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05 Aug 08

reportonbusiness.com: 'Social networking for social change'

marketing / business strategies for website, recurring revenue stream tips

www.theglobeandmail.com/...home - Preview

globeandmail socialnetworks socialjustice business local_news revenue

29 Jan 08

It's time to overhaul copyright law | Technology | guardian.co.uk

Excellent points by Cory Doctorow on how "folk" copyright usage get eroded (sodded, more like) by corporate copyright law, and why that doesn't make sense: it's "a genuinely radical idea: [that] individuals should hire lawyers to negotiate their personal use of cultural material, or at least refrain from sharing their cultural activities with others (except it's not's really culture if you're not sharing it, is it?). It's also a dumb idea. People aren't going to hire lawyers to bless the singalong or Timmy's comic book. They're also not going to stop doing culture."

www.guardian.co.uk/...copyright.law - Preview

copyfight copyright cory_doctorow law socialjustice

In theory, there's just one set of copyright rules and they apply to everyone, from Sony Pictures to your neighbour's eight-year-old who wants to photocopy his Spider-Man comics and sell them to the other kids.
- - key phrase: "in theory" (how true) - on 2008-01-29
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Now you have billionaire media empires behaving as though parents should get a licence for a Prince song before they upload a YouTube video of their adorable toddler dancing to it.
They are also acting as though fan fiction writers should be applying for a licence too - along with karaoke singers, would-be painters and, yes, the OAP picnickers who've uploaded the shakycam video of last weekend's knees-up in the church basement.
This is a genuinely radical idea: individuals should hire lawyers to negotiate their personal use of cultural material, or at least refrain from sharing their cultural activities with others (except it's not's really culture if you're not sharing it, is it?).
It's also a dumb idea. People aren't going to hire lawyers to bless the singalong or Timmy's comic book. They're also not going to stop doing culture.
2 more annotations...
- We need to stop shoe-horning cultural use into the little carve-outs in copyright, such as fair dealing and fair use. Instead we need to establish a new copyright regime that reflects the age-old normative consensus about what's fair and what isn't at the small-scale, hand-to-hand end of copying, display, performance and adaptation.
  - - right on! - on 2008-01-29
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- A diverse and extremely sensible group of people are doing just this: the Access to Knowledge (A2K) treaty is a proposal from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) to set out the rights and responsibilities of archivists, educators and people who provide access to disabled users of information.
  - See:
    http://www.access2knowledge.org/cs/node
    and:
    http://www.wipo.int/portal/index.html.en - on 2008-01-29
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21 Jan 08

How to make housing affordable (The Toronto Star)

"By relying on donations from suppliers, a Brampton developer has managed to build high-quality abodes for low-income families.
(...)
When the 16-storey "Chapelview" project, on John St. in downtown Brampton, is finished next year, it will provide 200 apartments for seniors and low-income singles as well as people with disabilities, and if all goes according to plan, it will earn LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification.

If he's successful, D'Angelo believes the Chapelview project, which includes a six-storey garage for municipal and tenant parking, will be the first high-rise social-housing project in North America to receive the LEED platinum rating, the highest benchmark for green building and design."

And then you wonder why this can't be done in more cities across Canada...?

www.thestar.com/...295631 - Preview

affordability canada cities development socialjustice toronto

When the 16-storey "Chapelview" project, on John St. in downtown Brampton, is finished next year, it will provide 200 apartments for seniors and low-income singles as well as people with disabilities, and if all goes according to plan, it will earn LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification.
If he's successful, D'Angelo believes the Chapelview project, which includes a six-storey garage for municipal and tenant parking, will be the first high-rise social-housing project in North America to receive the LEED platinum rating, the highest benchmark for green building and design.
"He's really shooting for the moon here," says Stephen Kemp of Enermodal Engineering, a sustainable-building consulting firm. "For affordable housing, it's amazing."
Just as he has done on previous housing projects, Woodbridge resident D'Angelo, 53, will ensure the cupboards are stocked with donated food when the tenants move in, and each will be given a quart of paint and a brush for future touch-ups.
D'Angelo's overall mission is to create non-profit housing of quality and comfort, with better-than-basic finishings and appliances. To achieve that end, he persuades corporate sponsors and construction trades to donate upgrades or cash. So far D'Angelo's been promised $800,000 in upgrades and donations for Chapelview and is shooting for his goal of $3.2 million.
- - amazing! Simple, but brilliant and amazing. - on 2008-01-21
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Future tenants will also have better air quality, since each apartment will be fitted with its own ventilation system, and doorways will be weatherstripped so smoke and other odours don't penetrate the hallways. Carpeting and wood flooring that out-gas minimally will be used throughout, and the appliances will be energy-efficient, as will the plumbing.
7 more annotations...
- Meanwhile, the building's design and materials were chosen with sustainability in mind. The steel used in construction is recycled, and the concrete and drywall have recycled content. The accessible green roof and landscaping will be drought resistant, says Kemp, so they won't need to be fertilized and irrigated.
  D'Angelo is also aiming for universal accessibility in the design, which will allow people with disabilities to live in any apartment.
- Chapelview is expected to cost about $37 million, with $11 million from the feds and the province, $8.5 from the city of Brampton and about $18 million from Peel Region.
  - - interesting -- how does one leverage that kind of funding ...here, in CANADA, land of perpetual senior-level-of-government meanness? - on 2008-01-21
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- Peel Living, the region's non-profit housing company, estimates total building costs will be $2 million less than expected market costs for a comparable structure – because of D'Angelo's fundraising efforts and the efficiencies that come from his past experience.
  This isn't the first time that D'Angelo, a partner in Martinway Contracting Ltd., has broken new ground in affordable housing. He won an award from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. in 2004 for Millbrook Place, a 163-unit building in Mississauga that houses seniors in one- and two-bedroom apartments in one section of the building and singles, including the formerly homeless and people with mental illness, in furnished bachelors in another section.
- "That kicked off our getting back into the social-housing game," says Keith Ward, general manager of Peel Living and commissioner of human services. "We kept waiting for the government to announce more funding. It didn't happen. Now we hope there are more builders motivated by that sense of altruism."
- "Most contractors would use mid-range paint, but he wanted to use top-of-the-line," says Doug Funston of Benjamin Moore. "That's his strategy – he delivers a platinum-level product for a bronze level price."
  - - brilliant - on 2008-01-21
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- The value to the corporate donors is a higher public profile, better public relations, new connections in the community, and letters and plaques of appreciation for being good corporate citizens. "It's wonderful to get those accolades," says Funston.
- "Years ago you heard 'social housing, why put money in when people are just going to destroy it?' – I've heard that from contractors on various sites," says Brett Barnes, a corporate representative for CMHC. "John has been able to turn that around. The more they contribute to bricks and mortar, the more they also contribute to improving the lives of lower-income households."

01 Jan 08

CEOS for Cities - Conversations - CEO Blog - Travel Wishes for 2008

"Ban further luxury hotel development until they can find enough capable people to staff them." That's a suggestion from Monocle's Travel Wishes for 2008/09 (via CEOs for Cities) -- and it's great. Here's CEOs for Cities further comment: "How can you have 'luxury' hotels without workers who can deliver a 'luxury' experience? If people are willing to pay more for luxury experiences, shouldn't some of the benefits accrue to workers equipped to deliver those experiences?" A carpenter once told me, "if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys," and monkeys aren't going to be able to build you a quality product. If you call yourself a "luxury" outfit, make sure you're not trying to get by on peanut payrolls.

www.ceosforcities.org/...travel_wishes_for_2008.php - Preview

ceos_for_cities income_disparity monocle_magazine socialjustice

Three items from Monocle's 25 Travel Wishes for 2008/9 caught my eye.

The first was this: "Suspension of the silly no-liquids rule."

The second was "Suspension of the sillier take-your-shoes-off x-ray procedures."

To both I say, Amen.

The third, though, is less obvious. "Ban further luxury hotel development until they can find enough capable people to staff them."

As our economy becomes more bifurcated, there is a sense that the fates of those at the top and bottom of the wage scale are increasingly disconnected. But their connection makes itself felt in the most unexpected ways. And this is one of them.
How can you have "luxury" hotels without workers who can deliver a "luxury" experience? If people are willing to pay more for luxury experiences, shouldn't some of the benefits accrue to workers equipped to deliver those experiences? If people are willing to pay for luxurious gardens, shouldn't the workers who plant them benefit more than those capable of planting only "ordinary" gardens? Isn't the same true of luxury homes, boats, clothes and cars?

Without judging whether any of this is "fair," it seems that workers who can delivery luxury goods, services and experiences ought to be able to link their incomes to those who can afford those luxury items. And if that's the case, then it makes sense for some of us to aspire (financially) to serve those needs.

06 Aug 06

Behind Bars, He Turns M&M’s Into an Art Form - New York Times

www.nytimes.com/...21artist.html - Preview

art donny_johnson human_rights socialjustice

- acc. to a CP article by Kim Curtis ("convicted killer disciplined...," Aug.4/06, CanWest), his lawyer notes:
"The inmate donated the artwork to Kurtz, who sold it and gave the proceeds to his charity.

"There's a very large question mark over the legality and morality of what the department has done to punish an inmate for trying to better himself and better his community," Carbone said.UNQUOTE

- exposes the hypocritical sadism of the prison system: so much for "rehabilitation"... - lampertina on 2006-08-06