imageHere is a video [updated] when a president napped ”my” stage, and the story behind that event. Last week I did a key note gig at Media & Message in Finland. SATU, who organized the conference, contacted me already in the spring and we agreed on the terms and dates right before summer. Then about a month ago I learned that the Finnish President, Mrs Tarja Halonen, would pay an (un-official) visit and address the audience with a short speech. Cool! The slightly rearranged plan was that the President would arrive right before I entered the stage (because she wanted to see me); I would do my gig with a brief Q&A; and after that she would be introduced and talk for about 15 minutes.

About half an hour before it was my time we were all told that the President was 15 minutes late, so I had to cut out some of my time. No problem, I am flexible. It was kind of funny when we all raised to greet the President, just to learn that ”she is in the building, not the room”. So, we had to stand up a second time a few minutes later. Anyway, I did my thing and it went quite well. I Ustreamed the whole presentation, and Bambused about 30 minutes (after that I handed over my Nokia N95 to the audience). Then the Q&A started. Apparantly the President was very engaged and eager to share her experiences of the Web. So, instead of asking a question, she took over the stage. That is an actionable President!

Perhaps what triggered her was that I Googled ”Tarja Halonen” and found the first hit to be the Swedish Wikipedia entry. In it there is an External link to tarjahalonen.fi, which she during my gig immediately commented ”that is an old one”. Whose responsibility is it to update that information? As I post this the old link remains, though I just added a new link.

Here is a YouTube clip from the unexpected, but fun, stage-napping. Enjoy! [Sorry, noted that the videa stops after a few minutes, blame Windows Movie Maker. Will fix later Update 2008-0-12: I made a new video, the intro animation was automatically created from Flickr photos and music by I Awake, check it out separatel at animoto.com]

The web site the President promotes is ”The Childrens President of the Republic of Finland” (in Finnish and Swedish). It sure is a nice web site, focusing children. But my humble opinion is that it is very Web 1.0, and would benefit from a social media fix. What do you say all (Finnish) innovators? Can we hope for a President´s blog?