Aug
25
I accepted an offer for a position at The CBC on Thursday, August 21st, so starting September 8th I’ll be working there as an Associate Producer of online content. The opportunities that present themselves just by virtue of being in the building are incredible, and I feel fortunate for having been given the chance to show what I can do within and for the company. It’s a big step up for me from working as a Webcast/Multimedia Producer for CNW, where I’ve been working for just over 3 years after having moved to Toronto from Montreal.
When I arrived I was working at The Disney Store at the Eaton Center, so this CBC gig really does make me feel like I made the right decision in forcing my wife to come to Toronto with me. Sure, I had to sedate her with some barbiturates and tie her her hands behind her back to make sure she made the trip to the big smoke with me, but with this new job I think I can finally untie her and let her see some sunlight without worrying that she’ll flag down a cop car.
Thanks to Guin for the big ups- they certainly didn’t hurt my chances!
Jul
24
The NFB has always held a strange place in my heart. On the one hand they provide the means for a lot of film makers to create and distribute their works. Without the NFB, many awesome little (and bigger) indie films wouldn’t see the light of day.
On the other hand they want $15 for a 10 minute VHS I wanted a few years ago. That right there meant I wasn’t going to see the film.
I can understand that people need to make some money, but I’m also glad that the NFB has realized that there are other ways to do so that don’t involve charging far too much money for an out dated technology. So it’s pretty damn awesome that they’ve started opening up their catalog for free, on the net, and totally embeddable to boot.
Jul
4
The above was recently posted on Dear Toronto, this morning in fact. It’s just some footage of some Kids on TV having fun with some Men. good times at Pride Toronto, and more videos showing the fun over the next week.
On another note I’ve witnessed a large number of my relatively small twitter friends publicly decrying their Apple hardware recently. A large number of Macbook Pro systems, in particular, seem to be EPIC FAILING on them. These people chose to go with Macs not only because they look pretty, but because of their reported reliability. These people are power users, not your grandmother.
I haven’t been a regular Mac user since OSX first came out, a period that many would call the Mac’s rebirth. I’ve been a steadfast PC user largely because I like being in control. Not being a Mac power-user I can only go on what I’ve read and heard others say about the platform, but I’ve never been a fan of anything that just works and doesn’t need your input on how it works.
I need to know how something works because when it breaks, I like to tinker around to try and fix it. I like to customize registry settings. I like to use a non-glossy interface that lets me do my work (and surprisingly enough, the operating system itself isn’t what I use to produce, it’s what merely enables the production software to be used).
I hope my friends get speedy fixes for the Mac gear, whether it be non-recoverable hard drives that won’t spin, iPods that won’t sync, or blue tooth devices that won’t latch. In the meantime, if going the PC route I heartily recommend Gateway, specifically for their customer support. Over the phone they allowed me to open up the computer, flip jumper switchess and do hard resets to the computer’s bios by removing the motherboard battery without voiding any warranties. The computer ended up being a lemon, and they exchanged it for a new one within two weeks, but still, it was the first time a level-1 tech didn’t tell me to turn the computer off and back on just in case.
Jun
25
For Tweets’ Sake
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Since attending Podcamp Toronto I’ve had a t witter account. I’ve amassed over 110+ followers but I’m only following about 60 back. Most of my followers aren’t spam bots, so why don’t I reciprocate?
Because we’re likely using Twitter for very different reasons. I see twitter as a way of casually mentioning what’s going on every now and then, and occasionally partaking in very brief conversation that usually doesn’t extend more than two tweets. Anything more and I either blog about it, or email/contact the person directly.
There are two issue with Twitter.
First, Twitter users on the whole will often use it as a god damn instant messenger. There’s nothing I hate more than seeing my tweet wall filled with 20 tweets from the same person within the last 15 minutes. You do NOT need to reply to every single one of your followers with a “Ya @person, that’s nifty!” followed by a “I agree @otherperson!” Once, sure, twice, fine, 15 times? Buy a phone and spend a minute with them.
Second, Twitter’s much lauded awesomeness in terms of its ability to connect the people is fraudulent from what I’ve seen. The average facebook/myspace user does not use twitter. It doesn’t have the functionality they’ve come to expect from their social networking experience. Want to share photos? You can post a link to a flickr/facebook set, sure, but that requires something other than twitter, and that something is more often than not perfectly capable of allowing their users to carry on conversations in groups or one on one. Also, and this is a biggie, Twitter is seen by PR folk as the second coming Christ, and for good reason: it’s mostly PR people who use the damn thing! More than half (I’d wager 3/4) of all the non-spam bot people who’ve followed me on twitter are all PR PR PR. This mostly makes twitter not a social-networking site, but a business/PR-networking site. You do not reach the average person and you don’t reach the tastemakers either if the only people you reach are other people like you (ie. PR PR PR).
As a result the only PR people that I follow back happen to be people I know in some way shape or form, or because they tweet interesting shit.
I’ll throw one last nugget out there: Twitter is the new Digg, in that the only thing people on Twitter talk about is mother fucking TWITTER. It’s down again? BOO HOO! Can’t think of anything tweetable? Don’t tweet “I can’t think of anything tweetable”!!! The video below comes to mind.
Jun
13
There’s been much ballyhoo about proposed copyright amendments details in bill C-61. I won’t go into much detail about, well, the details, as it’s all covered in great, err, DETAIL on many a site, including the ever awesome Michael Geist goes into deep detail about why it’s so insane.
Many creators don’t have much issue with their works being used by educational institutions, for research purposes, or even sharing amongst friends or non-friends (ie torrented files). so long as they see some sort of compensation (also known as a reason to keep creating), it tends to work out. If it didn’t all those local bands playing local gigs selling their discs and other merch locally wouldn’t exist. somehow, it still works.
Jun
10
I got a notice that my subscription to Wired was done and tat it was time for me to consider renewing it. It didn’t take long for me to decide not to, though, it’s definitely not because of the content; Wired is easily one of the most interesting magazines on the market. Its central theme is generally “Cool schtuff from everywhere,” and each page rarely fails to impress.
But why stop then? Read more
Jun
6
TTC Beta Testing
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The TTC has decided to open up its redesigned site as a public beta test of sorts. It’s a definite visual improvement, but what about what’s under the hood?
first things first, it’s already lying to us. Read more