Vancouver Jazz Festival iPhone App

Posted on July 2, 2009
Filed Under Events & Culture, Music, Web Culture & Links | Leave a Comment

This year, the Vancouver Jazz festival added a new tool for all its attendees to use: a “Mobile Companion”, for the iphone (free, from the app store [NB: iTunes store link]). This is probably the first (that I’m aware of) of innumerable related apps. I fully expect that every major, and shortly, even minor festivals, will have a similar app. It just makes sense.

When you first open the app, after asking for your location, it’ll update with the current schedule, and present you with a screen like this:

Jazz Fest Mobile Companion main screen

Jazz Fest Mobile Companion main screen

With this, I can quickly find what’s happening right now, what’s happening soon and how far it is from me so I can guess whether I can get there.

If I click on an event, I get another screen with info on the show itself:

The Event Details Screen

The Event Details Screen

This allows me to quickly see who’s playing, the cost, where it is and gives me links to the 2 things I’d want to do next: 1) phone for tickets or 2)find out how to get there (as an aside, the only major improvement I’d like to see is a almost-real-time count of the number of tickets available, even if it was “less than 100 seats left!” or “nearly sold out!”, rather than a specific count.

Of course, because your on an iPhone, the map is even more useful, because with 2 more clicks, you can directions to where you want to go, in the means of transport of your choice:

How to get to the venue

How to get to the venue

This is extremely useful for any multiple venue’d event, such as the jazzfest, the film festival (imagine the unwieldy Vancouver Film Festival Guide, digitized on your phone, along with movie descriptions directions, times, links to purchase tickets, etc.). It would likly prove just as useful for single-venue events like Sasquatch, or Pemberton - live-to-the-second updates of who’s on which stage, maps to bathrooms/vendors, etc.

Give it another couple of iterations, and tying in these apps to things like twitter for real-time interaction will be easy, seamless and make it possible to interact with the larger digital realm. I’d love to see a couple more links on that Jazz Fest details page: This event on Twitter/Facebook/Flickr/YouTube/(whatever) that opens up a search results, in the app that displays relevant results, and perhaps gives an interface to contribute to it as well.

French (and other) accents in Mac OS X

Posted on June 30, 2009
Filed Under Web Development | 1 Comment

So I only just learned this, and so thought I’d pass it along for others, and also, as a handily searchable record for myself, so here’s the list:

Some other useful codes:

generally, if you’re looking for a special code, hold the option key and start pressing around. I’ve tried to find a comprehensive list on the apple support site without luck. So happy typing!

Twitter vs. Facebook

Posted on May 29, 2009
Filed Under Events & Culture, Random Thoughts, Web Culture & Links | Leave a Comment

I’ve been thinking some of late about my relationships with Twitter & Facebook, and why, more or less as soon as Twitter came around, I stopped hanging out on Facebook (so, more or less the same post as about 10,000 others, but this one from my point of view).

I’ve been a joiner of all the social network upstarts. I had a MySpace account (I suppose I probably still do, although it is long unvisited), I had a friendster account, and, as soon I was able to, I had a facebook account. When I first joined facebook, I immediately “friended” all my real friends, which was great, and we had a new method, beyond IM of rapid communication. When apps were added, I got sucked into those and played games and whatnot. But the novelty wore off. And once I added everyone I knew, I stopped going as often. Sure, I could see what my friends were up to, but for the most part, their statuses didn’t change that often. And I wasn’t meeting anyone new or interesting on Facebook.

When I dove into politicking last summer, Facebook became indispensible. Every politician, aspiring politician, and most importantly, potential supporter and volunteer was on facebook. And here, facebook showed it’s true power: It is a closed feedback loop, which is exactly what is required for grassroots organizing. Once we’ve made a connection to each other, we can easily send information to and from each other. The information doesn’t really escape that loop, which is fine. On the downside, as all organizers know, no one considers anything on Facebook binding. Just because someone has said they’ll attend an event on Facebook does NOT mean they’ll show up. Just because they’ve joined your group does NOT mean they’ll participate.

Twitter, by contrast, is open-ended. When I tweet, the potential audience is not just my circle of 200 friends, the potential audience is anyone with an internet connection. Additionally, because I can read the conversation threads of the people whom I follow (caveat: with the recent changes to @replies, this is less possible now), I can quickly find new and interesting people. My list of people whom I follow on Twitter very quickly grew beyond my circle of friends and family - first to aquaintances, then to people whom I wished I knew, then people who inspired me, then, often, simply to people who seeming interesting, whether I knew them or not. And reading my language, you’ll note what I consider to be the key difference between Facebook and Twitter: on Facebook, you “friend” someone - it has to be reciprocal for it to be allowed. On Twitter, you follow someone, and there’s no need for them to follow you back. They can, but they don’t have to. And even if they don’t follow you, you can still read what they’re up to.

Interestingly, when I visit facebook now, the people who use it the most appear to be those who have connected their Twitter accounts to Facebook, so that their tweets update their facebook status. I suspect that the proliferation of non-web-based interfaces for Twitter have only helped to accelerate this - certainly, I almost never go to the Twitter site itself, just like I almost never go to the Facebook site. Websites, for all their goodness, are somewhat inconvenient compared to an app on my desktop because they’re not always on, like a desktop app can be.

I can be found at http://twitter.com/stv

Sign up for Jane’s Walk 2009, May 2nd & 3rd

Posted on April 17, 2009
Filed Under Events & Culture | Leave a Comment

Don’t Miss Out on Jane’s Walk, Tours Selling Out - May 2 and 3

Think City is still accepting walk sign ups for our May 2 and 3 Jane’s Walk. And if you have not reviewed our Jane’s Walk page by now, you will wish you had visited sooner.

Already John Atkin, Gordon Price and Bruce Macdonald’s tours are booked out, with over 300 people signing up for walks in the first six days. The good news is more walks are being posted every day.

Join Annabel Vaughan on her tour of the ancient Leqleqi portage, a tour that grew out of a response to the public process around the development of the Carrall Street Greenway. Visit grocery stores, community gardens including a fruit orchard, a roof top garden and a Green Table accredited restaurant with Wendy Mendes and Spring Gillard. Or hear the history and the facts from the perspective of the residents of the Downtown Eastside, as well as poetry by some of their famous DTES poets, on Wendy Pederson’s tour.

For more information, visit the May 2 and May 3 Jane’s Walks on the Think City web site

UPDATE: We are also looking for volunteers to help with walks and more walk hosts, so please sign-up.

Women in tech I admire: Lauren & Emira

Posted on March 24, 2009
Filed Under Random Thoughts, Web Culture & Links, Web Development | Leave a Comment

So today is “Ada Lovelace day“, a brand-new thing, to celebrate women in Tech, something that is definitely an issue, as many have pointed out when looking at conference speaker lists and whatnot. And there’s plenty of awesome women in tech & design, and I’ve been fortunate to work with several. However, I’m going to tell a story about two in particular, and the two are probably pretty obvious if you know me: Lauren Bacon & Emira Mears

I met Lauren way back when, when the internet was still young enough that we often had to explain to people why they might want a website. I met Lauren in one of those circuitous routes that made it inevitable we would be friends: I had a class with her younger sister, who introduced me to Day, who at the time was working part time at Duthie Books on 10th, and also starting up a small company called “Envolve Communications” with Jason Mogus (Envolve later became Communicopia). Day then introduced me to Lauren, who had moved down from Prince George and was working for Day & Jason when I started working there too. Lauren and I worked together at Communicopia, where we also met Emira. Way, way back in 2000, Lauren & Emira left to start their company Raised Eyebrow. I left Communicopia shortly thereafter to burn-out in a dot-com startup, while they slowly but surely, built what seemed to me an entirely different business model - one that I longed for, but was definitely not convinced it would work. Given that they’re thriving and not only the company I worked for at the time, but all but one of our clients, vendors and partners no longer exist, their business model clealy works ;).

When I started a sideline development company, Pencilneck Creations, I got to work with Lauren & Emira. And let me tell you - I’ve never had better bosses than they. They were patient, but knew how to push me to get things done. They both inspired and were inspired by their clients, and passed that on to myself and other contractors they worked with. They had a zine (Soapbox Girls, now sadly defunct), that inspired me to start blogging regularly some 8 years ago. They fought hard for women in tech to be recognized. They fought hard for themselves to be recognized, and slowly, surely, they were. I don’t think it’d be a stretch to say that they are now one of the most well-known local design firms, particularly in the sector of social-tech and progressive tech.

Lauren & Emira were also an inspiration to me when I left Digitopolis and formed Pencilneck Software with Jeff - I knew how they had worked, and that gave me the confidence to think I could do it too. They were also incredibly kind to Jeff and I, and we did a number of projects together our first years in business.

Lauren & Emira have also written a book, The Boss of You, celebrate International Women’s Day as a stat at their company, write passionately about women in business in technology on their blogs, continue to build beautiful, functional, useful websites, and also reach out to not only help, but promote other women in business across North America. I’ve worked, and continue to work now with a remarkable number of women in tech & design, but really, none are quite as rockin’.

So today, for Ada Lovelace day, I’m celebrating Lauren & Emira.

Parking Prices as social Experiment

Posted on March 17, 2009
Filed Under Random Thoughts | Leave a Comment

Most time when I drive to work (not too often, but often enough in order to be able to get to pick Liam up in time from daycare), I try to park for free. If that fails (which it will do more often than not), I park in the Pivotal building on Beatty. For a long time, the parking (for downtown) was fairly reasonable - $10 for all-day parking (to 6:30). However, in th past 2 weeks, the pricing has become varied, and I wonder if they’re doing some sort of an experiment. Last week, they removed the all-day parking option. Instead, I could park 2 hours for $6, or 4 hours for $10. The parking lot was more or less deserted. Then yesterday, the $10, all-day parking was back (as well as a $4 for 2 hours and $8 for 4 hours), and the lot was chocabloc. Today (I know! driving two days in a row! I’m going to lose all green cred in no time at this rate), there was no hourly-rate option. Instead, there was one $20 until 1AM option. The lot was about half-full. I didn’t park there, either. I’m kind of curious to see what other pricing options I’ll see over the next few weeks.

Third Annual Think City Citizen Budget Survey

Posted on March 3, 2009
Filed Under Politics | Leave a Comment

Every year, the City of Vancouver goes through a public consultation on the annual budget. This process has left much to be desired in terms of the actual consultation process. Each year, for the past three years, Think City has run it’s own, parallel Citizen’s Budget survey, to provide an additional means of feedback to the public that would otherwise be missed. Once the Think City survey is complete, the Think City executive present the results to council on March 31st.

Please take three minutes to fill out this survey and let Mayor Gregor Robertson and the rest of City Council know what you want in this year’s budget.

Let’s make sure citizens’ voices are heard, when city council decides the priorities for this year’s budget.

Vancouver Stories - a Think City Fundraiser

Posted on March 2, 2009
Filed Under Events & Culture | Leave a Comment

I would like to invite you to join Think City and me for an evening of Vancouver stories on Thursday, March 19 at the Heritage Hall.

Hosted by CBC Radio’s Bill Richardson, Vancouver Stories is a cocktail party and silent auction featuring Vancouver memorabilia and experiences, along with stories past and present as told by Vancouver notables. Storytellers include former CBC Radio Basic Black contributor Andreas Schroeder, community advocate Shirley Chan and civic historian John Atkin.

What: Cocktail party, story-telling and silent auction
When: Thursday, March 19, 7:00-10:00 PM
Where: Heritage Hall, 3102 Main St., Vancouver
Cost: $50

Last May, Think City, along with 600-plus Vancouverites celebrated the legacy of urban activist and writer Jane Jacobs with a series of free walking tours called Jane’s Walk. Over 30 Jane’s Walks were held in neighbourhoods all over the city. Help make this year’s Jane’s Walk an even greater success and buy or sponsor a ticket to Vancouver Stories.

Click here, for more information or to register.

My Random Band & Album Name

Posted on February 25, 2009
Filed Under Music, Web Culture & Links | 2 Comments

This is another one of those Facebook memes going around, but it was easy and fun, so I’m joining in.

Hamilton Amateur Athletic Association

Hamilton Amateur Athletic Association (Photo Credit: Jo's Fo's)

Here’s how to play along:

  1. Go to “wikipedia.” Hit “random” or click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
    The first random wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.
  2. Go to “Random quotations or click http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
    The last four or five words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.
  3. Go to flickr and click on “explore the last seven days” or click http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days
    Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.
  4. Use photoshop or whatnot to put it all together.
  5. Post it with this text in the “caption” and TAG the friends you want to join in.

Witnessed: A Clandestine Meeting

Posted on February 23, 2009
Filed Under Random Thoughts | Leave a Comment

I pull up to a stall in an underground parking garage. In the black SUV next to me, a 50-something chinese woman sits in the back seat, knitting. The front-passenger seat is empty, but decorated with a hello-kitty seat cover. A 50-something chinese man sits in the driver’s seat, talking on his cellphone. As I get out of my car, I look up at the car across from them. In a silver SUV, a slightly younger-looking chinese man sits in the driver’s seat of an SUV, talking on his cellphone. There is likewise a woman shadowed in the back seat of his car. I walk to get my ticket, and on my way back, it becomes clear that the two men are actually talking to each other. When one is talking, the other is listening. Not looking directly at each other, but certainly glancing up. As I lock my car and walk towards the exit, the couple in the silver SUV start their engines and peel out of the parking garage at high speed, tirese squealing on the slick cement.

keep looking »