Village Gamer

The Greater Toronto Marketing Alliance (GTMA) has made the digital media sector a priority for growth and innovation to foster a homegrown industry, and this morning it showcased student-industry collaboration results at the GTMA International Digital Media Forum.

In 10 months, Ryerson University’s Digital Media Zone – a collaborative digital media workspace for young entrepreneurs – has fostered 115 jobs, supported 100 innovators and incubated 20 companies, several of which are garnering partnerships from around the world. Sheridan College opened the Screen Industries Research and Training Centre in March of 2010, and it has already provided full-time work for 25 students and exposed over 200 to its collaboration with Toronto’s Pinewood Studios, Canada’s largest sound stage complex. Meanwhile, Seneca College is a leading collaborator with the open source software industry with partners that include Mozilla, creator of the popular web browser, Firefox.

The Greater Toronto Marketing Alliance brought all of these collaborators – and more – together for a showcase of the Greater Toronto Area’s (GTA) world-class digital media education, entrepreneurship and collaboration projects. “Ubisoft’s decision to locate a major studio in Toronto that will create 800 jobs over the next decade is another leading indicator of global interest in our extraordinary focus on digital entertainment,” said Gerald Pisarzowski, Vice-President of Business Development with the Greater Toronto Marketing Alliance.

The GTA’s digital media strengths are a dream come true for companies like Toronto-based Starz Animation that, with five feature films, has the largest profile of any independent studio in the world. “The digital media sector in Toronto is very competitive and growing worldwide,” said Jeff Young, Vice-President of Finance and Business Development for Starz Animation. “There is a constant demand for talent and having the breadth of top-quality graduates right here is an advantage that allows us to keep growing. Some of the top graduates from the Toronto-area used to dream of jobs at Pixar or Dreamworks, but now they want to stay in Canada.” In its 45,000 square foot facility, Starz employs 300 artists, and a large majority of them are graduates from Ontario’s digital media programs.

“The DMZ model is really a platform for regional digital media growth,” said Valerie Fox, Director of Ryerson University’s Digital Media Zone. “We’ve already graduated three companies out into the GTA and there are 17 more in the pipeline, creating jobs right now. By bringing young people together to create products, industry solutions, new companies, jobs and opportunities, the DMZ is helping to build Toronto’s future as a global hub of innovation and economic development.”

“It’s a blending of skill sets – that’s what we are trying to do here,” said John Helliker, Director of the Screen Industries Research and Training Centre (SIRT) at Sheridan College, “Our focus with industry partners is innovation. We don’t want button pushers. Our students can combine the technical and the artistic with a sound business sense. The key is college-university-industry partnerships.” SIRT reflects Sheridan’s conscious decision to build a presence in Toronto’s film and television studio district.

The partnership programs from Sheridan, Seneca and Ryerson have created skills and products that include a Mobile Transit Companion app for sight and hearing impaired transit users of the Paris Metro, an interactive fashion runway for L’Oreal, group-buying technology for eBay’s Kijiji, interactive graphical programming software “processing.js,” 3D stereoscopic animation prototype testing, and animation for the upcoming feature film “Gnomeo and Juliet,” the largest animated feature film ever produced in Canada that will be released on February 11th, 2011.

Today’s GTMA International Digital Media Forum was beamed live to Cisco TelePresence™ locations in Europe using technology developed by the event’s sponsor, Cisco. Cisco TelePresence is a ground-breaking category of products that combine advanced audio, true high-definition video and interactive elements to create unique, “in-person” experiences between people, places and events. The event was simultaneously broadcast to London, Paris, Rome and Hallbergmoos (Munich).

There were presentations by five colleges (Sheridan, Seneca, George Brown, Humber, Centennial) and five universities (Ryerson, York, Toronto, OCAD U, UOIT) from the Greater Toronto Area. Ontario government representatives and industry representatives also made presentations.  Dean Morrison (PricewaterhouseCoopers Canada) will presented on Greater Toronto’s internationally competitive digital media-focused tax incentives and Stephen Green (Green and Spiegel LLP) spoke about immigration policies.

The CATAAlliance initiative i-CANADA and IBM Canada have announced that IBM is becoming a Diamond Sponsor of the i-CANADA program, designed to spur the development of Intelligent Communities across the country. i-CANADA’s goal is to use advanced communications and collaborative applications to generate economic growth, build skills, support new social initiatives and improve the delivery of government and business services.

“The need to create Intelligent Communities is more urgent than ever”, said Pat Horgan, IBM Manufacturing, Development and Operations Vice President. “To compete in the 21st century economic environment, cities will need to better apply advanced information technology, analytics and system thinking to develop more entrepreneurial citizen-centric approaches to their development. By doing so, they can better attract, create, enable and retain their citizen’s skills, knowledge and creativity. Forward looking civic leaders will alter their investment strategies to optimize city services around highly skilled, innovative citizens and communities, as well as knowledge-intensive businesses. IBM supports fully the i-CANADA program of catalyzing the country as an Innovation Nation through the development of intelligent communities of world top class.”

“We are pleased to see the power and momentum of IBM enrolled in our program dedicated to the creation of intelligent communities across the country”, noted Bill Hutchison, Chair of i-CANADA. “IBM’s Smarter Planet initiative and their advanced Smart Cities Assessment tools and associated services are helping cities all over the world to identify strategic areas of competitive improvement. The world’s leading i-Nations consistently have high rankings in innovation, productivity, job creation and social prosperity. Our goal is to bring at least 30 Canadian communities into their ranks as defined by the Intelligent Community Forum in New York.”

Mr. Hutchison added that “We see i-CANADA as the new “National Dream”, much like the original railroad across the country, but with the 21st century view where communications are the rails of light, carrying knowledge and ideas between the shining communities of a global intelligent economy. The vision for i-CANADA is a nation of provincial and local Intelligent Communities large and small, urban and remote, featuring great places to live with innovation cultures leveraging unified and intelligent communication infrastructures, supporting growth in jobs and the economy in tandem with social prosperity for all citizens.”

OpenText has been awarded a framework agreement for Digital Continuity, developed by Buying Solutions and The National Archives in the UK as part of the government’s project to improve digital information management throughout the public sector.

Digital continuity is the ability for an organization to use information in the way that is needed, for as long as it’s needed. Usable information is essential if the public sector is to operate transparently and legally while maintaining accountability.

The Digital Continuity Framework is part of a broader Digital Continuity Service offered by The National Archives and provides a shortlist of suppliers which can be accessed by anyone in the public sector to help them manage their digital continuity. OpenText has been awarded a framework agreement for two Lots: digital archiving solutions and data quality solutions.

OpenText’s Senior Account Manager for Central Government, Stephen Walsh, said: “The exponential growth in digital data volumes presents a challenge to any organization; but it places particularly huge demands on public sector organizations. Without effective data management systems in place, digital information can become incomplete, unavailable or unusable over time. If government bodies cannot guarantee access to this data, it can have a serious negative impact on service provision to the public – and also threatens their ability to operate legally.

“The UK government fully appreciates the necessity of managing digital continuity, but it’s often difficult for individual public sector organizations to know how to improve their digital information management, or how to procure technology and services that will help them do this. The Digital Continuity Framework is an extremely welcome tool that makes it easy for the public sector to procure the tools they need to manage this mountain of digital data,” continued Walsh.

The Digital Continuity Framework agreement is for two years, with the option to extend it for two additional one year periods. The criteria for the Data Quality Solutions Lot of the framework required technology that enables users to access data from a variety of structured data sources; relate data between distinct data sources; and profile the data using patterns, rules and statistical methods. It also required the ability to drill-down into the actual data from a profile produced by the technology; provide a range of reporting options; and suggest or fix identified data quality issues.

The Digital Archiving Solutions Lot specified technology that can acquire information from a live system into the archive; manage retention policies applied to the archived information; place archived items on hold to override any other retention policy; and ensure the integrity of the archived information. Furthermore, it must enable user discovery and retrieval of the archived information; report on the contents of the archive; control access to the content of the archive and record provenance data about items transferred into the archive.

“The award of the Framework agreement for Digital Continuity recognizes OpenText’s expertise in the field of digital data management; and we look forward to working with public sector bodies to help them ensure that key digital information remains accessible and usable in the long term,” said Walsh. Read the rest of this entry »

Reminder: Confoo 2011 is March 9th – 11th in Montreal.

Digital Extremes, developers of the PC version for the upcoming HomeFront game is participating in a session on Video Games and the Next Generation of Literacy in partnership with the Child & Youth Network, London Public Library and the United Way of London and Middlesex. The session will take place at the Museum London, 421 Ridout Street North in London, Ontario on Thursday, February 10th from 4:30pm until 8:00pm.

There will be a Keynote presentation by Dr. James Paul Gee, Professor of Literacy Studies at Arizona State University and author of What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy. The event will also feature a panel discussion, networking and refreshments. Donations to support literacy initiatives are welcome.

Digital Extremes has also launched a new iOS title. Available now for 99 cents US, Retro Pinball includes three handpicked tables (Crash and Burn, Super Android, Pangea) from original creator James Schmalz, all with updated graphics and sound to enhance your gaming experience on your favorite Apple iOS device.

Eidos Montreal has released a new trailer for Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Take an up-close and personal look at player character and game hero Adam Jensen.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o39lpePeOp8]

Deus Ex: Human Revolution is rated M for Mature by the ESRB and according to GameStop Canada, will be in-store on April 1st.

Puzzle Pond from Little Guy Games is a featured FreeAppADay game today, so hurry over to the iTunes App Store and grab this cute match-up game. Just in time for Valentine’s Day, you play Puzzle Pond by matching two creatures with a swipe of your finger to make them kiss and explode with joy. There are three game modes, Speed, Puzzle and Zen, with the ability to conduct combos and streaks for huge points and power-ups. There are currently sixty brain teasing puzzles in this Game Centre and OpenFeint-enabled game has twenty different achievements and a leaderboard.

Mike Farah, President of Production at comedy website Funny Or Die, and key members of his creative team will deliver a Feature Panel on the future of online comedy at BANFF 2011. Farah and his team will offer an in-depth look at the production strategy behind the phenomenal success of the site, which averages 8 million unique users and over 30 million video views per month.

“In only three years, Funny Or Die has become the destination for comedy fans online, with some of the best content out there,” said Ferne Cohen, Executive Director of the Festival. “We are all looking forward to what I’m sure will be a compelling and entertaining panel.”

As President of Production, Mike Farah oversees the creative day-to-day operations of the premier comedy site, along with Funny or Die’s television and feature projects. With Funny Or Die for over two years, Farah has produced the award-winning video “Prop 8: The Musical,” the Ron Howard-directed “Presidential Reunion,” and Marion Cotillard’s “Forehead Tittaes,” among many others. Under Farah’s leadership, Funny Or Die’s creative team produces over 25 original videos each month. In November 2010, The Hollywood Reporter named Farah one of the top 35 Hollywood executives under 35.

Montreal’s gogo6 inc., a leading provider of IPv6 products, community and services has released gogoCPE version 1.0 – a small v6 adaptor for the home that can be installed and providing IPv6 within a minute. Designed to work with, rather than replace home networking equipment, the gogoCPE can be used to deploy IPv6 using IPv4 or to deploy IPv4 using IPv6 – both resulting in a dual-stack home network. Early customers of the gogoCPE include SingTel, Comcast and Globe Telecom.

The gogoCPE is plug ‘n’ play simple and designed to be installed by the end user without any support. The gogoCPE uses the same code as the gogoCLIENT which has reliably provided IPv6 to over 150,000 users of the Freenet6 service.

The gogoCPE supports the most popular transition technologies including TSP, DS-Lite, 6RD, DSTM and L2TP. It is compatible with the gogoSERVER and other manufacturer systems. Its wide technology support allows it to work in any IPv4/v6 network scenario, including:

* Providing IPv6 to existing and new customers with IPv4 home routers in an IPv4 network.
* Providing IPv4 to new customers with IPv4 home routers in an IPv6 network.
* Providing IPv6 to new customers without IPv4 home routers in an IPv4 network.

“Hands down the most difficult part of introducing IPv6 into a broadband network is the home. This is where a majority of the IPv6 costs lie and where service providers have the least control. In a vast majority of the cases the home networking equipment is either not upgradable or owned by the end user making IPv6 synonymous with installing new equipment,” said Bruce Sinclair, gogo6 CEO. “The recent depletion of IPv4 addresses from the IANA pool increases the pressure on service providers to find a simple yet effective solution to offer v6 and v4 by way of v6. Service providers can quickly introduce IPv6 into their networks with a single 1U gogoSERVER and one gogoCPE per home.”

The gogoCPE is available today after being tested by service providers around the world. In addition to being sold in volume individual gogoCPEs are available on the gogo6 website. These units are preconfigured to work with Freenet6 making them plug ‘n’ play ready out of the box. Individual units cost $99 plus shipping and handling. Volume pricing is lower.

If I owned a Mac, I would be downloading the trial version of Office for Mac from Microsoft Canada right now, because they are holding a contest in partnership with LiveNation. Entrants could win a chance to see any band in the Canadian city—and seats—of his or her choice. Please see the contest rules for complete prize and entry details.

Roaring Penguin Software has updated its CanIt Reputation List, which collects IP reputation data on e-mail servers from a worldwide network of sensors. Roaring Penguin currently aggregates this data into four DNS-based block lists:

Spam Source: A list of IP addresses that have sent mostly spam and very little non-spam.
Dictionary Attackers: A list of IP addresses that have sent to many nonexistent recipients and very few valid recipients.
Greylist Stumblers: A list of IP addresses that have been thwarted by greylisting. Such machines are typically compromised personal computers.
Good: A list of IP addresses that have passed greylisting, have sent to very few nonexistent recipients, and have sent mostly non-spam. These machines are very likely legitimate mail servers.

To these block lists Roaring Penguin has added a new list called “Mixed” for hosts that send a mixture of spam and non-spam. Roaring Penguin found that the old “SpamSource” list would often list outbound mail servers for large e-mail providers. These servers tend to send a lot of spam, but they also send a lot of non-spam e-mail. The change to Roaring Penguin’s Reputation Lists means that about 5600 machines formerly listed on the “SpamSource” list are now listed on “Mixed”. This still leaves almost 1.9 million machines listed on the “SpamSource” e-mail reputation list.

CanIt 8.0 is available as:

* CanIt-PRO, an anti-spam / anti-virus appliance or a soft appliance.
* CanIt-Domain-PRO, spam filtering software that allows service providers such as MSPs to host anti-spam for their customers.
* Hosted CanIt, a fully outsourced anti-spam solution.

The Founder of the Online Party of Canada, Michael Nicula, will be holding a press conference on Saturday February 5, 2011 in the Art Room of the Gladstone Hotel to discuss CRTC policies in the context of decision 2011-44 to impose User Based Billing (UBB) on the whole Canadian market. Nicula will be joined by Iain Calder of TorFree.Net as well as affected consumers and small ISP providers.

In a move aimed to calm angry consumers, already dissatisfied with the internet service market in Canada, the CRTC president as well as many senior MPs vowed to review or strike down decision 2011-44. Internet service quality in Canada is not a new issue; it just happened that the latest CRTC decision has touched a nerve, as consumers are now enjoying data-rich social networking, livestream and television programs more than ever before.

Online Party of Canada wants to take the opportunity to broaden this discussion. Why has Canada slipped in the world ranking of country infrastructures in terms of speed and service quality? Countries like Romania and Bulgaria clock more than twice the average speed, and the leaders Korea and Japan boast speeds as much as three times faster. Is government intervention into the CRTC the right thing to do?

Online Party of Canada (OPC) is an Internet-based Political Party, pending registration. OPC is a non-traditional political party; it focuses on issues instead of platforms or individuals. OPC operates exclusively online and promotes an innovative voting system inspired from today’s popular technologies such as like/dislike, share, tweet, comment.

When Ontario’s students need answers to their research questions, or access to multimedia archives or authoritative databases, they can turn to Knowledge Ontario’s online services, and the Ontario School Library Association (OSLA) showed its appreciation of these valuable services by presenting a Special Achievement award yesterday to Knowledge Ontario’s executive director David Thornley and chairperson Peter Rogers.

“The OSLA’s Special Achievement award goes to Knowledge Ontario for its capacity-building leadership and collaborative partnerships that make it possible for school libraries in Ontario, regardless of size or location, to provide students with equal access to virtual resources and technology tools needed by 21st-century learners,” says OSLA president Ruth Hall.

KO’s services reflect many of the priorities of the Ontario Ministry of Education, such as fostering digital literacy and providing equitable access to students across the province, including students in remote, rural, northern, Aboriginal and Francophone schools.

KO’s digital services include the following:

* eResources, a range of authoritative, age-appropriate collections of information, periodicals, newspapers and other learning tools;
* Learn Ontario tech help and tutorials for teaching and quick “how-to’s”
* Our Ontario, a digital collection of heritage photographs, videos, audio recordings, newspapers and other historical records; and
* askON and ONdemande, which allow students to get real-time research assistance in English and French after school and on weekends from public library staff.

Knowledge Ontario (KO) is gratified by the recognition. “I’m delighted to receive this award, along with my colleague David Thornley, because Knowledge Ontario deeply values our close partnership with teachers, students and school boards throughout Ontario. Educators at every level tell us that our digital tools are extremely useful to students, supporting them in school and in transitioning to college and university,” says Rogers. “We thank the OSLA for this recognition.”

Since January 2007, through negotiated province-wide licences, KO has turned an annual $1.2-million investment from the Government of Ontario into a suite of e-resources that would have cost individual school boards over $10 million. Before KO, over half of Ontario’s school libraries had no online database access for their students, and many others had only limited resources. Now, students use KO resources over 6 million times each year—and it’s making a difference to their education.

“Knowledge Ontario has proven to be a catalyst for change and improvement,” says Anita Brooks Kirkland, a library consultant with the Waterloo Region District School Board. “Having a broad range of quality, reliable resources, differentiated by instructional need, topic and audience, has been a powerful motivator for deeper learning and critical thinking for our students.”

At the school board level, administrators recognize the value of leveraging collaborative investment to prepare students for lifelong learning. “Knowledge Ontario’s services help Ontario’s students develop the skills they need to thrive in an increasingly high-tech world,” says John Stadnyk, director of education with the Huron-Superior Catholic District School Board and a KO board member.

Parents, meanwhile, appreciate the fact that their children can quickly access the information they need to further their education after school hours. “Knowledge Ontario is an excellent choice for the OSLA award,” says Gay Stephenson, online communications manager for People for Education, a parent-led organization that supports Ontario’s public education system. “The research is reliable and can be found in one place! For parents, it’s the perfect homework helper.”

The February 14^th deadline to submit entries for the 2011 Weston Youth Innovation Award is fast approaching. The Ontario Science Centre is looking for young Agents of Change – Canadian youth who are actively motivating positive outcomes in the world by creating solutions for real issues.

The Weston Youth Innovation Award was established in 2008 to support and acknowledge young Canadian innovators. It provides students ages 14 to 18 a unique channel to share their ideas and get the word out to a much larger audience. The winner (either an individual or team) is granted a $2,000 cash prize and the chance to work with a Science Centre multimedia team to produce a short animation showcasing their project. This video will be broadcast in the Science Centre’s Weston Family Innovation Centre, and will also be posted online.

Entrants are asked to showcase how they have demonstrated leadership and initiative in tackling a real-world issue, for example, energy conservation or climate change, and to illustrate the impact of their efforts. Submissions will be judged on demonstration of the characteristics of innovation: inspiration, creativity, collaboration, risk-taking and problem-solving.

Last year, Kimberly Gulevich from Fort St. John, British Columbia was granted the award. Her innovative project presented a potential method of reducing the carbon footprint of small rural households that use sewage lagoons – by exploring the use of methane capture as a way to provide energy to these homes.

“The Weston Youth Innovation Award is a great opportunity for Canadian youth to showcase the work they are doing on a larger scale,” said Gulevich. “For me, winning the award was not only about showcasing my work, but showcasing how communities can come together to benefit youth pursuing science. I not only believe that we are the next generation of scientists, but that we Canadian youth are making great progress today. The monetary portion of the award was also useful, as I was able to use it to further my education and am now studying Environmental Engineering at the University of Northern British Columbia.”

Entries will undergo a two-step judging process. A panel from the Ontario Science Centre will assess all entries in February and will then send a shortlist to a second panel of external judges. The winner is scheduled to be announced on April 30, 2011 and will receive their award during a special ceremony in May where a multi-media presentation of their project will premiere.

The Weston Youth Innovation Award was named in recognition of The W. Garfield Weston Foundation’s $15 million lead gift to the Ontario Science Centre’s Agents of Change initiative. This national award honours the Foundation’s dedication to education and contribution to the Canadian cultural landscape.

From storyboard to screen, the Screen Industries Research and Training Centre (SIRT) brings it all together at a conference dedicated to previsualization and virtual production – two innovative processes that are changing the face of film and TV production. The conference will be hosted by SIRT, an initiative of Sheridan College, at its Pinewood Toronto Studios facility. It will look at how digital technology and live on-stage computer graphics are allowing film, television and gaming professionals to become more creative, collaborative and cost effective. Previsualization and Virtual Production: Bringing It All Together takes place February 24 – 25, 2011 and includes panels, presentations and technology demos delivered by industry experts.

Previsualization (also known as previs) is the application of cutting-edge digital technologies, including motion capture, to help plan and create films and other projects. The process allows directors and other key personnel to explore creative ideas, plan technical solutions to production problems, and communicate their vision to the broader production team. Day One of the conference is dedicated to previsualization with expert presentations from Ron Frankel, Founder of Proof Inc. (The Green Hornet, The Twilight Saga: Eclipse); Aaron Weintraub, Visual Effects Supervisor for Mr. X Inc. (Resident Evil: Afterlife, TRON: Legacy, and The Three Musketeers); Brian Pohl, Co-Founder of POV Previs (Star Trek, Star Wars: Episode I and II); and Darren Cranford, President and Director for Keyframe Digital (X-Men, Driven, and Zombieland).

The sexy sister of previsualization – virtual production – is the focus of Day Two with panels and practical demos covering the latest technologies. Virtual production is the process of shooting a movie with real-time computer graphics, either for all-CG movies such as Christmas Carol, or visual effects movies with live action such as Avatar.

Confirmed speakers include: Jason Walter, Virtual Production Team Consultant at Autodesk; Jim Laird, CFO, Bedlam Games; Lui Francisco, Artistic Director, Bedlam Games; Steve Hoban, Founder/Producer, Copperheart Entertainment; and David Footman, Scripted Event Director, Ubisoft Toronto.

Reminder: Vancouver SIGGRAPH Convergence event TRON – Cult Favourite To Franchise is on February 8th – get your tickets now.

Our condolences to everyone at Frozen North Games, the latest Canadian studio to shut its doors. I have been criticized in the recent past for having a bias and not covering the news of studio lay-offs and closings. Perhaps its my innate desire to try to focus on the positive events in our industry, or it’s the fact that bad news often travels much faster than good and in the midst of the negative, perhaps by accenting the good things going on we can all move past that “gutted” feeling and find more positive aspects on which to direct our focus and ambitions. It doesn’t mean that the recent closing of Propaganda and the lay-offs at other studios such as EA Canada, United Front Games and others don’t touch me, they do, because I have friends employed at those studios, it just means that I would rather find the news about who is hiring or announcing new projects, so that I can pass that information along to those who have been affected by downturns in the industry. If you know who’s hiring or of upcoming events that would be great for introductions and the passing along of career interests, please let me know and I’ll get the information out there. Our audience grows with each passing week, and we’re always getting fresh eyes on the site who just may be looking for that next opportunity.

Microsoft has updated the Windows Phone 7 Developer Training Kit. According to the Developer blog, this update includes a refresh to almost all the labs along with a bug cleanup and the ability for the labs to run on real phone devices as well as the emulator. Two new labs, Accessing Windows Phone 7 Devices and Multi-touch Game Development XNA Framework, have also been added to the Kit. The Using Push Notification lab has also been updated so that it uses the latest Windows Phone Push Notification Library.

Early Bird registration is now open for the second annual Toronto Screenwriting Conference, which will take place this coming April 9th and 10th at Ryerson University’s Ted Rogers School of Management in Toronto. Professional writers, producers, directors, and executives will benefit from this gathering of the best creative talent, authors and speakers in writing for screen-based media.

The Toronto Screenwriting Conference offers attendees extraordinary key-note sessions with high-profile show-runners and screenwriters along with breakout sessions lead by international screenwriting academics, book authors and industry execs as well as the opportunity to participate in a level of education and skills development unparalleled by any other screenwriting event.

Confirmed speakers thus far include Christopher Vogler, Pen Densham, Sheldon Bull, Dara Marks, Christine Zander and one writer whom I would really like to meet and hear speak, Kevin Shortt, scriptwriter and story designer at Ubisoft Montreal. The Toronto Screenwriting Conference is sponsored by Meridian Artists and the National Screen Institute. Early Bird tickets are priced at $279.00 (+HST) and are available until 5pm EST, February 28th.

Canadian eLearning Enterprise Alliance executives Claude Martel Ph.D. (chairman) and Jay Bahlis Ph.D. (director) are co-chairing the Distributed Learning conference track at MODSIM World Canada 2011, being held this June 20th – 22nd in Ottawa.

In the Distributed Learning conference track, the CeLEA will be seeking to present a range of speakers who will describe the training and learning challenges they face, and discuss how they are applying new tools and technologies to meet the challenges in an increasingly digital world. A decade or so ago, computer and web-based learning technologies were limited in their scope and capabilities. Since then we have seen the emergence of social networks and collaboration tools, mobile learning, virtual worlds, Internet television, simulations and games, all enabled by increasingly available bandwidth, computers and mobile devices. Educators and trainers are adopting these solutions to create new, hybrid ways to distribute knowledge, both in the classroom and at a distance.

To that end, the CeLEA directors are seeking proposals for 8 session speakers for the CeLEA track. If you are interested please contact Claude Martel immediately and request the Speaker package. All proposal must be in by February 21st.

This stream will showcase innovative training solutions and blends that have lead to practical, adaptive and innovative learning environments and resolved specific challenges – including:

* E-Learning
* Collaborative learning
* Mobile learning
* Web television
* Serious gaming
* Virtual reality and
* Electronic performance support tools
* Hybrid programs

We urge you to participate, share your expertise and innovative solutions. MODSIM offers a unique opportunity to showcase Canadian innovation in learning technology and network with buyers and colleagues in the educational and training field in North America. MODSIM is also looking for speakers for other tracks, please see the conference web site for more information.

Whether you’re heading to the rink for the first hockey game of the season, or grabbing an ice-cold Coca-Cola on the local patio with friends, the moments that make Canadians happy vary from coast to coast. Coca-Cola, one of the original purveyors of happiness, is celebrating its 125th anniversary by finding out what makes Canadians smile.

To mark the occasion, Coca-Cola Canada is sponsoring a comprehensive study that will examine the idea of happiness across the country. The study will explore what generates the feeling and where best to find it, whether it’s spending time with family, working out, volunteering or enjoying a moment of peace and quiet.

“We have been bringing people together and sharing happiness for 125 years,” said Bobby Brittain, Vice President, Marketing with Coca-Cola Canada. “As we look forward we want to capture through this research those hopeful and optimistic moments, be they random or planned, and share them with Canadians.”

In addition to the study, Coca-Cola Canada is expanding the dialogue on happiness by encouraging Canadians to visit iCoke.ca to voice their support for a Gross National Happiness (GNH) indicator. GNH, the concept of monitoring social well-being and happiness as a supplement to pure economic indicators, has been gaining ground in countries like the United Kingdom and France.

The premise behind GNH suggests that leading a happy life has a direct impact on all kinds of critically important individual and collective standard of living issues — from health and wellness to productivity. GNH has become a frequent topic in the Canadian media following the release of Statistics Canada’s General Social Survey, which gathers data on social trends related to the living conditions and well-being of Canadians.

“We are inviting Canadians to share their opinion on happiness and whether as a country we should monitor just how happy we are,” said Brittain. “In the year ahead and beyond, we are committed to shaping a better future for the customers and communities we serve and the consumers we refresh.”

Later this year, Coca-Cola Canada will release the results of its national study on happiness. The report will delve into specifics about what makes Canadians happy; where and when they are the happiest; the role of demographics, lifestyle and geography on happiness; and, the simple day-to-day things that put smiles on their faces — everything from sports and popular culture to family milestones to food and beverages. The main purpose of the study, which will be released in phases over the course of 2011, is to help Canadians individually and collectively celebrate and share the things that make us happy and positive – ultimately helping to advance Canada’s social and economic well-being.

It seems Coke won’t have too much of a task ahead of it, because in spite of having just come through a tough economic year, the majority of Canadians are generally happy with their jobs and like the people they work with. Despite job satisfaction, nearly half of Canadians doubt they are being sufficiently rewarded for their work efforts according to a new survey released today by the Canadian Education and Research Institute for Counselling (CERIC). The on-line survey of just over 1200 Canadians, recently conducted by Environics Research, provides insight into Canadians’ perceptions of their workplaces and approaches to their career development.

“As Canadians, we value our connection to our work and to each other. The majority of working Canadians is satisfied with their jobs, like their colleagues and believe their workplace is inclusive. Our findings suggest that, while important, money isn’t always the determining factor in job satisfaction,” said Nancy Schaefer, CERIC Board President and President of Youth Employment Services (YES), a centre of excellence for youth employment and empowerment.

CERIC’s Key Survey Findings

* In spite of having just come through a tough economic year, the majority of Canadians are generally happy and satisfied with their jobs (81%) and like the people they work with (88%).

* Satisfied workplaces are inclusive workplaces. Overall, the Canadian workplace is seen as inclusive and free from discrimination, although visible minority Canadians are less convinced than their non-visible minority colleagues –only 28% describe their workplace as very inclusive compared to 41% of non-visible minority workers.

* Despite high job satisfaction numbers, nearly half of Canadians doubt they are being sufficiently rewarded for a job well done.

* In today’s active “hidden” or unadvertised job market, Canadians are most likely to turn to their colleagues and co-workers (68%) as well as friends and neighbours (65%) for career advice. When looking for a job, Canadians are most likely to turn to on-line services and company websites for job opportunities (48%), though few use social media or social networking sites to advance their career goals (12% use social networking sites like Facebook; 9% use professional networking sites such as LinkedIn). In general, regardless of the tools chosen to look for a new job, Canadians are fairly optimistic about their ability to meet their future career goals.

* On the career front, younger Canadians appreciate the help and support of their boomer parents. Canadians with and without children agree that parents can help their children’s career development most by encouraging experiences where kids succeed and fail.

What Canadians Said:

In spite of having just come through a tough economic year, Canadians overall are generally happy with their jobs and like the people they work with. From executives to front-line service workers, and across occupations;

* 86% like the work they do
* 88% like the people they work with
* 62% are generally content with their job, with no plans to move on.
* For the 33% who hope to land a new position, it is for one of two reasons—either they are not happy with their compensation or are under 30 and looking for a new job with more responsibility or closer to their field of interest

Even with high job satisfaction numbers, nearly half of Canadians doubt they are being sufficiently rewarded for their work efforts.

* Four in ten (39%) do not feel they are paid a fair amount for the work they do, and
* Visible minority workers are not convinced about the financial recognition they receive when they do a good job — 47% agree they receive the recognition they should vs. 59% of non-visible minority Canadians.

Overall, the Canadian work place is seen as inclusive and free from discrimination. And if a workplace is viewed as inclusive, workers tend to be more satisfied with their jobs overall.

* A majority of Canadians (82%) describe their workplace as either very (39%) or somewhat (43%) inclusive.
* But, visible minority workers are less convinced. Only 28% of visible minority Canadians describe their workplace as very inclusive compared to 41% of non-visible minority Canadians.

The unadvertised or hidden job market is very active. Canadians turn first to their co-workers and friends. Newer internet tools are surprisingly lower on the list of how we find new opportunities.
We first turn to colleagues (68%), friends and neighbours (65%) for guidance and information, followed by:

* Newspapers 62%
* Parents 61%
* Internet 58%
* Mentors 58%
* Government and community employment centres 53%
* Community-based employment agencies 43%
* Teachers or professors 40%
* Career specialists or counsellors 37%

Regardless of the tools chosen to look for a new job, three-quarters of Canadians are optimistic about their career goals in spite of recent tough economic times.

On the career front, younger Canadians appreciate the help and support of their boomer parents. Canadians with and without children agree that parents can help their children’s career development by offering a wide range of opportunities and experience.

* More than half of Canadians between the ages of 18 and 24 typically characterized their boomer parents as wonderfully supportive (54%); relatively few (5%) characterize their parents as overbearing.

Many Canadians say parents can help their children’s career development by providing them with a range of opportunities and experiences including

* Encouraging them to learn from their experiences (by succeeding or failing) 56%
* Exposure to a range of character-building experiences such as sports and hobbies 51%
* Helping them develop career-related skills 39%
* Encouraging children to volunteer in a variety of places 32%
* Talking to children about career choices 31%
* Exposing them to a wide variety of careers 28%

The Survey was also co-sponsored by TD Bank. The complete report is available on line as a PDF.

The Canadian Education and Research Institute for Counselling (CERIC) is a charitable organization dedicated to promoting career counselling related research and professional development opportunities across Canada.

With CAD designs being one of the most highly in-demand services for engineering work on contract and CAD design companies these days, both clients and designers would find it useful to have a related library containing useful information, tools and resources that they can access anytime, anywhere.

This is exactly what CAD Crowd offers – a free CAD library, where they can learn everything that there is to know about 3D and CAD models and CAD templates. The CAD Library includes CAD symbols, CAD drawings and CAD blocks for engineers. Common CAD software in the block library includes Adobe, AutoCAD, Alibre-Design, CATIA, Google Sketchup, Pro/Engineer, Solid Edge, Solid Works and Revit.

The popularity of online forums has brought about this instant sharing of ideas, which is exactly how the Free CAD Library works. Through it, you can share content with other users, download other members’ content or even find components for your design which are provided by actual industry engineers and companies. CAD designers will find it easy to increase their visibility, client base, establish their reputation and get instant feedback for their work. They can also browse through the Free CAD Library and get ideas for CAD designs, and even reuse the work of other engineers. With the goal of becoming the a leading engineering design and CAD services procurement, CAD Crowd definitely does provide benefits for buyers and designers through the easily accessible – and free – CAD library that they have onsite.

Social Media Week Toronto will showcase a series of free sessions with leading social media experts designed specifically to help companies thrive in today’s ever-changing digital landscape. The events run from February 7-11 as part of a series of simultaneous global events in nine cities.

“As the social web has moved from the fringe into the mainstream, its ability to impact business has increased dramatically. To explore this side of social media, we’ve curated a series of events during Social Media Week Toronto focused squarely on business”, says Eli Singer, founder and president of Entrinsic, a social media communications agency, and co-curator for Social Media Week Toronto.

On February 8, Social Media Week Toronto event partner BMO Bank of Montreal will bring together social media industry experts Google, LinkedIn, The Globe and Mail, and Silver Lining for a session focused on small businesses. Entitled Business 3.0, the forum will offer social media strategies and tactics to help small companies grow their business and brand.

“We are very excited to be creating a forum where our customers can come together to learn about how to use the social web to build their businesses and simplify their financial matters,” says Bal Sahjpaul, Director eChannel, BMO Financial Group.

On February 9, Sysomos presents Using Analytics to Get the Most Out of Your Social Media Efforts, an event showcasing new tools to monitor, measure and analyze social media. Additional events targeted towards business growth, including Facebook’s The People Web on February 11, highlight the importance of creating consumer experiences and relationships, instead of simply trying to tell consumers what to think.

Award-winning global PR firm Weber Shandwick hosts Defending Your Brand and Corporate Reputation in Social Media on February 7. This session will introduce FireBell, a crisis simulation tool developed by Weber that allows businesses to experience threats in real-time across an array of social media platforms in order to prepare for future reputation attacks.

Over 45 free events are being delivered through Social Media Week Toronto. The sessions cover a wide range of industry sectors and conversations about the impacts of digital and social media on business, marketing, culture and society as a whole. Full registration for Social Media Week Toronto is now open. Follow them on Twitter at @SMWTO.

Social Media Week Toronto is produced by Entrinsic. Global support for Social Media Week comes from headline sponsor NOKIA and supporting sponsors PepsiCo, Meebo, JWT and global media partner Weber Shandwick, along with local media partner Marketwire, all of whom have come together to make this possible.

Intertainment Media Inc. has released the latest growth stats for its social media, real time, language translation platform Ortsbo. The service has doubled user engagement since December 2010 with over 54 million minutes of online usage. All other key performance metrics including Online Sessions, Page Views and Unique Users experienced double to triple digits growth in the past month. Ortsbo is breaking down the language barriers initiating new marketing programs in South America, South East Asia and India while continuing to expand programs in Asia, Europe and North America.

According to published reports, by the end of its first year in 2004, Facebook had 1 Million users. By comparison, after just 7 month of operations, January 2011, Ortsbo already had almost 4 Million active users on a monthly basis, increasing 83% month over month, and is currently tracking at over 1.2 Million per week, well on its way to Facebook’s 2005 second year results of 5.5 Million active users.

Since its launch on July 22, 2010 Ortsbo has achieved the following:

54.1 Million Minutes of User Engagement
33.7 Million Page Views
15.2 Million Online Sessions
10 Million Unique Visitors From Over 170 Countries / Territories
35,000 Facebook Fans
3,800 Twitter Followers

Ortsbo’s real time multi-session, multi-platform and multi-lingual application connects to PC and Mac computers, mobile devices as well as all major search engine chat platforms including Microsoft, Google and Yahoo! along with Facebook, iChat, AIM, ICQ, Gadu-Gadu, Ovi, Lotus Sametime, LiveJournal and Tencent QQ and QQ International, China’s largest chat platforms and Twitter. Ortsbo instantly provides real time translation capabilities to well over 1 billion active chat accounts in over 170 Countries / Territories.

With beta trials expected to be completed shortly, Ortsbo is finalizing its commercial release schedule for its translation module for email applications. Ortsbo for Microsoft Outlook provides instant translation of both sent and received emails, with original language attachments, making it easy to communicate via email in multiple languages. The email plug-in module will retail for $29.95 US. Ortsbo also offers a secure, multi-user, multilingual chat module for the commercial market.

With the accelerated growth, popularity and global reach of Ortsbo, as well as the upcoming commercial launch of Ortsbo for Outlook, the Company has engaged the Corum Group (Seattle and Zurich), a global leader in software mergers and acquisitions to assist with its strategic opportunities. The Company has considered independent offers and feels that working with Corum provides potentially higher value for Ortsbo. The Company has stated that it will provide further updates as they become available. Intertainment Media also owns and operates a number of other key properties including Ad Taffy, itiBiti and Magnum.

Reminder: Registration is open for the Wired Woman Vancouver session with Tod Maffin on Deconstructing Viral: How to Build a Killer Viral Marketing Campaign.

Serebra Learning Corporation has announced important enhancements to the Serebra Campus learning management system (LMS) that will combine features designed to better service existing clientele with features that will distinguish Serebra as a leader in the industry.

“At Serebra we are constantly innovating and looking for ways to increase student engagement and satisfaction with our systems,” said Serebra’s acting President, Taleeb Noormohamed. “Taking into consideration feedback from our valued clients, we’ve made revisions and enhancements that will empower administrators and streamline the learning process.”

In addition to numerous application improvements, Serebra has added new features to Serebra Campus, including:

Learning Plans: The new learning plan feature offers administrators the unique ability to organize courses into educational paths directly related to employees’ career plans and goals. Learners can review plans that have been assigned to them and track their personal progress. This feature will allow organizations to formalize their training and development programs and effectively manage short and long-term career development of employees.

Custom Course Management: The latest release of Serebra Campus allows administrators to upload and manage proprietary SCORM or AICC custom courseware. Administrators can now preview the training before making it available to students and ensure that it is working as they expect. Organizations that create their own content can now track, manage and deliver their courses more effectively and efficiently.

Student Training Dashboard: When students log into the system they will now be directed to the My Training Dashboard, which will provide them with a snapshot of their training activity with an emphasis on compliance and learning plan progress. This streamlines the learning experience and keeps students on track with their learning.

Edmonton-based Lifelong Learn is proud to offer two new additions to their library of children’s e-books on their website. The children’s books from Lifelong Learn provide an enjoyable reading experience while motivating basic reading skills, left to right progression, turning pages, identifying words through pictures, early research, and much more. The concept books are available to assist caregivers (parents, families, early childhood educators, and teachers) on how to motivate a child’s developmental process.

One of the new books offered by Lifelong Learn is called Feelings. This easy-to-read book helps children with identifying feelings. Each feeling is represented in two variations and in two languages. Identification of feelings is a critical skill in the early years of development because it supports the building of positive self-esteem and social competence.
Read the rest of this entry »