Arjun Singh...

Old Man's Beard Will Be Big...

Listening to CBC's All Points West last week turned me on to the band Old Man's Beard. I have officially fallen in love with their incredible lyrical sunny tune Tofino!

Everyone loves Obama!

Everyone loves Obama!, originally uploaded by Rachel Binta.

Great photo!

Wise Advice for Entrepreneurs Starting Out...

From the co-founder of Blogher, Jory Des Jardins, who has this very accessible and clear writing style. Really enjoy her posts. Here is the the entrepreneur's guide to looking bigger than you are.

Lying by Telling the Truth...

A good friend of mine told me today that governments / politicians often "lie by telling the truth". This is a seriously intriguing thing to say and, of course, I pressed him to elaborate. He said he thinks that governments often say things like "we have given the Ministry of education the largest annual increase in it's history" but leave out that they also made the deepest cuts in history to the same ministry a year or two earlier. Lots of examples of that. Lesson for citizens: context counts.

The Vancouver 2010 Olympics - the Good, the Bad, and the Interesting...

I'd like to thank Ruth Ann Harnisch for a little push to put thoughts on the Olympics "down on paper". Much appreciated!

As residents of this amazing part of the world, our 2010 Olympic experience actually started in 2003. That was the year Vancouver was awarded the Winter Olympics. And, in the past seven years, the Olympics has loomed larged. The provincial media has dilligently covered all the planning and provincial government officials have never missed an opportunity to extol all the benefits for British Columbia. A lot of BC commmunities have benefited from various Olympic related programs and pre-event events.

Still, the Olympics have also been very controversial. From sponsorship heavy handedness to concerns about misplaced priorities to concerns about the incredible costs, many people have been worrying.

Pre-Olympics, I was mostly in the camp of the worriers. I also felt that some relatively grassroots community priorities were being replaced by Olympic driven spending items. Transit planning in Vancouver, in the past years for example, has been largely planning for these past two weeks. I do think some social concerns were given more resources because of the games.

But, a funny thing happened once the games began. I started to get excited because everyone around me started to get excited. I was concerned that we could spend money going to the Olympics to help address homelessness, but then I was volunteering at a homeless shelter and witnessed two fellas talking with great pride and excitement about Canada' golds. This made me think.

Canada did have this "own the podium program". I didn't get too into that , but I personally feel watching people at top of their game from any country is an incredible treat. It makes me think of excellence, makes me want to be more excellent, and makes me wonder how I can be more excellent.

With great glee, I watched hockey, ice dancing, skiing, curling, and bobsledding. All on my tv, didn't get to Vancouver (and I even kind of regret not going to take in the incredible energy almost everyone who was there has spoken of).

The games are of such a magnitude and have so many dimensions that is really hard for me to say "I love" or "I hate" the games.

In the end, I am proud we were good hosts. I don't really get into this competition for world supremacy in sports, but as an exhibition of excellence and an exciting, energetic, and (yes) unifying events, I really enjoyed the Vancouver 2010 Games.

I guess we will see what this all has cost us financially. That is the only real concern I have left.

Notes from PDF network call - Using Online Video to Grow Your Campaign

hosted by Micah Sifry, PDF founder

with Kate Albright-Hanna, who was online video director for Obama for America:

• targeted videos could motivate volunteers and supervolunteers, often better for videos with mass appeal to Americans at large
• not ratings driven
• analytics people checked to see whether video in email actually worked for email purpose, such as fundraising.
• dedicated player not a great idea for campaign, you tube great for getting message out. Also used other targeted players where people gathered, but you tube key.
• most powerful tool was email
• user generated video : first question campaign video staff asked, but big tension because big boo boo could put whole campaign in jeopardy. user generated video from the campaign became campaign volunteers who signed on to broader goals of the campaign and became part of team. Firewall between official user generated video and unofficial. Hopefully, set a tone with official that infliuenced unofficial.
• most important thing in video is sound.
• music and motion graphics great tools for explaining stuff. Video of talking head not interesting (person at desk). Need to tell stories.
• link for video in email, did not embed video. Having word video in subject line key element
• 30 second cartoon guy or powerful story arc : 2 possible techniques
• getting people to say somehing straight to camera (memorization) without teleprompter often a disaster (sometimes even with a teleprompter)
• interviews great
• interested in other campaigns videos, but stayed true to the Obama campaign grassroots movement message.
• some of the videos served as grist for political press core - give them something to chew on, more of in the attack "dark star" push back mode. feeding talk show news cycle.
• comedy is hard to do in video
• tea party movement really figuring out video
• forced spontanenaity (sp?) tough

Busting a Gut over Tearing Up Newspapers....

This baby cracking up makes me crack up....

hat tip to Andrew Sullivan

China's Stranglehold on the Green Economy?

From a metafilter post..interesting and potentially troubling

Early Impressions of Graduate School....

In October, I started an MA in Professional Communications at Royal Roads University. I chose the program not only because Royal Roads allows the ability to work full time during the program, but also because communication theory and skills seem very important to learn at this time in human history.

The Copenhagen Climate talks involved no less than 193 countries trying to come up with a common vision on addressing climate change. More than ever, we are realizing that we need to work together; however, what we often have is a failure to communicate.

The Royal Roads program combines a yearly residency of three weeks with online coursework and research. There are two cohorts. I am in the more general stream, and there is another stream specializing in international / inter-cultural communication. There are roughly 50 people in each cohort.

We're working our way through our first set of courses and just completed our first residency. Here are some early impressions:

• Really good foundations: The first three courses in the program are Intro to Communication Theory, Research Methodologies, and Professional Communication (basically a writing course). I've really enjoyed all of these courses. Michael Real, our theory professor, reframed the study of theory from the outset. Theory is often seen as dry and boring, but Michael has got me thinking of theory as an incredibly useful conceptual toolbox that uses historical experience / best practices to gain insights for present research and action. This is just one example of how the instructors have made these topics come alive.
• The Public Intellectual: In a panel discussion at the residency, Prof David Black raised the question of the public intellectual. This is someone, as I understand it, tries to bridge the gap between academia and the mainstream public conversation / issue landscape. This greatly appeals to me. We have enormous societal challenges and, associated with those, we have tremendous opportunities. Peer reviewed, rigorous research often only gets published in academic journals with little readership.
• Access to Knowledge: I am finding it hard to believe how much knowledge my Royal Roads library access allows me. I almost have to pinch myself. The amount of online resources - journal articles and such - is staggering. I am really enjoying tapping into some of this stuff

Just some early thoughts on a late December Saturday.

Buy More Poppies....

I'm on my third or fourth poppy now, each one became disfunctional in a different way.

I've pricked my finger a few times too.

But, all these minor minor inconveniences are so worth the little effort they consume.

I really don't mind. I really can't mind.

Lest we forget....