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 31 Jul 2004 @ 23:41
I've changed the title of my newslog to better represent where I get most of my information from. I won't be covering everything that happens in Vancouver, not by a long shot, there is simply too much that happens in this city. But most of the stuff that I land up writing about comes to my attention because I am in Vancouver.
A big part of living in Vancouver is that it also means living in Canada, and I've found that our news is less like propaganda compared to the US. Most of my news comes to me through the CBC Radio which is commerical free and a nice mixture between investigative journalism and the arts and culture.
The city also has a number of free newspapers and magazines that get a lot of readership because they hang around for a week (a month in some cases) in coffee shops, bus stops, laundermats and other public places. The list below is a small sample seeing as how every journalism school and university has an edition and there are lots of free lancers as well. The weeklies that I usually checkout are:
The Georgia Straight Over thirty years ago this was our underground newspaper but now it is mainly entertainment but with a few good stories every week.
Westender Is not really a gay newspaper but there are just so many gay's in the WestEnd that they have a strong influence. My favorites are 'Evil Brain', Curious Times, and the letters sections.
The Vancouver Courier A weekly newspaper that gives good coverage of local issues, possibly even better than the dailies.
Terminal City Music and politics of the younger generations, and major boomer bashers.
There are a couple of monthly glossies about spirituality which also cover the liberal left political spectrum.
Common Ground
Shared Vision
Then there is the culture in general and the huge mass of creative people that have moved here. Vancouver is an international city, less than half the population was born in Canada, most immigrants come from Hong Kong and the middle east, and the latter in particular sponsor regular speakers on political issues. Public lectures are a big part of the Vancouver information scene, and information in general is a large part of the scene.
Oh, and I don't own a TV and very rarely visit anyplace that does have one so that kind of influences my perception as well.
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 31 Jul 2004 @ 09:19
the members only club that doesn't want you
insults the egoic of an excluded other side
who wants to decide whom are the chosen few
in scarce sanctuary granted a place to hide
but a solution safe from wisdom's seduction
ignored at the core when walls of reduction
rage for justice of the recently stultified
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 30 Jul 2004 @ 00:50
30th July -- Flow Jaguar
Six / Flow
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The movement of volume through space creating time. Six is the energy of negotiation and responsiveness. Think on the art of dance or the play of a great athlete to see this energy in action. Six energy facilitates dynamic developments and improvements in all aspects of life.
Jaguar
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Born with a deep love of Mother Earth, Jaguar or shaman, is directly tied to the source of all Earth magic. They possess great power of intellect and strength of charactr through integrity. Jaguar energy is feminine in nature and is the ruling spirit of jungles, plains and mountains. The spirit of Jaguar inhabits the Mayan temples and is called on to assist in spiritual as well as in material ways. Jaguar is also the god/goddess of gratefulness. Patience born of strength and skill can turn to pounce of quick decision and action. Both bold and stealthful, Jaguars do not often attack directly and communications from them usually contain some mystery. In the absence of integrity, Jaguars power corrupts becoming a search for wealth and fame.
A good day to: Commune and give thanks to Mother Nature.
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29 Jul 2004 @ 13:02
29th July -- Empowerment Reed
Five / Empowerment
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At the center of the cube we find Five. Five is an intelligent, organizing force which manages communications and materials, knowledge and applications. Fives are natural net workers who gather what is needed. These persons can probe directly to the core of any situation making them excellent investigators.
Reed
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Reed persons are the spiritual essence, protectors and guiding light for family and home. They are competent speakers who will take up a cause. Very tough and analytical, Reeds endeavor to bring peasce, harmony and order to all of their relations. Reeds are blessed with great skill at negotiations and consoling which are very often put to the test. Although Reeds need a lot of appreciation, many have marriage or business problems because of inflexible views and high expectations, which erode affinity. The lesson for Reed is to be like a garden hose, not a steel pipe.
A good day to: Bless or repair your house.
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 28 Jul 2004 @ 14:59
SAGE stands for Simulation and Advanced Gaming Environments (SAGE) for Learning. This is a recently launched collaborative research initiative by Simon Fraser University in Vancouver Canada. Most of the initial work is for the purpose of collecting a foundation of information for using the latest computer technology and applying it towards the creation of learning environments. The expectations are that this will create a new industry in which Canada will be able to play a leading role.
SAGE is a wisdom project. We have evolved beyond facts, beyond knowledge, and now we seek wisdom on a mass basis. Wisdom to know what to do, and why and how. Wisdom which can be learned but not taught, earned but not bought, elusive but essential. Perhaps in virtual environments we can try things on for size and see how they fit before we commit. This is an option we really haven't had before.
SAGE is more than an academic exercise, it involves the academics but also the students and the general public as well. There is a theory side, a participatory side, and the observation of both. This initiative has the support of the universites, the government and industry. There are a lot of qualified people that are being paid to work on this project, it is not just a good idea being held afloat by a handful of volunteers, although I suspect there will be lots of volunteers involved, as well as by those that want experience for future monetary gain. There should be high interest in this project since the content involves health care which is probably the most popular political issue for Canadians.
Vancouver already has an established industry in electronic gaming. There is also a large number of people working in the film industry and the nickname of Hollywood North is well earned. Vancouver itself, along with the high concentration of creative people that have moved here, is probably the biggest asset for this project.
We already have some experience in new education forms such as high school classes where every student was provided with a laptop, which had wifi connection, and classroom projects were collaborative efforts; parents, teachers and students were so impressed with the results that there are plans to introduce this method into more Vancouver schools.
The SAGE project is hyper multi-media. It not only includes all aspects of online communication but a large off line component as well. It also involves that overlapping area where the mass population engages in collective dialogue. For example I heard about this project last week on CBC Radio where David Kaufman the project leader was being interviewed and was also taking telephone calls from the audience. The project brochure (at SAGE link) lists a multitude of well defined objectives, and seeing as how it is in that most disagreeable online format of pdf Adobe Acrobat it will most probably be printed out, and find its way into coffee shops around town, along with newspaper articles, and through word of mouth. Hyper multi-media is not restricted to a communication medium but is diffused throughout the culture.
Vancouver is engaged with experimenting in numerous forms of participatory democracy, and all of this comes together in a culture of creativity and creation.
It wasn't that long ago that I would get very discouraged by the fact that online worlds like Everquest and Ultima would have millions of users paying a monthly fee to engage in escapism, and yet it was damn hard to find more than a handful that would cooperate in an intellectual discussion in a web conference. It will be interesting to see if this latest Vancouver experiment will provide more than mere stimulation. If it can happen anywhere it will be here. More >
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