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Once again, Mediamatic and a huge number of partners are holding a “festival for geeks, marketeers, bloggers, web 2.0 aficionados and the likes” - yes, PICNIC’07 has officially started.

PICNIC’06 was great and everyone who went there loved every single minute of it so it only makes sense that many of last year’s visitors will be taking part again this year.

PICNIC’07 features great speakers, great opportunities for networking and, certainly, great experiences and while I would love to attend the whole week, including the most awesome Red Bull Soundclash, I still have to go to college every now and then, so I decided to only attend one, event:

The European Bloggers Conference - a session that will focus on topics such as how and when citizen journalism works and how one can build successful web 2.0 applications. Apart from interesting information, this unconference will definitely spark some interesting discussions and I am hoping to gain some new insight into the workings of the blogosphere.

So, uncork your brain and if you are in the city, stop by the Westergasfabriek for some cross media-enlightenment.

The summer is (finally) coming to an end and the only show worth watching during the summer break, Eureka only has another two episodes left before it, too, goes on hiatus (with no word on a possible third season yet).

Fret not though, for all is not lost: the third (and fourth) week of September generally marks the beginning of the Fall season for TV shows and therefore also means that a number of great series will either start or continue.

Last year around, I only really discussed one show, Jericho, which, incidentally will return for a second season, sometime mid-season - which can be anywhere from November to March.

Jericho was first canceled and then renewed only a couple of days later, thanks to the doing of many, many fans that kept sending nuts (an insider reference to the last episode) to CBS, Jericho’s home.

If you have never seen Jericho, I suggest you either try to catch the re-runs, or grab yourself the DVD; in any case, you will not regret me exposing (yes, another insider reference) you to this stuff.

Secret Wars around the globe

Last May, The Unit, another CBS hit show, concluded with a breathtaking finale that left more than a handful of questions open. Tonight, September 25th, the third season’s premiere will start answering a couple of these questions.

The best way I can classify The Unit is by calling it a military-social-drama, which means that there is a lot of shooting, some killing, a couple of nice explosions, a great song and of course the really dangerous things, these elite soldiers face: the home-front which consist of adultery, lies and other niceties.

Save the cheerleader … then what?

NBC’s Heroes was one of the most successful series last year, with an approximate 14 million viewers during the premiere as well as a place in the “Top 10 TV Shows of 2006″ ballot from the American Film Institute.

The second season kicked off yesterday and continues where the first season left off - in feudal Japan and although I could give you a synopsis of the first episode, it is best not to spoil anything. Heroes, simply is too great a work of (modern day filming) art to not experience it on your own time.

On a related note: close to the end of the 2007 / 2008 season, Heroes: Origins will premiere, which will feature six episodes, with one new hero in every episode, at the end of the mini-series, viewers will get to vote which will be allowed to return in a third season.

From Stargate to Atlantis

On September 28th, this Friday, the SciFi channel will premiere the fourth season of Stargate: Atlantis and for the first time, this will be the only Stargate franchise that will kick-off at that day.

Season 10 of Stargate was concluded last May, after more than 200 episodes, which, incidentally, made it the longest running science fiction show, just a few episodes ahead of The X - Files.

The new season will bring a number of changes, such as one of the main characters from Atlantis giving up her job and another main character from Stargate: SG1 taking up her place. Apart from that, the fourth season will also feature the return of crowd-favorite Dr. Beckett, who passed away in the latter half of the third season.

The great thing with scifi is that you can, one way or another, revive people and while there were no plans to bring back Beckett at first, fans of the show around the world united in order to bring back the heart of Atlantis.

Interns and Relationships

Apart from Stargate: Atlantis, Grey’s Anatomy will also start it’s fourth season this Thursday, September 28th, which, too, will answer a great number of open questions on the status of the various relationships between, among and across the various actors.

One day prior, Grey’s Anatomy’s spin-off Private Practice will start its 13 episode season. The show will focus on the life of one Dr. Montgomery after she left Seattle Grace Hospital and heads down to the Los Angeles area in order to, well, join a private practice.

Shanks and Shackles

While not as good as all-time favorite prison show Oz in my opinion, Fox’ Prison Break just kicked off its third season a week ago and once again tells the story of two brothers who “got each others backs in times of need”.

While the first two season took place mostly in the North American part of this world, the third season features a plot in Panama with a selection of new threats, new fish and questionable alliances.

The (silent) clock

Much later this season, January 13th, 2008 to be precise - everyone’s favorite counter-terrorist Jack Bauer will return for season 7 of 24. Contrary, however, to the previous six season, Bauer will not be the same “guy” anymore; Season 7 will be very different to what we have grown accustomed too and will feature a much darker plot.

It is expected that season 7 will introduce a (number of) plot(s) that will be concluded during the eight season, which is as far as Fox went with pre-ordering new episodes.

3, 2, 1 … cut!

All the above shows have been hand-picked by me, they represent my personal taste and my personal taste only. The shows range from drama to action to thrillers to science fiction and the only thing they really do have in common is that they all provide a great source of entertainment.

Not all of the above mentioned shows are safe for young children, so make sure you know what your kids are watching.

[UPDATE]

For those that are curious, The Unit’s new theme song is called Walk the Fire, by Robert Duncan, the guy who also made the theme for the first two seasons. Both tracks are available for listening at Robert Duncan’s MySpace page.

[UPDATE #2]

I just came across this bit on the premier Eureka fansite VisitEureka.net that states:

SCI FI Channel has greenlit production on a third season of its most-watched Original Series Eureka, ordering 13 new hours of the dramedy.

So, come summer 2008, Eureka will be returning for a third season, yay for that.

When I first met Nate, I knew that I had found one of those rare people you have an immediate link with; you share the same thoughts at the same time and it starts to become magical.

Nate and I are both passionate about what we do, what we have done and what we will be doing and we agreed that it was time to start doing something together and so we started to work on NachoTalk:

NachoTalk is a blog that focuses on social and cultural commentary, with viewpoints from two writers on opposite sides of the Atlantic (hence the tagline). We also may occasionally stray from that that formula and post something a little more lighthearted than the usual topics.

Nate and I both started writing articles a couple of weeks ago and decided that the best way to handle things was to go for a two-weekly schedule; one week Nate publishes an article, the next week I do and so on.

Our first contributions are online, so feel free to hop over and enjoy our new project.

That said, thanks go out to Kevin, Ben, Phillip, Emma, Gabriele, Joel, Katie, Darren and a couple of others for providing us with feedback during our soft-launch period, you rock guys (and gals, of course).

I was just reading up some of the questions my LinkedIn contacts were asking and came across a rather interesting one, asked by F.Xavier Garcia:

Who wants to share a dream ?

I am a “Professional Dreamer” which means I like to listen to people’s dreams, see how many are in common with mine and how we can manifest them faster. All my dreams are bold and ambitious, my main dream is to leave the planet in a better state than it was on the day I was born.

Wether or not F. Xavier really gets this done is not the point here, what is important is that he still dares to dream, in a world that is so full of corporate drones that sometimes one feels like an outcast as a dreamer…

One person offered an answer that more than underlines my above statement:

Dreams are like rainbows. Only idiots chase them.

And even though the statement was most probably meant to contain a humorous undertone, it seems to be the sad truth. Too many of us have lost track of their (original) dream. People, especially males, get sidetracked easily. A new business opportunity presents itself, a new hobby and suddenly, the original dream is not important anymore.

In closing, I think the way Kent Dryer put it is spot on:

What about making an impact on others? Too many of us are selfish and are so wrapped up that we have a hard time making a difference.

Dare to pursue your dreams, it will make you a happy ( / happier) person.

Avast me landlubbin’ rats, t’is that time of the year again arrrr. Yes matey, September 19th is Talk Like a Pirate day.

Unlike last year, I actually (very last-minute) created a shirt to commemorate this very important event, only to find out that I wasn’t getting much chance at wearing it today because I had a day off.

Regardless of that, it is good to see that TLAP day has cast its wave across the web like a new schooner would:

The guys pirates at Iliumsoft are giving you a chance at getting 50% off of any title if you dare to call and speak like a real pirate, arrrrrr!

The land lubbers at CrunchGear are giving you a chance at winning 2GB of RAM, again, for talking like a pirate.

And the rest of the world is simply enjoying the day …

In case you have not gotten your pirattitude on, head on over to the official TLAP page for some information on how to pronounce words like a real sword buckler.

The TLAP team also created a nice video of the 5 As every pirate should remember and a funnny song.

Kudos a free keg of Grog for Emma Rault for hooking me up with this, most lovely, picture, made by Astrid Recker: