September 2008 Archives
In the world of tagging (attaching metadata to stuff on the web), very unlikely associations can happen due to exhaustion of particular acronyms.
Yesterday, I took the following picture, and posted it on Flickr:
I initially did not tag it with anything, but had in the title the word "Conservative", describing our riding candidates' poster being sandwiched between two signs of "Canada get out of Afghanistan". Later this morning, I get invited to the Conservative Party of Canada (International) (sic) group.
And then, I see Asian girls in various poses (SFW). I go around looking at the pictures, and end up realizing that they belong to... the Cebu Photography Club!
So, is someone in Cebu, a well-known resort island in the Philippines that caters to all East Asia, following the Canadian elections? Well, according to Flickr pictures of the Conservative Party of Canada (International) group owner, he is a probably of Filipino origin, living in or with ties in the Vancouver area (mentions Seattle, but is also getting stuff at Costco that is bilingual English/French)...
On the same run, I also found out that Stephen Harper, not just as Prime Minister, but as the Conservative candidate, may have a Flickr account. Someone accepting those Flickr automated (?) group requests is maybe not doing his job well (or maybe doing it too well).
I made a gadget for looking up geocodes, that can be used with Google Maps, Google Earth. (link)
I've been following the elections - yes, the federal elections in Canada. Wrt cuts in culture, the whole media/culture is raising their arms up in the air. But I can't believe that the Conservatives are doing it w/o paying attention to public opinion. So, will they really get away with it? I have the impression that they might. Just like how they managed to demonize the Liberals' Green Shift. Tough and populist - that's how at least you win a part of the electorate!
This is an interesting involvement of well-known Quebec artists in viral marketing (of themselves, ultimately). Less than three days after it was released, the original video gathered 235,000 views (the entire Quebec population is about 7.5 million), and whose channel is now #3 most subscribed to this week! But it pokes fun at anglos, in a way that would be scandalous if anglos portrayed francophones in a similar way.
