Ronald Kats
Windows development
Music, music, music
Needless to say I listen to a lot of music. I don't really collect music but I do buy CD's regularly. Currently we have around 400 albums. I especially like rock music (alternative, normal rock, hard rock, heavy metal, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, 00s, etc.) and jazz. I also visit concerts regularly. That's one of the biggest advantages of living in Amsterdam. There are some great concert halls here. Paradiso is definitely my favourite place. But also the Melkweg and the Heineken Music Hall are nice places that I visit now and then. And sometimes I go to one of the many bars in Amsterdam to check out a local band that happens to be playing there. I also suffer from a bad case of festivalitis: visiting festivals. We always go to at least two festivals each year and the past years those two were Lowlands and Rock Werchter in Belgium. Seeing so many bands play, drinking beer and partying with my friends is just great. It can't get any better... oh yes it can... I hate camping. After I've visited a gig I write a review on our Music Connect Blog. So if you're interested check it out and leave a comment if you like. If you're not interested check it out anyway.
I love playing the drums. Unfortunately I'm not very talented and started pretty late at 19. First I was self-teaching but I got stuck. So now I do take lessons and have a very patient and skilled drum teacher who's trying to fill in the many gaps in my technique. I used to play in bands but stopped doing that a while ago. I really want to pick it up again soon. So if there's a band in Amsterdam looking for a not-so-good but very eager drummer you can contact me. My drum kit is put up in our spare room. It's still the one I started out with when I was 19: a Pearl Export Series. I replaced the heads with muffle heads to remain friends with the neighbors. A few years ago I purchased a trigger set and drum module so now I can play it with a head phone and some actual drum sounds. I also taught myself a bit of guitar as well however don't really play it that much anymore. Recently I took up playing keyboard as well but managed only five and a half chords so far (chords with four keys are pretty hard).
When I was a little Ronald I used to read many European comics and did some drawing myself. I kind of grew out of it but still own some albums like Suske en Wiske, Storm, Trigië and some other ones. I'm thinking of maybe picking up the cartoon drawing again when I can find the time.
At Collectorz.com
I finished my Computer Science master's at the Eindhoven Technical University in '97. I then worked for Lost Boys where I met Alwin and Syts. After a while I left the company and worked for Overloaded/MoConDi for a couple of years. Alwin and I stayed in touch throughout those years and at the end of 2006 he asked me to come work for Bitz and Pixelz. After a very persuasive dinner I couldn't resist and in 2007 I started working as a developer on the Collectorz Windows applications and still happily doing so. We have many ideas, so there's enough things that will keep me busy for many years to come.