Downtown Calgary and SF

Downtown

My trip to San Francisco was pretty awesome and I think it’s my new favorite city—in the United States anyway. Here’s a photo I took from the plane coming into Calgary. And here’s my San Francisco Flickr Set (it’s a work in progress as I continue to sort through the nearly 500 photos from last week).

I’ll write more about my trip later including a glimpse into the Social Media Club event where we were lucky enough to meet Jimmy Wales and listen to him speak a little bit about social media and Wikipedia. (Also thanks for the t-shirt SMC). I also really enjoyed trying out the The World Café format, a way in which the best ideas in the room can be shared with everyone through smaller discussions that leads to one large one.

It was disappointing to have to leave so soon, but I’m sure another adventure is just around the corner.

Spiders on Drugs

A couple of weeks ago I watched the video Spiders On Drugs.

It’s a parody of the old Hinterland Who’s Who show that you may remember if you watched Saturday morning cartoons in the 1980’s here in Canada. Hinterland’s Who’s Who would come on between shows—I used to hate them, “enough with the stupid animals I want to see cartoons!”

This interesting read is the story of Andrew Struthers who made the video and his narration of what happened after he posted it on YouTube.

If You’re Going to San Francisco…

On Sunday I’m taking off for a few days in the California sun. No, I’m not off to MacWorld, but I am going to San Francisco to take part in a Social Media Club round table discussion.

Chris Heuer (SMC Co-Founder) will lead a roundtable discussion on blogs, podcasting and all the cool things we want to do and would like to see happen in 2007. SMC is working to connect Social Media groups all over the world, so it’s a great way to take a part in universal efforts to spread the Social Media love.

I’m really looking forward to it, for one thing, my skin is getting a little pasty white up here in the Great White North—but also it will be a great opportunity to make some interesting new friends south of the border. Maybe it’ll even inspire me to start my own podcast.

One Red Paperclip

One Red Paperclip is a site about one man’s successful attempt at trading one red paperclip for something bigger and better until, 14 trades later, he had a house. File under, “why didn’t I think of that?”

Coincidentally, because of the One Red Paperclip guy’s challenge to CBC’s The Hour, the show went to Yahk, BC and on the way they did a couple of shows in Calgary. It was one of those Calgary episodes that I was on.

Stephen Colbert’s Interview by the Institute of Politics at Harvard

A Conversation with Stephen Colbert

I found the video of Stephen Colbert’s appearance before the Institute of Politics at Harvard an enjoyable and entertaining look at the real life Stephen Colbert. It humoured me to find out, among other things he bases his character on, he really is afraid of bears.

Enjoy the conversation and learn more about what makes his persona on the show in this video, A Conversation With Stephen Colbert. Be aware, the video is about an hour and ten minutes long.

Art Puzzle

From https://rinpaeshidan.jp/about/

Since the group’s first breakthrough video went viral on YouTube in 2006, Tokyo-based Art collective Rinpa Eshidan has been creating “motion paintings” and commercial films that have earned the group fierce notoriety in the global art scene.

With over 60 million collective hits worldwide, Rinpa’s signature style is recognized and emulated the world over.