New Links Page

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I did a bit of work to my links page tonight. I wrote a piece of code so that now the people I follow on Twitter show up as well. It’s sort of a neat mashup, and I’m hoping to do a bit more with Twitter soon. ...

24 Article About E-Commerce And Credit Cards

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Apparently there is a word or two from me in today’s 24 daily paper. If you happen to stumble upon any, please send me a link. ...

Another Article Saying Blogs Are Dead Or Dying

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I found this article on Twitter which is by an author who basically thinks the era of blogging is at an end. What do you think? HT, Kris. ...

Google Plans To Start Making Things People Want

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Hey, that sounds like a great idea. What brilliant strategist came up with that new plan, and who’s the guy from before who thought they should make things without user input? ...

US Government About To Bail Out Auto Makers

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if (is_single()) { ? } ?How do you feel about that? I read this article with the CEO of Ford today, where the interviewer basically pummeled him. When asked about Ford’s strategy with regards to electric cars, the CEO had this to say: We are working on that [fully electric cars], but let me just share with you the Ford plan about that. Our No. 1 priority is to improve the internal combustion engine, and that’s why the turbocharging, the direct fuel injection, we get a 20 percent improvement in fuel mileage and a 15 percent reduction in CO2, but we get that across all of the engines, across ...

WordPress Asides

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Lately I haven’t felt like writing big entries, so I quickly added an asides plugin so that I can do quick and easy entries for humour or quick comments on current events. ...

The North Shore

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Yesterday morning I found myself in Pacific Center mall doing a bit of shopping for Brennen’s daughter, Kaede. I ended up getting her this pretty cool Canucks shirt (thanks to Beth for the idea): I ran into Ianiv in the mall, and we ended up chatting for a bit. One of the things I’ve been debating for quite some time now is moving out of the downtown core. My first choice is somewhere on the North Shore, hopefully fairly close to the Seabus (since I work downtown). Whenever I’m out that way, it just seems more community oriented, and easier to get around than downtown. My second choice ...

Duane's Guide To Visiting Tokyo: Part I

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Someone on Twitter tomorrow asked for some advice on things to see and do in Tokyo, so I thought I’d write a bit about my trip in April of 2006. At the last minute, my employer asked me to attend a SIP interoperability conference in Tokyo. Since I had never been to Asia before, I thought it would be a pretty awesome trip. Derek and I left Vancouver sometime in the afternoon on a Saturday I believe, and we landed in Tokyo 10 hours later. Narita airport is actually more than an hour outside of Tokyo, so even after you land you still have a fairly long trek to get into the city. Derek and I paid ...

Quantum Of Solace

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I’m heading out to see this with a few friends tonight. The reviews so far are pretty mixed, with half the people totally loving it, and others kind of going “meh”… So we’ll see. I think it looks pretty awesome myself. [easyvideo video=”http://youtube.com/v/Q4jY8WxcFMo&hl=en&fs=1”] ...

Global Warming

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Clearly just a myth. Photo from here. ...

Rainy Tuesday

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Today is of course Remembrance Day. It’s a holiday here in BC, but unfortunately I’m at work today. Ultimately, that’s not a bad thing, since in exchange we’re getting some extra time off around Christmas time. There’s a lot I could say about today, but browsing around the Vancouver web it seems others have already said it for me. But I’m obviously thankful for the sacrifices others made so that we can enjoy the freedoms we have today. Outside it’s rather dismal out today. I ended up driving to work, which is something I don’t typically do since it costs me around $20/day to park ...

The Fracturing Of Content

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I sat down right now to write a blog entry, and this is the one I came up with. There have been numerous entries on various websites over the last few weeks that have hinted that blogging is dead. While I don’t necessarily believe them, I can’t help but see some truth in a few of their statements. First, let it not be forgotten that the *ability* to blog is at an all time maximum. Thanks to the work of Automattic and WordPress, it’s relatively painless to start a blog, either on WordPress.com or on your own hosted server. That being said, I have to question just how many people are listening ...

WordCamp Whistler Update

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I met with Rebecca and John tonight and we started finalizing the plans for WordCamp Whistler. We’re hoping to nail down a venue in the next week or so, at which time we’ll open up official registration. Given that we want to make the event as awesome and as interesting as possible, we’re going to be charging a small admission for the event. In addition, we’ll also be accepting sponsorship from a few organizations, which will hopefully cover the costs of the venue, and the social. Stay tuned in the next week or so for some official announcements. As of now, the date is still set for January ...

2:22am

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Wow, that seems like a title from 24. Anyways, Ryland Haggis was by tonight for a few beers, which was definitely cool, since we’ve been talking about it for a while now. For those of you who don’t know Ryland, he’s an extremely talented photographer who also happens to be an amazing bass player — he’s currently in Jessie Farrell‘s band, and has been touring with her this last year. If you haven’t heard of him, go add him on Twitter, or also check out his professional musician website. Also, make sure to check out Jessie’s website — Jessie’s currently down in Nashville writing ...

A Line Drawn In Time

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It’s been a few days now since president-elect Barack Obama won the election, and I thought I would share a few thoughts. The day of the election I saw an interview with a prominent African American on CNN who said that should Obama win, you would literally be able to divide the history of the United States into two time periods: the period before Obama, and the period after. He said from that moment on, you would no longer be able to say that certain things were not possible in the US if you were a person of colour. For the first time, he would be able to tell his son that he could become ...

Yes We Can

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if (is_single()) { ? } ?I did something similar in Feburary of this year for Northern Voice, and I thought it would be a good idea to try again. Given that Barack Obama was one of the first presidential candidates to embrace social media, I thought I’d do a celebratory mosaic using a public photos posted to Flickr. The image is constructed using Flickr photos from everyday, normal people, the same people who helped Obama and his grass-roots campaign to secure the presidency. The search tags used on Flickr were “obama election victory” and “obama celebration”. The result is a mosiac ...

There Are No Words

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On September 11th, 2001, I was working in the middle of a clean room in a tiny building somewhere in the middle of Ottawa. Upon walking down the hall, I learned from a co-worker that a plane had just struck the World Trade Center. Thinking it was just an accident, I continued on with my job without any more thought to the event. Upon learning that another plane had hit the second World Trade Center building less than an hour later, I began to realize the magnitude of the day’s events. A few hours later, I would find myself across the street on Hunt Club, watching history unfold on a small television ...

Tomorrow's The Day

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It’s finally here. After over a full year of campaigning, tomorrow the United States will be voting on who will be the next president of the United States. As I’ve blogged about many times before, I’m hoping Barack Obama wins. Compared to most politicians in this day and age, he seems upfront, humble, intelligent, and with an honest desire to improve the state of America. I’m probably going to hole myself up tomorrow near a TV and watch the coverage as it happens. Without a doubt, this is bound to be the most important political event that I’ve witnessed in my lifetime. Whoever wins ...

WordCamp Whistler

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Yes, that’s right people. How does going up to Whistler and spending a weekend boarding/skiing and talking about everyone’s favourite blogging engine, WordPress, sound? I suggested this briefly on Twitter tonight, and immediately got a message from Rebecca along the lines of “hell ya!” I emailed a hotel already tonight at the heart of the village to see what kind of group rates we could get in December or January. I think it would be awesome to go up for a weekend, hold a WordCamp during the day, and do afternoon/night skiing in the off time, or on the second day. Rebecca and I helped ...

The Joy Of Sleep

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Lately I’ve actually been sleeping fairly well, given how much trouble I have routinely had in the past. I’ve been trying to keep a fairly consistent schedule these days, going to bed sometime around midnight, and trying to be up around 8am or so. There’s a period of time between about 7 and 8 in the morning that is pure bliss these days, where I just kind of fade in and out of sleep and stretch periodically. Now that it’s a bit colder, my heater is on slightly, so my room is nice and toasty at the point. Plus, it’s still a bit dark at that hour, which makes it easier to continue relaxing. With ...