Weblog Ryan Chen-Wing

TPBCTributeClub membership cards

Trailer Park Boys Tribute Club membership cards are now on sale.

Calling 998 from campus

Though 998 is a local exchange it cannot be called directly from UW telephones. I called IST more than a year ago, but it is still a problem for me today.

Mapping news coverage

Newsmap creates a visual representation of news coverage in different counties.

I haven't explored it yet, but the playground says that it is cool.

Newsmap is an application that visually reflects the constantly changing landscape of the Google News news aggregator. A treemap visualization algorithm helps display the enormous amount of information gathered by the aggregator. Treemaps are traditionally space-constrained visualizations of information. Newsmap's objective takes that goal a step further and provides a tool to divide information into quickly recognizable bands which, when presented together, reveal underlying patterns in news reporting across cultures and within news segments in constant change around the globe.

book: The College Classroom

RJE showed me a book he got from the library. It is called The College Classroom — Conflict, Change, and Learning by Richard D. Mann (and seven otehr researchers) 0-471-56712-4.

Samstag party at Rgna n Princss

Saturday after the awards dinner I went to a party at Regina and Princess (mother and daughter). It was great because I knew loads of people there and met people who knew me.

It was a nerd party, but I was still in my navy gaberdine suits, yellow strtch shirt and UW bow-tie from the dinner and grey wl cshmr overcoat. Some kid were wearing buttons so i put on my button of me and Megan.

When I arrived some kid threw a snowball at me from the balcony. It was RyanS from Bradford. It turns out loads of the kids were from Bradford.

• RyanS, Steph
• Albert
• Michelle, Brennen,
• Paulina, Sonja
• David
• Sabrina
• Sarah E
• Aylwin
• TomV, Becky, csn Nathan
• Jonathan, Ana
• Warren (POC), Sarah
• Debbie, Nicole, Sarah (from Mac)
• ChrisSt

Afterwards we left and walked west down Princess, two guys dodged around the corner off King Street. It turns out a kid had been beaten up one block or so south.

Iwagpwh. I expected to go to a poultry auction the next morning but the trip was cancelled.

Largest traffic circle

I was told recently that the largest traffic cricle (or roundabout) in the world is around Queen's Park Savannah in Port-of-Spain Trinidad. I think this is kind of funny because I see it as a large round road and not a traffic circle.

Feds awards dinner

Tonight was the Feds awards dinner.

The winners were: Michelle Zachrison Jesse Helmer Paul Lehmann Raymong Lai (that's how it was spelled on the cert) Maria Simoes Leanne Whitely Jeff DeLoyde Jeff Henry and three other people whose names I don't know.

Clocks at the Star

In the news room at the Star they have a bunch of clocks on the wall. It's just like in any international type setting where there are clocks for different major city time zones except each clock is for a different part of the GTA. So, of course, each clock has the same time.

Fed Hall subsidy

The Fed Hall subsidy was $99,407 this year.

Armoury usage 24 Mar 2004

Wednesday 24 March 2004 17:04 — 30 people
Wednesday 24 March 2004 17:30 — 36 people

I realized today that the pins for the weight plates are magnetic to hold them in place. The staff person looked really bored.

I editor pregnant

The kids told me that the I editor is three months pregnant.

This is particularly relevant since we are around three months from her rehiring.

Arts1 and Science1 pages

Here are links to Arts1 and Science1 pages to which i referred earlier. Do you think a similar program is worth starting at UW.

Science one

Science One is an innovative first year undergraduate Science program at UBC in which the traditional disciplines of Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics and Physics are presented in a unified, integrated format. The program emphasises and cultivates critical, independent thought as the basis of scientific inquiry. Science One has at its core a single, academically rigorous interdisciplinary 25-credit course which incorporates lectures, tutorials and laboratories.

Arts one

Arts One is an innovative way of doing your first year in the Faculty of Arts. This programme offers you two groups from which to choose. Each group is led by a team of instructors from a variety of academic disciplines. They have constructed a theme and a reading list of substantial texts. Together they will lead you through the material with a combination of lectures, seminars, and tutorials. Upon successful completion of the programme, each student will receive 18 credits equivalent to first-year English, History and Philosophy. During first year, you will also take 12 other credits which may include courses you need in order to proceed into the programme of your choice in second year and beyond.

Award nominators don't get invitations

I found out yesterday that unlike in previous years people who nominate leaders for Feds Student Leadership awards will not get invitations to the dinner where the awards are given.

This would affect me because I am a nominator and not a nominee. I did receive an invitation when I enquired about it.

I don't think that appropriate priority is given to the cultivation of volunteerism and leadership in the organization. This is particularly troubling when that lack maybe the opportunity cost of hiding subsidies of Feds businesses.

update: I got this e-mail today so either things changed or the other guy had it wrong or was mischieving me.

hank you for taking the time to recognize one of your peers for this award. For taking the time and demonstrating your appreciation of the leadership that the person you nominated has shown The Federation of Students would like to invite you to attend the Federation of Students? Student Leadership Awards Banquet at Federation Hall, cocktails start at 5:30 and dinner will follow. Once again thank you for your time and helping us take a moment and recognize the leadership of our fellow students.

Campaign Waterloo launch

UW launched its largest capital campaign in the Davis Centre today.

I walked over to DC with Chris and waited a bit. I chatted with Jude who was stopping people from walking from the library exit past the projection screen and directing them to opposite direction.

Things opened up with the champion UW cheerleaders busting up some acrobatics.

Bill, Dave, Bob, and Mike were on stage. Chris and Simon also spoke.

Bill Davis of the William G. Davis Centre for Computer Research was super. His speech was hilarious and he kept going like a standup. He said Dr. Dave asked him to say a word or two, which is dangerous because he can go on and on. And he did but it was entertaining and uplifintg the whole time.

Dr.Dave introduced him and referred to a story he had heard of Davis approving the building of what would be named the Davis Centre. Dr.D said that when asked if it was okay because hte funding was supposed to go towards engineering or something that he supposedly said "computer science that sounds close enough to engineering." Strange story, I am unsure of the point of it.

He said that he introduced himself to the cheerleaders as a graduate from UW. Dr. Dave, he said, explained that Bill received an honorary degree. Bill said that he earned it as premier enduring the changes in presidents and chairs at this university. He talked about the federal budget and how accessibility is important. He asked what station the TV cameraperson was from and she replied "CKCO." I have somethings to tell you for your viewers. He spoke against the privatization of TVO. He said that Bob goes to Creemore whereas he goes to Georgian Bay, but Creemore is okay.

Bob gave the keynote speech and he was wearing a pinstriped suit similar to the one he wore in RoB magazine. He talked about the campaign. I didn't catch much of it because I was moving around.

Dr.D introduced Mike and told a story about when asked by someone in the usa why RiM was located in Waterloo Ontario Canada in particular, he supposedly said "You build the refinery next to the mine." I had read that one before.

Mike talked about how 1/3 of his R&D staff are form Waterloo. He said that when asked by a reporter why UW is successful he talked about the transfusion of talent every term.

Chris and Simon spoke.

Then they showed a WDTV video starting with shots of student faces and breaking into campus scenes interspersed with interviews. The interviews were of Bob, Dave Mike, Chris, HeatherM, SylviaN, RayLF, WilliamT and maybe one or two more. It also panned and zoomed stills and used a lot fastf dissolves. I would have had some quick reverse cuts to break those longer shots. At the end it had shots of students (including Paul) saying words and slogans "It's about people." "Innovation." "Entrepreneurship."

Things closed off with the cheerleaders returning wearing shirts with the letters AMP IGN ATERLOO and Dave, Mike and Bob donned shirts with the letters C, A, and W.

Light lunch was served. As well as the usual sandwiches there was sushi maki and bean, corn and quinoa, sandwiches.

Join the neighbourhood association

The head of the SugrBsh Neighbrhood Assoc says he represents the residents of an areas that includes the Albert-Hickory neighbourhood.

The [SNA] was formed in January 2004. It represents the residents of the area of Waterloo, Ontario bounded by University Avenue, King Street, Weber Street, Albert Street and Phillip Street.
Our mandate is to make our neighbourhood a better place to live.

http://www.geocities.com/sugarbush_assoc/aboutus.html

Get your friends that live in this neighbourhood to join the association so we can make the neighbourhood a better place to live. I will get more details. Chris told me that he and Kari are going to join.

Shorts from UW senate

I left the meeting early to get ready for the City Council meeting. Here are a few things I remember.

• Dr. Dave: "Currently 3% of UW student benefit from some kind of international experience before they graduate. I can rest easy in my grave when that number is 100%. I will breath a little easier if in 5 years that number is 20%."
• UW has the smallest graduate program in the G10. We have 1.25 grad students per faculty compared to 3.3 average in the G10.
• UW's operating grant is less now than it was ten years ago (1993), but has 40% greater enrolment.

Transdisciplinary approach

The Elements of Typographic Style is great.

Chapter 7 is called Historical Interlude, where he talks about the history of typography of the Roman alphabet.

Now I am reading Chapter 8 Shaping the Page. In it he compares aesthetic pages dimensions to the diatonic scale and to ratios in regular polygons. This is particularly interesting concept because it takes a transdisciplinary approach tying mathematics, music and, of course, typography.

By understanding a concept from different starting points all the way to application can only strengthen the usefulness of that knowledge.

That reminds me of a talk I went to in 7 by former E&CE chair KD S when he was VPA at The UBC talked about the program streams of Arts1 and Science1 where students are taught their core program with a unified approach.

Concept of distance to housing

Last week at SASAC Anthony said that he thought higher height along university should be allowed, because the proposed Columbia corridor was too far. "No one at Laurier would walk that far," is similar to what he said.

I thought this was crazy. The distance from the edge of WLU campus to Columbia Street is about the same from Ring Road to Albert Street.

Laurier students have a much different concept of distance than UW students.

Feds improve discussion

The FutureOfFeds page hasn't been changed since 12 Feb. I collected the suggestions that are there now to comment on to perhaps keep the discussion going. I didn't understand some of the suggestions and I didn't have insightful things to say about other. I just want to hear more from others.

A. Feds stucture of governance

1. Unicameral governance - Having one governing body is worth considering. People call council the highest governing body in Feds, but the board of directors has more formal power and Feds doesn't even treat council like a meeting of delegates. There is too much of a separation between executive and students and similarly there is too much of a separation between board and students. Whatever body the board is needs to more clearly representative. Direct election of directors (regardless of unicameral governance) would contribute to this.
2. Eliminate Board and make Council into the only governing body of the Feds - This is a subset of the above suggestion.
3. Kind of like the early Chretien removal of the inner cabinet? - Someone is a Liberal politico. I do not know if this is what it is like.
4. Confidential Affairs Committee to deal with things that actually need to stay secret? - This a mechanism for dealing with confidential issues. It is an appropriate suggestion. Such a committee and currently board should always record when there was an in camera meeting or communication and its general nature.

B. Technology and council communication

1. Stream Co-op Councillors - In a structure where representatives are away from campus there must be a way for them to participate in meetings.
2. Use technology | Record all meetings digitally, that way only decisions must be recorded manually, and we can actually have decent minutes for retrieval. - Having an audio recording would be good, but there should also be a text record. I think the text minutes should include more than just the decisions.

C. Council meetings

1. Weekly Council Meetings (4:30pm-6:45pm) | different locations, force Councillors to host meetings in their constituency - Weekly council meetings are a good idea. I am unsure of the value of having councillors host meetings.
2. Have decision council meetings as well as workshop meetings - decisions should all have gone through committee - workshop meetings should be for development, improvement, new initiatives and long term planning - This is a good idea.
3. Council should become the main path for constituent feedback to Feds - I am unsure of what this means. As opposed to what? Is this feedback for the organization, for an officer or business?
4. Allow councillors to chair committees. - Yes, councillors shoudl be allowed to chair committees.
5. Councillors to have weekly (bi-weekly?) office hours in their constituency, preferably at lunch time so they can walk around talking to students instead of waiting for students to approach them. Senators and Society Presidents should participate as well. One Feds Exec should show up once each month as well. - What is the best way of finding out student sconcerns. This is one way. I suggested that the exec do this three years ago to overcome the separation I mentioned above.
6. Streamline council What should council be informed anent? What should council be discussing? What should council be deciding? Sometimes debate occurs doubly at committee and at council. - Council could definitely be more efficient.
7. Striking Council wear. Incite curiousity into where you got that leather jacket with the crazy patch. - This is fine. Having common clothing can be a part of building a team.
8. Constituency-based poster boards with pics and bios of relevant student representatives. - This is okay.

D. Council representative structure

1. Have councillor seats based on different criteria - hometown, year in school, international/domestic - his is an interesting idea. It is worth considering what the reason for our current structure is.
2. Make Council smaller | rep. based on region, rather than pop. -Smaller council can raise the bar for qualifying as a councillor.

E. Succession and knowledge management

1. Plan succession - not necessarily by choosing people but by preparing people - have an executive training program - train, educate and groom councillors, commissioners, co-ordinators, soc presidents to be executives. - Currently executive come in ignorant and ill-prepared. This has a big impact on the effectiveness of the organization. This could be an outlet for interest in the future and could prepare leaders of Feds.
2. Creation of Feds Minor Leagues. Use "at large" positions and other appt's outside of Council to warm up or teach people the ropes. - This is good. It is a subset of the above idea, I think. We should do more than take a passive approach to learning.
3. Knowledge management - how can we ensure that knowledge gained by senior members is transferred to younger members - THis is a question worth answering.
4. Longer/overlapping terms to improve continuity | adopting a system like the Senate and BoG? - This is good for maintianting experience, it relies on people fulfilling a full term. Also, in terms of learning it is a passive approach.

F. Research and knowledge of students

1. Implement student surveys though Quest. | What about the Student surveys/polls through Nexus? They're never used. - Having a survey being a requirement of registration will allow Feds and UW to collect information about students so that the two organizations can better address student needs.
2. Start Feds research branch - gather and create knowledge for lobbying - collect information on students including their opinions and needs - This is great the maintenance of knowledge is improtant.

G. Miscellaneous

1. How can we promote and measure continuous improvement - Good question.
2. publish instant-messenger contacts as well as email addresses for all councillors - Sure.

Jack Layton's visit to campus

I think I got some adequate shots of Jack when he was in the SLC. When someone is giving a speech, there aren't necessarily easy oopotunities to get good photographs other than "guy standing there talking." The photo published in I is just such a photo.

Almost all photos people took of him during the day were posed. This one while posed is taken in a few seconds. Right after he finished speaking I asked him to turn around allowing me to capture him and the audience he just addressed.

This photo is unposed, but is a common situation for politicians. Such a shot is easy because there isn't much movement. This shows an interaction between the politician and some people. The women's head in the foreground is too prominent and we only see the back of her head.

The problem with these photos are that they are pretty boring and the picture quality isn;t that good. THey are generally less boring than other photos of the event.

Armoury usage 19 March 2004

Thursday 19 March 2004 12:45 — 26 people
Thursday 19 March 2004 13:04 — 28 people

Feds housing discussion list

The only message on the Feds housing discussion list is spam from December. There are three members.

From 6 January 2004 to council:

Also, a Feds housing discussion list has been created. If you are interested in joining, please follow the link below. Future housing discussions will be conducted in this arena.

http://lists.feds.ca/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/housing

Thanks, have a good day.

Chris

Membership of one organization controlled by another

FedsUW is unusual as a membership organisation because its membership is defined as a group decided by another organisation, University of Waterloo.

Becoming a UW student means becoming a member of Feds. This is certainly not a natural way to do things given the situation, but it does have consequences if does not accommodate the situation. Students have a detachment from Feds and feelings about UW are not naturally associated with Feds.

Further Feds are not required to do anything to maintain their membership. Id est, if a memberis not contacted or signed up he continues to be a member because it is dependent on UW registration.

This situation becomes another challenge because Feds do not have a register of members. This means that Feds do not know who their members are and can make errors in say creating a voters list more likely.

March SASAC leading into discussion

The SASAC meeting last night was good. I have typed my characterization of some comments from people and other info.

• The new buildings being constructed on Hickory-Hazel and Ezra-Clayfield by French are about 100 units/hectare.
• Chris said that the suggestion that developing in Albert HIckory neighbourhood will reduce single-detached stock is false because such develpment would significantly open up SD stock elsewhere.
• Assembling land is one of the biggest challenges to higher density development. How can denser development be encouraged and conversion of houses to lodging houses be discouraged.
• Mike said that the on-campus option is absurd he didn't know why it was there, it is a waste of paper.
• Dan explained that the paper was meant to cover all options and that it was in there so its lack of feasibility could be explained. He later said that housing students on-campus is the most common suggestion he receives from city residents.
• Glen said he thought it was very important that students be able to live close to campus to be albe to go home in breaks between classes and to be able to participate in the student community.
• Greg said that the recommendation was just to get people talking and he thought that none of the options would be implemented as they are described. The ultimate soution is not any one of them.

Discordia

Discordia, the film about the conflict between pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli factions at Concordia last year that erupted following a visit by Benjamin Netanyahu, played at UW Modern Languages Theatre of the Arts on Tuesday.

Without narration as only a stream of footage and interviews the camera follows three Concordia students from the Netanyahu incident in the Fall of 2002 over the school year. Aaron, Samir, and Noah are players in the story. Aaron is a vice-president of the student union whose administration is third in a row of activist pro-palestinian executives. Samir is head of a plestinian rights gruop. Noah is head of the Jewish group on campus.

The movie is simply made and without much of a video narrative which makes it flat. That the story is told by the actual players through their words and actions makes it real to viewers who are have experiences parallel to it.

In additiopn to telling the stories of these individuals, it paints a picture of how mid-east tensions exist on campuses, and it shines a light on the small politics of students.

I enjoyed it. I thought it was great.

Finished measuring Monday

I finished the measuring stage of my campus walking distance project on Monday.

I used a measuring wheel along the curved paths to measure walking distances from DP and SLiCe as central points on campus. From those points I measured out recording the distance between nodes and distances from those nodes into neighbourhoods recording distances at various path intersections.

The idea is to create a map with concentric rings with isodistance lines showing the points you can reach in a given standard distance walk.

This information combined with an estimate of walking speed provides an estimate of time it takes to walk to various housing locations.

Since time to campus is a factor in stuitability according to the discussion paper, this information can help determine how much housing is suitle according to this factor.

How many Feds members are there?

Did the number of Feds members really increase by 1,303 in a month?

Full time undergraduate students were eligible to vote in the election. The total number of eligible voters for Federation of Students Executive and Council elections, including full-time Federation of Students staff members, was 19,514. The number of eligible voters for At-large Senate was 18,181.

The total number of voters in this referendum was 767 out of 20,817 voting members, and overall voter turnout was 3.68%.

Feds GenMeetng lights

The Feds General Meeting was tonight.

The director elections just showed how ignorant the candidates were.

The Feds fee was increased.

Some bylaw changes happened.

Three of the soon to be old executive gave presentations or speeches.

Liam had a joke slide that had a diagram of Feds world domination. "Oh that's the wrong slide," he said. I liked the joke.

Interesting old letter from the Precedent

Check out this crazy letter I found from a few decades ago. It kind of makes you think, eh?

No I am just kidding. I can't believe anyone would believe such things even fifty years ago. Some of my best friends are non-students.

Letter to the Editor
The Kitchenr-Waterlo Rancour

15 March 1958

Dear Sir,

I must express my deep concern for what is happening in our fine town. Our university is about to be overrun by suburbs and all the horrible things that come along with it.

If left unchecked these incompatible sort will engulf our campus. Please don't misunderstand me. Families, the elderly and young professionals are wonderful. I am friends with some of them and I welcome them into our community. I just don't want them so close to our campus.

We enjoy our students living nearby. Since they live close by, they mostly walk or bicycle, easing traffic and congestion on our roads. They get along with each other and are community-minded making their neighbourhoods harmonius. Students are also respectful of each others' lifestyles. Understanding that some students like to sleep-in they don't make loud noises in the morning. Students have the same interests and will take part in various academic and extra-curricular activities scheduled throughout the day behooving them to dwell near by.

I support balanced development, but allowing too much single-family dwellings could push us past the tipping point. Studies have shown that exceeding 30 percent such development in an area will have negative results. Complaints will increase and gangs of those people will try to expand their kind throughout our neighbourhoods. We must be wary.

Their large, inefficient, widely-spaced housing is a strain on our land resources. Their frequent generation and disposal of garbage puts a strain on the city's sanitation services and fills up our landfill sites.

They also often bring children with them. Children are a great delight to everyone but children require schooling. And schools are necessary for schooling. New primary and middle schools will need to be built. Where will we get the money for that?

Families, the elderly and young professionals don't bring money into the community. While our co-op students travel to far-off places to earn money, these people just stay in Waterloo to work. When co-op students and out-of-town students return for academic terms they bring more than a kabillion dollars in tuition and payment for goods and services. All this money goes to pay most of the people who live in the city for various jobs associated with tuition, goods, and services.

While we, the university, and the students appreciate the service these worker provide for us, we don't think they have to live right next door to us. Perhaps they could live on the far side of beech trees to the west of campus, where they won't bother us.

I must admit I am a bit ashamed. While the University of Brantferd, University of Cambridg, and The University Kitchenr are welcoming these people to live near them, here I am complaining. I do realize that I look ungrateful and unco-operative, but it's not the same situation.

Jerry H Gerry
Precedent of The Univercity of Waterlo

Actually I wrote the letter as a joke. I just banged it out really quickly so if you have criticisms about the lack of polish, open with such acknowledgement. Any other comments are welcome too.

Strength knocked out of play-offs

We lost our first post-season match making it our last game of the term. We were playing Rest of the World. We had only enough to field against their bench four-deep. Their keeper was AJ who taught me some strucgeol.

We opened the scoring but gave up an easy goal and then inevitably got tired and let several more good and bad ones in. We left with a 4-1 loss.

We had some good talent and I think we came together pretty well over the season. Especially with a team where at most only any two or three people were friends we developed well and that is something of which I am proud.

A11 Strength Futsal match 6 and into play-offs

Last Wednesday we played 5-star for our last regular game of the season. I think they are named for the flag of China.

They were a good team. They had strong team skills and were consistent in developing the play slowly allowing them to attack when we erred.

We ended up losing 4-2. The referees Laszlo and Matt performed well provinding super officiating.

We ended up sixth out of fourteen, which means we are near the bottom of the upper draw. If we had won we would have been in third.

In about an hour we play Rest of the World in our play-off opener.

Tudor's C'L'.ca platform

Tudor is running for editor of club laur'.ca. Her eis His platform

He compares CLca with two publications including uws.

[...]UWStudent.org (which is the "archetypal" student-run online publication).

StudAccommStud DiscPaper online now

Discussion Paper

Here is a link to the discussion paper. I will say more about it in the future.

Water-bottle cap-height

Have you noticed that plastic water-bottle tops are shorter now than in the past. I assume it is to save material costs.

Now that I think about it did plastic pop bottles used to have metal tops with a plastic cap lining? Probably most people reading this have experienced less history than me, but let me know if you remember this.

I also remember being in the North-by-Northwest, reading the label on a Coc-Col can and wondering where the heck Don Mills was.

Measuring walking distances

I am measuring the walking distances between many points around campus and into neighbourhoods. It takes a long time in a similar way that walking to and from school many times would.

Planning TPB Tribute Club AGM

Superintendent Dave says:

Wednesday March 17th at 7:00pm the Club needs to meet to discuss our upcoming Annual General Meeting in May. The meeting will be held at one of our secret meeting places.

[...]

Venues: We can rent a hall and get a liqour license or hold it at a bar. Their are pros and cons to both.

Keynote Speaker: We need to contact the show to try and get one of the actors to come and make a key note speach.

Trailer Park Boys Tribute Club

Where the truth is not valued

Where the truth is not valued, liars may prosper.

Student housing coverage in The Record

Here are some of the stories in the newspaper in the last month about student housing in Waterloo.

Some funny things are said in them. In Pander's 3 March article he quotes two residents, one from Cardill and another from Albert St. talking about a student neighbourhood. Neither of them live in Edey's proposed area.

StudAccommStud — DiscPaper; 01 Intro

Today I received my copy of the Studnt Accommodatn Stdy — Discussn Papr.

It consists of 38 letter size sheets glue bound with beige card stock covers and a black spine. It is dated 3 March 2004.

There is a 6-page executive summary; a 57-page body in six sections; and Appendices A to E.

The six sections of the body are:

1. Introduction
2. Context
3. Research Summary
4. Options
1. Status quo
2. Dispersion
3. Uptown/Downtown
4. On campus
5. Student precinct
6. Neighbourhood preservation
5. Implementation
6. Next Steps

The paper contains interesting and valuable information, but it does have some flaws including poor assumptions, language errors,

In the near future I plan to list the interesting points and then some of the specific flaws. Let me know if you have any questions.

Which way the stripe when you swipe

I think that most magnetic card readers I have encountered have the swiping slot positioned vertically on the right of the device. Most have the stripe facing outwards to the right, but the ones at the PAC have the stripe facing in.

I can see a reason for the outward stripe readers. It matches right-handed use. If you are holding your card with the front facing you and with your thumb on the front and fingers behind, then it is natural for you to position the stripe to the right as you pull the card towards you.

Coincidental mentions of social entrepreneurship

Funny coincidence.

3 Mar 2003 Ideas need implementation uwRyan.com: "We need to emphasize social entrepreneurship in addition to business entrepreneurship[...]"

5 Mar 2003 'Enterprise' program now open to all DB: "[...]gives advice on how to become an Intrapreneur or even a Social Entrepreneur."

It is funny because my statment was published in Imprint on the same day as the story about Enterprise Services was in the DB. I do think there needs to be more emphasis on social entrepreneurship and support for UW-related endeavours.

When I use social entepreneurship I would include educational endeavours and most if not all not-for-profit enterprises. Do others take the term so generally?

Book on title pages

I borrowed a book on typography from my sibling. The book paints a colourful picture with mostly just black and white.

THE ELEMENTS OF TYPOGRAPHIC STYLE Robert Bringhurst

4.1.1 Make the title page a symbol of the dignity and presence of the text.

If the text has immense reserve and dignity, the title page should have these properties as well - and if the text is devoid of dignity, the title page should in honesty be the same.
Think of the blank page as an alpine meadow, or as the purity of undifferentiated being. The typographer enters this space and must change it. The reader will enter it later, to see what the typographer has done. The underlying truth of the blank page must be infringed, but it must never altogether disappear - and whatever displaces it might well aim to be as lively and peaceful as it is. It is not enough, when building a title page, merely to unload some big, prefabricated letters into the center of the space, nor to dig a few holes in the silence with typographic heavy machinery and then move on. Big type, even huge type, can be beautifuland useful. But poise is usually far more important than size - and poise consists primarily of emptiness. Typographically, poise is made of white space. Many fine title pages consist of a modest line or two near the top, and a line or two near the bottom, with little or nothing more than taut, balance white space in between.

The book is 350 pages of which the last third or so contain the appendices and index. It is 23 cm by 13.5 cm and 2.2 cm thick.

I have read only the first 70 pages and I have learned some things interesting and useful while also admiring the typography of the book itself.

mN — Fedoply

mathNEWS is funny. Fedopoly — New board game based on your favourite student union!

Other cards reflect the role of campus media in the election

Community Chest
RYAN CHEN-WING INTERVIEWS YOU FOR UWSTUDENT.ORG
ADVANCE TO GO

The card mentioned above depicts a bigshot monopoly looking guy with a super long whitebeard and a cane. Out of his mouth is a voice buble with a "UW$."

There are other funny ones.

Retain Edey as housing lobbyist

In order to ensure that the best solution for student housing is incorporated into city policy, Feds should retain Edey as a lobbyist for housing.

Decisions of a similar scale dealing with student housing have not been made in years, but will be in June. Edey has worked on these issues for more than a year and a half and we need him for two months more.

Think tank inspired

Our idea generation session is making waves in Hawkland.

My experience with the UW think tank has been quite incredible, and now I'm more determined than ever to start something like this at Laurier as well. At tonight's Board meeting I presented my views on the UW experiment and on the ways a think tank can be implemented here.
— Thinking About It Tudor

I am excited about the session we had. Even moreso I am excited that I influenced the possibility that our activity might ignite something similar at Laurier.

A11 Strength — third place with one match to go

In the CR futsal league we are in third place, three points out of first place and one point ahead of fifth place with one match to go. For our last matches the two teams ahead of us play each other and we play the fifth place team. We could end the season in second or in ninth or points in between.

Laurel creek exceeded its banks

Yesterday around noon after a heavy rain I discovered that laurel creek had flooded the surrounding flood plain. The bridge between the softball diamonds and Seagram did not span all of the troubled waters.

http://uwryan.com/img/2004/2004-03mar-05-8424-flood.jpg

Later in the afternoon I saw some kids who had tried to raft downstream from health services on a raft made of large plastic containers. Only one of them had made it on the raft and it tipped over. The "raft" was then stuck in some trees as the water rushed by.

Edey delivers great speech on housing

Chris Edey delivered an amazing speech on student housing to municipal and university officials, and other attendants at the Town and Gown Symposium Friday.

He spoke third in a panel of three talking about housing issues. In his speech he advocated for greater density of housing near the unviersities pointing out that the area is made up of mostly students, from the 80% non-owner occupied from the housing survey.

• University and city debate housing uwRyan.com 25 Feb 2004
• Edey: Student precincts are the best solution [The Record] 4 Mar 2004

Armoury usage 4 March '04

Thursday 4 March 2004 22:45 — 39 people
Thursday 4 March 2004 23:20 — 18 people

JR Coutts international awards deadline 31 March

Tell UW student you know who are going on exchanges or international experiences they can apply for a JR Coutts award.

J.R. Coutts Award Series

The three different awards are $1,500, $2,000, and $2,500.

The Assoc-VP-Ac has had me contacted to talk about these awards and other internationalization endeavours at UW.

Liam's idea on Feds effectiveness — EngSoc

Yesterday Liam told me that he thought a good solution to Feds effectiveness would be to word more closely with the Engineering Society (societies actually).

I paraphrase him suggesting that by Feds co-operating and integrating some activities and endeavours with EngSoc, those activities will be more successful.

This is interesting let's remember (History lesson RC-W uws comment 10 Oct 2002) that the student societies formed Students' Council which then became Feds.

Committee reviewing UW CECS

Co-operative Education and Career Services will be reviewed this year.

Franklin and M-chug both suggest that the review required in the memorandum of agreement did not happen (CECS review required by Memo 8 Feb 2004) (CECS review and building hours 12 Feb 2004). CECS has suggested that the student survey was most of the review (Student survey playing a strong role in co-op review 29 Jan 2002).

A change from a draft of the memo on the review to the final one is this:

"The department has never conducted a comprehensive review."

Neither the university-wide program of co-operative education nor the department has ever been comprehensively reviewed."

No, actually, it's not that interesting.

Tudor and ideagen

Tudor wrote about the then-upcoming idea generation session"

Today I received an invite from Ryan to participate in some sort of think-tank at University of Waterloo. Apparently, at UW people gather to discuss and generate ideas, something that rarely happens at Laurier. I'm eager to find out how the UW think-tank functions, since I'd like to set something similiar in motion at Laurier.

We had the session last night and it worked out reasonably well.

Brandon comments on me

Brandon commented on me during the election (29 Jan 2004) on his 'peat blog.'

"Highlights of the forum:
[...]
Ryan Chen-Wing asking 95% of the questions"

I asked all but two of about twelve questions. It was closer to 85%

PIPEDA and not-for-profit

PIPEDA can apply to not-for-profit organizations depending on the activity involved, according to Bar-ex. Bar-ex is a legal resource website, which is a joint venture of a number of organizations including the Law Society of UC.

Applicability of PIPEDA to charitable and non-profit organizations

The most important factor in determining whether or not an organization is subject to PIPEDA is the presence of "commercial activity" as defined in s. 2 of the Act. Most non-profit organizations are not subject to PIPEDA because they do not engage in commercial activities. For example, the following are not considered commercial activities:

• collecting membership fees
• organizing club activities
• compiling a list of members' names and addresses
• mailing out newsletters
• fundraising.

On the other hand, selling, bartering or leasing a membership list or a list of donors is considered a commercial activity. In this case:

• consent is required for the disclosure of this information
• assuming the information would not be considered sensitive, an organization could use a clear and simple opt-out process as a means of obtaining consent.

The Application of the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act to Charitable and Non-Profit Organizations

The presence of commercial activity is the most important consideration in determining whether or not an organization is subject to the Act. Section 2 of the Act defines "commercial activity" as:

"...any particular transaction, act or conduct or any regular course of conduct that is of a commercial character, including the selling, bartering or leasing of donor, membership or other fundraising lists. "

This might become relevant to UW student organizatins as they are likely approached by many companies wanting to market to students.

Story on U's and FOI unjustified

Marshall of The Western Gazette reports on the possibility of universities being included in the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act of Ontario. Jesse reported it secondarily on uws.

The Gazette headline is weird because it makes a statement and tacks on a question mark (?). Nothing in the content of the story suggests that the act will change to include universities "[...]there is a bill to amend the Act, though it is too early to tell if universities would be included."

Universities in Quebec and in BC are under the respective freedom-of-information statutes of those provinces. In Ontario colleges are under the FIPPA, but not universities.

Universities to fall under new Info Act?
Universities may fall under Freedom of Information Act