like this one, in which “the artwork” cracks the frame with a hammer. Or this one where the glass of the frame is hit with a baseball bat (he has more of this kind, with smashed glass).

Well, simply check all of his work ;) Oh, and of course: visit his website!

I got many of their publications in my bookshelves or in my digital library. It feels like I bought the first one last month and now they are closing their doors.

This is a farewell and thanks for all the wonderful publications. 🥂 to Jason Santa Maria, Katel LeDu (always a pleasure working with you also on partnerships!), Jeffrey Zeldman and anyone else involved of course!

Sad to see you leaving the publishing stage!

I really, really enjoyed watching this. Not just because of the content. Those two guys get along well and you can feel the atmosphere in the room. Copeland surely respects Beato and I think Copeland is a funny guy also. Interesting, fun conversation to follow, I think. Not only if you are into music or like The Police.

A few days ago a new podcast with the title “The Gatekeepers” was published on BBC Radio 4. A podcast with and by author and journalist Jamie Bartlett in which he traces the story of how and why social media have become the new information gatekeepers.

I have been in touch with Jamie a couple of times, as well as now again, to get him to Berlin’s edition of my event, and know of him through his published books such as The Dark Net (2014), Radicals [< affiliate link] (2017), The People Vs Tech: How the Internet Is Killing Democracy (2018) or last but not least The Missing Cryptoqueen [< affiliate link] (2022). All well worth reading. Next to this, I am subscribed to his newsletter “How to survive the Internet” on Substack.

Yesterday I got notice, that he started a new podcast titled The Gatekeepers and so far I have listened to the first two episodes. The description of the introduction episode reads as follows:

It all started with a crazy idea to realise a hippie dream of building a “global consciousness”. The plan was to build a connected world, where everyone could access everyone and everything all the time; to overthrow the old gatekeepers and set information free.

But social media didn’t turn out that way. Instead of setting information free – a new digital elite conquered the world and turned themselves into the most powerful people on the planet.

Now, they get to decide what billions of us see every day. They can amplify you. They can delete you. Their platforms can be used to coordinate social movements and insurrections. A content moderator thousands of miles away can change your life. What does this mean for democracy – and our shared reality?

Jamie Bartlett traces the story of how and why social media have become the new information gatekeepers, and what the decisions they make mean for all of us.

Sounds exciting, doesn’t it? And so far, first two episodes in, I find it an exciting podcast with a very interesting topic.

But listen yourself: The Gatekeepers with Jamie Bartlett on BBC (or on any podcasting platform of your choice) …

I think, but am not sure, I heard of Shift Happens, the book project of Marcin Wichary, when he spoke at beyond tellerrand in 2018, where he gave a brilliant talk about “The Abridged History Of Having Fun \/\/ith Keyboards” (watch the talk here on YouTube). Back then he already started working on it, but I think it was in the pretty early days.

Marcin’s book project is the best selling tech book on Kickstarter ever with over $750,000 pledged. Even though I said, I never gonna back anything on Kickstarter anymore, I supported Marcin’s project of course.

This morning I got my edition of “Shift Happens” and could not help, but make a few photos that you can find here to get a first impression of the books, their case and how it looks and feels.

Massive congrats to Marcin. Can’t wait to meet hi next time and ask him all the questions about the book, the process of everything and more.

See the photos I took here

It was such a wonderful day over here yesterday. We took it as a chance to take a long walk along the Rhine.

It was such a great feeling to have the sun back. I knew it before, but I am really dependent on the weather and my mood is heavily influenced by how light or dark a day is. OK for a day, but if it is dark and grey over a period of weeks, I can’t help, but am tired and unmotivated.

On another note, today is the birthday of my brother, who died 2013 surprisingly. I think of him and send him a massive hug. Happy birthday, Kurti!

Like I said before, I was shitting my pants before I had seen the film. Andreas Brüggemann and Stefan Nitzsche were working on this since beginning on 2019 and many things happened during this time. Many things that those two might see different to how I see it and in general they have a different view on things than I do. That is perfectly fine, especially as I would never think any either of them would have any intention to harm beyond tellerrand or me. But surely they also did not want to create and advertisement film about my event and needed a certain distance to the event and also me. Difficult situation for them. Now, last Friday was the day, when they were finally and proudly presenting the first film of this kind they ever did together.

In the following I won’t give any feedback on how the film is. I think it is not on me to decide how well made, good or needed the film is. I am too close to the subject of the film and can’t judge about this or whether a film about what I do and who I am is needed on this planet 😁, but I have to say I had a wonderful evening.

At 7:30pm doors opened for 200+ invited guests. A variety of drinks and a few nibbles were offered and I was surprisingly recognising that the people showing up were a wonderful mix of my past and present. People I haven seen for more than ten year mixed with family, people I regularly see these days and people from my web and design bubble. That was lovely to see.

8:15pm we went into the cinema and the film was shown. After roughly 1,5 hours, people applauded and stood up and it seems they had liked what Andreas and Stefan made here. The two, Elliot, who was the MC for the night, Nicolas Schuele, who created the music for the film and I had been asked to come on stage for a round of questions. When it came to me and the question what I had to say, I said something like “I am very happy and humble about all the lovely things that had been said about me and beyond tellerrand in this film. Thank you. But surely for me all this feels a bit awkward and crinchy, as it must be for my family and especially my children, right?” – I looked to where our three children were sitting, but thy all were shaking their heads and said they massively enjoyed and liked the film and later on said they are proud … wow. If not anything else, but THIS really made my evening!

Now this chapter is closed and I can say “There is a documentary, a film, about beyond tellerrand and me, Marc Thiele”. I am not sure if Andreas and Stefan plan to publish it somewhere online. Right now, I think, they have plans to leave it unpublished to have the chance of being part of some film festivals. I keep you posted about their plans of which one is to show the film again around beyond tellerrand in May.

Thanks to Andreas, Stefan and Nicolas for all their work on this project.