What:

A meet-up, hosted by Raincity Studios, of independent and grassroots media publishers and creators to exchange ideas, resources, and notes about the 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver.

This is not an Olympic protest but rather a constructive, strategic conversation about the role of social media documentation of the forthcoming Games to ensure the ability to tell all the stories associated with the Games without censure or hassle.

Why

To discuss the possibility of an "independent media centre" at Raincity Studios office during the Vancouver/Whistler 2010 Olympic Games in February 2010 in order to maximize visibility and quality of documentation from local and international independent media makers.

Who:

This event is convened by Raincity Studios, presided by Robert Scales, conducted by Kris Krug, and facilitated by Dave Olson. They will lead a discussion and recount past experiences gained from covering Olympic Games as non-accredited media.

To attend, please send a Twitter message @raincitystudios or email to dave (at) raincitystudios (dot) com to let us know you are coming due to space limitations (30 people max,) otherwise participate via chat channel.

Keep an eye on http://raincitystudios.com/blogs-and-pods/ for any changes to the event or info on connecting by chat.

When/Where:

Dec. 4th 5PM~6PM
at Raincity Studios HQ
Suite 420, 1 Alexander St., Gastown

Topics:

The primary topic is determining space, sponsorship, and role of Independent Media Centre.

Other topics to discuss (time permitting) are:

• Update about the IMC non-accredited media centre at UBC downtown
• Outreaching to international indie media makers - planning photowalks, etc.
• Coordinating with activist groups to receive their media releases and stories
• Gaining access to non-sports events and hospitality houses
• Boundaries of rights-holders re: trademarks, description, and coverage of events ...
• Aggregating content efficiently - where/how/what
• Recap of VANOC worldwide press briefing reaction
• Chat about IOC blogging guidelines re: athletes/officials blogging
• Exchange of contacts at VANOC and Government ministries

Notes:

To keep the conversation on track and the meeting short, like "Lord of the Flies" the person holding the conch shell is the one who speaks ;-).

This meeting is transluscent meaning you and your words are bloggable, recordable, photograph-able.

Photos Olympic flag by Daveo (uncleweed) Vancouver emblem ceremony by Kris Krug (kk) Dave and conch by Phillip Djwa (phillipdjwa)

I am following up on the Open Letter to VANOC from Social Media Makers with a few notes as well as an invitation to continue the conversation with VANOC over a tasty beverage. The letter has made its way around the world with Twitters, comments, blog posts, and personal notes of support and/or confusion coming in from many corners of the globe.

So, to keep the conversation rolling, here are my annotated notes, thoughts and recaps from the past few days of opinions rolling in:

First off, Jeff Lee, the Olympic reporter from the Vancouver Sun explored the changing media landscape in an excellent article and an accompanying blog post. He talked to several interesting people and brought a veteran mainstream media eye to the conundrums in "Changes coming to media's coverage of Olympics - But new forms of news delivery are restricted by Olympic committee rules". He keys right in on the crux of the tension - money vs.choice.

"As traditional news organizations struggle with declining readership and cutting staff while trying to capture greater online presence, the Olympics is undergoing its own transformation. The change is also affecting broadcasters, who like the others, have not yet figured out how to fully monetize their Internet properties.

The traditional forms of media coverage -- exclusive territorial contracts with broadcasters, appointment of news wire agencies by the IOC and press credentials parcelled out by national Olympic committees -- are coming under pressure as people change the way they get their news."

His article also brought an insider's point of view from the head of the (enormous) newswire AP who raised the same questions we are within the inner-sanctum of the IOC:

"In an address to the press commission, Tom Curley, the chief executive of Associated Press, warned that the lines between traditional news delivery models are blurring. Newspapers want to use streaming video, but are restricted because the IOC licenses broadcasters for field-of-play images. Audio broadcasts are similarly restricted. According to those who were at the meeting, Curley's address stunned many members."

Mr. Lee (who is olympicreporter on Twitter) also published extended notes and thoughts in a blog post titled "Social networking media push for inclusion in Olympic plan" (a bit buried in the site but worth the read).

His blog post provides a full quote from Renee Smith-Valade, VANOC spokesperson, who took time on a Sunday to follow-up to Lee's inquiry thusly:

“The IOC is the ultimate arbiter on the representation on the Press Commission, and each country's National Olympic Committee determines which media get accredited for the Games. As the Organizing Committee we can and will encourage both entities to recognize and facilitate the immense growth of online media, however ultimately decisions for press commission membership and Games accreditation lie with them. We have not yet responded to the open letter from the social media group but will do so in the coming days."

My colleagues and I are encouraged that VANOC has a reply in mind. While its unlikely that we would have been accredited going through the IOC and national press associations channels, we firmly contend we have value to offer by being engaged in the dialogue. We also have first-hand experiences to share about creative solutions (including non-accredited media centers) and strategies to embrace the social media makers without compromising the relationships rights-holders, corporate sponsors and the like.

This quest isn't just "for us" - we are starting the conversation for the thousands of people who are coming to participate in the Games as "amateur" reporters, photographers, podcasters, videographers, etc. and will eagerly post their content to audiences of maybe dozens, maybe millions of viewers. Individually, the coverage is very niche, and that micro-coverage is a big part of the appeal. Further, the collective content produced by "all of us" will likely rival the mainstream media output.

Mr. Lee's article includes remarks from Yahoo Sports which articulates how quickly media is changing:

"However, change has already started. This summer, Yahoo Sports -- which doesn't have a print or TV broadcast property -- sent 19 journalists and "analysts" to the 2008 Beijing Games. It had only one reporter at each of the 2004 and 2006 Olympics. Dave Morgan, executive editor of Yahoo Sports, said the investment paid off: more than 32 million "unique visitors" went to Yahoo's Beijing Olympics microsite in August, outstripping even NBC's online Olympic traffic."

So how does VANOC let the enthusiastic and experienced amateurs cover the Games while not opening up a box of problems? For starters, we look to the Piemonte Non-accredited Media Centre in Turin as a good example as it helped the alternative and independent press understand IOC guidelines, provided press releases and updates, and in-formal collaborative workspace and office resources. The funding came from tourism boards, local press agencies, sponsors (especially from the hospitality industry) and resulted in richer "long tail" coverage of the Games and the region.

For my colleagues who were in Turin (I was covering from Vancouver), this facility worked out great for organizing photo sessions, conducting athlete interviews, and exploring non-sports stories about art, culture, industry and tourism. We'll talk more about this example over a hypothetical coffee but, ... whether or not there is a "non-accredited media centre" we will invite folks to our Gastown loft office to add another layer of coverage beyond what CTV (in Canada's case) has in store.

Frankly, this solution is hardly ideal (it *is* a working office after all) so we're also touring downtown locations and talking to landlords and sponsors about acquiring a larger space - it's too big of an opportunity to settle for "good enough".

Opinion round-up

Competitive videographer and Bootup Labs Marketer, Jordan Behan comments with an inquiry about VANOC's social media (non)strategy:

"The decision to exclude the likes of the Raincity gang is quite puzzling, even without a social media strategy in place. In Dave's full letter, he highlights the history of the fan-based, non-intrusive coverage they've done at previous Olympic Games, and it's clear that this kind of participation only benefits the host city, the Games and even the holders of exclusive broadcast rights. I'm holding out hope that Vanoc (and our Canadian Olympic committee, apparently) will take great strides, not only to appear to appease social media creators, but instead fully embrace the concept and help to redefine citizen journalism's role in Games coverage. With some creativity, they should be able to do so inside of the confines of the above-mentioned (archaic in these times, if you ask me) broadcast rights."

While Kris and I were in-between the official press briefing (where I somehow caught a cold) and the Olympic Resistance Network pres conference, Mr. Behan sent this Twitter update: "jordanbehan @uncleweed It's ok to be pro-Olympics, and still anti-exclusive rights broadcasting and media monopolies, etc. At least, I hope it is. 12:48 PM Nov 20th"

Techvibes' wunderkind Greg Andrews offered his insight with Vancouver 2010 Organizers Snub Social Media (Nov. 20, 2008 2:21PM), where he points out how Kris and I didn't fit into either group (protesters or journos) with twitter updates and commentary:

"Unlike many Vancouverites that were outside the event in the rain protesting the Olympics, Olson and Krug had intentions of journalism, not protest. Between them and Raincity CEO Robert Scales, they've unofficially covered the last four Olympic games, in addition to Olson's blogging and podcasting of Canucks hockey.

Via Twitter:

    Got stopped at the door. "if you guys are here to protest pls go accross the street". Now they're checkin our credentials.

    We were just escorted from the building. We had better access, even a welcome in Beijing and Torino.

    @todmaffin agreed they can't make us go home. but we're not here to protest in the rain, we're here as jounalists."

Ruth Seeley commented on the Tech Vibes article pointing out the perception of value is no longer based on delivery method:

I wonder if they let in folk from The Tyee? It would be interesting to find out - because that could be part of the argument for allowing access to a broader definition of media. If anyone truly believes that 24 or Metro deserve access because they're printed on paper and The Tyee doesn't, some re-examination of belief systems needs to begin.

View from the Isles writer and photographer (now now working at Media2o) Tris Hussey offered his thoughts in "Raincity throws down the gauntlet to VANOC: Let citizen media in!" and asks what VANOC plans to do:

"Will VANOC step up to the plate where other host cities and Olympic Committees have not? That's an open and excellent question. I for one would welcome social media participation at the games. I think we'd all be the richer for it."

Raincoaster Lorraine (who teaches blogging workshops in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside) followed up with her thoughts:

"Vancouver’s citizen journalists have done an exceptional job of covering the last several Olympics, and have, in fact, become known worldwide for it. This is a creative proposal that would ensure that, rather than taking an oppositional stance, Vancouver's citizen journalists take one in support of the Olympics and civic pride."

Ianiv the Blogaholic (who also works at crowd sourced media site Now Public) writes about how ubiquitous recording devices have changed how media is created (and what media is) in, "Social Media and the Vancouver 2010 Olympics", saying:

"With the prevalence of devices capable of recording video, still images and sound, it is almost impossible that a significant event will not be recorded in some way. And sometimes all this content created by the people is at odds with the interests of the corporations that produce or sponsor an event."

... and Ianiv continues with concerns about the power of takedown notices which are often foisted at well-meaning and unsuspected fans ...

"It remains to be seen what VANOC’s response will be, if any. It would be very nice if everyone could document their Olympic experience and share it with the rest of the world without the fear of getting takedown notices that would make all their efforts useless."

Vancouver (really Victoria) blog-father, new PR ace, and theatre enthusiast Darren Barefoot posts his thoughts (complete with a geeky Venn diagram) in "Thinking About Social Media and the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver" and frames expectations of what social media makers seek to make their reportage.

"As Dave says, social media types aren't expecting all-access passes to the gold medal hockey games. He’s right to point out that there's a big hole to fill in the media coverage for such an event. I was thinking about it, and drew this little Venn diagram:

The CTVs and CBCs are going to have the major, breaking news covered. It’s all that green space–that’s where social media creators can live. Through various channels, I’m seeing several ways forward for benefits for both parties. Social media creators get some tools, resources and access to help with their citizen journalism efforts, and VANOC enjoys a whole new layer of news coverage. Such a partnership would also highlight Vancouver’s place as a global for new media, citizen journalism and the like."

BuzzNetworker Colleen Coplick sets the scene and asks for an update in "The Olympics Must Adapt to New Media" (in her usual witty style):

"Recently, the Vancouver Organizing Committee (aka VANOC - you know, the bigwigs in charge of all of the Olympic everythings in Vancouver) began a four-day “World Press Briefing” for more than 250 visiting journalists and media managers. There was some serious debate about how media coverage of the Olympics is changing dramatically due to new and emerging media."

"So, Dave, Kris, Robert, where do we stand on this? Has VANOC gotten back to you? Have we come to any sort of conclusion here?"

Nothing yet Colleen, stay tuned for updates.

Out-Smarts Internet Marketing firm's Mhairi Petrovic wrote "The Olympics and Social Media" speculates on the Olympic committee's concerns and the unstoppable force of social media coming in 2010:

"Its no surprise that the Olympic committee is shirking this question.  Many organisations especially large traditional companies (those that vet each and every public communication to ensure it reflects the corporate line) view social media as a quandary and even a threat to their brand.  They think that encouraging community participation leads to loosing control of that branding process.  But the fact of the matter is that brands are out there in the public forum anyway. Isn’t it better to be part of the conversation to learn adapt and grow because of it than to be on outside throwing out press releases.

Social media journalism is undoubtedly going to be part of the Olympics in Vancouver with an army of bloggers, social network participants and online journalists all giving their perspectives.  Rather than stick their head in the sand the Olympic committee should be embracing this new way to entrench its brand with new generations and different communities."

Jenn Lowther lays out our big mission with "Social Media and the 2010 Olympics" and peers into the future to how the possible scenarios might play out:

"Kris and Dave were there not only as representatives of Raincity Studios, but as ambassadors for Vancouver’s entire Social Media and Citizen Journalism community - their exclusion from the briefing sends a message that social media is not a welcome commentator when it comes to the 2010 Olympics.

Regardless of how VANOC feels about Social Media and Citizen Journalism, it needs to realize that we will be covering the Olympics for our various media properties. Ideally, we would like to work with VANOC, ensuring that we are aware of the basic guidelines that it has regarding our coverage, i.e. not showing a Telus ad when Bell is a sponsor.  By excluding us from the VANOC media briefing, the organization is creating a self-fulfilling prophecy - by not including members of the Social Media community for fear that we will not follow the rules, it is ensuring that we do not know what rules need to be followed.

Yes, currently we do not measure our readership levels at those of mainstream media, but in aggregate we do receive significant viewership. In my opinion, VANOC is being extremely myopic in their exclusion of Social Media and Citizen Journalism, when it has a perfect opportunity put in their laps - being the first Olympics to fully capitalize on the power of Social Media that is present in Vancouver’s thriving tech community. When the Olympics are over and the MSM’s coverage of the Olympics is relegated to a disk or hard drive in some storage area collecting dust, the coverage from Citizen Journalists will be alive online, gaining views daily, reminding people how truly awesome the Vancouver 2010 Olympics really were."

Finally (for today at least) social media's Clark Kent (and former Raincity Studios cohort) Will Pate offers kind words about us (thx bud) and words of advice for VANOC in Social Media’s Place in the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games:

Several of the folks in question are colleagues of mine, and represent Raincity Studios, the web studio I’m proud to say I co-founded. Kris Krug, Robert Scales and Dave Olson are tireless social media practitioners, trainers, authors and conference organizers. They represent the best of what Canada does when it comes to the ongoing evolution of journalism through technology. They are treated with the respect due to recognized experts outside Canada, it would be a loss for the Vancouver games to overlook great talent in their own backyard. It would be a win to build on what they learned using social media to cover the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympic Games.

Nor should social media as a force for good and bad PR be overlooked. The news has been filled in the last few years with stories of journalists, politicians and businesses tanked by bloggers and cameraphones. But my colleagues are not proposing to build a virtual lynch mob, interfere with the major networks who pay good money for exclusive coverage of the events, or otherwise tarnish the image of our beloved Vancouver.

My colleagues want to help the mass of people who will arrive to watch and create social media at the games. I would like to see VANOC and the IOC reconsider bringing them to the table, at least so their exclusion doesn’t become a story that detracts from what I expect to be a most successful event.

If I may humbly offer a piece of advice: a little love goes a long way with the social media crowd. You don’t need to give them the VIP treatment, a seat at the big kids table is enough. Recognizing the powerful voice of the people will do wonders for getting them to sing on key.

Well said Will, a seat at the big kids' table *and* a tasty turkey drumstick will help us all ;-).

My three cents

My personal reason for caring about all this starts from being a sports fan, a social observer and a documentarian and a belief that authentic media works better for many audiences. What I've found about the Olympics is what you see on TV is not like the experience on the ground.

The viewpoints and stories which are the richest and most compelling aren't the ones getting the round-the-clock coverage. If i drift into anecdotes here I'll never get this posted so I'll save my loquacious stories for a fireside chat with a tasty beverage ;-). Be sure to ask me about the impact of a :10 video clip of the first ever Nepali Winter Olympian.

I should point out for the record (since I am being transluscent here). I grew up in Whalley in the 70s, I lived in both Salt Lake City, Utah and Nagano, Japan prior to those regions hosting the Olympics and witnessed controversies aplenty. I've also seen the changes (good and bad but mostly good) resultant from hosting an event of this magnitude. I traveled and worked in 20+ countries and now live in North Vancouver and will be hosting all sorts of international friends at my place during the Games (well those who bribe me appropriately at least - hint: bring micro-brews).

Like many British Columbians, I am bombarded with negative Olympic-related news from loan guarantees gone wild to security budget chaos and street closures. I work next to the heart of DTES and see daily the lives of the disenfranchised and addicts and homeless. These are very real problems but also beyond the Olympic mandate. Certainly though, pausing to consider their point of view will cause the most calloused to think twice about how we spend public money.

I have a 14 year old son who is stoked for Aerials and Moguls and Snowboard at Cypress Mtn. I saw 4 out of 6 Team Canada men's hockey games in SLC and saw every hockey team (men's and women's) in the tournament at least once. Heck, Don Cherry even wore my hat! and i held the torch a few times ... ooops i am starting on the stories ...

Anyhow, this time, I am personally most excited to meet more Latvian hockey fans and watch Jeremy Wotherspoon fulfill his Olympic potential at the glorious new oval - where I also hope to see my friends from Thuringen, Germany again set records and party afterwards. Like I said, i'ts a whole different Games on the ground compared to the TV coverage of superstars and scandals.

Indeed, there are huge social problems facing residents of our fair region, but they won't improve by complaining, instead we must use this platform judiciously and show that Vancouver has the ability to shine a light towards the possibilities of what we can accomplish as a progressive, creative and cooperative society - the Games are coming and I am ready in many ways.

Note from the Resistance

As for protesting the Olympics, ... the Olympic Resistance Network's press conference didn't get too much International coverage as hoped but some Canadian sources took notice of their various concerns: Canadian Press - The Tyee - Globe and Mail.

These concerns are express by people who frankly have a hard time getting their message heard by the "suits" and as such, feel disconnected from the process and a bit ornery about the Games to say the least. I recorded audio to go along with photos and video of the Olympic Resistance Network event and will try to get that posted to share their important stories and concerns.

Keeping the conversation going

I've also pinged the erudite Olympic scholar Dr. Andy Miah in the UK for his comments so hope to hear from him for the next update, along with sharing whatever response we receive from VANOC. As rumoured, we are planning for a meeting next week to riff ideas about creating social media centres in Vancouver and Whistler (perhaps with sponsors?) - whew.

Mainstream media who wish to speak with Kris Krug, Robert Scales or myself (Dave Olson) about this topic, contact details are at the Raincity Studios media kit. Social media makers already know how to find us ;-).

PS If I missed including your coverage, please leave a comment. Ditto if you have something to say about the role of Social Media in the Olympics.

NOTE: Sent to VANOC {mediarelations@vancouver2010.com, pressoperations@vancouver2010.com} Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2008.
Cross-posted at: urbanvancouver.com, 2010.dailyvancouver.com, nowpublic.com, etc.

Hello VANOC Media Relations and Press Operations,

I am writing today on behalf of Raincity Studios, a Vancouver-based social media company who owns and publishes a suite of media properties. We had hoped to talk about social media (blogs, podcasts, twitter, wikis etc.) at the World Press Briefing this week, however we did not receive any response from the applications we submitted to participate in the event. So, as per Mr. Furlong's suggestion at the Vancouver Board of trade meeting last week, we are liaising with VANOC.

In brief, we'd like to have a conversation about how to allow fans and amateur media makers to document their Olympic experience while keeping out of the way of the IOC IP lawyers. As a company and as individuals, we've produced extensive, non-accredited coverage of Beijing 2008, Torino 2006, SLC 2002, and Nagano 1998. With the next games literally in our neighborhood, we'll be hosting an independent, international media centre at our Gastown loft office. As part of this, we'll organize events like photo walks and aggregate fan-made content for the enjoyment of a worldwide audience. We'd like to work with you to do this for mutual benefit.

As you likely know, Vancouver is a hub of innovative journalism with companies like ourselves, Now Public, and others plus renowned conferences like Northern Voice. Raincity Studios/Bryght is also an "official weblog service provider." My colleagues Robert Scales and Kris Krug were published in the academic paper "Pathway: Critiques and Discourse In Olympic Research," participated in the 9th International Symposium on Olympic Studies in Beijing and will be presenting about the experiences at the noted SXSW Interactive conference in 2009.

Among my colleagues and myself, we've posted thousands of photos, dozens of audio and video podcasts along with hundreds of blog posts, updates etc. from several Olympics. Additionally, we've cooperated with mainstream media and published Olympic-related coverage in the LA Times, BBC online, plus outlets in Poland, Brazil, Shanghai, and so on.

In Torino, Scales and Krug (and others) tested cutting edge equipment for Comvu and produced a cross-ocean symposium "Athletes and Social media" between Turin and Vancouver. In Beijing, they tested camera for Qik and contributed to many mainstream media outlets. Our own media properties include DailyVancouver.com, UrbanVancouver.com, Hockeynw.com, plus dozens of other presences, and we are allied with dozens of other media properties in BC and around the world.

Mr. Scales is China desk editor for Now Public and has presented to numerous international business groups about Olympics and business. Mr. Krug is ranked #4 on Vancouver Sun's "Internet Most Visible in Vancouver" list, both Krug and Scales were included on Tech Vibes "Vancouver Digital Media People to Watch 2008" list and appear on various other "best of" lists.

As for myself, I've produced extensive photo essays of event venues and published interviews with Canadian athletes like Duff Gibson, Ross Rebagliati and Crispin Lipscomb and written magazine articles about Olympians. I also appear on CBC Radio One discussing sports culture and new media as the producer/host of the Canucks Outsider podcast.

Bear in mind, aside form the occasional stipend, we do this work for no pay.

We are aware of your obligations to media rights holders and are seeking to provide an entirely different sort of coverage than the accredited media provide. We are not looking to cover events per se but are instead interested in covering the cultural stories, athletes' families' stories, and stories from fans who saved and traveled from around the world for this experience. In other words, we plan to encourage and aggregate fan coverage of the individual's "on the street" experience of the Games. We are locals who have watched (and helped pay for) the development of the Games since before the Plebiscite - as a result, we are tuned in to the issues and excitement surrounding the Games.

To begin our liaison relationship, we would like to attend the media briefing portion of the Worldwide Press Briefing on Thursday. We would also schedule a follow-up conversation with the appropriate point of contact to discuss how we as a weblog vendor company, and as individuals, can be involved in providing amateur coverage of Vancouver/Whistler 2010.

With Best Regards,

daveo (and Robert Scales and Kris Krug)
--
Dave Olson
Community Evangelist
Raincitystudios.com

PS These links will provide a flavor of our point of view:

* Raincity Studios Olympics posts: http://raincitystudios.com/search/node/olympics
* Olympic overage at Daily Vancouver: http://2010.dailyvancouver.com
* Beijing kick off post: http://raincitystudios.com/blogs-and-pods/daveo/beijing-2008-social-medi...
* Krug's Flickr Olympics photos: http://flickr.com/photos/kk/tags/olympics
* Scales' Flickr Olympics photos: http://flickr.com/photos/raincitystudios/tags/olympics
* Olson's Flickr Olympics photos: http://flickr.com/photos/uncleweed/tags/olympics
* You Tube videos: http://www.youtube.com/user/robertscales
* Olympic Outsider podcast feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/olympicoutsider
* Scales' Olympic coverage on Now Public: http://my.nowpublic.com/user/6247/assignments
* SLC 2002 photo/video essay: http://olsonboys.org/galleries/olympic-gallery.html
* Torino/Vancouver Symposium: http://2010.dailyvancouver.com/torino/symposium

Raincity Studios/Bryght Hosting is looking for an experienced System Administrator to join our team.

You will help with the day-to-day operations of our hosting environment, a 30+ server CentOS based Xen cluster. Your average work week will involve working on client issues, server auditing, server updates, server upkeep. You will be expected to be on call for the infrastructure.

Experience with CentOS/RHEL, Apache, MySQL, Subversion, BIND, Postfix, PHP configuration, RPM building and the Xen Hypervisor required. Experience with Nagios monitoring, Puppet/CFengine management, Drupal and Amazon web services preferred.

Excellent opportunity to expand your skills and work with experienced developers and a company focused on Open Source and customer service. Ability to quickly pick up new technologies and adapt to a fast paced work environment required.

Job Details:

Work with Bryght's support staff to solve client issues, such as SSL configuration, memory balancing on a small virtual machine, web configuration and optimization.

Work with Raincity developers to provide development environments for their work and management of the Raincity/Bryght office network.

Manage dozens of physical server, 100s of virtual server environment, ensuring performance, security and uptime. This will largely require enforcing management best practices for a virtual hosting environment.

Work with product development team to roll out new hosting options, such as Amazon EC2 based offerings.

Continue building out management services, such as locally cached CentOS repositories, monitoring, SNMP graphing, centralized backup, SSH key based authentication and Xen management.

Contact robert(at)RaincityStudios(dot)com with CV and expectations.

As the national broadcaster, the CBC has a special place in hearts of Canadians. Growing up in the USA, there is really no equivalent - PBS is well intentioned but just doesn't have the public mind-share the 'Ceeb garners with important documentaries and top-shelf sports coverage. Now that i think of it, the ability to satirize politics and still gets funding tell me that something like the CBC could never exist back home!!

I think the CBC (with help from Tod Maffin no doubt) have done a very good job of delivering new media content via podcasts and other channels while some aspects need some improvement (more openness please).They've learned a lot in the past year or so about developing digital content.

CBC is taking steps to get the internal teams more social media literate with an event on Friday, Nov. 21st moderated by Megan Cole. I'll be joining CBC journalists and employees on Friday for a conversation about using social media tools from Twitter to Flickr. Specifically, I'll be discussing how journalists and marketers can use Facebook and other emerging technologies and tools to enhance media coverage by building community as well as connecting fans with artists.

Follow along with blog and twitter coverage and see the reactions and comments to the presentations - I am look forwarding to learning a bit more about the process of producing "traditional" media and plan to listen more than speaking.

For more info, here's how the CBC describe the Lederhouse Social Networking Workshop:

Social networking has recently supplanted e-mail as the most popular use of the Internet.

Many of BC's best facebookers, flickrers and twitterers are CBC employees. Some of us don't know a SMS from an SOS.

That's why some CBC'ers will be gathering at the end of November for a day long seminar on social networking. We'll find out how some of us use it to make our jobs easier, and how others can learn to tap into its power.

We'll meet journalists who twitter, and producers who digg -- and create a project or two to try at your desk.

It's a day set aside for social networking -- about social networks.

See ya there or see ya online.

 

This action alert is re-purposed from: The CRTC Should Stop Internet Gatekeepers

In the coming days the federal communications regulator will issue a landmark ruling that has huge implications for Canadians’ access to the Internet. The CRTC decision will determine whether Bell and other big telecoms can continue to “throttle” Internet service. Please take a few seconds to tell the CRTC to stop Internet throttling. Your voice could be the deciding factor!

The commissioners have already twice delayed releasing their ruling, suggesting that they are struggling to make a decision. We need to make it very clear to the CRTC which side the Canadian public is on. Find out how to help at: http://saveournet.ca/content/take-action.

Tell the CRTC to stop Internet throttling now!

Until recently, Canada's Internet was an open network – a level playing field for free speech and innovation. All that is now threatened by a handful of corporations that want to control a “gatekeeper network” in which they decide what content and services get the fastest access to our homes.

These companies have been caught:

* throttling or slowing Internet traffic to businesses and consumers;

* blocking access to websites that criticized them;

* crippling consumer devices and applications.

The upcoming CRTC decision will have major and long-lasting implications for our Internet. Our online level playing field of innovation and free speech hangs in the balance.

Please Take Action and invite your fellow Canadians to do the same!

Action Tasks

• Start here: http://saveournet.ca/content/take-action
   
• Add a Save the Net badge or banner
   
• Join the Save Our Net Facebook Group
  
  
• Follow Saveournet on Twitter
  
  
• Download the Fact vs. Fiction Report
  
  
• Download the SaveOurNet.ca Flyer
  

See also:

• Does Social Media Have an Immune System? (Steve Anderson on Save our Net)
• Coalition rallies public to support Open Internet (Save our Net press release)
• Net Neutrality - What does it mean for you? (daveo on Raincity Studios)
• Vancouver Geeks Speak, Out About Media Democracy (Tris Hussey on View the Isle)

 

Another Raincity Studios project released to the public - this one is a location based feed aggregator called Placeblogger.com.

Designed to gather a deep view of their any micro-location, readers can follow all your local content in one place or track the news in places you've lived or want to visit. Travelers can reconnoiter destinations and arrange coverage to coincide with their itinerary. I.e. blogging from Seattle on Monday, reading blogs, in NYC on Wednesday, and reading and writing Prague blogs on Friday.

The geo-located aggregate feed also bakes-in geo-tagged Flickr photos, Wikipedia content, Google maps. Participants' fave blogs, posts, locations, etc. are gathered at your personal profile page. Bloggers can add their content on-the-go by attaching their location to posts creating a travel timeline of content + location.

Raincity Studios worked with Knight Foundation 2007 News Challenge grant winner Lisa Williams to create this project which is a new way to quickly get to know about a specific location in a deep manner whether the place is somewhere you live, or you are just passing through. Her objective was to create a tool where

The project used most all facets of the inter-disciplinary team including strategic planning to custom code development, database migration, full UI grapic design and themeing, and finally deployment. Placeblogger is one of the first tenants in the Bryght Canadian data centre and hosted in a Bryght Drupal-optimized VPS .

You can check out the Placeblogger portfolio narrative to learn more and consider stopping by to sign up for a Placeblogger account and tell the world where you are blogging from.

We know Drupal is great and, of course, we're not the only ones. On Halloween, Packt Publishing announced Drupal as the overall winner of their annual open source CMS award - repeating the win from 2007.

The award is judged by both a panel of industry professionals as well as votes on the website.

Here's the blurb which mentions Joomla as #2 and DoNetNuke as #3:

Packt’s annual Open Source Content Management System (CMS) Award reached its climax today with the announcement that Drupal has won the Overall category, collecting a first prize of $5,000. Three months after it was launched and a staggering 20,000 votes later, Drupal finished ahead of Joomla! and DotNetNuke to retain the Award it won in 2007.

Packt includes the obligatory brief history of Drupal which you probably know, so instead ... here's a quote from Drupal Godfather Dries giving props to the community:

 "These awards are a testament to the valuable contributions from dedicated Drupal community members around the globe" said Buytaert in response to the news. "Working together, the Drupal community is building the future of the dynamic web so that anyone can quickly build great social publishing websites" he concluded.   

Check the full results of the 2008 Open Source CMS Award and/or follow along with my edited judges' notes:

• Judges were impressed with second place Joomla’s ease of installation and ability to get a website up-and-running in a short space of time.
• DotNetNuke in third place received positive feedback from judges who were impressed with its ease of development and security implementation features.
• Most Promising Open Source CMS: SilverStripe
• Best non PHP Open Source CMS: Plone
• Best Open Source PHP: Drupal

digg_url = 'http://digg.com/software/Drupal_Best_Open_Source_CMS_WINNER';

The judges note that: the result of this year’s Award confirms this quality and also suggests that there isn’t necessarily one CMS that is the best, more that there is the best one to fit an individual user’s needs and requirements.

To offer my editorial opinion, no matter which CMS suits your need, I am enthused by the excellent choices created by vibrant developer communities, and kudos to Packt for lending a hand by offering up cash bounty to these organizations along with the accolades.

Raincity Studios is proud to be an annual participant at Gnomedex - the indescribable geek-fest/inter-disciplinary/think-tank hosted by the effervescent Ponzi and Chris Pirillo where the attendees are part of the show.

At the 2008 edition of Gnomedex, Raincity Studios' Kris Krug kicked off the on-stage performances with a multi-purpose primer of photo tips - extolling objective info and subjective tips to the audience to help them elevate their photos to a higher level - starting a stern recommendation to adjust your white balance.

The videos of all the (awesome) presentations are appearing on Chris Pirillo's web empire including: Kris Krug - Photography Tips. Keep an eye on the remarkable content rolling down this channel and drop a comment if you learned something handy in Kris' Taking Making Better Photographs presentation.

Chris | Live Tech Support | Video Help | Add to iTunes
You may also enjoy:

Alex Williams' interview with Kris Krug at Gnomedex 2006 sandwiched between interviews with Tara Hunt and Micheal Arrington.

Kris also recently attended Pop!Tech in Camden, Maine - See the Pop!Casts of the world-changers and luminaries - translated into many world languages.

More Gnomedexer commentary on KK's presentation:

Gnomedex 8.0 Day 1 - Photo Tips in 15 Minutes with Kris Krug

Photography Tips (EasyEdit) – Kris Krug Gnomedex

Kris Krug’s photography tips: Learn from these. Really, watch now.

The value of attending Gnomedex: Priceless

Fun Weekend at #Gnomedex

Dancing at Gnomedex : Day 1

What You Missed at Gnomedex

Kris Krug On Making Better Photographs

Did i miss you review? Add a link to the comments ...

Install profiles and monitored support make Drupal good for everyone - not just experts

Some technical minded Drupal users are fine and happy installing Drupal themselves. They know how to choose the modules and themes needed to make their project happen. Indeed, these savvy users have little need for support, monitoring, patching and consulting.

However, as Drupal's user base gets bigger, and larger clients like enterprises and universities sign-on to the open source revolution, the need for a technical support "safety-net" (in the form of someone keeping a technical eye to make sure everything is up to date and humming along) becomes more apparent.

At Raincity Studios, we know this need well. This demand is why we market the Bryght hosting product which includes a pre-selected and supported set of modules configured ready-to-go, out-of-the-chute.

We also know variety is a good thing. 'Tis better to allow customers to choose the service which best fits their needs than tell them "one size fits all."

With this in mind, Raincity Studios recently announced a platinum partnership with Acquia. Founded by new Ph. D and Drupal ringleader Dreis Buytaert and business-veteran Jay Batson (and a crew of Drupalatti), Acquia provide a commercially-supported distribution of Drupal as well as a subscription-based support network.

This model means that companies and organizations can confidentially use Acquia Drupal install to run their dynamic web presence and enjoy support and network services like uptime monitoring, update notifications, patches and Mollom spam blocking.

Much like the Bryght Basic install, Acquia Drupal is licensed via GPL and includes Drupal core and a suite of popular modules.  With this new offering, Raincity Studios customers will be able to choose between hosting packages for Bryght Light, Bryght VPS and Bryght Acquia.

The customers choosing the Acquia package can then sign-up for Acquia network's support network and enjoy the advanced monitoring and proactive support services that come with it.

The network doesn't end there as customers and partners are encouraged to cross-pollinate and exchange business opportunities to find the best fit for customers' needs.

And of course, the ace Raincity Studios design team will also create sites for customers built on the Acquia profile and hosted on the Hostmaster/Ægir-powerd Bryght platform.

In the meantime, we'll get out the wrenches and bolt the Acquia options into the Bryght order form and server environment until it's as tasty as Robert Douglass' layered coffee (note: don't think it's a macchiato ... is it a cordatto?) which he uses to describe a day working for Acquia.

With Acquia and Raincity Studios aligned philosophically, the future of install profiles and supported hosting looks very positive for clients with diverse needs and lofty ambitions.

Photos: 

Drupalcon Boston Acquia party by Cody Hanson

Tasty espresso by Robert Douglass

This past Saturday was  Media Democracy Day in Vancouver and around Canada.

While I was otherwise indisposed, the Vancouver event at the Public Library looked like a huge success (because of or in spite of the beautiful autumn weather), our man Scales was among the participants on stage on a panel to discuss "The Battle for New Media and Open Communication" along with Micheal Tippet of Now Public and others.

He used his experiences covering Olympic Games in Turin and Beijing as reference points to discussthe changing landscape of news gathering.

Our pal Tris Hussey was among the active audience live twittering the event to provide some excellent stream of collective consciousness reportage in: Journalism in a time of Big Media Domination & The Battle for New Media and Open Communication.

Tris captures snippets of the conversations ranging from landscape change and market woes to non-rights-holders covering the Olympics. Here's a taste:

"You won’t recognize the media landscape in three years" Michael Tippet edit • delete

Scales still "super editor" and "unofficial" China desk editor on NowPublic edit • delete

Streets of Torino, they couldn’t talk about the Olympics, IOC shut them down. Hmm. Guess you have to pay to cover, eh? Became cultural show edit • delete 

Along with thick photoset from Media Democracy Day Vancouver, Tris also contributed to the collective online media literacy by adding a another tasty flavour to the layer cake of the net neutrality discussion in: Vancouver Geeks Speak Out: Net Neutrality Part 2.

What net neutrality would ensure is that we don’t have “rich people’s internet” where because you pay a premium fee your email is delivered instantly and your traffic is uncontrolled versus a “poor person’s Internet” where a company will decide when traffic passes through its network and how.

Beyond Robson published Steve Anderson's manifesto: A Focal Point for Media Democracy in Vancouver

Miss604 gave our MDD08 preview post a thumbs-up Media Democracy Day in Vancouver 2008

Nick Naylor discusses being the enemy in Media Democracy Day (PS nice post about Elizabeth May Whistlestop Tour too - read my comments about train travel in the Vancouver Courier)

The Georgia Straight weighed-in with a short piece about Linda Solomon (an American "Canadian-in-training" who runs the Vancouver Observer)'s unpleasant  exchange with CanWest in: Journalist alleges she was told that she'll never write for CanWest.

The menace of Net Neutrality pops into the mainstream news from time to time but, unless you are an hyper-informed citizen or public policy wonk, 'tis a bit hard to grok the issues which manage to get some pundits very worked up.

Part of the comprehension conundrum is caused by the inter-disciplinary nature of the issue which mixes free/controlled market economics, Internet routing protocols, monopolies and (lack of) competition and the tension of public vs. corporate (Telco) investment in the "last mile" technology which delivers your internet.

The confusing nature, and the difficulty of framing the argument to maintain status quo (sort of anyhow), results in many stakeholders tacitly ignoring the issue and hoping the Telcos/cable companies will simply "do what's best" for the consumer.

A few months back at Vidfest 2008 in Vancouver, I attended a panel about Net Neutrality presented by Jason Roks, Steven Andersen and Kris Krug surfing along to the discourse with relevant sites to add depth to the conversation. From the questions from the audience, it is a clear that most people do not understand the issue and, as a result, the big firms (Telus, Bell, Rogers) have the public by the IPs so to speak. Afterwards, over beers, we discussed the need for a Common Craft video to explain the issue ;-).

At first glance, one could think that the Telcos/cable companies have a right to "protect" - meaning shape, mold, direct the bits traveling via "their" network - however they choose. Also, one can assume that the policies of traffic shaping only affect a small, rogue-ish segment of Internet users. I find both of these assumptions to be misleading and beneficial to the conglomerates who seek to control the public's Internet access patterns.

As a supporter of extending the benefits of free market economics and democracy to all segments of the population, and harbouring a disdain for the scant choices for the "last mile" access, I've assembled a primer of talking points, web links, campaign logos, and miscellanea as a starting point to get educated about this topic.

First off, ... to explain the crux of the concern from my vantage point:

Consumers have little or no choice when choosing access providers carrying IP traffic to the home - usually only the incumbent rights-holding phone and cable company. (Some of) these de facto monopolies are, or aim to, unilaterally decide which traffic is prioritized on their network for delivery to you.

The Telcos decisions could be based on technical issues (i.e. hyperbolic concerns over peer to peer sharing), or other insidious reasons including censoring of controversial content, and directing traffic towards paid advertisers and payola-paying business partners rather than immediate delivery of the customer's desired content.

Consumers need marketplace choice, some degree of Telco company policy transparency, and the ability to access the essential public resource of the Internet without hinderance.

Chime in with a comment if there is a great resource to add to the mix, or with your way of explaining this complicated issue in plain-ish English.

Campaigns

Citizens Save the Net - Diverse coalition calls for communication conversation
SaveOurNet.ca

"We need to protect innovation, competition, free speech, and Canadian culture, by protecting the principle of Net Neutrality and the Internet’s level playing field." 

Join the members and share your support - SaveOurNet.ca members agree to a set of principles banding them together in protecting Canada's Internet.

• Sign on as an Individual Member
• Sign on as an Organization Member

Bonus: Net Neutrality Rally photoset

The Basics on Net Neutrality

Wikipedia entry Net Neutrality

Campaign for Democratic Media talks about Net Neutrality

What is Net Neutrality? primer

Video about ... yep Net Neutrality

Industry Perspectives

No really, what is Net Neutrality

Google's perspective on Net Neutrality

and a letter about the issue

Media and Pundits

CBC's technology and consumer articles

Background on Deregulation in the USA and effect on consumers from an independent ISP's perspective , circa 2000. Leveling the Playing Field #5 by Dave Olson (me) - Free the Internet! — Open Access (.pdf)

Canada ignoring the threats? The Tyee's ... Canada Sleeps Through War to 'Save the Internet

--

Photo credit: Steven Andersen at Vidfest by uncleweed on Flickr

Raincity Studios' Ambassador Kris Krug discusses the W2 Community Media Arts centre, part of the socially-minded Woodwards project in downtown eastside Vancouver. Built on the spot of a former department store, the new building includes a mix of social housing, market housing, an university campus, and the community media arts space.

Resources

• W2 Community Media Arts
  
• Gallery Gachet
• City of Vancouver Woodward's info
• Fearless City
• Wikipedia about Woodwards Building
• Woodwards Implosion video by Nadia Aly 
• Change Creative, Jeremy Crowle
• W Building 360 photoset by DaveO
• Woodwards tag by Roland on Flickr

 

• "W sign" Photo by Kris Krug
• Others Woodwards Building photos by Dave Olson

Note: See the old Woodwards spire in the background

 

In conjunction with the BC Library Association's Information Policy Conference, Canadian Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law, Micheal Geist is speaking tonight (Thursday, Oct. 23rd) at Vancouver Public Library at 7PM.

Mr. Geist is also an EFF Pioneer award recipient, serves on the Privacy Commissioner of Canada’s Expert Advisory Board and maintains privacyinfo.ca, a leading privacy law resource.

The topic: "Why Copyright? The Fight for Canada's Digital Future".The event is free but requires registration unless you are registered for the full conference.

The (super groovy IMO) Vancouver Library is at: 350 W. Georgia St., (Stadium Skytrain) and the speech is in the Alice MacKay Room, Lower Level.

Here's a synopsis of Mr. Geist's remarks:

In June 2008, the Canadian government introduced Bill C-61, new copyright legislation that closely followed the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The public response to the bill was both immediate and angry - tens of thousands of Canadians wrote to the Minister and their local Members of Parliament, leading to town hall meetings, negative press coverage, and the growing realization that copyright was fast becoming a mainstream political and policy issue.

The "Canadian copy-fight", which includes many new advocacy groups and the Fair Copyright for Canada Facebook group that has over 90,000 members, has attracted considerable attention from the mainstream media, with many wondering how copyright had emerged as a contentious policy issue. This talk will assess both the legislative proposals and the Canadian copyfight experience in an effort to answer the oft-asked question "why copyright?”

Photo Credit: Will Pate photo of the Library so you know where you are bound

Raincity Studios' CEO Robert Scales discusses his recent trips to DrupalCon Hungary, Drupal Camp Montreal, Blog World Expo and partnerships with Acquia, plans for Ægir mass Drupal deployment system and other big ideas for clients and content publishers.

interviewed and produced by Dave Olson for Raincity Studios.
Photo by Kris Krug, (hat by DaveO).

Spreading the word

The 2008 Media Democracy Day event in Vancouver is Oct. 25th 2008 and features a batch of excellent panels and noteworthy speakers headlined by Rex Wyler, co-founder of Greenpeace.

With many critical issues affecting net users and publishers, the Media Democracy event will address copyright in flux, open access to the Internet, and the tension between mainstream and independent and grassroots media.

Raincity Studios' CEO Robert Scales is joining Leslie Shade – Associate Professor Concordia University, Jeff Davis - Vancouver Open Network Initiative Cooperative, Mike Tippet – Co-founder of NowPublic to discuss "The Battle for New Media and Open Communication" at 3:15 ~ 4:30.

Here's the blurb: We stand at a crossroads in the history of communications technology, a moment when traditional media are in disarray, and a new form of communications and organizing -- more grassroots and decentralized -- is on the rise.

The Internet is upsetting conventional wisdom about "mass media" and changing media power in ways never before imagined. But change also raises new threats. Will an open Internet succumb to the same companies that control traditional media?

The new challenge for us is to organize around and develop new sets of policies, projects, and tools that will finally give us an advantage in the decades-long struggle against the gatekeepers. Panelists will discuss the fight for an open Internet, prospects for online/social media, and future challenges.

I suspect Scales will offer anecdotes and insight from the Olympic symposium and on the ground experience covering Games in Turin and Beijing.

Plus tips and tricks learned while photographing the Dalai Lama's visit to Vancouver and rock bands and tech luminaries at SXSW in Austin, TX.

Here are the event details:

Speaking For Ourselves: Media Democracy Day 2008

October 25th, 2008, 12:00pm – 6:00pm
Vancouver Public Library, 350 West Georgia Street
FREE

With media concentrating into fewer and fewer hands, and Internet Service Providers quickly emerging as online gatekeepers, a public forum on media issues like Media Democracy Day takes on a new sense of urgency.

MDD 2008 includes a series of exciting panels, workshops and speakers, including:
*Rex Weyler - World Renowned Author and Co-founder of Green Peace
*Deborah Campbell - Award Winning Independent Journalist
*David Beers - Publisher – The Tyee
*Michael Tippett - Co-founder of Nowpublic.com
*Marika Swan - Redwire Native Youth Media
*Charlie Smith - Editor of the Georgia Straight
*Robert Hackett - professor at SFU and author of "Remaking Media"
*Andrea Hayley - president of the Epoch Times Vancouver
*Robert Scales – CEO of Raincity Studios
*Dawn Paley – The Dominion Newspaper
*Gurpreet Singh - Broadcaster on Radio India, freelance columnist for Surrey Now, freelance reporter for South Asian Post
*Matt Thompson - Campaign Strategist for FreePress, Co-Founder of SaveOurNet.ca
*Kate Milberry - Media and Technology Commentator
and many more!

Panels and Workshops include:
*Big Media Clamp Down: Taking stock and fighting back
*Free Your Computer, Free Yourself - Practical steps to get you on the
road to liberation with free and open source software
*Journalism in a time of Big Media Domination
*The Battle for New Media and Open Communication
*Community Organizing and Media
* Open Source Journalism

Full programme pasted below and more information at:
http://mediademocracyday.org/vancouver

Join the MDD Facebook Event:
http://www.facebook.com/inbox/#/event.php?eid=85334255510&ref=nf

Find info and tools to promote MDD here:
http://mediademocracyday.org/press08

Acquia Teams with Raincity Studios as a Platinum Development Partner

Drupal development and hosting leader set to deliver solutions with Acquia Drupal and Acquia Network

Two leading Drupal companies have teamed up to make the popular open source content management system a more accessible and practical choice for businesses.

In an agreement finalized at DrupalCon 2008, Acquia has announced Raincity Studios as a Platinum Partner on the newly launched Acquia Partner Program.

Dries Buytaert, project lead of Drupal and co-founder of Acquia, expresses his enthusiasm about the partnership saying:

"Raincity Studios is just the kind of company we seek for partnerships to help us transform the web - they have a history of innovation, participation and contribution to the Drupal community.  I look forward to future success together." Adding to the Menu

The Acquia partnership adds to Raincity Studios' full-service menu of web development and design services primarily using the Drupal CMS. Raincity Studios also offers hosted Drupal products under the Bryght brand featuring pre-configured Drupal deployments and performance-tuned hosting. The Acquia Drupal install will be another valuable choice for customers who require on-going maintenance and support via Acquia's support agreements.

Raincity Studios CEO Robert Scales agrees with the opportunities coming out of the relationship, saying:

"Acquia Drupal and the Acquia Network are key parts of making the Drupal CMS an ideal choice for enterprises. With Acquia's support packages, customers can concentrate on publishing great content for their audiences rather than technical upkeep. We look forward to actively working with the top-notch Acquia team in same spirit of cooperation and collaboration evidenced in the Drupal community."Products and Services

Focused on the mission of making Drupal better, Acquia's custom-assembled version of Drupal includes the core components along with a variety of popular modules.

Aquia's custom Drupal install profile (previously code-named Carbon) may be downloaded for free under a GPL (Gnu General Public License) license and then be commercially supported with an Acquia Network subscription. The support subscription includes support and network services such as up-time monitoring, update notifications, and Mollom junk comment blocking.

The Acquia Network also provides a structure so that the Acquians can work closely with partners like Raincity Studios to vet projects and refer clients to shops which best meet their needs.

Raincity Studios client list include major media outlets, record companies, and major software organizations with current projects focused on SMS and geo-location mash-ups as well as rich web community building for all manner of businesses and organizations.

About Acquia

Acquia is an open source software company providing value-added products and services for the popular Drupal social publishing system. Acquia believes open source development and social publishing technology have the power to connect people and unleash their collective creative potential. Company founders are Dries Buytaert, original Drupal creator and project lead, and Jay Batson, previously founding CEO of open source VOIP software company, Pingtel.

More info: http://acquia.com

About Raincity Studios

Raincity Studios is a full service web agency, strategically creating and hosting online communities for businesses, organizations and publishers. Raincity is a team of specialists whose competencies include: Drupal deployments, graphic design, strategic consultation, information architecture, and custom development.

Enthusiastic advocates of open source software, Raincity Studios actively participates in the Drupal development community and speak at events about open source software, international entrepreneurship, and technology growth trends. Founded in 2003 by Robert Scales, Raincity Studios has offices in Vancouver, Canada and Shanghai, China.

More info: http://raincitystudios.com/about/media-kit

Photo Credit

Thanks to Chrys for DrupalCon Hungary photos.

A feast of Drupalish delights was enjoyed in Berkeley, California at the weekend. I was lucky enough to attend - for me it had the added bonuses of getting to see the beautiful Berkeley campus for the first time, enjoying warm Californian weather when it's already quite cold in Vancouver, and spending some balmy evenings hanging out in San Francisco, a city I've been crazy about since a 3 month stint working here when I was 20.

Anyway, back to Drupalcamp itself. Day One began with breakfast courtesy of the wonderful Chapter Three peeps, which included delicious vegan donuts and great coffee. Then the event kicked off with Tao Starbow welcoming us all and handing over to Earl Miles for his keynote talk on what he has learned about user experience issues over the past few years (and with his work on Panels, and especially on Views, he has learned a LOT). I then attended a session by Adam Kalsey of WorkHabit on building APIs for your modules. One of the main points he kept drumming home to us was that if we developers don't document our modules, we ...basically... suck. It was an excellent session and since there had been so much talk about the importance of documentation for Drupal, I asked Adam afterwards if he wouldn't mind adding the main content of his presentation to the Programming Best Practices page I initiated in the handbook with senpai and aj045 a couple of months back - he said he'd be delighted to :-)

Lunchtime saw a bunch of us heading across the campus to get to Telegraph Avenue for a delicious Indian meal and some lively Drupal discussions and then I attended four sessions in a row but they were such high quality that I wouldn't have missed a single one of them. There was Tao Starbow's talk about AJAX and JSON, a subject that is of course dear to my own heart. Then Matt Cheney of Chapter Three presented a talk on Panels 2 that was full of eye-openers for me - it's a module I've been making heavy use of in a current project, not having had much experience with it prior to that, so I was intrigued by some of the tips and tricks this seasoned Panels user had to share. After that, Adam Kalsey presented on Drupal performance tuning, covering issues from module bloat to database indexes to code efficiency to the use of CDNs to opcode caching and server tuning. And more besides! Awesome stuff. And as if that wasn't enough awesomeness for one day it finished off with a talk by Earl Miles about the Views 2 UI, and being - like most Drupalers - a very big fan of Views, this was a rare treat.

By that stage it was time for evening refreshments and most of us headed to nearby Jupiter for some free beers on Sun (thanks, Sun!) and had a fine time indeed.

Sunday got off to a later start (thankfully ;-) and had fewer sessions but again those that I attended all held many points of interest for me. Neil Drumm gave a session on data imports using Jobqueue and Import Manager modules, which I am definitely going to look into in the very near future. The one and only chx presented on the Form API and amused us with anecdotes of how he has tried to get the html standard for forms changed by the w3c so that they're not so ridiculously hard to work with on the server-side. And Scott Mattoon of Sun presented on Drupal efficiency and some of the tools they provide developers with to monitor this - something else I will definitely be looking into very soon, thanks to the DVDs they provided of OpenSolaris and NetBeans.

As with most Drupal events I've attended thus far, the best part of it was getting to meet so many other drupalers - putting faces to d.o handles, as it were. In particular, it was wonderful to finally meet Dmitri Gaskin in person after we had missed out on co-presenting in Szeged together when his school commitments prevented him from attending. And also I finally got to meet Marco Carbone of Advomatic, whose Slot Machine module for advanced content scheduling I had done some work on earlier this year.

BADcamp 08 was a most excellent event - a huge thank you to all the organisers and presenters for making it such a valuable experience!

It's a baby beta named Ægir - say "eager"

Today, Drupal rockstar and the  Raincity Studios super-developer and South African Emissary, Adrian announced the release of Ægir 0.1 Beta1. Named for the Norse God of the Seas, this evolution of Hostmaster is a critical part of Bryght's hosting environment.

The hardwork of Raincity Studios and Koumbit software engineers, and other contributors, is helping take mass Drupal hosting to the next level and you can join the fun - start at the Ægir hosting system group.

Added this release:

• Drupal install profiles - can be localized to provision sites in various languages
• Improvements to the comprehensive inline documentation
• Installation wizard to modify and/or simplify the user interface

User-interface refinements, non-critical ancillary features, and a Drupal 6 version are on the immediate roadmap.

Ægir is made for mass hosting

Brielfy, here's what Ægir is and how it works:

Ægir is a new set of contributed modules for Drupal that aims to solve the problem of managing a large number of Drupal sites. It does this by providing you with a simple Drupal based hosting front end for your entire network of sites. To deploy a new site you simply have to create a new Site node. To backup or upgrade sites, you simply manage your site nodes as you would any other node.

To non-techies, this release allows organizations needing batches of similar sites  to be up-and-running, quickly and easily, for a minimal investment. The sites can be centrally-managed for patches, security updates, and new modules or themes.

The open source nature allows companies and organizations to use, extend, and then contribute back, to make the software even more "real-world" capable.

Personally, I can see this being a powerful tool for school districts, muncipalities, sports leagues, record labels, and inter/national organizations. One site to rule them all!

Required geekery

Here's what you need to play with Ægir at home:

• A Unix-based operating system - no Ægir for Windows
• Full access to your server or machine
• A web accessible Drupal directory with a hostname

Then, proceed to the overview wiki entry to assemble the components or, if you are savvy, download the complete Ægir package.
Contribute

Chime in at the Drupal hosting project to share your experiences, report bugs, fix patches, write documentation, etc. 

Bonus

It's an "Aesc": To type the character "Æ" on a Mac, use option+shift+apostrophe - cool eh.

More about Ægir: Adrian Speaks About Ægir at Drupal Con Szeged and Szeged presentation slides (.pdf)

Image: "Ægir, Rán and their nine daughters prepare a huge vat of ale" from a 19th century Swedish translation of the Poetic Edda - via Wikipedia.

Designed for Campaigns

No matter which side of the USA/Canada border you live on, it's impossible to ignore the political campaigns in full swing. Regardless of your leanings, no doubt the campaigns with polished social media strategies are enjoying advantages. Indeed, this is the first election cycle which 'Web 2.0" tactics are mandatory rather than merely optional or an after-thought.

Because Google (and the other search engines) efficiently index mostly all the pages within a site, visitors can obviously enter a site via hundreds of different on ramps. While this means the visitor may easily find the information they seek, the organization's time-sensitive objectives might not receive enough attention.

To rise above the noise, the savvy campaigner needs to transmit their message in a method in which people will receive and react to it with a clear and easy call to action.

New Drupal tool

A new module developed by Raincity Studios' Makara Wang will help the many politico sites using Drupal to harness their Google-juice and funnel their visitors to a desired actionable task.

The module is called "Roadblock" - a term which usually denotes a unwanted traffic snarl, but in this case, the roadblock is designed to focus the visitor's participation and funnel them towards a specific action.

Real-life application

The first use of the module is at political organization COPE's "Take Back the Power" site. Regardless of the site entry point, the visitor is presented with a pre-determined landing page. In this case, a page about their current campaign to prevent the sell-off of public hydro-electric resources to private interests.

Lori Winstanley, COPE's Director of Strategic Campaigns explains the reason for using Roadblock to energize their campaign,

“With a limited amount of time to influence policymakers’ decisions on this important topic, we needed to focus the attention of all the site’s visitors and encourage them to contact the Premier’s office. Of course, then they can explore other content on the site but the Roadblock module helps us get the most important message out to all visitors without a big hassle.”

More

Learn more about the Roadblock module

Meet Production Developer Makara Wang, the module's developer

See all of Raincity Studios' Drupal contribtutions