Category: Geek

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Geek Play

The Geek Alphabet

The blog Geeks are Sexy put together a wonderful alphabet rhyme using Creative Commons “share-alike”-licensed photos on Flickr, which I thought I’d share with you:

geek alphabet

Here’s the text of the rhyme, along with a credit for each corresponding photo:

A is for Away Team, where you should never wear red (mild mannered photographer)
B is for Binary, 1s and 0s in your head (jpstanley)
C is for Cosplay, making cons an awesome place
D is for Doctor, who keeps changing face (great beyond)
E is for Emoticons, that tell you what we’re feeling (neal gillis)
F is for Flickr, whose photos we are “stealing” (tricky)
G is for Gadgets, the way to our heart (slipstreamjc)
H is for Hardware, I took it apart! (jurvetson)
I is for iEverything, love it or hate it (dan dickinson)
J is for Japan, we’re glad Nintendo invaded (oscar mota)
K is for Keyboard, we love every letter (andrew*)
L is for Leias, the more the better! (koadmunkee)
M is for MMORPGs, it’s a magical place (i eated a cookie)
N is for NASA, and the beauty of space (nasa1fan)
O is for Occipital Lobe, we love using our brains (illuminaut)
P is for Programming, ((though lisp is a pain)) (phil_jackson)
Q is for Quilting, and other geeky crafts (athenamat)
R is for Reading, no matter what the path (timonoko)
S is for Science, though the cake is a lie (don solo)
T is for Tabletop, and a 20-sided die (nengard)
U is for Uncertainty, you just never know (neil crosby)
V is for Voltage, oh the places we’ll go! (oskay)
W is for the World Wide Web, it’s more than just porn (shimown)
X is for Xerox, where so much geekiness was born (marc smith)
Y is for Youth, since kids are geeks too (benmcleod)
Z is for Zork, watch out for the grue! (the_tml)

This article also appears in Canadian Developer Connection.

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Geek It Happened to Me Toronto (a.k.a. Accordion City)

Toronto Developer Lunch, Friday May 14th

developer lunch

Once again, Kristan “Krispy” Uccello has declared another Toronto developer dim sum lunch! It’s at the usual place – Sky Dragon, located on the top floor of Dragon City mall (corner of Spadina and Dundas) tomorrow (Friday, May 14th, that is) at noon.

I’m trying to boost the .NET geek quotient at these lunches – it can’t just be me, Mark Cidade, Reg “Raganwald” Braithwaite (he’s developed with just about everything under the sun) and David Crow! If you’re in the area, come on down and have some cheap, delicious dim sum. We split the bill at the end, and it typically runs about $11 – 12 a person.

This article also appears in Canadian Developer Connection.

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Geek The Current Situation

I Don’t Think They Wanted to Use That Photo

Take a look at the photo accompanying the SFGate article below, which is about the all-hands meeting being called at Facebook over complaints about their approach to privacy:

sfgate facebook privacy article

Click the image to see the original article.

While the photo is probably not the one they wanted to use for the article, it’s a pretty good metaphor for the scene at a company when they call emergency all-hands meetings of this sort.

This article also appears in Global Nerdy.

Categories
Geek It Happened to Me Work

Toronto-Montreal NerdTrain (Departs Tuesday, May 25th, Returns Friday, May 28th)

via nerd car

A quick reminder: if you’re looking for cheap transport to Montreal for MonDev, Montreal’s Open Source Week (which concludes with the Make Web Not War conference), we’ve booked an entire VIA Rail car from Montreal to Toronto! The train car (pictured above) has wifi, power outlets and will be equipped with video monitors, an Xbox or two, a big-ass HP TouchSmart computer and other technological goodies to make the time pass by.

Best of all, if you want to book a trip on this car, we’re subsidizing it. Round-trip tickets are a mere $50 and cover the cost of the ride, a sandwich lunch and drink voucher! The train departs for Montreal on the morning of Tuesday, May 25th and departs back for Toronto on the morning of Friday, May 28th.

For more details, email cdnsol@microsoft.com.

This article also appears in Canadian Developer Connection.

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Geek It Happened to Me Life Toronto (a.k.a. Accordion City) Work

Mesh Conference: Toronto, May 18th – 19th

mesh conference

The 2010 Mesh Conference – the fifth one – takes place at Toronto’s MaRS Collaboration Centre on Tuesday, May 18th and Wednesday, May 19th. Its organizers call it “Canada’s Web Conference”, and it is: it’s this country’s premier get-together for creatives, techies and “suits” to share ideas about the internet and how it affects how we work, live and play.

This Year’s Keynote Speakers

This year’s keynote speakers are:

Chris Thorpe, Developer Advocate for the Open Platform at The Guardian

His background as a research scientist and his early involvement in Open Access publishing, makes him fascinated and passionate about what happens when data, content, platforms, identity and pretty much anything opens up. He spends his time at The Guardian working on the best ways to integrate The Guardian’s content, data and APIs with other people’s technology and businesses as part of the drive towards building the distribution and engagement channels of a mutualized newspaper.

Joseph Menn, author of Fatal System Error: The Hunt for the New Crime Lords Who are Bringing Down the Internet

Fatal System Error: The Hunt for the New Crime Lords Who are Bringing Down the Internet, Menn’s third book, was published in the US in January 2010 and in the UK in February 2010 by PublicAffairs Books. Part true-life thriller and part expose, it became an immediate bestseller, with Menn interviewed on national television and radio programs in the US, Canada and elsewhere. Menn has spoken at major security conferences on his findings, which include hard evidence that the governments of Russia and China are protecting and directing the behavior of some of the world’s worst cyber-criminals.

Scott Thompson, President of PayPal

Scott Thompson is president of PayPal with overall responsibility for establishing PayPal as the leading global online payment service. Scott previously served as PayPal’s senior vice president and chief technology officer, where he oversaw information technology, product development and architecture for PayPal.

Arvind Rajan, Vice President, International at LinkedIn

Arvind Rajan leads the company’s initiatives in markets outside the United States and Europe. Prior to joining LinkedIn, Arvind was the CEO of Grassroots Enterprise. Also a co-founder of the company, Arvind developed pioneering online grassroots communications programs for a wide variety of Fortune 500 companies, trade associations and nonprofit organizations. Arvind began his career with the Boston Consulting Group, and has held a wide range of leadership positions in emerging growth technology companies.

This Year’s Topics

Mesh will have two days’ worth of sessions covering a number of topics, including:

  • Open Government
  • Mobile phones and computing
  • The Pirate’s Dilemma
  • Privacy in the age of Facebook
  • Real-time
  • Social media in the Olympics, in the newsroom, as used by Médecins Sans Frontières and your business

For more, see the schedule.

Who’s Behind Mesh?

Mesh is a great example of the sort of thing that engaged and enthusiastic communities can create. It wasn’t created by a professional conference-organizing company, software vendor or government program, but by these five individuals known through the Toronto tech scene:

  • Mark Evans: Digital marketing and social media consultant, former VP at my old company, b5media, worked with the startups PlanetEye and Blanketware, and former tech journo with the National Post and Globe and Mail.
  • Mathew Ingram: Senior writer with GigaOm, former tech journo with the Globe and Mail and supreme tech blogger-about-town.
  • Mike McDerment: Runs Freshbooks, one of Toronto’s most successful start-ups.
  • Rob Hyndman: If (or more likely, when) I get sued, I’ll haul ass for Rob’s office! Considered by the Toronto tech scene to be its unofficial legal advisor, Rob runs Hyndman | Law, a boutique law firm catering to tech companies.
  • Stuart McDonald: Runs Tripharbor/Tripharbour; in a former life, he brought Expedia to Canada.

And of course, there are the sponsors, which includes Microsoft Canada. I’ll be there, representing The Empire along with my coworkers David Crow, Barnaby Jeans and John Oxley.

Get Your Tickets Now!

There’s not much time left before Mesh, and tickets are going quickly. The student tickets are already gone, but a few regular tickets — CAD$539 each – are still available at the registration page.

This article also appears in Canadian Developer Connection.

Categories
Geek Toronto (a.k.a. Accordion City)

MeshU Workshops: Toronto, May 17th

MeshU: May 17th, 2010 - Toronto, Canada

MeshU – short for “Mesh University” – takes place on Monday, May 17th at the MaRS Collaboration Centre (101 College Street, just east of University). It’s a series of workshops for web designers, developers and “suits” that takes place the day before the Mesh Conference (“Canada’s Web Conference”) and will feature 12 workshops divided into “Design”, “Development” and “Management” streams delivered by people with real-world startup/tech business experience.

I’ll be there, as both an attendee furiously taking notes (which I’ll post here) as well as a representative of Microsoft Canada and Silverlight, who are MeshU’s event partners.

Keynote: Bill Buxton

Keynote: Bill Buxton

Bill Buxton, Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research, human-computer interaction guru extraordinaire and fellow alumnus of Crazy Go Nuts University, will deliver the morning keynote. Every presentation I’ve ever seen him do has always inspired me and given me at least three new ideas, and I expect that this one will be no different. He’s an intelligent, engaging and interesting speaker – don’t miss your chance to see him live!

MeshU Sessions

Here are the MeshU sessions:

Registering for MeshU

Alas, the $49.00 student tickets for MeshU are sold out. Here’s what remain:

  • Regular tickets: CAD$289.00 each
  • “Friends of MeshU” sponsorship: CAD$1000 each – with this, you get:
    • 1 regular ticket
    • 1 student ticket
    • Your logo on the MeshU site and at the event
  • “Really Good Friends of MeshU” sponsorship: CAD$2000 each — with this, you get:
    • 2 regular tickets
    • 2 student tickets
    • Your logo on the MeshU site and at the event
    • A table at the event

To register for MeshU, go to the MeshU registration page.

This article also appears in Canadian Developer Connection.

Categories
Geek Life

GovCamp: Ottawa, May 31 – June 1, 2010

 Photo of the Peace Tower in Ottawa: "GovCamp: Ottawa, May 31 - June 1, 2010" Creative Commons Photo by the Poissant Family.

Open Government / Government 2.0

The intersection of the internet and politics has given rise to many things, including the concept often referred to as “Open Government” or “Government 2.0”. To borrow a couple of lines from Mark Kuznicki’s keynote at ChangeCamp Toronto, its goals are twofold:

  1. For governments to become more open, transparent, participatory, innovative, efficient and effective
  2. For citizens to become more connected to each other around their civic passions in the place they call home

Events like ChangeCamp, TransitCamp and Metronauts – unconferences where ordinary citizens, government officials and representatives of organizations that receive public funding meet to exchange ideas – have been happening across Canada. At these events, people have thought about, discussed and built new relationships with their local governments, often through the use of technology.

Most of these events focused on a local community, municipality or occasionally, a province, but none of them have had a discussion at the federal level. Could this be done at a broader level?

GovCamp: May 31 – June 1 in Ottawa

GovCamp logo

That’s where GovCamp comes in. It’s an “Open Government”/”Government 2.0” discussion where the topics will be centred around Canada as a whole, the interactions between cities and provinces, and how our provincial and federal governments can help cultivate the growth and prosperity of Canadians and their vibrant communities.

John Weigelt, Microsoft Canada’s National Technology Officer, is putting together this event, which takes place on Monday, May 31st and Tuesday, June 1st in Ottawa. It’ll be a gathering of local citizens, public sector employees, service delivery leaders and policy people with an interest in having a conversation about engaging citizens and businesses and making government at all levels more open, responsive and efficient. It won’t be a trade show or product-oriented discussion; instead, it will be a workshop-style unconference where participants establish the agenda and explore the themes that they care most about.

GovCamp is being hosted by CIPS – the Canadian Association for Information Technology Professionals – and sponsored by Microsoft Canada on behalf of the community.

Who’s Coming to GovCamp?

In putting GovCamp together, we’re reaching out to a number organizations and communities including:

Who is GovCamp For?

This event is for:

  • IT People –Technology is one way that governments are transforming how they deliver services externally and internally. Technology people are needed to explore the art of the possible for these new services. Mash-ups, Open Data, social media are but a few of the possible areas for discussion.
  • Policy People – We need you in the conversation so that you can share your expertise on the realm of the possible from a policy perspective. Privacy, Security, Access to Information, Information Management are all key considerations for successful government transformation.  Come share your knowledge on how to make these policies enable new services.
  • Government Services leaders – Ultimately, government delivers value through the many services that are provided. GovCamp is about exploring the realm of the possible for service to individuals, services to businesses and services to other departments. Your voice is essential to inform the community and to guide those ideas that the community may have for you!
  • Community – We are fortunate that there’s a passionate and creative community with vibrant ideas about how they can help create a closer connection between governments, individuals, businesses and even among government itself. Your participation at the Canada Gov Camp will provide you with a venue to share your great ideas and, if all goes well, interact with some of the people that can take your idea further.

How Much, and Where do I Register?

Registration for GovCamp is free! To register, visit the registration page.

GovCamp will be held at the University of Ottawa, in a location to be determined.

This article also appears in Canadian Developer Connection.