Since February of 2009, I have been running a number of contests on my blog, particularly to promote local events, such as dance exhibitions, theatre shows, movies, etc.
While my traffic has gone up, I have also noticed at the same time, a decline in hyperlinking to other blogs and a decline in comments overall in the blogosphere (I’m really lucky in that my readers still comment quite a lot, though, so I ain’t one to complain).
Credit: Rob Cottingham (Noise 2 Signal)
For a while, as my online network grew, I have had my followers gain additional entries to my contests by just retweeting the post. The reason why I did that was because I thought that made it easier for them to enter the contest.
But I can see the point that my good friend Rob Cottingham makes in his cartoon and blog entry on Read Write Web, which probably should be titled “How to Retweet to Win in a Contest And Lose Followers“. It is true, we seem to have lost the ability to engage in online conversation and build community.
I loved the post, and as usually, Rob made me think about what I can do to make my contest posts more conversational and less about the retweet. Good food for thought. Now, if you were in my place, and you ran contests online, how would YOU make them more conversational? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
And no, please don’t retweet this post to win anything. If you think it’s worth sharing with your networks, please do so, but by no means feel obligated to retweet.
I don’t think there’s any human who hasn’t experienced depression even in its mildest form. I certainly have (even if only twice in my life). I have previously talked to many of my friends about how in Spanish, we don’t talk about “mental illnesses” (enfermedades mentales). We talk about mental health (salud mental). When I moved to Vancouver, I realized how much stigma was associated with mental illnesses. It’s like what cancer was a decade or so ago. It became an invisible disease.
For the past couple of years, I have helped co-organize (with my very good friend Isabella Mori) Mental Health Camp Vancouver, a one-of-a-kind unconference on exploring the intersection of social media and mental health. Depression has afflicted and continues to affect many people that I love, several of them whom I discovered through blogging. Mental Health Camp was launched as a result of the great work that Airdrie Miller put into organizing the panel “Coping Digitally” at Northern Voice 2009 (read my liveblog of the session here).
Thus, while my research expertise is not in the field of mental health, I have become a bit of an advocate for the cause, particularly because I have many friends whom I love profoundly who have been afflicted by depression, ADHD, bipolarism, etc. I like using whatever little exposure my blog has to promote these worthy causes. And it is in this context that I am delighted that there is a Mental Health Week from May 3rd to May 7th, launched by the Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA).
The media release to which I linked above lists all the local events that will take place around the Lower Mainland.
Since 1951, the first week of May has been celebrated as Mental Health Week, with the Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA) leading the national campaign. It’s a time when CMHA branches and other groups remind us that there is no health without mental health. CMHA branches host events that increase respect for people with mental illness and promote good mental health for everyone.
The theme for this year’s Mental Health Camp Vancouver is “Breaking Our Silence: Setting Us Free”. Help spread the word about Mental Health Week and MHCYVR10 if you can. Thank you.
Today is “the day of the Holy Cross” in Spain (and in Mexico, most likely an inherited tradition from the Old Continent). It is also the day when we celebrate civil engineers (in Mexico, as well). It’s also the day when we celebrate my brother’s birthday. It’s a marvelous coincidence that my brother S is actually a civil engineer, and an extremely competent one at that. As I have told him since he was very little, he was born to do what he does.
My brother S is the epitome of a project manager. He was born to solve problems. He was born to execute incredible projects, and more importantly, he was born to occupy a key space in the lives of us, his brothers, his family and his friends. He was also born to be an amazing father. I am so proud of what he has accomplished in the time he’s been on this planet. And I feel extremely privileged to be his son’s Godfather, particularly as I know how much my brother loves the movies (“The Godfather”).
I can’t even begin to count the many reasons why I am proud of you. Without your help, I wouldn’t have completed my PhD and I am forever grateful for that. You continue to amaze me every day not only with your intelligence and your ability to be analytical and strong willed, but also your capacity to find answers where many have stopped attempting to look at the questions. You are extremely kind, loving, caring and more importantly, you are incredibly generous.
Today, and every day, I feel extremely privileged to be your brother. I feel proud and grateful for being such an integral part of your family and I love the time we have spent together getting to know each other and being such great friends. Because beyond being my brother, you are one of my very best friends.
Like any human being, I have only a limited amount of time in my day. I’ve tried desperately to keep up the pace with my blogging and all the client work I have, all the marking papers and final exams I’ve accumulated, and still attend theatre shows, dance performances and spend time with my friends. There’s only one Raul and I’ve hit the wall.
Both panels are on Friday (although Northern Voice takes place all week). So, until then, if you do not see any content here, or do not see me on Twitter, you know why it is.
Despite the fact that I do research in environmental policy, I will fully admit that I do eat meat. Not a lot, and when I do, I try to eat organic (and free range). A large part of my diet, though, is primarily vegetarian (though not entirely vegan). However, lately (despite my super busy schedule), I’ve been eating more fruit, up to the point where a couple of days I’ve eaten primarily fruit and nothing more.
Even though I took many courses in food science throughout my undergraduate in chemical engineering, I never paid too much attention to the topic of nutrition, so I’ve always been curious. Can someone really live eating only fruit? Seriously, the other day I had basically mangoes and strawberries, for breakfast and lunch, and snacks throughout the day. So, I have been pondering this question.
Last night, after a full day of marking, I thought I deserved a couple of hours of fun. I had already booked part of the evening to have dinner with Jason Sanders and then head over to witness opening night of The Wedding Singer (the most recent production of Fighting Chance Productions, and superbly directed by Ryan Mooney), so I put the pedal to the metal and spent the whole day marking, hoping I’d have a lot of fun at this wonderful movie-turned-theatrical-play. I was not disappointed, and that’s putting it lightly. Seriously, I’ve been witnessing some fantastic theatre performances.
The Wedding Singer was an absolute delight, even despite the possible jitters that any opening night can give to even the most seasoned actors. The initial song (“It’s Your Wedding Day” by Stephen Lynch) did require the actors to step their voices up (I don’t really like the sound-proofing of Jericho Arts, it doesn’t seem to lend itself to musicals). Minor challenges aside, I was completely delighted to see that there was not an empty seat on opening night of The Wedding Singer. The ensemble and cast delivered, and boy did they deliver!
We laughed, we shed tears, we sang along. It was probably one of the nicest musicals I’ve seen in a long time. I had already seen RENT by Fighting Chance Productions and it was nice to see their work again and meet some of the actors that I’ve met before. Every person has his/her own favorite songs of this fantastic musical, but if I had to pick the one that is absolutely worth the price of admission, it is “It’s All About The Green” by Richard H. Blake). The cast and ensemble perform acrobatic dance maneuvers, sing amazingly in sync and harmony and tell a beautiful story about how sometimes, and for some people, it IS all about the money! (we’ll discover in the end, that good triumphs over evil, but that’s to be expected of any Hollywood story-turned-theatre-show).
I know that there are people who wondered why Fighting Chance Productions ended up producing a theatrical play based on a popular movie. I am so glad they did, because I am certainly bringing along a bunch of my friends to a repeat performance of The Wedding Singer. Andrew Halliwell completely embodied Robbie Hart, and Lexy Campbell is great as Julia Sullivan. A fairly tale of love, peppered with some struggle and sadness, FCP’s production is a total delight. You should see it, because I fully recommend it. And for the record, I think so does Jason.
Disclosure: The tickets to attend the play were sponsored very generously by Fighting Chance Productions. Thanks to Ryan Mooney for always being so generous with tickets for me and for my readers. While I did not pay to attend the musical, I will very gladly pay to attend a repeat performance, as it is a great production. This post hasn’t been paid for either. In any review I write or publish on my site, I retain editorial control at all times, and producers and publicists are well aware of this. Should you have any questions/concern feel free to contact me via e-mail through my contact form.
It’s rare for me to have a play whose central theme is interpersonal that doesn’t make me feel tired and/or overwhelmed. I am a theatre fanatic, but with the kind of schedule I have (teaching, doing research, doing client work/consulting and then attending social media/dance/theatre performances in the evening on top of it all), I need to manage my energy levels quite well, and pay close attention to how I feel.
Prodigals (a play by Sean Minogue and produced by Sabrina Evertt from Twenty Something Productions) is an exceptional show, in my opinion. Set in a bar in Sault St. Marie (Ontario), Prodigals tells us the story of a group of six underachieving friends, with story lines that are interconnected in various ways. Jen, bar manager extraordinaire (Tara Pratt, in an exceptional performance) is currently dating Nips (Brandyn Eddy) but her heart doesn’t seem to have let go of everyone’s favorite villain, Wesley (Timothy Johnston). As indicated in the official release,
Set in a small bar in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, six young underachievers await the results of a murder trial thatâs hit close to home. Their world of drinking, sarcasm and missed opportunities is flipped upside down when a former friend returns from Toronto to testify in the trial, reopening old wounds and creating some new ones as well.
Peter Boychuck’s direction was fantastic, in my opinion. The actors’ performances were seamless. All actors are so incredibly believable, so totally human, so flawed and imperfect yet so caring and loving. I was so incredibly taken by the play that in one of the climaxing scenes, I actually shouted “oh sh!t” (I can’t tell you the context, because I would give the play’s plot and climax away). That, to me, was the perfect demonstration that I was completely immersed in the play.
I was very happy to be joined at the Havana Theatre by my good friend Julie Wright (WrightOn Communications). We both had a fantastic time (and the mojito at Havana rivals that of Bridges). I had two tickets to give away, and contacted my winner but haven’t heard back so I might re-draw, and if so, you might just get lucky and get a chance to attend this excellent play.
Thanks to Sabrina for the complimentary tickets to attend, I really enjoyed the play. And to all the actors, I’ve fallen in love with all of you 🙂
I am headed downtown to my office at The Network Hub to continue marking final exams and papers, but beforehand, I’m going to stop at an event dubbed #MarksOver.
The thing is, today is also Jeans Day (organized by the BC Children’s Hospital Foundation). So, I am actually wearing jeans (I’m not wearing this same outfit but I don’t have a photo with jeans in my Flickr stream other than this one right now).
Jeans Day™ is a fun and easy event for people of all ages to participate in and show their support of BC’s kids. Simply by purchasing a $5 button or $20 pin, you get a chance to wear your jeans to work or school on April 29 and help the kids at BC Children’s Hospital.
How Do I Get Involved? You can become a Jeans Day™ Champion.
Champions are people who coordinate Jeans Day™ at their workplace. By inviting colleagues, family and friends to participate by purchasing a Jeans Day™ lapel pin or button you can help us raise over $1 million, through Jeans Day™, for BC Children’s Hospital.
One of the key discussions I continue to hear in the social media world is “how do we measure influence in social media?. Public relations companies, marketers are constantly seeking to pitch top influencers, in the hopes that those influencers will in fact help them increase their sales, etc. Jeremiah Owyang recently mentioned that number of followers is a bad measure.
Owyang asks for folks to look at quality and quantity of list memberships when measuring influence. The more time I spend analyzing social media (with an academic lens, even if I don’t actually study social media in my research), the more I think that measuring influence is next-to-impossible. Let me explain why. The graph to the left of the above paragraph is my Klout score of a few months ago (right now my Klout score has gone down to approximately 59, down from 75 which used to be my score, consistently).
For a while, I used to be in the top 5 Twitter Grader for Vancouver, even reaching #1 (that score also oscillated so much that it was almost useless). So when Klout came along, it seemed as though I had found a better measure of my own influence. Truth be told, in my own view, now that my Klout score is substantially lower, I believe that I have MUCH more influence, measured not by numbers, but by impact. I think my tweets have more impact now than ever before.
For example, recently, I asked the people who follow me on Twitter to re-tweet a job at UBC (I clearly marked my tweet as “please share widely”). I get one, two re-tweets here and there, maybe 6 on a good day, when I am not running contests that involve retweeting. But with this particular job, I got about a dozen or more retweets. That puzzled me. Is it the nature of the job, is it the fact that I have more influence, what made more people decide to retweet.
And the more time I spend trying to understand social networks (particularly for my research on ENGOs, but also transferring lessons to social media), the more I think influence is not associated with numbers. It’s associated with degree of trust. It’s associated with the right mixture of strong and weak ties. And please note that I didn’t create a causal link. I said that it’s associated (or even, has some degree of correlation).
In the next few weeks, I’ll be giving “tech-ie” talks (e.g. on blogging, on freelancing, on WordPress site building). But as I clear my desk from all the marking I still have to do, I want to start thinking more about issues of privacy, influence, safety and network modeling in social media. This post is the first of a series of thought entries. Obviously, it’s still half-baked, but it’s a start…
So, my question to you, my dear readers? What measures of influence do you take as most valuable? What constitutes influence, particularly as we think of social media?
I have been reflecting in the past couple of weeks, particularly as my 4 years blogaversary party approached, about how lucky I am. I don’t have a lot of money, I do have to live a budgeted life. I live in a small apartment. I don’t own a car, nor do I have many luxuries. I’m not one to own lots of gadgets. But I have a life I love. As my friend Jo Van Every wrote, I have the kind of academic life I have always wanted. I teach at the university level, do research, do consulting and I’m even mentoring students!
On the personal side, I have great friends, I have an amazing family, I am absolutely loved. My students really enjoyed my classes, and the feedback I received was fantastic. So, all in all, do I really have a right to complain? No, I don’t. I am living to the fullest, I feel integrated again.
I don’t have everything I want, but I love everything I have.
I’m not perfect, nor have I ever claimed to be. And the more time I spend reflecting on myself I realize how important it is to step back and look at what I have been doing.
It’s almost May, so technically we’re almost 1/3 of the year over, and I wanted to take a look at my own performance in keeping with my 2010 Manifesto: Feeling Like an Integrated Person Again.
So, where am I now in terms of my search for re-integration? Well, that is a good question. The first thing I did was I went back to swimming.
I also started exercising 6 days a week, primarily 3 days of weights and 3 days of cardio. I began dancing again through a beginners’ dance class (just for the fun of being a beginner again, even though I *teach* dance), and I have taken time for myself. Last week, because of the overwhelming amount of work I had, I didn’t exercise. And that took a toll on me. I wasn’t sleeping well, I did a bit of eating too much pasta, etc.
So, this week, even though I’m incredibly overwhelmed, I have made it my goal to continue exercising, even sneaking 20-30 minute swims and 15 minute early-morning runs. And I can’t tell you how much better I feel. I’m more focused on my client work, I can still meet with my students and I feel that I am ready to take on my workload better. I’m stronger and more resilient.
So that’s where I am at the end of April. And you know what? I’m very proud of what I’ve accomplished. I’ve lost 25 pounds, gave away a lot of my old, non-fitting clothes and still managed to have some measure of social life. I can’t wait for summer 2010.
No, I am by no means paid by the Glowbal Group to write reviews of their restaurants, nor have they given me any complimentary meals. But by some weird, strange reason, I’ve ended up at three (yes, you heard that right, three) of their restaurants in the last three or four months. First, I was taken to Glowbal Grill by my good friend Liv Hung (A Beautiful Life). Then, I had dinner at Coast (again, invited this time by my best buddy from Mexico, CB and his boss).
A week or so ago, CB, CA and myself went for lunch to Coast, but it was closed, so we ended up across at Italian Kitchen. I remember hearing about Italian Kitchen as it had opened in Kitsilano a year or so ago. I love Italian food, and I have had food at other Glowbal Group establishments, so I figured it’d be a safe bet to take CB and CA to Italian Kitchen.
I started off with a spinach salad ($11, marinated radicchio, shaved parmesan, crispy onion rings, figs, balsamic vinegar). We then ordered a Pasta Platter (spaghetti and spicy kobe meatballs with truffle cream, braised veal cannelloni with wild mushroom cream, pappardelle with lamb sausage, cabbage and potatoes, rigatoni pomodoro, with a pricing of $ 16 per person, minimum 2 people). It was enough food for all three of us.
There are three things that I know now. First, that when I’m hungry I don’t even make the time to take photos of my food. Two, that I am completely and utterly a dessert addict. I love the creme brulee that Italian Kitchen makes. Third, I absolutely love the spicy kobe meatballs. I have had this flavor in my mouth before, at Glowbal Grill, but it’s the first time I try it at Italian Kitchen.
And the service was really good, so I can’t complain at all. All in all, a great experience. Now that I’ve had some time to think about the rest of the Glowbal Group restaurants I’ve visited, I think I’ve also been to AfterGlow. I’ll write about that one once I’ve actually been there more fully.
It’s the end of the term at UBC, and I’m not getting any rest at all. My May 2010 looks completely, utterly and totally booked. Something that is actually quite fun, I can’t complain (and I shouldn’t).
As I review my Calendar to update it with my speaking engagements in the upcoming month, I just realized these are the talks I will be giving in the next few weeks. If you attend any of these, please make sure you introduce yourself. I really enjoy knowing the people behind the Twitter accounts!
May 7th – Panel at Northern Voice 2010 – Government 2.0: Politics, Policy and Social Media in Canada: A Multi-Level Exploration – Friday May 7th, 2010 from 10:30am to 11:30am at the UBC Life Sciences Centre building. David Eaves moderates, with Ian Capstick (MediaStyle), Tanya Twynstra (BC Government) and Andrea Reimer (City of Vancouver Councillor) and yours truly (UBC/CIELAP/HB Strategies).
May 15th – Panel at WordCamp Victoria 2010, with Rebecca Bollwitt (Miss604) and Lorraine Murphy (Raincoaster) on Blogging and WordPress. I’ll be giving a talk as well. My talk title is: WordPress for Professional and Personal Blogging: Two Approaches, One Site Building Platform.
May 17th – Panel w Tris Hussey (A View from the Isle). Part of the WordPress Mastermind Series, this is Number 4: How Come No One is Reading My Blog? Get Traffic. Tris and I will be sharing our thoughts on how you can grow your traffic using WordPress.
May 29th – Workshop Leader and Speaker at FreelanceCamp Vancouver 2010. I will be leading a workshop on “Freelance is Not Free” (by now, probably my trademark!). This workshop will be focused on how to value our freelancing services and strategies to maximize value for our clients and ourselves. Fore more information, follow @604freelancers on Twitter.
Given how many courses I teach every term you would think I wouldn’t even want to give talks anymore. But you know what, I think that it’s good for me as a warm up for the summer academic conference/speaking circuit. Plus, if you got it, you share it (the mantra of Social Media Club).
I had heard amazing things about the restaurant Coast (one of several of the Glowbal Group) from my friend Minna Van (co-founder of The Network Hub). Since I needed to take my dearest friend CB and his boss, CA, for dinner near by the hotel where they were staying, I chose Coast.
I had wanted to take CB and CA to Coast actually for lunch, but on the Sunday when they were here for a whirlwind visit, it was simply impossible because… Coast was closed for lunch. I’m not kidding. So instead we went to Italian Kitchen, which is also part of the Glowbal Group. I wasn’t really super hungry, but anyways decided to start with a Caesar salad ($ 7), REALLY good.
My only beef with Caesar salads is that they include cheese (and I hate cheese). For my main course I chose the salmon ($27), a dish that is usually my savior as I really love fish. This salmon was tender, flavorful but a tiny bit crusty at the top. Nevertheless, the bed of veggies and the sides were really tasty as well. I accompanied my dinner with a 2008 Gewurtzaminer (I love sweet wine).
I was a bit surprised, because I tweeted during dinner that the service at Coast was REALLY slow, and by the time my salad had arrived, the service improved TREMENDOUSLY. I am not sure if they were monitoring my stream, but seriously, kudos to them for improving the service so dramatically within such a short period of time. At the end, our server was incredibly gracious and nice, prompt and effective.
For dessert I chose my trusty bread pudding (a dessert I’ve learned that, no matter how bad it is in any other restaurant, it’s hard to screw up, so whenever I see it in a menu, I order it). I almost had no space for dessert, and that bread pudding was to-die-for. Wish I could have had two. Overall, (and thanks to CB and CA for the dinner, as they invited me out), I have to say that I’m glad we came to Coast.
It was a really good and tasty experience. It’s kind of weird that every time I’ve gone to a Glowbal Group restaurant (and full disclosure – I have absolutely NO TIES with the Glowbal Group, nor do I work for them, nor have they ever comp’ed a meal for me) it’s been a good experience (and I’ve been to three of them already). I’ll be writing about lunch at Italian Kitchen shortly too.
When I started my undergraduate degree in Chemical Engineering, I always thought I would be a plant manager for some chemical plant. When I completed my MBA & MEng degrees, I thought I would be a Project Manager or a Research Manager for some kind of research institution. When I completed my PhD, I thought I would jump on the tenure-track and try to get a job as an assistant professor in a university. My life hasn’t turned out this way and I’m grateful forever.
For the past decade, in addition to my research, student mentoring and teaching, I have undertaken consulting assignments. First, as part of a research centre that was trying to move forward towards a more self-sufficient business model, and in the past few years, independently.
In the past year, I have written articles for several outlets, including The Network Hub‘s blog, TechVibes and a number of other online magazines and outlets. That’s part of what being a freelancer is. Moreover, I have done a lot of writing about the topic, and one of my most celebrated posts is my “Freelance is Not Free” post (which then led to a BarCamp discussion last year).
Thus, it is only fitting that I am going to be speaking/facilitating a workshop at FreelanceCamp Vancouver 2010, organized by my good friend Minna, co-hosted as well by John and Jay (co-founders of The Network Hub), and co-organized by a number of local freelancers, including Natalie Sisson, Cecilia Lu, Cathy Browne.
So what is FreelanceCamp Vancouver 2010? it’s a Barcamp format unconference for independent professionals. It will take place on May 29th (Saturday) at The Network Hub (422 Richards Street). You can follow @604freelancers for more information.
As I had indicated recently, the City of Bhangra Festival is opening on April 29th. I can’t make the May 1st opening night of rePercussion at The Vogue (which is a leading act for the festival) but thanks to the lovely organizers, I have a pair of tickets to give away to my readers.
To enter, drop a comment on this post indicating whether you’ve had any exposure to Bhangra music/performances. I will draw a random winner on Wednesday April 28th before 2pm. As I usually do with my contests, I will contact the winner by email, and if I don’t get an answer within 24 hours, I will re-draw a winner on Thursday.
More on rePercussion:
Drums of the world beat as one.
Although he’s the world-renowned Dean of Music at VCC, to us, Sal Ferreras is the epitome of super cool percussionist. Over the last few years he has been collaborating with the VIBC Society, and this year Sal Ferreras has Salsa-infused Bhangra madness in store for the 2010 City of Bhangra Festival.
For the first time, VIBC Society is pairing up with explorASIAN to celebrate Asian Heritage Month in Canada. RePercussion will be the official launch of Vancouver Asian Heritage Month with the ode to the drum and dance from a variety of cultures that represent Vancouver’s rich multicultural landscape. Feel the beat of the drum from Asia, Africa, and South America as they blend with the dhol and fuse with Punjabi folk dancers.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Official Opening of Vancouver Asian Heritage Month
VOGUE Theatre
918 Granville Street, Vancouver
Doors: 7:00, Show starts 8:00pm
A modern reinvention of Ovid’s Book 2 (the Raven and the Crow) dirty white by the folks of Theatre Terrific offers a re-examination of lust, greed, immaturity and jealousy. In dirty white, we see a young girl (Cora, sublimely performed by Sindy Angel) who is being lusted after by an immature and sometimes childish God (excellent Christian G. H. Prohom). The Raven (Manuel Shulte in a great performance) and lovely Charlie Wilson who plays the Daw, are two excellent additions to the conflict (as Raven works for God, almost like an automaton).
The Boy, lovely Adam Lindgren, was fantastic as well (and a surprising turn of events that I can’t really give away). I went to The Cultch (which has been impressively renovated and I absolutely love – I was there with Chris Walts for Ali and Ali 7 a couple of weeks back) last week, with one of my best friends, ML – we wanted to check dirty white as I have always been unable to check any of Theatre Terrific‘s productions.
We both really enjoyed the play (90 minutes all told, without intermission) although I found the first 15 minutes and the last 20 of the second part of the play a bit slow, as the characters seemed to be taking a tad too much time to develop their character.
Overall, I really enjoyed this reinvention of one of Ovid’s most popular books (I was a Greek mythology fiend a couple of decades back). Thanks to Theatre Terrific for inviting me (thanks Andrew Templeton too for hooking me up with TT!). I couldn’t get a winner for my tickets giveaway so I’m re-drawing. To win a pair of tickets for a performance before May 1st, comment on this post or RT! I will draw a winner tonight at 8pm.
There will be a Wine and Cheese Affair and special performance of scenes of dirty white at Performance Works on Granville Island from 5 to 8pm, with additional jazz by Michael Klein Duo (tickets are $40 and are for sale before in the lobby).
My dear friend Minna Van just reminded me of this amazing song “One on One” by Robert Miles, this one featuring Maria Nayler. I have to say that I can always count on Minna to remind me of amazing music. We both love “Empty Streets” by Late Night Alumni, so I was really not very surprised when Minna suggested One on One. And it’s #MusicMonday, so it’s all good!
In the past couple of weeks, I haven’t had the time to articulate all the reasons why I disagree with Malcolm Gladwell’s views posed on the keynote he delivered at F5Expo (thanks Nels Agerbo and Lindsay Smith for inviting me to attend). Many of you who were there know the context. Gladwell was closing his provocative keynote, and I asked Lindsay to let me ask a question. Very kindly, Lindsay mentioned that I was a big Twitter/blogger/social media dude with thousands of followers.
But when I took the microphone, I told Gladwell that instead of seeing me as a social media guy, I was speaking as an academic who has studied transnational networks of environmental activists for over a decade. I told Gladwell that my research contradicted what he had just told the audience (about how revolutions aren’t created through online tools – he really misinterpreted Granovetter’s findings). And it’s true. In my research, I have found that transnational networks of activists are strengthened by the use of online tools. So, the ‘weak ties’ become with time, ‘strong ties’. Gladwell said that my research showcased people who were using online tools the right way and that we should learn from those cases.
I found it kind of ironic that one of the points that Gladwell made (that anonymity hinders trust) is actually very true, and highlighted by a curious gaffe that occurred during this event and the follow up. I met Gladwell and had a chance to have a very brief conversation where he told me he wasn’t even on Twitter, and that whoever was behind the @Gladwell account wasn’t him. Funny enough, during F5Expo, another fake Malcolm Gladwell account was created. See screenshots below.
So, ironically, Gladwell was simultaneously right and wrong. Right in that online tools foster anonymity and anonymity precludes trust. Wrong in that social media and online tools can’t create revolutions. You have the case of Iran, you have the case of RETC activists (ask me in person about my research on these transnational networks). More importantly, I can easily say that my own life has been revolutionized thanks to social media.
I know that Nels and Lindsay are doing a follow-up event on Wednesday (and I can’t make it, unfortunately, as I teach right at that time), but I do hope that the issues I present here are raised. And if they know who is behind the fake Gladwell accounts, I’d LOVE to knwo.
I used to live near Broadway and Cambie a few years ago (when I was doing my MBA/MEng). I remember that I felt so incredibly lucky because, even though we didn’t have the Canada Line yet, we had excellent bus access. It would take me 30 minutes using the 99 B-Line to get to UBC. I could get to Commercial in 10-15. And I had excellent restaurants near by. But not amazing coffee shops.
While admittedly, now you have a Starbucks and a Blenz almost kitty-corner from each other, and even a Cafe Artigiano near by, I always have had a soft spot for independent coffee shops. While Elysian Coffee now has another location (something that kind of makes it now a chain, heh. But I love their coffee, and now that they have wifi (yes, they do!) and a cute patio, I think I’ll be there for a coffee often.
I know for a fact that my good friend Linda Solomon (founder of The Vancouver Observer) loves that particular location of Elysian Coffee, so I might decide to drop by and have coffee with her sometime soon. Have any of you, my dear readers, been to this location of the Elysian Coffee?
The gentrification of my area (Mount Pleasant) has concerned me for a while now (admittedly, the Kingsway and Fraser area and from 16th and Fraser to King Edward is getting nicer and highly touted to become “the new Main“). So, when I saw that a new sushi place had opened right next door to Rhizome Cafe, I was a bit worried. I didn’t want “yet another sushi place” in an area that is even a tad crowded with restaurants – for example, Jiro and Sushiyama are both within two blocks distance).
I will admit that I walked into Hime Sushi a bit hesitant (admittedly, it was 9 pm and all I wanted was a couple of rolls). Unfortunately, I think they might have recognized me from my profile photo on UrbanSpoon, which is a bit unfortunate, because I would have wanted to eat there knowing that the excellent service I received was the same level of service that they provide everyone. I ordered a California combo ($ 8.00) and that was that, and I’ll say, Hime Sushi’s rolls are on par with some of the best sushi I’ve had (perhaps to the level of Zipang Sushi on Main and 20th).
I’ll have to come back and let you know if the service is as good when they’re busy as it is when they’re empty (they close at 10pm).
I’m always grateful that the community of public relations professionals keep me abreast of what’s happening in my own city that I might not be aware and invites me to events, but I sometimes don’t know if I have the time to attend all the things I get invited to. But this event is one I would really like to attend as I have a lot of friends who are into Bhangra (most notably, HZ and JH).
The festival, organized by the Vancouver International Bhangra Celebration (VIBC) Society, encourages cultural exploration and community participation through a diverse series of events highlighting the Northern India music and dance art form known as Bhangra.
For more information check out their website. I’ll be inquiring if I can get some free tickets for my readers.
Let me just say this – whoever invented the ‘granny’ cart and whoever designed this particular type of shopping cart (a-la granny cart) are geniuses. I no longer need to break my back when I go shopping. I recently had to go on a “let’s get supplies for the office and a few items for the pantry” shopping trip, and the place where I went shopping had this type of shopping carts. Genius!
You are brilliant, insightful, and intuitive.
You understand people better than they would like to be understood.
Highly sensitive, you are good at putting together seemingly irrelevant details.
You figure out what’s going on before anyone knows that anything is going on!
Why you would be a good superhero: You don’t care what people think, and you’d do whatever needed to be done
Your biggest problem as a superhero: Feeling even more isolated than you do now
