Podcasting is like recorded history

I’ve been thinking about this lately, but what is the point of having a podcast when you don’t keep your episodes archived and available over the long term?

Podcasting, in its true form, is prerecorded media that is ready for download and playback, video or audio, at any given time. Unlike traditional, broadcast media, your audience doesn’t have to be there when it’s available or remember to set their recording apparatus, because the use of VCR’s is dwindling as we speak, just so they can be in the know.

When you podcast something, you publish it for the world. It’s shiny and new, ready for the devouring crowds to eat it up. Then it gets old when you publish the next one, but a month or so down the line, someone discovers it. They share it with a buddy, post a link to it on their blog or Facebook profile, or subscribe to your podcast just because they found something in your archives from a year ago. This person even goes through everything you have ever produced just to get caught up.

I’ve been doing this myself over the past month or so. I’m an admitted listener of the Daily Source Code, but I’m not a daily listener. It piles up on me, and I’ll go back to hear the conversations just because I find personal enjoyment from the conversations on that podcast.

I even do this to everything DaveO produces, get caught up on CNet News Podcasts because even though it’s from three weeks ago, I still like to hear the tech news that I might have missed while riding the bus. Remember when Microsoft wanted to buy Yahoo? It was fun to listen back on how that one played out, and that’s just a sample of short term history.

Even though the Vancouver Giants missed their chance at a repeat for the Memorial Cup this year, you might find enjoyment to hear the audio adventure that DaveO took when they had a public celebration for the team at Vancouver City Hall. A very good piece of historical evidence for you right there.

If anything, it’s something that you made and long term proof for anyone to stumble upon. The longer it’s there, the better chance it gets to soak in the Google juice and be discovered. However, if you are going to take the media away, do your best to remove all traces. Nothing more disgruntling than clicking on a link to an MP3 and it being not found.

Time for Thanksgiving, part one

I’ve known for a long time in my life that there were two things that were celebrated in Canada that we simply didn’t where I grew up back in the states. One of those is Boxing Day, but even that isn’t completely the truth. We had a family friend who was originally from England, and the holiday celebrations we took part in at her home taught me a lot about British traditions as a young kid. Those traditions are commonly found here, so I’m a little up to speed on what’s going on there.

Now, I guess the next holiday I’m talking about isn’t so much the fact that it isn’t celebrated back in the U.S. It’s just done at a different time, maybe even a little differently, depending on culture and tradition. Of course, I’m talking about Thanksgiving[wiki]. Canadian Thanksgiving[wiki], to be exact.

I’m well versed in the history of American Thanksgiving[wiki]. I’ve drawn my fair share of turkeys and Pilgrim hats, watched football games after being stuffed with food, and devoured enough pumpkin pies in my life.

Canadian Thanksgiving, on the other hand, is something that I only know of in its existence. One of those days on the calendar that said, “Thanksgiving (Canada)”.  So, why not dive into what Wikipedia has to say about it together, shall we?

The first and original Thanksgiving comes from Canada. In Canada, Thanksgiving is celebrated on the second Monday in October. Unlike the American tradition of remembering Pilgrims and settling in the New World, Canadians give thanks for a successful harvest.

The history of Thanksgiving in Canada goes back to an English explorer, Martin Frobisher, who had been trying to find a northern passage to the Orient. He did not succeed but he did establish a settlement in Canada. In the year 1578, he held a formal ceremony, in what is now the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, to give thanks for surviving the long journey. This is considered the first Canadian Thanksgiving, and the first Thanksgiving to have taken place in North America. Other settlers arrived and continued these ceremonies. He was later knighted and had an inlet of the Atlantic Ocean in northern Canada named after him – Frobisher Bay.

At the same time, French settlers, having crossed the ocean and arrived in Canada with explorer Samuel de Champlain, also held huge feasts of thanks. They even formed ‘The Order of Good Cheer’ and gladly shared their food with their Native-Canadian neighbours.

After the Seven Year’s War ended in 1763 handing over Canada to the British, the citizens of Halifax held a special day of Thanksgiving.

During the American Revolution, American refugees who remained loyal (United Empire Loyalists) to Great Britain were exiled from the United States and came to Canada. They brought the customs and practices of the American Thanksgiving to Canada.

Eventually in 1879, the Canadian Parliament declared November 6th a day of Thanksgiving and a national holiday in Canada. Over the years many dates were used for Thanksgiving, the most popular was the 3rd Monday in October. After World War I, both Armistice Day and Thanksgiving were celebrated on the Monday of the week in which November 11th occurred. Ten years later, in 1931, the two days became separate holidays and Armistice Day was renamed Remembrance Day.

Finally, on January 31st, 1957, the Canadian Parliament proclaimed…

“A Day of General Thanksgiving to Almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed … to be observed on the 2nd Monday in October.” [wikipedia]

Learn something new everyday, eh? At least I feel better knowing more about the feast we are about to have on Monday.  We will be celebrating American Thanksgiving in our little home when the day comes. However, we’re going to do it our way. I’m going to try my hand at making a nice lamb roast for Rebecca. However, if I am gainfully employed at that point, then we’re heading somewhere super swanky, nice, and making someone cook that lamb for us.

Bring back the stick in rink

Vancouver Canucks - Original logoI’m not sure where I picked this up exactly, but it’s a really great read. There are so many, non-Canucks fans who look at the original logo for Vancouver and can’t figure it out. Just recently, in fact, Rebecca and I had a Flames fan ask us this question. Even I knew that it’s a “C” for “Canucks”, made from a hockey rink with a hockey stick set inside it, just like you see here(click on it for a larger image).

The story of it is really interesting though.

“For one thing,” Joe explains, “I was a hockey fan. But also I was on my own as a graphic artist and I figured if I ever got this thing [the logo], it would really be something because Vancouver is such a crazy town for hockey.

“I spent about a week doing it,” he recalls. “I took it to Greg Douglas who was then the Canuck’s public relations man. He said that Mr. [Tom] Scallen and Mr. [Lyman] Walters, who were the heads of Medicor, were coming to Vancouver and he’d make arrangements to have me meet them.

“So it was the next day or so that I went to the Hotel Vancouver to see them. They owned an agency in San Francisco that did advertising for their ice shows, and they also had submissions from other people around the States.

“They had a whole pile of designs scattered around the floor, but I really had no time to look at them closely.

“So I submitted mine and left it there after explaining about the blue and green for the water, mountains and trees. There was no price talked about.

“About two weeks later, Greg called me up and said, ‘Joe, they want to go with your design. [sportslogos]

I also love the part where Brian Burke coughed up the cash to use the logo for Orca Bay to use the logo on Vancouver’s third jersey. You wouldn’t think that an organization would be so nice to the creator of a logo like that, but this just goes to show the class that Burke had as a GM. At the same time, there is no arguing that Joe Borovich was the guy who created the logo.

If Orca Bay made the move to make the “stick in rink” logo, including the original colors, the main jersey for the Canucks, then I am all for it. It’s the only logo on any merchandise that I would buy, and Rebecca would probably tell you the same thing.

Update: Not so much to this post, but the Canucks played in Columbus tonight. Great game, taking it into overtime. 3-2 over the Blue Jackets.

Doing my part in documenting local history

Jason Vanderhill[flickr] is a guy I met at the Vandigicam event that Rebecca and I attened a few weeks ago to do a podcast[rz#110] during. A short time ago, Jason contacted me to aid him in a project he is working on with members of the Vancouver Historical Society. I wasn’t completely sure I was volunteering for, but the idea of lending my knowledge of recording in the field sounded like fun.

Turns out, the oldest film of Vancouver is the same piece of footage that I heard about from Dave Olson when we hung out during the Celebration of Light.

Last week, I was helped Jason capture some audio that is to go into a project about this film that was discovered in the basement of a house down in Australia. Nine minutes of a movie where William Harbeck[vancouverhistory.ca] put a camera at the front of a cable car as it goes through Vancouver in 1907. Very cool stuff, and it made me overly happy to have ventured over the Granville Bridge by foot on such a gorgeous day.

The film has been shown publicly, but I have yet to see it. I’m not sure what the whole plan is for the final project, but this is something I am very lucky to have a hand in. I’ll be sure to update here when I know more. If you can get a chance to see this piece of history, I’m betting that the images of Vancouver from one hundred years ago is a trip.