April 24th, 2008, 9 Comments »
I’ve been to Moscone Center in San Francisco a few times. I only learned a couple of weeks ago that it was named after George Moscone, former mayor of San Francisco. Along with city supervisor Harvey Milk, he was killed by a former, disgruntled employee.
I was talking to somebody about Moscone at Web 2.0 Expo yesterday. During our conversation, I wondered out loud whether a Canadian government official had ever been assassinated on domestic soil. I did a little searching, and couldn’t find anything. Can you think of anybody?
UPDATE: D’oh. How could I forget the October Crisis? Thanks to Andre for reminding me. Thinking back, I don’t think I ever studied this bit of history in high school. And I took no Canadian history courses in university. Still, I hang my head in shame, eh?
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April 17th, 2008, 5 Comments »
On the CBC’s Ideas podcast, I’m currently listening to “Canada: Nation or Notion” (MP3, 25 MB, 53:46), a debate between two Canadians who live in the US: Adam Gopnik and Malcolm Gladwell. They’re both very smart, eloquent speakers, and it makes for an hour of enjoyable listening:
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The talk was sponsored by Maclean’s, and there’s text from the debate on their site. It’s not an exact transcript, though, because I couldn’t find this self-effacing joke that Gladwell made:
I thought I would begin by drawing on an example that may seem a little far fetched. But trust me, I will circle around and make it make sense. And that is to talk about the success of ethnic Chinese immigrants throughout the world.
Now, those of you who are familiar with my writing will know that this practice of talking about X by discussing Y is my only rhetorical move.
I gather this is just one in a number of discussions that Gopnik and Gladwell have been having over the years. Here’s the text from a 2000 debate about American vs. Canadian healthcare systems.
If you haven’t read Gopnik’s beautiful book Paris to the Moon, I highly recommend it.
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March 9th, 2008, No Comments »
Blogging will be slow to nonexistent over the next couple of days as I head back to Vancouver and get settled in. If you’re in search of diversion, there’s always my page o’ links or my favourite meta-aggregator.
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February 14th, 2008, 11 Comments »
Via Metafilter, I read two really well-written pieces entitled Mythbusting Canadian Health Care (here’s part two). They’re written by one Sara Robinson, who apparently lives in ‘suburban Vancouver’:
The percentage of Canadians who’d consider giving up their beloved system consistently languishes in the single digits. A few years ago, a TV show asked Canadians to name the Greatest Canadian in history; and in a broad national consensus, they gave the honor to Tommy Douglas, the Saskatchewan premier who is considered the father of the country’s health care system. (And no, it had nothing to do with the fact that he was also Kiefer Sutherland’s grandfather.).
The argument and the writing are both quality. I’d like to read an equally well thought-out article from the other camp.
There is one fundamental problem with these articles: their total lack of citations and references. Both articles are full of facts, figures and claims, but there’s barely a hyperlink to be seen. This lack of transparency really undercuts Robinson’s argument, and it’s a shame.
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February 7th, 2008, 3 Comments »
Last summer I collaborated with Rob from Techvibes and Christine from Blue Lime Media to build the first version of Techcouver.com, a Vancouver transit map showing Web 2.0 companies.
Then Cameron from Reaction Lab got involved, and we had a much fancier, Flash-based version 2.0.
Techvibes has national ambitions, so with Christine’s help, they recently rolled out version 3.0. It’s based on Google Maps, is nation-wide and is no longer restricted to Web 2.0 companies. Check it out.
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January 17th, 2008, 9 Comments »
Because we’ve been living in old, chilly stone houses of the past year, I’ve started wearing slippers for the first time in my adult life. I bought some garden-variety, Leave-it-to-Beaver slippers in Malta. They don’t look quite as silly as these, but the shape is the same.
This is kind of embarrassing, but two things happen with alarming regularity when I’m wearing my slippers:
- They fall off. Particularly when I’m climbing or descending stairs. This isn’t surprising. After all, they have no heels.
- They cause painful cramps or, maybe, hyper-extensions in my toes. This usually happens when I stand up. It’s like my poor little toes have been tensed inside the slipper, and they get a little, well, sprained when I shift positions.
It’s ridiculous, I know. Regardless, I look forward to getting back to Canada, a nice hardwood floor and plain old socks.
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November 28th, 2007, 5 Comments »
Warren points to a peculiar article in the Montreal Gazette. I read it twice, and I still don’t quite understand the point.
A coalition of arts groups is asking Ottawa to protect the Canadian identity by regulating the Internet, which so far has remained untouched by government oversight in this country.
The group of 18 associations of content creators – most of them from Quebec – says the Internet should be subject to the same rules as TV and radio – that is, it should have more Canadian-made content.
Also, artists should get a cut of the money Internet providers make every time Canadian content is transmitted to homes, said Richard Hardacre, president of the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists.
What’s the real story here? I don’t think it’s artists hungry for cash, and here’s why:
- In a world where file sharing is ubiquitous and web regulation is relegated to Saudi Arabia and China, only an imbecile would think that Canada could and would control Internet content.
- No actual artist is quoted in the article, nor are any of the other “18 associations” cited. Given that we’re talking about Canadian arts and culture, I would have liked to have heard from a Canadian artist.
- The Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists is also known as ACTRA, and they’re a labour union.
- Richard Hardacre, the ACTRA president, has no ideas about how this regulation might take place, or what it might look like. He says (I’m not sure if I hear irony or not) “”We have great deal of faith in the CRTC. We’re just asking them to not let this remain the Wild West.”
Reframing the Issue
I’m ill-informed, but let me speculate. ACTRA is a protectionist organization, and according to a recent press release, fears foreign ownership. That release specifically identifies “CanWest Global’s U.S.-funded takeover of one of Canada’s leading media companies” as a threat. They’re reframing the foreign ownership issue, arguing that it will “damage our cultural sovereignty, deepen the crisis in Canadian drama and potentially jeopardize Canadian content rules”.
CanWest also owns the Montreal Gazette, where this story was reported. They were all too happy to go along with the CanCon angle, because it directs attention away from the corporate takeover and union’s true concerns about job loss.
Does anybody have the average Canadian news consumer in mind? Nope. Both parties seem to be intentionally obfuscating the truth.
I’ve invited both Roberto Rocho, the Gazette journalist, and Mr. Hardacre to clarify things. Specifically, I’ve asked Mr. Rocho why no artists were quoted in the story, and why none of the other arts organizations were mentioned. I’ve asked Mr. Hardacre to provide some specific information about the kind of regulation he’d like to see.
UPDATE (December 4, 2007): I failed to recognize that this article was actually about a month old. My bad, there.
UPDATE #2 (December 4, 2007): I heard back from Mr. Rocho, who wrote article. With his permission, I’ll quote his response:
Now, as to why other artists weren’t quoted, the answer is simple: none of the artists organizations I contacted returned my calls in time. Only ACTRA.
I wasn’t satisfied with only Mr. Hardacre’s voice in my story, since one in 18 hardly satisfies my idea of a representative view. But given that all groups put their names of the press release and showed a united front, given deadline demands, it had to do.
Personally, I found it hard to believe that hundreds of content makers spanning 18 groups can all be this monumentally clueless about the reality of the Internet. But my personal opinion shouldn’t matter. I reported the information that was available to me at the time.
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October 4th, 2007, 8 Comments »
My Irish friend Sarah recently wrote a post about a trip to the USA, and the stark difference between customer service in Ireland and stateside:
In Ireland, no matter what shop you go into, the main purpose of the assistants is to make clear that you needn’t think you are any better than them just because they are on the other side of the counter. Refusal to make eye contact, flinging change on the counter (or managing to put it in your hand without looking at you which takes considerable effort) grumpily announcing that all sizes are on display and consciously avoiding one’s attempt to attract attention.
The Irish folks in the comment thread unilaterally agree. All of my Irish friends would regularly complain about the service in Ireland. They sometimes found the service in North America a little ingenuine, but they preferred too much help to not enough.
There’s tangible evidence of this attitude implicit in the way Irish clerks greet you in many shops. They say “are you okay, there?” I never really knew what the correct answer to that question was. If I needed assistance, I think I was supposed to say “no”, as in “I’m not okay, I need your help finding hot pants”, or whatever.
The subtext of “are you okay, there?” is, of course, “do I actually have to deign to do my job and help you?”
I asked several Irish people why there’s such a lousy attitude in the service industry. Nobody gave me a satisfactory answer.
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