Archive for the 'fun' Category

Lokku Team Event Summer 2009

Published by Ed on October 5, 2009 in about us and fun. Comments

Fellow Nestorfans,

here at Nestoria we pride ourselves on a rigorous adherence to “just in time” production methods. As such it was appropriate that our team Summer event took place on almost the final official day of summer a few weeks ago.

With speculation rife over the last year about the collapse of the global economy – lead by a fall in house prices in the UK and Spain (two of our biggest markets) – we thought it appropriate to focus on honing skills that will help us succeed in a post-apocalyptic world. As such we headed out of the old office and into the wild to do a bit of team building via wilderness skills training.

For all of our fans out there here are some pics of the Lokku team in action:

Lokku Team Sept 2009
Firestarting contest – no matches

Lokku Team Sept 2009
A chance for reflection on the challenges ahead.

Lokku Team Sept 2009
Doing our part to solve the UK housing shortage

The weather gods smiled upon us and a good time was had by all. Most importantly we’re well positioned for the future.

In seriousness, we’ve had a great year so far despite the bumps in the road thrown up by the global financial meltdown. A big thanks to the team for their hard work and to all of our partners for their support. We look forward to great things ahead.

BTW – if this looks like the kind of backwoods internet fun that you’d be interested in being a part of please get in touch as we’re hiring.

Property Portal Watch Workshop recap

Published by Ed on August 10, 2009 in fun. Comments

Last week Javier and I spoke in San Francisco at the Property Portal Watch Workshop. I’ve written a full guest post about the event over at Renthusiast. I go into detail about the discussion that ensued, but here are the slides for any blog readers who don’t subscribe to Renthusiast (which you should).

The path ahead for property portals
View more presentations from lokku.

Please let us know if you have any feedback, and we look forward to seeing everyone at the next one.

You had us at “pub”

Published by Ed on February 25, 2009 in events and fun. Comments

Fellow Nestorites,

As you’ll recall, last October we invited you to join us for a pint or three at a pub in Mayfair to talk online property.

We had a great mix of estate agents, industry commentators, property portalers, Nestoria interviewees, foreign dignitaries, and a few folks who just happened to be sitting in the corner when we showed up (bless ‘em). I can rant on about the thrill of all things virtual for hours, but there’s just no replacing a physical meeting (f2f as I like to say in the old chatroom). The event was a great success and a good time was had by all.

Anyhoo, before I get too philosophical about the how cool the crazy offline world can be, it seems the event was such a success that our friends over at Property Owl and Globrix have organized London Property Drinks 2.0 for the evening of Thursday 12 March. As before the location remains the Windmill in Mayfair. As per last time, no need to RSVP, just show up.

We very much look forward to seeing any and all Nestoria fans and onlinepropertyphiles there. Big thanks to the organizers.

Celebrate, partcipate: It’s OneWebDay!

Published by Ahmed on September 22, 2008 in events, fun and what's hot. Comments

Nestoreaderos, Celebrate!

Today is OneWebDay:

The idea behind OneWebDay is to focus attention on a key internet value (this year, online participation in democracy…)

We do try our best to involve our users in our development process – providing you with feedback opportunities whenever possible – every piece of which is read by our Democratic Feedback Monitor.

However, OneWebDay this year is about more than that – it’s about widening participation on the internet, reaching out especially to developing countries and those less able to access the internet. It’s also about learning and spreading knowledge – have you ever edited a Wikipedia article? Or submitted some geodata to OpenStreetMap or GeoNames. Or worked on an open source software project? Or supported heros of online democracy mySociety? If not, maybe today’s the day to get started.

To read more, feel free to visit the OneWebDay site, or look for a meetup in your locality. For those of us resident in London, there’s a get together planned for 6:30 this evening at Inn 1188.

As always, please feel free to comment below, or send us some feedback (naughty or nice). 

Nestoria Team Day, Summer 2008

Published by Ed on July 23, 2008 in about us, events and fun. Comments

Fellow Nestordelphians!

We’ve been hard at work the last few months with the launch of Nestoria Italia, and much else as well. And, as we all know, all work and no play makes for a dull life, even when that work is the never ending fun and excitement of creating a great property search experience. So last week we decided to get out of the office for a day to enjoy the beautiful cloud formations of the English summer and have a bit of wholesome team fun. In keeping with British tradition we thought a round of golf was in order. In keeping with the hand eye coordination skills of the team and the budget of a start up, we went with a round of adhoc frisbee golf in the parks of central London.

A great game ensued, across a course stretching from Primrose Hill to Regent’s Park down to Hyde Park Corner and finally ending in St James’ Park. Our keen geography and mapping abilities were tested, competition was fierce, and the display of skills was impressive.

Here’s the requisite picture of the Nestoria team for the archives (last year’s photo drew a great deal of flattering commentary from across the real estate blogosphere).

Astute observers will notice that I’m wearing Lederhosen (third from right in front row). Beyond being damn comfortable, (and a magnet for, shall we say, interesting, comments while riding the tube) this was a celebration of our imminent launch of Nestoria Deutschland and the fulfillment of a drunken promise made a few months ago. In keeping with the Germanic theme, after a day of outdoor fun, we headed to German pub Zeitgeist, where many a Schnitzel was washed down by many a Bier. Good times. Many thanks to the team for a great day.

Data is fun

Published by Ahmed on November 30, 2007 in fun. Comments

Regular Netorblogswotians (readers) know how we roll at Nestoria. We like our data. We like data that makes us smile even more.

So, in the vein of ‘funny data’ blog posts that have gone before, I bring you:

A list of Slightly Amusing UK place names

Continue reading ‘Data is fun’

UKPropertyVision.com – ambient property browsing

Published by Ed on November 26, 2007 in API, Google Maps, fun and web 2.0. Comments

Hello Nestormanos,

We know that many of you are advanced users perched over your keyboards (or iphones) at the bleeding edge of internet innovation. So you no doubt saw the trend over the last few months of ‘vision’ sites – starting with David Troy’s twittervision and flickrvision, and most recently copied by sites like Wikipedia Vision.

Like many of the most beautiful ideas – the concept is very simple. The vision sites hook into the API of the original site and display a continual stream of random data on a map. But the outcome is very powerful. It’s somehow very entertaining and soothing to watch the map glide from point to point in the continual stream of photos and locations.

We were thus delighted to see our own Nestoria API employed to create UK Property Vision. Here’s a screenshot, but to truly experience it you’ll simply have to click.

UKPropertyVision

For you property addicts out there, welcome to paradise. Kick back, grab a glass of something nice, and just let the homes dance across the screen.

No need to worry – here at Nestoria we’ll keep our laser sharp focus on delivering you a relevant results from our comprehensive database of homes. But we know a search engine like Nestoria isn’t the only way people want to look at property. It’s great to see a clever use of the API to present a different interface.

Enjoy!

Nestoria Pin Gallery

Published by Ed on November 15, 2007 in about us and fun. Comments

Fellow Nestorites!

Last week we launched the integration of local sport information with our partner Sportsbase to positive reviews (theRatandMouse, blognation). As you will recall we chose to use a pin with a football (the most popular sport in the UK) to represent all sport locations.

Our post prompted one reader to write in saying how much he liked not only the wealth of local data we show on a Nestoria search result page, but also the aesthetic enjoyment (dare I say ‘cuteness’) of the pins themselves.

As a result today we present to you, our loyal fans, a gallery of all the local content pins we show on Nestoria UK (of course we use different pins on our Spanish property search engine)

Enjoy!

Pin Example
 
Pubs: Nestoria pin Rent in Soho near the John Snow (Nestoria’s favourite pub)
Sport facilities: Nestoria pin house close to Wembley Stadium
Train Stations: Nestoria pin flat near King’s Cross anyone?
Schools: Nestoria pin buy a home near Eton
Police: Nestoria pin live near Scotland Yard
Places of Worship: Nestoria pin homes for sale in Canterbury
Tram: Nestoria pin South London
Tram: Nestoria pin Manchester
Tram: Nestoria pin Birmingham
Tram: Nestoria pin Nottingham
Tram: Nestoria pin Sheffield
Tram: Nestoria pin Newcastle
Tube: Nestoria pin London
Tube: Nestoria pin Glasgow
Hospitals: Nestoria pin  
Shops: Nestoria pin  
Fire Stations: Nestoria pin  
Parking: Nestoria pin  

Get the Scots while they’re hot

Published by Ahmed on October 21, 2007 in fun and what's hot. Comments

According to a recent article, Scottish house prices are rising even faster than those in England…

Surely this is the perfect time to grab a little hot cake before it burns up!

Properties in Inverurie and properties in Greenock were said to see the highest rises, whilst properties in Edinburgh still tops the tables as Scotland’s most expensive place to buy a home.

So stop reading and get searching, before you can’t afford a garage…

Why just talk like a pirate?

Published by Ahmed on September 19, 2007 in fun. Comments

Ahoy!

Today is a very special day. Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day.

The infamous Jolly Roger

Arrr, that’s right me’arties…

My fellow pirates in the Nestoria ship/office were thinking, why just talk like a pirate when you can live the pirate life too. Life would be so much easier – steal whenever you’re a little short of cash, drink plenty of grog and have a good hornpipe every now and then.

If all that sounds like a little too much effort, you should at least consider looking for your new abode in a town with historic pirate ties…

Avast landlubbers, get ye house hunting!

Iron Leg Henson