Comments on: Community Platforms & Community Harmonization

By: Yule Heibel

Yule Heibel — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 18:06:49 +0000

I agree with what Dave says about regions — there has to be an element of customization, and a “regional strategy” can never be a template you can determine by measuring kilometers or miles. My personal feeling is that such an approach (regional angle) *could* make sense for Victoria insofar as we’re embedded in a tourism economy, for which Vancouver and Seattle are feeders. (I mean they feed travelers to us.) (And vice versa — some of us, lucky bastards, do get off “The Rock” occasionally…!) And since we’re on an island (yet also the province’s capital city), transportation options become vital to whatever regional thinking goes on. Those options include ferries to the BC Mainland as well as to the Olympic Peninsula and to downtown Seattle; plus of course airplane travel, including not just the regional airport here, but also the many flights that go into and out of the Inner Harbour in downtown Victoria. The floatplane Inner Harbour airport even has its own airport code. People in the arts and in technology in turn form the other 2 legs of this tripod (with tourism/travel) to sustain a regional approach.

Well, that’s my big dream anyway. Alternately, of course, there’s always entropy, where you just kind of settle into a lump and let it all wash over you! But that’s not “sustainable” for an urban economy over the long term.

By: David Crow

David Crow — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 19:30:24 +0000

Regions are hard. But the talent piece is key, I’ve been thinking a lot about the Fairchildren model. What is the thing that attracts companies, people, and money to an area be it city or region?

I often argue with Peter Childs about a Toronto/Ottawa collaboration, i.e., I don’t find that much value in the co-efforts. But there are a lot of shared resources for us between Waterloo and Toronto (45 minute drive).

I need to come back out to Vancouver and over to Victoria in the near future. I’d love to hear more about the efforts.

By: Yule Heibel

Yule Heibel — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 21:28:35 +0000

I’m scribbling away at my “concept overview” right now!

By: Mark Lise

Mark Lise — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 17:58:58 +0000

@Boris @Yule – excellent!

By: Boris Mann

Boris Mann — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 17:53:43 +0000

Kelowna, which has several networking/ISP startups and of course the big Club penguin success under its belt.

San Fran is a little far, but yeah, we do quite easily get back and forth. Flights to San Fran are cheaper than ones to Toronto or Ottawa…

@Yule — I’ve got ideas around this as well — and some tech! — so lets talk tomorrow night at DemoCampVictoria.

By: Mark

Mark — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 17:31:52 +0000

Seattle would be an appropriate add I agree. So we can hope for Vancouver, Victoria, Seattle, and San Francisco looking to be the main pipes for the Western region. San Francisco is obviously not “local” but with direct flights coming soon, YYJ-SFO, this will make it local with only a 3hr house-to-office timeframe.

Tea behind the tweed curtain? Now you’re talking! I promise not to dump it into the Pacific (as opposed to the Atlantic).

By: Yule Heibel

Yule Heibel — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 17:16:45 +0000

I’d go so far as to add Seattle to the “regional” mix, which is also just a jump across the puddle — and with technology, those crossings don’t have to happen that often.

Consider Salem, Massachusetts. In the late 18th and early 19th century, Salem became rich and pre-eminent because of the China tea trade. Using fast Clippers, Salem put itself into the middle of that trading hub. Ever since moving back to Victoria (from Greater Boston, of which Salem is a part), I’ve thought, “huh, the new ‘TEA’ is information, and our ‘Clippers’ today are fibre optic cables.”

In addition (to technology), you need talent, and that means drawing on people *regionally* and breaking down the silos wherever possible. That’s the “flat” (‘the world is flat’ = Tom Friedman) part, but get enough synergy going, get the talent, the technology, the tolerance (making it a good place for immigrants and different-thinking folks), and have the territorial asset (“nice place”), and you can perhaps manage to marry “flat” with “spiky” (Richard Florida). That happens in big cities (T.O., for example), but it happens *regionally* too, which is why I think it behooves Victoria to reach its feelers (however they’re constructed) to Vancouver and Seattle.

And thanks for the pointer to David Crow’s post, Mark. I keep getting derailed, but I am writing up a sort of “plan” for a local news / community aggregator idea, and I want to run that by you when it’s done. Over a cup of TEA perhaps!