Brain Album

Edmonton New Media Roundup 30

Sun, 22 Jul 2012 12:01:00 -0600

Exciting things are happening in the realm of making it easy to discover new media in Edmonton. So exciting that I feel compelled to blow the dust off my blog and see what I can do to bring these efforts to your attention.

ShareEdmonton blogs

Mack Male has made a number of improvements to his important ShareEdmonton site, but the thing I am most excited about is the index of Edmonton blogs. I know Mack has been working on this for a long time, as I had the pleasure of seeing some early versions. What he launched this week surpasses my high expectations.

I have long wanted a place to go to see at a glance what was going on in Edmonton’s blogosphere. When I was the editor of edmontonjournal.com, we made a stab at a page like that, which has since been greatly improved — kudos to Barb Wilkinson and Kerry Powell for making that happen. But it’s still pretty deep in the site (though you can find it under the Opinion nav under “Community Blogs”), and it’s not easy to look at on my phone, which is where I do most of my reading.

ShareEdmonton has a responsive design, so it’s just as easy to read on a mobile device as on a desktop. It’s organized so that the most recently updated blogs are at the top, and if you’re only interested in a certain category, like politics or fashion, you can just pull those up. I’ve bookmarked ShareEdmonton’s blog page on my phone, and I expect to return to it daily.

If you have an Edmonton blog that is updated regularly and you’d like to bring to the attention of more people, I encourage you to submit it to both ShareEdmonton and the Journal. The more ways we have to discover each other, the better.

Made In Edmonton

There must be something in the air, because here’s another aggregator of Edmonton blogs that launched this week. Made In Edmonton focuses on startups. As creator Jas Panesar describes it, it “aims to be a complete list of startups from Edmonton that exist in and out of the limelight, complete with a centralized city-wide blog feed of Edmonton’s Startup Blogs and Twitter feeds in one place.”

This grew out of discussions at the Edmonton Lean Startup Circle, which meets every Friday afternoon. I’ve attended a couple of times, and have been impressed with the intelligence and problem-solving power in the room. Bravo to Jas for cultivating such an atmosphere, and for building this site to spread the word.

As someone who is very interested in Edmonton’s startup scene, I’m grateful to have one place I can go to find out what’s going on. Its robustness will depend in part on how often and how well local startups update their blogs and/or Twitter feeds, but I think this has great potential to shine a light on some pretty interesting stories. If you have an Edmonton startup, submit it to Made in Edmonton, and visit often to keep up on what your peers are doing.

The Unknown Studio

The Unknown Studio, whose podcast has introduced me to so many interesting Edmonton people, now has a weekly Edmonton Blog Watch. In it, Adam Rozenhart does what I had been trying to do with the new media roundup, except more succinctly and regularly (and therefore better).

Adam has a good eye for what’s worth reading, and gives you enough information to decide for yourself whether you want to click. It’s a much more curated experience than the blog feeds on ShareEdmonton or Made in Edmonton, but sometimes that’s what you want. If you want to bring a blog to the attention of the Unknown Studio, submit it.

I haven’t updated my own blog in too long, as I’ve been busy with this and that. I think I’m going to pivot a little here. When I notice a pattern worth commenting on, I’ll fire up the new media roundup again. In the meantime, I’m going to use this blog for some other experiments in creative expression.

As always, I’d love to hear what you think about any of this. You can comment, or find me on Twitter or Google+.

(Edmonton aerial courtesy of jasonwoodhead23’s Flickr stream, licensed under Creative Commons.)

Watermelon + strawberries + blueberries + feta + vinegar + oil =...

Tue, 08 May 2012 19:09:31 -0600

Watermelon + strawberries + blueberries + feta + vinegar + oil = yum (Taken with instagram)

An offer I couldn't refuse

Fri, 04 May 2012 17:16:19 -0600

One year ago, I left the Edmonton Journal. The overlap between what I was spending my time on and what I wanted to be spending my time on was not big enough, and it was making me crazy. So I quit.

I spent a few weeks thinking, talking, imagining what I could do now that I was free. And then I did it. I started a business. I taught. I spoke. I wrote. I consulted. I spent a lot more time with my husband and children.

I did that thing I always do, which is to make a job for myself that is a little bit too hard, but on the whole, I have been very happy and very busy, with a much bigger overlap of the “want” and “do” circles of the big Venn diagram of my life.

Part of the reason I could do all of that was, well, The Journal.

Barb Wilkinson and Sandra Marocco gave me the opportunity last summer to make something, which turned into the media lab, which turned into a pilot project with City Hall School, which has now turned into a full-fledged Edmonton Journal School. I’m excited to continue to help make that project go with the inimitable Sandy VanRiper.

Now I have another chance to try something new and make a difference. Starting May 7, I’ll be leading a project whose working title is the Edmonton Experiment. We’re setting up a sandbox on the first floor of the Journal building downtown to come up with new ways for The Journal to be useful to its community. Our mission, as stated by our sponsors at Postmedia, is to “transform our city by inspiring everyone to share their expertise.” What that actually looks like in real life is up to me and my team (and a team in Toronto that is trying the same thing there).

Clay Shirky says a newspaper is a solution for a problem that doesn’t exist anymore. Our task is to see what problems this news organization can solve, and how. We’ll be trying our best to operate like a startup — problem-solving, testing, learning, and most of all, doing. I’ll be blogging about our efforts as we go.

So I’m back, sort of. Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in. But seriously, how could I turn down an opportunity like this?

P.S. I have been horribly delinquent with my new-media roundups. This will be rectified soon.

Edmonton New Media Roundup 28

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 09:43:00 -0700

It’s about time I got around to writing about MediaCamp, which brought more than 80 people to the World Trade Centre on Feb. 4 to explore the intersection of journalism and technology. I’m still thinking about that intersection, and the other roads that feed into it.

For a recap of what we did and learned, check out the amazing on-the-fly summaries put together by the MediaCamp newsroom. Huge thanks to my co-chair, Mack Male, and the organizing committee: Jeff Samsonow, Owen Brierley, Brittney Le Blanc and Tamara Stecyk, with assistance from Bruce Winter, Sylvia Schneider, Kerry Powell and Chandra Lye.

What follows are my thoughts alone, as the committee hasn’t had a chance to meet yet to discuss the event and our next steps.

Our mission for MediaCamp was to get storytellers and coders together to see how they could help each other do what they do. Did we succeed? Sort of. Because it was programmed instead of being an unconference, we were able to gear the agenda towards teaching tech skills to journos and story skills to devs. The storytellers greatly outnumbered the coders, however.

Part of this may have been timing. Startup Hackathon and Global Game Jam took place the weekend before. I suspect, however, that a lot of the people we were trying to attract just didn’t see what was in it for them. I wonder if it would be easier to go where the techs are instead of trying to lure them over to hang out with the word-mongers.

Startup Edmonton’s recent announcements may provide such an opportunity. I’m intrigued by the courses and workshops that are starting in April. Most are aimed at those who have built something cool and need help to make a business out of it, but some look applicable to working journalists and communicators of all stripes.

Startup Edmonton has also launched Startup Support Communities, an effort to kickstart “local connections and conversations around creative and startup culture here in Edmonton.” And the new space in the Mercer Warehouse aims to be a place to get designers, developers and entrepreneurs together to see what emerges from the collision of their worlds.

I’d like the journalism world to get in on that collision. I don’t know what that looks like yet, or if Startup Edmonton is interested, but I’m keen on anything we can do to infuse the spirit of entrepreneurial thinking into those who spend their days finding stuff out and telling people about it. As Jeff Jarvis suggests, it’s the only practical way to keep journalism happening as the old business models crumble.

Anyway, I’ll keep thinking about that. Stay tuned for more on what MediaCamp plans to do next.

Not that you’d know it if you’ve been waiting for an update, but I have been consuming as much Edmonton new media as usual lately. I just haven’t sat myself down to write about it. Which is a problem, because then it piles up, and the thought of catching up becomes daunting. So here I am, catching up. Consider this one big ICYMI.

— Jen Banks has been writing up a storm on Tech Mommy. She has just the right mix for me: a eulogy for a dead computer on the tech side, a harrowing tale of childbirth on the mommy side.

— I’m way late on this one, but Linda Hoang’s feature story on Edmonton’s Awesome Foundation is definitely worth a read. When she covers something, she covers the heck out of it. The next pitch party is March 29. By the way, Awesome grant recipient Words with Friends holds its fifth event on Feb. 23 at Bohemia.

— Paul Matwychuk and Heather Noel have replaced DVD Afternoon with a new show call Trash, Art and the Movies. Not only have they changed the format in a way that makes it more accessible to the likes of me, but they’ve also brought in Erin Fraser, who has her hand in all kinds of interesting stuff, including Metro Cinema, Graphic Content and Sequential Tart. The first episode was lots of fun, and I’m looking forward to more.

— Speaking of comic books and podcasts, I’m listening for the first time to Podcast! The Comics, which is part of the Comics! The Blog juggernaut fashioned by Brandon Schatz and James Leask. As I have said before, I’m more an admirer of people who like comics than a reader of comics themselves, but it seems to me this is quite an impressive effort.

— In other podcast-related news, Jay n’ J have a new feature called Jay vs J, in which the two movie buffs debate the merits of a film and ask you to vote. Very slick. Lots of fun episodes lately, too, whether it’s the “sliders” or the most recent full episode with Aaron Clifford. (Also, Aaron, who was awesome at MediaCamp, is making me want to try Pinterest. Aarrgh, no time! And yet…)

(Addendum: Unbeknownst to me when I wrote this post, James Leask is the guest on the actual most recent Jay n’ J podcast. Spooky. Plus he likes The Princess Bride, which is my favourite movie, so obviously, this is a must listen, even though I will never ever watch Ghost Rider.)

— The Unknown Studio is back on track after illness and busyness got in the way of regular podcasting. In the spirit of ICYMI, do listen to the small but mighty Flu Episode to hear Alex Abboud talk about being the Edmonton Journal’s first blogger-in-residence. In my admittedly biased estimation, Alex has been hitting it out of the park, both on his own blog and at The Journal, where he consults, blogs and observes under the aegis of the media lab that I co-ordinate.

OK, way too long, and still too much to say. I should blog more often — then I wouldn’t get so pent up. Comment, tweet or Google+ at me if you like.

(Thanks to Mack Male for the photo, which comes from his Flickr stream under a Creative Commons licence.)

Edmonton New Media Roundup 27

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 20:21:00 -0700

It seems an awful lot of people are interested in learning how to do new things this year, and a lot of them are journalists and/or bloggers, judging from my Twitter stream.

For example, tens of thousands of people — including me! — have signed up for Code Year 2012, which is Code Academy’s super-enticing way to make it fun and easy to learn the basics of JavaScript and other stuff that we word people never imagined wanting to learn. You get a lesson a week by email.

I don’t think it will turn me into Lisa Williams, and I’m going to have to improve my time management skills to work the lessons into my life, but I’m excited for the opportunity. So is Sheri at This Bird’s Day. So could you be.

Speaking of opportunities to learn new skills, MediaCamp Edmonton is set for Feb. 4 at the World Trade Centre on Jasper Avenue. Tickets will be on sale at yeglive.ca very soon. (Update: Are on sale now!) The idea is to get storytellers and coders together to see how they can help each other.

Among the speakers are SEO/analytics expert Dana DiTomaso, Edmonton Journal publisher John Connolly, developer Aaron Clifford, data journalist Lucas Timmons, designer Tanya Camp, social media strategist Jay Palter, data miner Mack Male, radio/web wunderkind Brittney Le Blanc, Storifyer extraordinaire Tamara Stecyk and Edmonton’s own Dumbledore of code, Owen Brierley. And me. So come!

(Addendum: Todd Babiak of Story Engine will also be joining us, to talk about how developers can get their story out. For more on MediaCamp, see Jeff Samsonow’s post, or listen to his dulcet tones on the latest Unknown Studio podcast.)

MediaCamp is just one of many cool and useful events coming up. To wit:

— Jan. 18: DemoCamp 17: Developers show their stuff at the Telus Centre at the University of Alberta
— Jan. 19: Girl Geek Dinner, Season 2, Episode 5: No speaker this time, just a chance to get together and geek out at Brewsters Oliver Square.
— Jan. 27: Social Media Breakfast: Walter Schwabe of fusedlogic will be speaking at this edition of the monthly event. Ticket details to come, so watch the #smbyeg hashtag for details.
— Jan. 27-29: Startup Hackathon and Global Game Jam: A 54-hour marathon to make apps and games.
— Feb. 2: Pecha Kucha Night 12: A night of short, sharp talks at the Metro Cinema (Garneau Theatre).
— Feb. 8: TEDxEdmonton Salon Series #1: A live speaker event on the theme of “Rethinking Open Source Culture.”
— March 8-10: BlogWest 2012: A conference that aims to get bloggers and brands together, organized by Felicia Dewar.
— May 4-5: iMedia, a social media conference organized by Carol McBee.

And that’s just a bit of what’s going on. Keep an eye on ShareEdmonton’s calendar for more.

Here are a few more things I noticed this month:

— Avenue Edmonton started a petition to get the city to build a monument to SCTV, which was made here in the early 1980s. David Staples and Colby Cosh liked the idea; Mike Otto did not. Much back-and-forthing ensued on Twitter. As many have pointed out, there’s a bit of a generational divide here. If you (like me) grew up with the show, it’s monumental. If you didn’t, chances are you’d rather see the time and energy spent elsewhere.

— While we’re talking about monuments, the prolific Paula Kirman had a nice post earlier this month on the homeless memorial sculpture on 99th Street.

— If you’re looking for a primer on FourSquare, its uses and abuses, Jerry Aulenbach has you covered.

— Lowetide has migrated his widely read Oilers blog to a new site.

— Alex Abboud is in the middle of a thoughtful series of blog posts on Jasper Avenue. Here’s the preamble and here’s a rumination on what’s good about 104th Street. (Mack has a post on 104th, too.)

— In Roundup 26, I admitted my dearth of knowledge when it comes to food blogs. Luckily, Sharon Yeo publishes regular Food Notes as part of her encyclopedic Only Here for the Food.

— In other food news, Jennifer Cockrall-King gave a great talk at The ARTery on Jan. 12 about her new book, Food and the City, which comes out next month.

— She spoke a TripLit, a fun and well-attended literary event put on by three authors: Jocelyn Brown, the new writer-in-residence at the Edmonton Public Library; Lynn Coady, co-founder of Eighteen Bridges magazine; and Marina Endicott, founder along with Coady of the Literary Saloon. I learned a lot that night.

By the way, I’m giving a workshop called Social Media for Writers through MacEwan Writing Works on Feb. 11. I have started compiling a Twitter list of authors who use Twitter effectively. Many are local but there are a few others sprinkled in there. I’d love to hear your suggestions for worthy additions. Comment, tweet or Google+ at me.

Edmonton New Media Roundup 26

Sat, 31 Dec 2011 18:48:00 -0700

As I reflect on 2011 in Edmonton’s new media space, a figure haunts me: 3,400.

That’s how how many blogs Mack Male counted in this city, for a talk he gave at WordCamp in November.

Man, I thought. Here I figured I was reasonably on top of the Edmonton blogosphere. I had read so many posts in 2011, thanks to the recommendation machine that is Twitter. I had selected dozens for the Edmonton Journal’s first try at aggregating local blogs. And I was writing a sort-of-but-not-quite-weekly roundup that presumed to bring attention to the cream of the crop.

But did I even come close to reading 3,400?

No.

I don’t think I even made a big dent in the 850 or so “active” blogs — i.e. those that had been updated within the week that Mack made his count (a level of activity that I can’t claim to have lived up to).

And that doesn’t even count all of the other new media work being published on YouTube, in podcasts, on Flickr and Instagram, on Soundcloud and Pinterest and Reddit and Yelp and elsewhere.

I felt a paralyzing sense of inadequacy. And then I remembered what I always tell people who avoid Twitter for fear of information overload: You can’t drink the whole stream, so don’t even try. Just dip in, and enjoy getting something you didn’t have access to before. (Thanks to Steve Buttry for the useful metaphor. And thanks Dave Sutherland — corrected! — for the picture of the North Saskatchewan River to illustrate said metaphor.)

So I’m at peace with the knowledge that I can’t consume everything. But I will take this year-end opportunity to examine how I filter and in what ways I should broaden my horizons.

— I have a definite bias towards blogs that focus outwardly rather than on the inner life of the blogger; in short, I like blogs that are journalistic. That’s why Mack’s Mastermaq, The Charrette by Mike Otto and Scott Lilwall, and Dave Cournoyer’s daveberta are in heavy rotation, as was the edmontonian, the late, lamented blog of Jeff Samsonow and Sally Poulsen. Civic affairs and local stories turn my crank, so I listen to every Unknown Studio podcast and try to read everything that Zoe Todd writes, both on Urbane Adventurer and on post-awesome.

— I also tend to read the blogs of people I know, and I’ve met an awful lot of people over the past couple of years. Among those I tend to pay attention to are Andy Grabia’s The Blanket Fort, Tamara Stecyk’s Community Intelligence, Jeff Samsonow, Jen Banks’s Tech Mommy, Alex Abboud, Linda Hoang, Chris LaBossiere, Jason Konoza’s 8 Frame Dissolve and Duncan Kinney’s Polynerd.

— This is kind of a cheat, but West Edmonton Local, the news site that my MacEwan students produce, is technically a blog, and I can honestly say I would read it even if I didn’t run it. I’ll also mention a couple of interesting blogs kept by students in my class: Vickie Laliotis’s Adventures in Fashion and Aaron Taylor’s Egocentric Movie Blog.

— Gig City is also a good source of local happenings. While we’re talking entertainment, I’ll note that I listen to a couple of locally produced movie podcasts: DVD Afternoon and Jay n’ J, even though I see few movies. I sometimes listen to Shutter Time with Sid and Mac and User Created Content, but my lack of knowledge about photography and video games, respectively, holds me back. The Prairie Belles keep me up-to-date on local music.

— Food is a definite blind spot. I hate cooking, and while I like a good meal, I don’t live for great epicurean experiences. But there are so many talented food bloggers in this city. I plan to pay more attention to Only Here for the Food, A Canadian Foodie, Kevin Kossowan, The Kitchen Magpie, Walsh Cooks and foodgirl, among others.

— My knowledge of local mommy and daddy blogs is also spotty. I am a parent, and I like sharing things about my kids, but I don’t read a lot of parenting blogs. I know from those posts that I come across on Twitter that there’s a lot of good stuff being written, so I resolve to pay more mind to blogs such as Attack of the Redneck Mommy, Mom Nation, Wildsau, home made dad, Modern Mama Musings and the like.

— Fashion, exercise, cycling, travel, general lifestyle kind of stuff? Again, not my bag. And yet I suspect there is a lot of good stuff out there that would be worth my attention. City and Dale, Bikini or Bust and Girls and Bicycles are on my “really should pay more attention to” list. I’m sure I’m missing tons more.

— I’m in the middle of reviewing applications for The Journal’s blogger-in-residence program. Besides being very fun to successfully pitch an idea that was a little out of left field, it has also been a great way to draw my attention to blogs I didn’t know about at all or hadn’t paid enough attention to. Some are mentioned above; others that have been updated recently include Traveler Ahoy, Sacred Social Justice, The Mind Travels, The Hope Lady, Recycled Thoughts from a Retro Gamer, Thingamajig, Jamie Post, Blogginsince 05, Chaiwalla’s Boombox, The Past in Unwritten and Caroline in the City. (If you applied and haven’t been mentioned, don’t fret. No decisions have been made, and what The Journal is looking for in a blogger-in-residence is different from what I’m looking for as a reader.)

— Speaking of The Journal, you may note that I rarely mention blogs written by mainstream media in this space. My reasoning was that they have their own tribune, so they don’t need mine. On the other hand, traditional news outlets tend to undervalue the blogs written by their staff, so maybe I should link more. For the record, I tend to read The Edmonton Commons, Plugged In and Capital Notebook, and I greatly admired Elise Stolte’s Living on the Edge in the summer. I haven’t paid enough attention to other local media blogs, but resolve to do better in 2012.

OK, so I just named 50 or so blogs. That leaves roughly 3,350. Gulp. I know I have left out lots of good ones, so please use the comments to let me know what I’m missing. You can also find me on Twitter and on Google+.

Addendum: Andy points out that I didn’t mention any hockey blogs, which is kind of a big lacuna in this town. Unlike food and fashion, I actually pay some attention to the Oilers, so I’m not sure why I left these blogs out, other than that most of them seem to go into the game far deeper than my casual fandom can absorb. Anyway, a few do cross my transom via Twitter: Copper & Blue, Lowetide, Oilers Nation, The Cult of Hockey and mc79hockey (written from Toronto but very Edmonton-focused). There are, of course, many more.

Edmonton New Media Roundup 25

Sun, 04 Dec 2011 18:38:26 -0700

I’ve been doing this, that and the other thing, so this time around I’m heading straight into cool stuff I’ve come across in the past little while:

— It was nice to see the edmontonian’s YouTube channel come to life again with A Close Shave, a trailer for Marty Chan’s latest children’s book. I have it on good authority that that thing above Miles Cruz’s lip is not Jeff Samsonow’s real Movember moustache, although he did sprout hair for prostate cancer research, along with seemingly half of the Edmonton twitterverse.

— The Charrette, the urban planning and design blog kept by Scott Lilwall, Mike Otto and a cast of perspicacious contributors, just celebrated its first birthday. I can’t overstate how much I admire this blog. It’s such a perceptive conversation about what our city looks like, or should look like, and it’s a sandbox for playing around with new storytelling techniques, such as the Austerity Bot or the masterful live-tweeting and Storifying of city council’s budget hearings. I wish you many more birthdays, fellas.

— A few blog posts emanating from the intersection of parenthood and technology caught my eye. Jen Banks has two: One offers a cautionary tale about hard lessons learned while switching web hosting for Mom Nation; the other is a provocative prediction on Tech Mommy positing that Facebook will go the way of MySpace in five years. Both are worth a read.

On the dad side of things, Francois Bourdeau launched a new blog called überdad with a post on why he wants his kids to learn to code, which in turn prompted Jay Palter to take it further on his home made dad blog. I don’t know if their kids are too old for this book, but maybe it’s a start.

— I love both opera and trains, so I was sorry to miss Mercury Opera’s performance in the Bay LRT station on Nov. 25. Luckily, Mack Male’s blog post offers the next best thing, with a lovely writeup, pictures and video. Speaking of Mack, he’s conducting a survey on the meaning of #yeg that you should fill out when you have a minute.

— While we’re handing out homework, why don’t you head on over to Mashable’s awards page and vote for Edmonton’s own Empire Avenue as best up-and-coming social media service? And have you considered applying for the Edmonton Journal’s blogger-in-residence program? And do you want to enter a contest cooked up by my students at MacEwan? And are you planning to come to MediaCamp?

— One more question: Are you following Colby Cosh on Twitter? Back in our university days, Colby and I were so far apart on the political spectrum, we could barely see each other. Now that he represents Edmonton and Alberta to the rest of Canada via Maclean’s, I still disagree with him a fair bit, but I do find him entertaining and intelligent. As this piece on the Raymond Comets shows, he writes like a dream.

— I got behind on my podcast listening, but thanks to having to clean up my house for Christmas and company, I’m all caught up. The Unknown Studio’s live interview with Joe Wos of the Toonseum, recorded at the Pure Speculation festival, is delightful listening. If you can’t get enough of The Muppets, among other movie matters, tune in to both Jay n’ J and DVD Afternoon (in which Paul Matwychuk takes a swing at The Rainbow Connection. I still like him, despite that.)

As well, Jay n’ J squeezed in a slider episode with Trent Wilkie on Metro Shorts, a series of short films at the Metro Cinema presented by Trent’s Mostly Water Theatre. He also has a cameo in A Close Shave that really did make me laugh out loud.

Well, we seem to have come full circle, so that will do for now. You’ll find more media stuff in Mastermaq’s Media Monday. Comments are welcome here, on Twitter and on Google+.

(That’s a screen capture from A Close Shave up top. Nice shooting, Sally Poulsen.)

Edmonton New Media Roundup 24

Mon, 21 Nov 2011 00:57:00 -0700

I was fortunate to be asked to speak at WordCamp Edmonton, which meant I got to soak up a whole bunch of great stuff from this terrific conference on all things WordPress.

As I admitted in my presentation (which won’t make a lot of sense out of context, but the links are worth looking at), I am a WordPress n00b of the highest order, so a lot of the talks from the developers and designers sailed straight over my head. No matter. It’s useful to me to know what I don’t know; Step 2 is to get around to knowing it.

The conference gave me a chance to announce The Journal’s call for applications to be the paper’s first blogger-in-residence. It’s a little experiment that Barb Wilkinson and I are trying in the media lab. Deadline is Dec. 19, so check out what we’re looking for and fill out the form if you’ve got what it takes.

Slides and video of the WordCamp presentations are to be posted in the fullness of time. In the meantime, check out Tamara Stecyk’s summaries of Day 1 and Day 2 on Storify. Also, I would dearly love to steal Taylor Reese’s notebook — that shot up top is of his notes from Jeff Archibald’s talk on typography. I love people who think the way that looks.

I’m on Tumblr because it’s easy, but my New Year’s resolution will be to move my main blog to the WordPress site that Sally Poulsen built for me. WordCamp was a good baby step in the right direction.

My favourite session was Dana DiTomaso’s talk on search engine optimization for WordPress. She delivered tons of practical tips and links to resources in a mile-a-minute but highly entertaining talk. I’m looking forward to hearing her again at the Social Media Breakfast on Nov. 25.

Another takeaway came from Mack Male’s talk on lessons from the Edmonton blogosphere. He highlighted a number of excellent blogs, and distilled their success down to four qualities: passionate, interesting, engaging and consistent. Judging from the reaction I’ve been getting (thank you, commenters and retweeters!), I’m doing OK on the first three, but I know I’m falling down on consistency. Working on it.

And now, rounding up:

— “I’m No Superman: The Comic Book Collection of Gilbert Bouchard” opened at the University of Alberta’s Bruce Peel Special Collections Library on Nov. 18. Not only did Andy Grabia do an amazing job curating the collection, but he also curated the night’s tweets and snapshots on Storify. You can see the show for free, but do yourself a favour and buy the catalogue: only $5 for a beautiful tribute to a man who cared a great deal about the arts in Edmonton. (Addendum: The catalogue, which is not available online, includes Andy’s perceptive essay on Gilbert and the story his collection tells, in addition to many wonderful images from the comics. It’s a keepsake.)

— Another Girl Geek Dinner happened this past week. I missed it, but I followed along on Twitter as Ruth Kelly, president of Venture Publishing, addressed the gang at D’Lish. Tamara storified this one, too. (Have I mentioned how much I love Storify? Yeah. It’s pretty awesome. Great for bringing meaning to the stream and keeping it around. Also an increasingly powerful tool for serious journalism.)

— Dave Cournoyer is performing a great service keeping on top of who’s been nominated where and for whom as we head into a provincial election in the spring.

— I finally got a chance to listen to the Unknown Studio’s latest podcast, featuring Jay Bardyla of Happy Harbor Comics. Recommended listening, not only for comic-book fans but for anyone interested in candid, well-informed, earned-the-hard-way advice on running a small business.

— Bardyla was also one of the organizers of Pure Speculation, the geek festival that happened on the weekend and sounded like a very fun time. I missed both PureSpec and Refinery, the big party at the Art Gallery of Alberta featuring Fish Griwkowsky’s “Explorers of the North and the Monsters Who Killed Them,” which also looked like a blast. Had I gone to either, I might have seen my old friend Jason Kapalka, a fellow Gateway alum who is the reason I almost never see my iPad, as everyone else in my house steals it to play Plants vs Zombies.

OK, ça suffit. Catch up on more Edmonton goings-on in Mack’s weekly Edmonton notes, and find out about other media happenings in his Media Monday. Tell me what I missed or messed up in the comments, on Twitter or on Google+.

Edmonton New Media Roundup 23

Mon, 07 Nov 2011 23:03:14 -0700

The past little while has been heavily IRL for me — I spent a lot of time at events, talking to people in real life, as opposed to reading or listening to their stuff online. But every one of those opportunities had its seeds in connections made on Twitter, so there’s the new media angle (or what will have to suffice as one).

— EdCamp Edmonton, an unconference organized by teachers and held at Lillian Osborne Senior High on Nov. 5, was all I had hoped it would be. I attended to learn more about teaching, as I find myself doing that a fair bit now, both at MacEwan University and at the Edmonton Journal media lab. I was not disappointed. We learned too much to convey here, but you can get a sense of it from this Google doc compiled by the participants. I used Storify to curate the day’s Twitter chatter. If you want the whole stream, check out #edcampyeg.

- The Advertising Club of Edmonton brought Leslie Ehm in for the second installment of its Cultivate speaker series at the Art Gallery of Alberta on Nov. 3, and I was lucky enough to be her warmup act. She gave a funny, perceptive talk exploding several myths around the idea of creativity. To sum up: Creativity is not magic, or a gift you’re born with; it’s a process, and you can participate fully in that process if you free your mind from judgmental, safe thinking that holds you back. You’ll find the highlights on the Twitter stream at #cultivate.

- Ehm’s talk was especially enjoyable because of all of the serendipitous connections to other discussions I had participated in that week. Douglas Merrill, the former CIO of Google, spoke about what it takes to innovate and win in the Nov. 2 keynote at ICE, the tech conference organized by CIPS. Just like Ehm said, it involves getting messy. Merrill’s advocacy of embracing failure gave Owen Brierley and me a nice lead-in to our little session on “Fail often, fail fast” later that afternoon.

- I also had the pleasure of participating in a salon organized by Andy Grabia on Oct. 29, a lovely evening of conversation among a small group of clever and interesting Edmontonians, many of whom connected or at least reconnected via Twitter. Andy’s salons are conducted under Chatham House rules — what’s said in the room stays in the room. But he did release this snapshot of the evening, created by Fish Griwkowsky. In other Andy news, the display he curated of Gilbert Bouchard’s comic-book collection, which I wrote about earlier this year, opens Nov. 18.

- Next up on my agenda is WordCamp Edmonton, to be held Nov. 18 and 19 at the Shaw Conference Centre. At $40, it’s a very reasonably priced opportunity for professional development and networking among those who use WordPress (or want to, for that matter). Read co-organizer Mack Male’s post if you need more convincing. I’ll be giving a session on the Saturday called “Beyond Bloggers vs Journalists,” a discussion of what mainstream journos can learn from bloggers, some examples of collaboration, and some experiments we’re working on at the Journal media lab.

Wow, new record for shameless self-promotion. Enough. Here’s what some other people are doing:

— Tamara Stecyk has been blogging again, which is a good thing. She did her first Storify this week to go with a post on the surprising reaction she got to a tweet about man caves.

— I neglected to hail Felicia Dewar for her gargantuan and ultimately successful effort to win $100,000 towards the development of Brintnell Park. Anyone who follows Felicia knows how hard she worked to win the Schneiders Picnic Anywhere contest, and it’s nice to have a happy ending to the story.

— Urban planning student Paul Giang has a thought-provoking guest post on the Royal Alberta Museum debacle on The Charrette. He argues that it would be best to leave the RAM where it is, thus solving the funding squeeze.

— I know way too many people participating in Movember this year. Anyone got a good way to decide who to give to? You can keep track of some local Movember goings-on here.

— November is also National Novel Writing Month, and Marty Chan is conducting his marathon-writing project in public. What an amazing writer-in-residence he has been for the Edmonton Public Library. He will be a very hard act to follow.

— KikkiPlanet.com, Kathleen Smith’s online magazine, has a new issue, featuring two Twitter power couples: Kari Skelton and Ryan Jespersen, and Rene and Kari Mayer.

You can always find more new (and old) media news on Mack’s Media Monday, and his weekly Edmonton notes are a good way to catch up, too. You can talk to me on Twitter or Google+, or in the comments below.

Edmonton New Media Roundup 22

Mon, 31 Oct 2011 02:50:47 -0600

To block or not to block? That is the question I’ve been thinking about this week, because of a tiff on Twitter between David Staples and Dave Cournoyer during the coverage of city council’s decision on the downtown arena.

As near as I can tell, here’s what happened. Cournoyer asked Staples for a source on some figures he had cited. Staples responded dismissively, then Cournoyer noticed Staples had blocked him, and assumed his question was the cause. As a mini-furore ensued, Staples said he had actually blocked Cournoyer “long before,” and explained why he blocks people. This added fuel to the fire.

I don’t want to suggest this was a big deal; it’s a tiny, inside-baseball blip on a much bigger story. But these are both Daves I know, so I’m interested. And I think it offers an opportunity to explore how legacy media and new media interact, and to look at what community engagement — which is a big part of what I’m doing now — really means.

My own policy is to block no one but spammers. This is a relatively easy policy for me to have. Hardly anyone attacks me or even criticizes me, and those who do are easy to ignore if I feel they are trolls rather than genuine critics. I stopped being a reporter before social media came along, even before stories were published online with comments. So I don’t really know what it’s like to be slammed repeatedly in public. Maybe someday. Maybe today.

Based on my observations, people tend to react in two ways. One is to become so thick-skinned that such criticism does not bother them, or at least never appears to bother them. The other is to become increasingly thin-skinned, to the point that they no longer differentiate between intelligent dissent and trollish invective. That’s completely understandable, and were I in Staples’s shoes, I might react that way.

But blocking is a bad idea. Here’s why:

1. Twitter is for listening. Journalists have never had a better tool for tuning in to the conversation about their work. Deliberately tuning out part of that conversation diminishes the value of the tool.

2. Noblesse oblige. Journalists get paid to do journalism every day. The price of that privilege (and that’s how I see it — to me, it’s the best job in the world) is to absorb some flak. That’s probably not what most journos thought they signed up for, but the web didn’t even exist when most of us signed up. I would argue it’s part of the deal now.

3. Blocking is bad PR, which mainstream media can’t afford. I’m not sure it’s ever a good idea to tell your audience you don’t care what it thinks, but it’s particularly ill-advised when your industry’s economic underpinnings are crumbling away. Every reader is precious. It’s not good business to aggressively ignore anyone.

I think highly of Cournoyer, but he probably could have phrased some of his tweets in a less snarky way, if his intention was not simply to poke Staples with a sharp stick. In a 140-character medium that allows for little nuance, it’s better to be nice. That said, Cournoyer appears to have extended an olive branch; I don’t know if Staples will take it, but I wish he would.

OK, that’s enough lecturing from me. Roundup time:

— I liked Kiri Wysynski’s post arguing for trick-or-treating in the neighbourhood instead of the mall. We intend to do the same (although half the people in my house are sick right now, so we’ll see). As you can see from Linda Hoang’s latest feature story, my neighbourhood is a great place for Halloweening.

— Tom Sedens turned insomnia into a funny post on the discomforts of sharing a bed, complete with illustrations.

— Because I took a week off here, I didn’t get a chance to acknowledge the fifth anniversary of Sharon Yeo’s Only Here for the Food. It’s a beautiful blog, a great chronicle of Edmonton’s food scene, and an excellent example of the value of following your passion. Congratulations, Sharon!

— The Halloween edition of the Unknown Studio podcast is definitely worth a listen, even if you don’t get to it until after Oct. 31. It features Stephanie Sparks, who writes about vampires.

— I had a great time giving a workshop on citizen journalism for Get Publishing on Oct. 29. Here are some pictures taken by Marilyn Jones of mediamag.ca. I’ll also be speaking at ICE: The Tech Conference on Nov. 2 with Owen Brierley of Guru Digital Arts College. Our talk is called “Fail often and fail fast.” It looks like I’ll be talking at the Advertising Club of Edmonton’s Cultivate event on Nov. 3, and at WordCamp Edmonton on Nov. 19, too.

That’s enough out of me. The comments are open, or you can find me on Twitter or Google+.

(Instead of blocking, why not buy that nice T-shirt you see at the top of this post? It comes from Flickr courtesy Carly Franklin, and is licensed under Creative Commons.)

Edmonton New Media Roundup 21

Sun, 16 Oct 2011 09:50:35 -0600

The story of the week was the downtown arena project. I wish I had been free on Friday to Storify the reaction to city council’s decision to buy the land amid news of the negotiations between the city and the Katz Group with NHL commissioner Gary Bettman in New York.

The volume of tweets on #yegarena and #yegcc was overwhelming, as Mack Male shows in this post summarizing the day and the Twitter reaction. Word clouds have had a bit of a bad rap lately, but to me, the clouds in this post and the post setting up Friday’s events do a pretty good job of letting us see what was said.

As Mack notes, Mike Otto of The Charrette also did a nifty little bit of data journalism on opinions expressed about the arena proposal in calls to 311, the city’s information line. (Speaking of The Charrette, Otto’s partner-in-awesome Scott Lilwall recently launched a semi-regular feature called Ask the Charrette, an invitation to ask them anything about urban planning. In this city, at this time, there are a lot of questions that need answering, so have at it.)

For a more elegiac take on the debate, see Zoe Todd’s post on how the arena narrative clashes with her own feelings about the story of this city. The post itself was already a worthy read. Then Journal sports columnist John MacKinnon made a rather rude comment, to which Zoe responded thoughtfully and with class. The ensuing back-and-forth is revealing and also worth your time.

This is a neverending story. If I’m missing something good on the arena issue, let me know in the comments. Now, what else?

— Besides being another great get-together and a chance to show off my dino-loving daughter, this month’s Girl Geek Dinner introduced us to an inspiring young University of Alberta paleontologist named Victoria Arbour. If you like dinosaurs, I encourage you to read Victoria’s blog. You can also follow the U of A’s Dino Lab on Facebook. The next Girl Geek Dinner will be held Nov. 17 at D’Lish Urban Kitchen and Wine Bar.

— YegNews has officially shut down after four months of operation. I was skeptical about its editorial and business model from the get-go, and its challenges were all the more difficult to surmount when Scott McKeen departed in July. But I also applaud anyone who tries anything new and hard. Alain Saffel deserves credit for that. Failure is a gift, as long as we learn from it.

— Jay Runham of the Jay n’ J movies podcast was kind enough to take me out to see Page One: Inside the New York Times, which I had been dying to see. We recorded a “slider” episode of Jay n’ J (sans J, aka Jordan Blackburn, who was out of town). The movie’s brief appearance in Edmonton is over now, but have a listen to see if you’d like to rent it or see it on Netflix. It was such a delight to meet Jay in real life. Next up, I believe, is a full episode on Footloose, featuring woman-about-town Brittney Le Blanc.

— The Conservative leadership vote and Premier Alison Redford’s cabinet-making have provided plenty of fodder for Dave Cournoyer on daveberta.ca. With Redford in charge, a provincial election won’t happen until spring, but nominations are well underway. Here’s Dave’s running list of who’s running.

— Efforts to organize MediaCamp Edmonton 2 are in full flight now. We’ve changed the date to Feb. 4 (instead of Jan. 28) so as not to conflict with the next Startup Weekend and Global Game Jam. MediaCamp aims to bring storytellers and developers together to see how we can help each other do what we do. Watch the website for details in the coming weeks. We’re using the hashtag #yegmediacamp on Twitter to seek input and share links. If you’re interested in coming, please fill out this survey so we can try to make it all you want it to be. If you’re interested in sponsoring or volunteering, email me at karen@unlandmedia.com.

There’s always so much more to say, and yet, that feels like enough. Feel free to add more in the comments, on Twitter or on Google+. More media news can be found on Mack’s Media Monday.

(Speaking on Mack, that’s his photo up top, taken in May 2010 at an open house on the Edmonton Arena District.)

jaynj: Slider - Page One It’s very special slider edition of...

Tue, 11 Oct 2011 14:57:07 -0600

jaynj:

Slider - Page One

It’s very special slider edition of Jay n’ J. with Karen Unland! Karen was the perfect person to talk about Page One: Inside the New York Times with Jay (Jordan was in BC finishing up the Top Ten and eating turkey). Karen is a Journalism Educator and Consultant currently working at MacEwan University (her and her students setup westedmontonlocal.ca) and she also used to work for The Edmonton Journal.

Download Here or Listen below:

Edmonton New Media Roundup 20

Sat, 08 Oct 2011 23:53:00 -0600

This week, I’ve been thinking about the future of publishing and the power of going deep.

The idea that the future of media depends on serving niches rather than being all things to all people is not new, but it becomes more meaningful when you meet people who are living that concept in real life.

I met some such people at Digital Storytelling in Alberta, a “speed-dating” event at Guru Digital Arts College on Oct. 6. The purpose was to get digital folk, publishers and filmmakers together to talk about the future of publishing. It was put together by Lyn Cadence, a Calgary publicist and the publisher of the newly formed Frontenac House Media, and was hosted by Owen Brierley, who runs Guru and sits on the board of Digital Alberta (and is at the centre of the photo you see above).

Here’s what I learned.

There’s no shortage of books in the world. There is a shortage of time to spend reading them. So publishers have to go after those people who love their books so much that they will drop other things to spend their precious time with them. They need to provide those books in every format those fans like. And they need to provide other opportunities to engage with those creations (and make money from them), whether it’s through film, graphic novels, games, conferences, speeches, newsletters, forums, podcasts, social media or whatever else comes next.

Big guys like Seth Godin already do this. But there’s nothing stopping little guys from doing it, too — in fact, it’s probably even more important for little guys, who have few resources and a smaller market to start with.

All of what I just said applies to journalism, too. Broadsheet newspapers were built on having something for everyone, and their websites tend to be the same. But that’s not the way of the future. Inch-deep, mile-wide coverage won’t cut it, especially as the culture of recommendation takes over from Google-gaming as the way to get your stories in front of the people who want them. Specializing in doing a few things very well, deeply and vertically, has more hope. It’s also way more fun.

I had lots of great conversations — thank you, Ron Manke, Karen Gartner, Faye Boer, Gary Whyte, Tamara Stecyk and Kieran Flynn — but the most inspiring chat was with Merle and Jerome Martin of Spotted Cow Press.

Spotted Cow is very small, and judging from its titles, it doesn’t put out a lot of bestsellers. But three things impressed me about the Martins:

They love what they do.
They don’t waste time seeking grants; they bootstrap everything.
They aren’t afraid of trying something new. They sell e-books. They offer free downloads. Jerome has a blog and is on Twitter. They are doing on a small scale what everyone needs to be doing, and they’re hungry to learn more.

So I’m adding the Martins to my heroes list. Thanks to Lyn and Owen for a delightful time. If you were there and want to share what you learned, please comment on this post.

And now, rounding up:

— Meshwest Edmonton on Oct. 4 was another opportunity for future-of-media ideas to burble. I really enjoyed hearing Ali Asaria, founder of well.ca. He is unabashedly focused on Canada, not because it’s the patriotic thing to do but because it’s the right niche for his business. Customer service is at the core. He also had interesting things to say about cultivating a creative workplace. So much of what he said has applications to the media business. For more recapping, see Justin Jackson’s excellent post. The next Meshwest is in Vancouver on Dec. 5.

— Meshwest also brought social media superstar and GigaOm writer Mathew Ingram here. He shared some nice Edmonton pictures on Instagram. Every little bit helps, when it comes to promoting our fine city.

— Tickets are on sale now for the FIERCE awards, Mom Magazine’s night to honour “women who make a difference in the lives of others, whether it’s within their own household or on a global level.” By the looks of the nomination list, it will be quite the night, orchestrated by Tamara Plant, one of the fiercest women I know.

— There’s a whole blog post (or 20) to be done on the good works going on in Edmonton’s social media circles. Here are a few that have crossed the transom: User Created Content is raising money for the Stollery Children’s Hospital by playing video games for 24 hours; The Going Blue 4 U campaign aims to raise money and awareness to fight mental illness; John Winslow and others are raising diapers for the Terra Centre; and the list goes on. Check out KikkiPlanet’s #yegenda for more.

— It has been both heartwarming and heartbreaking to watch the Twitter community’s embrace of Jason Konoza after the death of his beloved wife, Wendy. Jason’s response has been remarkable. You can donate to the Wendy Konoza Memorial Award in Education at the University of Alberta. Rene and Kari Mayer set up a site to gather help for Jason and his kids.

— The next Girl Geek Dinner is on Oct. 13. I’m bringing my daughter with me to hear Victoria Arbour talk about dinosaurs. This is an all-ages affair, with an amazing speaker and yummy food at Chianti’s. And it’s about DINOSAURS. Plus it’s on Dana DiTomaso’s birthday. How can you not go?

— Finally, the one and only Sally Poulsen has made me a website! I cannot begin to tell you what a pleasant and educational experience it was to work with Sally — I highly recommend her. Shout out as well to Janice Belyea of Crayon Creative, whose business-card design became my logo. Thank you, ladies!

You can always find more media talk on Mack Male’s Media Monday. Feel free to respond to my ramblings here, on Twitter or on Google+.

Edmonton New Media Roundup 19

Sun, 02 Oct 2011 10:28:00 -0600

The theme of this week’s roundup is inspired by something Kathleen Smith (aka @KikkiPlanet) said on the most recent episode of the Unknown Studio.

The discussion turned to people who leave Edmonton for Vancouver or Toronto because they think there’s nothing going on here. “They’re complaining about a city that doesn’t exist anymore,” she said.

I think she’s exactly right, and this past week is the perfect illustration. There is so much going on here. Both the Edmonton International Film Festival and Western Canada Fashion Week generated buzz, but there were lots of smaller events as well that brought enthusiastic, creative people together. For example:

— DemoCamp Edmonton: The 15th edition brought about 200 people to the Telus Centre at the University of Alberta on Sept. 29 to see developers/makers/wizards demonstrate cool stuff. I loved being in a room surrounded by people who like to solve problems instead of just complaining about them. Mack Male has a comprehensive summary of the evening. It was also a great night to hear about other events that Startup Edmonton and others have in the works; read to the bottom of Mack’s post for the list.

— Social Media Breakfast: Social media enthusiasts (and a few who aren’t there yet but want to learn more) packed d’Lish Urban Kitchen and Wine Bar to hear MLA Doug Griffiths on Sept. 30. It seemed like a very big crowd, which may have been because Griffiths had just finished sixth in the Progressive Conservative leadership campaign and people wanted to hear from him. (He was impressive.) I get the sense, however, that this monthly event has started to generate its own momentum under the effervescent influence of Steven Hodges and the here-to-help spirit of people like Jacqueline Fraser. This one was live-streamed by fusedlogicTV, which is a good way to bring even more people in.

— And, coming back full circle, Sept. 30 also saw the launch of KikkiPlanet.com. Kathleen Smith’s new online magazine aims to be a showcase for the best of Edmonton, focusing on the young movers and shakers who love their city and work hard to make it even better. Her inaugural examples are Brittney Le Blanc and Seth Glick. KikkiPlanet was going to be a blog, but Smith decided to turn the focus away from herself and onto the world around her, which is what I would call a journalistic approach, and one that I naturally approve of. I didn’t make it to the launch, but I’ll be watching with interest.

So that’s just two days in the life of #yeg. October is already shaping up to be busy. I’ll be going to Meshwest Edmonton on Oct. 4, Digital Storytelling at Guru Digital Arts College on Oct. 6, Girl Geek Dinner on Oct. 13 and, I hope, the big Guru party, The Subsequent Fall, on Oct. 20. For an anti-social person like me, that’s a lot of sociability.

It’s hard to keep track of everything, but ShareEdmonton is a good start. Feel free to plug your own events in the comments.

A few more notes:

— The gaming guys at User Created Content are now doing a bi-weekly videocast call New Game +. Here’s Episode 1 and Episode 2.

— There’s a new podcast in town: Shutter Time with Sid and Mac, a discussion of photography by Sidney Blake and Mac Sokulski. You can subscribe in iTunes and follow the show on Twitter.

— Finally, I don’t usually talk much about mainstream media, but I’m proud of my former colleagues at the Edmonton Journal, which has been nominated for six Canadian Online Publishing Awards. Ryan Jackson and Lucas Timmons had a lot to do with the work that was nominated, and as their one-time boss, I can vouch for their amazingness. But really, this is a recognition of the whole newsroom’s digital efforts.

OK, that’s plenty. Comment, tweet or Google+ at me if you like. I blew my Friday deadline by a lot this week — will try to do better next time. But as you can see above, it’s hard to get spare time in this town.

(Photo of What the Truck?! 2, another illustration of how there’s never nothing going on in Edmonton, is from Brittney Le Blanc’s Flickr channel.)

Edmonton New Media Roundup 18

Sat, 24 Sep 2011 13:26:49 -0600

West Edmonton Local is about to be reincarnated again, so this seems like a good time to explain and explore this gift to MacEwan journalism students, created last school year by Archie McLean and Lucas Timmons.
I call it a gift because journalism is learned by doing. To have a real-life news website to work on, with a real community to serve, is a tremendous opportunity, as Archie explained well to Mack Male when the site launched in February.

West Edmonton Local has changed since then, and will keep changing, which is a good reflection of the state of journalism itself. When the semester ended last spring, West Edmonton Local was kept going by Mathew White and Trevor Robb. Trevor then got a job at the Edmonton Examiner, leaving Mathew to hold down the fort, which he did ably through the summer. Meanwhile, Archie has returned to the Edmonton Journal full-time, where he is now the assignment editor.

Now Mathew is about to move on to a job in Osoyoos. So, starting Sept. 26, West Edmonton Local will be in the hands of students in their second year of the journalism diploma program at MacEwan. I teach senior reporting to these students, and Lucas and I teach them news production, so between those two classes, we are creating a newsroom.

It’s a slow-motion newsroom, as we want to make sure we learn along the way. It’s hard to resist making sacrifices to the news production gods (listen to Jay Rosen’s conversation with Mitch Joel on that subject if you want to know what I’m on about). Our story cycle, from story pitch to publication, takes about 12 days. In a normal newsroom, it takes about 12 hours.

So it’s not a breaking news site. It has had breaking news and event coverage through the summer, under Mathew’s direction. But now, West Edmonton Local’s content will be more like what you might find in a weekly, but taking advantage as much as possible of the other opportunities afforded by online news: links, interactivity, multimedia.

This is all a learning experience for me, too. My only online journalism experience was at The Journal, where we dealt with a custom-built content management system and a much different editorial setup. West Edmonton Local is run on WordPress and requires some knowledge of HTML and CSS, which I’m learning alongside the students. Talk about being thrown in the deep end. But that’s sometimes the best way to learn.

Monday is our first day taking over West Edmonton Local, so have a look and tell us what we could do better. You can comment directly on the stories or email me at unlandk(at)macewan.ca. You can also interact with our community engagement editors on Twitter and on Facebook. If you’ve got any good west-end story ideas, send them our way!

That’s enough log-rolling. Rounding up a few more things I noticed this week:

— Kikki Planet, an online magazine dedicated to celebrating young, community-focused movers and shakers in Edmonton, launches on Sept. 30. Get your tickets here for the launch party at the Daffodil Gallery. And follow Kikki on Twitter for updates.

— Dave Cournoyer’s daveberta.ca has been on fire of late, what with the Liberal leadership vote, the first round of the Conservative leadership vote and the coming Round 2, plus some entertaining intrigue around the Liberals’ interest in the Alberta Party’s Michael Walters. If you like geeking out on politics — and I do — there’s plenty of great stuff to chew on.

— The Edmonton International Film Festival’s 24/One Filmmaking Challenge is on now and will conclude Sept. 25 at 11 a.m. That means 40 soon-to-be sleep-deprived teams are working on making a movie in one day, which sounds crazy to me. Watch the fun on the #24One hashtag on Twitter. Also, go see a movie — the festival is on until Oct. 1.

— It’s Western Canada Fashion Week, too. You’ll find coverage at City and Dale and Adventures in Fashion, among other places, as well as on Twitter at #wcfw.

That’s all I’ve got time and space for today. Comment, tweet or Google+ at me if I’ve missed anything. There always more media news on Mack’s Media Monday.

(The picture above comes from West Edmonton Local’s Flickr stream.)

Edmonton New Media Roundup 17

Sat, 17 Sep 2011 00:49:00 -0600

I know I already talked about Pecha Kucha Night 11, but preparing for that night took up so much space in my brain that I scarcely had room for anything else, and there’s still more worth rounding up.

For an excellent recap of the evening, see Mack Male’s post. The Edmonton Journal, which livestreamed the event, has some of the speeches up on its video page, including mine. And there are tons more pictures like the one above on the Edmonton’s Next Gen Flickr channel.

(Addendum: Brittney Le Blanc has some PKN11 pix on Flickr, too, including the unicorn slide she made for me, which got much attention, all deserved.)

Another big event in new media circles this week was What the Truck?!, the second incarnation of a food-truck festival organized by Mack and Sharon Yeo. Twitter was alive with food chatter on Friday. To me, the event is a great example of a couple of things: First, social media can lead to meaningful, engaging events in real life, and second, actions speak louder than words. This is just the kind of action that gets beyond the talk about revitalizing downtown and all that.

There are many useful and interesting events coming up in the next little while:

StartUp Edmonton’s next DemoCamp takes place on Sept. 29. I know of at least one extremely cool thing that will be demonstrated at this one (sorry, lips sealed), and I’m sure there will be many wow moments and networking opportunities.
The speakers coming to Meshwest Edmonton on Oct. 4 are now posted. As was the case with Meshwest Calgary in the spring, it offers a mix of locals and come-from-aways to introduce new ideas to media, marketers, entrepreneurs and citizens. Among the locals are the City of Edmonton’s Ashley Casovan and Empire Avenue’s Duleepa Wijayawardhana. I don’t know many of the other speakers, but if the Calgary event is any indication, it’s kind of like the FolkFest — you’re going to see people you didn’t even know you wanted to see who turn out to be awesome. Early-bird ticket sales end Sept. 30.
The “social media for business” workshop by Dana DiTomaso that I blogged about last week has been postponed to Oct. 26. Dana is on a panel with The Journal’s Barb Wilkinson on “The Rise of the Mobile World” on Sept. 22, put on by the Women’s Executive Network. She and Brittney Le Blanc also put on a Girl Geek Dinner on Sept. 15; the next one is Oct. 13, and I am definitely going.
The next organizational meeting for MediaCamp Edmonton is on Monday, Sept. 19, at Guru Digital Arts College. If you’re interested in helping out and you’re not on the mailing list, email me at karen(at)unlandmedia.com. We’re aiming to hold MediaCamp on Jan. 28, so mark your calendars and stay tuned for details.
Digital Alberta is having a launch party for its new website and 2011-12 program on Sept. 27 at D’Lish Urban Kitchen and Wine Bar.

— Jeff Samsonow of the late, lamented the edmontonian is now blogging on his own site, and is already making a splash.

— The Charrette is back after a little break with a couple of excellent posts on the city’s new bike lanes and a whack of downtown development news.

— The latest Unknown Studio podcast features a truly delightful conversation with Journal columnist Paula Simons. If you love Edmonton, politics and/or Star Trek, you’ll find something to love in this one.

— Felicia Dewar is looking for your votes for her video to help Brintnell Park get a playground.

— Speaking of video, I watched some Jo Thrillz for the first time yesterday. It is… an experience. He recently consolidated his Twitter presence, so follow him here.

— And finally, here’s a gallant post by Rene Mayer about a hardworking woman who made him think about his life differently.

Let me know what I’m missing. Comment, tweet or Google+ at me.

(The picture of me with a slide of Clay Shirky in the background was taken by Dave DeGagné for Edmonton’s Next Gen. The Shirky image comes from Kris Krug via Flickr.)

My Pecha Kucha talk: What journalism needs now

Thu, 15 Sep 2011 11:56:06 -0600

My Pecha Kucha talk: What journalism needs now:

Here is the video of the talk I delivered at Pecha Kucha Night 11 at Myer Horowitz Theatre at the University of Alberta on Sept. 14, 2011. It was so much fun. Thank you to Edmonton’s Next Gen for the opportunity, and thank you to all of the generous and encouraging people who laughed at my jokes and said nice things on Twitter.

It was a delightful, eclectic evening. You can see more archived video from PKN11 on the Edmonton Journal’s Livestream channel.

Edmonton New Media Roundup 16

Fri, 09 Sep 2011 17:21:00 -0600

I’m going to blame the tardiness of this week’s roundup on my grief over the retirement of the edmontonian. It may not be an entirely accurate excuse — I was busy getting ready to teach and finishing off a super-cool project I’ll tell you about one of these days — but it is completely true that I am choked to lose one of my favourite blogs.

Many others share my sadness. Jeff Samsonow and Sally Poulsen have made a tremendous impression on this city, and the response to their decision to move on surprised even them, they told Mack Male in this interview. Mack’s was one of many fine tribute posts (Gregg Beever had another good one and so did Adam Rozenhart of the Unknown Studio).

So I thought I’d do something a little bit different. Here’s a Storify curating the best of the Twitter reaction, and Sally and Jeff’s reaction to the reaction, starting with their announcement on Aug. 29 and ending with their inspiring final post on Sept. 9.

Judging from the reaction, one of the most beloved services offered by the edmontonian was the daily headlines roundup. If you are clever, well-read, super-focused on local news and thinking “I’d love to blog, but what should I write about?”, do this. An audience is poised to gobble your words.

OK, what else has been going on?

— The Unknown Studio is about to get going again in earnest, and you are invited to join the audio fun. You have until Sept. 30 to pitch a segment for the podcast. This is a great opportunity for anyone eager to break in to podcasting, as this one already has a considerable audience.

— Speaking of podcasts, I am so happy that research for this post led me to subscribe to DVD Afternoon. It is such an enjoyable listen. Co-host Paul Matwychuk has launched a new Tumblr for movie nerds: The Cinematic Jokebook, a compendium of clips of movie characters telling jokes. If you know of such a joke, Paul wants to hear from you.

— Also on the movie podcast front, Jay n’ J have started doing “sliders” — mini-episodes the slide in between their big monthly podcasts. Here’s the latest.

— In awwww news, tech mommy and SEO ninja Jen Banks shared some awesome news on Mom Nation.

(Addendum: Modern Mama Musings asked Albertans to vote on their favourite mama blog, and Edmonton’s City and Baby won. Congrats!)

— Plans are underway for another MediaCamp Edmonton. We are aiming to have it on Jan. 28. If you would like to be in on the organizing but you aren’t on the MediaCamp Google Group, email me at karen(at)unlandmedia.com. We’ll be meeting again on Sept. 19 before splitting off into committees; stay tuned for details.

— Meshwest is coming to Edmonton on Oct. 4, and tickets are on sale now. It’s pricy, but I got a lot out of the Calgary event and I bet this one will be good, too. Plus it will bring Mathew Ingram here, which is always a good thing.

— The formidable Dana DiTomaso is offering a seminar on social media for business at Guru Digital Arts College on Sept. 20. I learn two or three new things every time I talk to Dana, as I did at Edmonton’s first Women in Wireless event, a nice little get-together put on by Lisa Hagen.

— Dana is one half of the dynamic duo behind Edmonton Girl Geek Dinners, the other half being my favourite unicornologist, Brittney Le Blanc. The next dinner, on Sept. 15, features Karin Weekes of BioWare. If I could go, I would, so if you can go, you should.

— And finally, speaking of things you should go to, Pecha Kucha Night 11 is on Sept. 14. It’s at Myer Horowitz Theatre at the University of Alberta, which is a big venue, so there are still tickets available. The speakers list is full of cool and crazy stuff. If you stay until the end, you will see me give a talk called What Journalism Needs Now. If you can’t come, it will be livestreamed on edmontonjournal.com. And it will be all over Twitter at #PKN11.

When I started doing this new media roundup, I aimed to have a new post every Monday. I’m going to keep with the regularity, but my new publication date will be Fridays. So I’ll see you then. If I’m missing something, comment, tweet or Google+ at me. You can always get more media news in Mack Male’s Media Monday.

(If you want a T-shirt like the one you see up top, it’s not too late to buy merchandise from the edmontonian, a bargain at twice the price.)

Edmonton New Media Roundup 15

Mon, 29 Aug 2011 11:21:00 -0600

It’s back-to-school season in our house. The kids return to class on Thursday, Trustee Spencer’s meetings have resumed, and I am preparing to teach (!) reporting and news production in the journalism diploma program at Grant MacEwan University. So I’m in an education frame of mind for this week’s roundup.

In many ways, the Internet has disrupted education as much as it has disrupted journalism. As with journalism, there are some in education who resist the change, pine for the good old days and are certain things are going to hell. And then there are people like George Couros, who embrace change and see all the good that can come of it.

I haven’t met George, but I’m a fan of his Twitter feed and find myself increasingly drawn to his blog as I work on turning myself into an educator. He is a principal in Stony Plain and now holds a newly created position as division principal in charge of innovative teaching and learning in the Parkland School Division, which covers several communities west of Edmonton.

George has exactly the attitude I want to see in anyone involved in teaching. He considers it part of his job to turn students into “strong Digital Citizens,” and he models that behaviour by being one himself. He also created Connected Principals, a group blog where school administrators from all over share what they’ve learned. From where I sit, Parkland is pretty lucky to have him.

What networked teachers inspire you? Let me know in the comments, on Twitter or on Google+.

Rounding up some other new media stuff from the past week:

— Speaking of networked education, registration is now open for EdCamp Edmonton, a one-day unconference on learning. It will be held Nov. 5 at Lillian Osborne High School. I’m planning to be there.

— Which reminds me, plans are underway for another MediaCamp Edmonton. The first one was held in May 2010, and it felt like a success, but then life got in the way of working on the next one. Efforts are now resurrected. An organizational meeting will be held at Guru Digital Arts College at 6:30 p.m. tonight (Aug. 29). Minutes will be posted here.

— My own education efforts this fall will be centred on guiding students through the production of West Edmonton Local. MacEwan grad Mathew White has done a bang-up job keeping the site going through the summer, and he’ll be helping me and Lucas Timmons turn it back into a learning experience for the next group of MacEwan journalism students. If you have any suggestions for improvement, let us know.

— In other news, Andy Grabia has launched a new photo project called My Edmonton, documenting the beautiful buildings in our city. As Andy points out, there is a lot of talk about how ugly our architecture is, and while much of that criticism is deserved, it obscures the fact that we have lovely and striking architecture here as well. He’s looking for suggestions, so be sure to chime in.

(Addendum: Also on the theme of beautiful things about Edmonton, see Sharon Yeo’s post on Edmonton Transit’s historical tour.)

— Speaking of Andy, a fierce opponent of the proposal to build a new arena for the Oilers downtown, the discussion continues in Edmonton’s blogosphere in light of the city’s new proposal to fund the arena through an expanded community revitalization levy. Of note are Alex Abboud’s call for downtown development with or without the CRL, Ryan Batty’s skeptical look at CRLs, and Mack Male’s coverage of the proposal to expand the CRL boundary. For more commentary and links to what mainstream media and others are saying about the arena, keep an eye on the edmontonian.

(Addendum 2: Looks like the edmontonian is hanging up its cleats. Nooooo!)

For more on media new and old, check out Mack’s Media Monday.

(Image of George Couros courtesy Kevin Jarrett, taken Jan. 30, 2011)

Edmonton New Media Roundup 14

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 01:17:30 -0600

I took some Edmonton podcasts with me on a trip to southern Alberta last week, so this week’s roundup focuses on some of fine shows produced right here at home. To wit:

— DVD Afternoon is an erudite but highly accessible weekly conversation about movies between Paul Matwychuk and Heather Noel. I don’t watch a lot of movies, but I like hearing smart people talk about them, and DVD Afternoon delivers. It’s a bit like eavesdropping on a really good film studies class. It is geared towards the latest DVD releases, given that Heather manages The Videodrome, but they also talk about movies in repertory theatres (e.g. their discussion in Episode 71 of The Big Lebowski at Metro Cinema at the Garneau), and their recommendations would likely to useful if you’re a Netflix watcher, too.

— For talk about more mainstream movies, tune in to Jay n’ J, a monthly gab between Jay Runham, Jordan Blackburn and a guest. They’re not as polished as Paul and Heather, but they’re also a lot newer to the game, with three episodes under their belts compared to 72 for DVD Afternoon. Listening to Jay n’ J is a bit like eavesdropping on smart guys talking about movies in a bar. As it happens, Paul was the guest on their second episode, reflecting the collaborative spirit that, to me, characterizes Edmonton’s new media scene. Episode 3’s guest is Colin MacIntyre, whose Tuesday morning CJSR show, Makin’ Whoopee, is also available as a podcast.

— The Prairie Belles podcast is a weekly look at Edmonton’s arts scene with Lisa Nicole Grace and Daneel Irons.They talk about music, theatre and the like in a delightful way, and they have introduced me to a number of excellent bands. They’ve been at this for 66 episodes as of this writing, but I don’t think they got into iTunes until Episode 47, and I didn’t discover that fact until recently. Anyway, I’ll be listening regularly from now on. (While we’re talking local music, let me throw in a plug for yeglive.ca, which sponsors Prairie Belles and is an comprehensive source of information on live music in Edmonton.)

— The Unknown Studio, a twice-monthly podcast about all things Edmonton, took the summer off, but hosts Adam Rozenhart and Scott C. Bourgeois did do a special episode on the Folk Festival and the Fringe. I’m looking forward to Season 3, which they promise will start the week of Sept. 12.

— User Created Content, the gaming podcast, is also taking a little break, but you could easily fill your days listening to the 85 episodes recorded so far. Hosts Ramin Ostad, Matthew Dykstra, Cory Satermo and Anthony Bacchus are (to these non-gaming ears) enormously knowledgeable and passionate about their subject matter. They are promising regular video when they kick off Season 4, so that’s something to look forward to.

— Podcasting is a medium that lends itself to niche audiences — take, for example, Equinely-Inclined, a podcast for horse-lovers. Sylvia Schneider and her co-host Diana Balbar have been at this since 2007, which makes them local podcasting pioneers and worthy of salute.

What other Edmonton-based podcasts do you listen to? What kind of podcast do you wish existed so you could listen to it? Let me know in the comments, on Twitter, or on Google+.

I listen to a lot of non-Edmonton podcasts as well. Radiolab, This American Life, all of the Slate gabfests, On the Media, Planet Money, Stuff You Should Know, This Week in Google, The Moth, Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, Wiretap, Media Talk, Freakonomics and New Yorker: Out Loud are among my favourites.

I subscribe to all of these through Stitcher, a handy app that streams the latest episodes on my iPhone without making me plug in and sync. I don’t know if it’s worth it for local podcasts to partner with Stitcher, but as a user, I’d love it if you were there, so if you’re interested, here’s the form.