Tag: canada

Online advertising in Canada is booming

Post ImageThe numbers are in, and it appears that 2006 was an incredibly impressive year for online advertising in the great north. Forget about all the action happening south of the border, Canada is where it’s at! From 901am:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau of Canada (IAB) announced that 2006 Canadian Online Advertising Revenues surged to an unprecedented $1.01 billion dollars for the year. The 2006 actuals represent a 26% increase over the $801 million originally estimated by the IAB for 2006; and an 80% increase over the 2005 actuals of $562 million.

Projections for 2007 look really positive too. Mark Evans says:

Still, if you do some back-of-the-napkin calculations, the Canadian market is still only two-thirds that of the U.S. market if you use the traditional 10:1 ratio formula.

I assume by the “10:1 ratio formula” he is normalizing the two markets for comparison purposes. So it’s not as big as the US, but it’s getting damn close.

Read: 901am

How gay is Edmonton?

Post ImageApparently the city I live in is gay enough to make it into Out Traveler magazine’s top five gay-friendly tourist destinations in Canada. Vancouver, Montreal, Winnipeg, and Toronto are the other cities. Here’s what they say about Edmonton:

Its hard not to take a shine to Edmonton, the laid-back capital of oil-rich Alberta. A refreshing optimism permeates this city of one million–buoyed by its oil-boosted fortunes. Edmonton has struck it rich but hasnt changed its friendly down-to-earth charm.

Let the herds kick up a ruckus about Calgary; bold, assured Edmonton gallops way ahead, leaving the rest of Alberta in the dust.

Such kind words! The magazine notes there’s a number of gay and lesbian bars and clubs in “the burgeoning gay village of Jasper Avenue, a two-block area with half a dozen gay businesses.”

Sun Media talked to editor in chief Ed Salvato, who had this to say:

“We chose Edmonton because we think it’s one of the more interesting places for gays and lesbians to visit in Canada. It’s a bastion of progressiveness. It’s surprisingly gay-friendly.”

City councillor Michael Phair, who is openly gay, said the magazine showcases Edmonton as “diverse and welcoming.” Sun Media also talked to gay activist Kris Wells, who wasn’t so upbeat:

He says he still doesn’t feel safe walking down Whyte Avenue hand-in-hand with his partner. “It’s still not safe to be visibly gay or lesbian. You put your life at risk.”

So I guess Edmonton is gay-friendly but most Edmontonians are not? Perhaps that’s because Edmonton is situated in the Texas of the North! Clearly we have some work to do.

Read: Canoe

Canadian Mobile Data Access Sucks

Post ImageI readily admit I am simply echoing the chamber with this story, but it needs to be seen by as many people as possible. Mobile data service in Canada is horribly expensive. As Boris said, “this pricing structure is stifling mobile innovation in Canada.”

Here’s a graph that Thomas Purves made (click for the photo page):

Thomas explains:

The motto of the CRTC, Canada’s telcom regulator is “Communications in the Public Interest”. Right. If you live in Canada, write to your MP. The CRTC, as an institution, needs to be taken out and shot.

I would like to say that Canada is a 3rd world country when it comes to Mobile ICT, except you can clearly see from this chart that even *Rwanda* has orders of magnitude better Mobile Data service than Canada.

This is just sad. Certainly the CRTC is at fault, but the companies themselves deserve some of the blame as well. Write to your MP, but also write to your service provider.

Read: Thomas Purves

Ottawa to help Alberta energy go green

Post ImageHere’s something you don’t hear every day – the federal government wants to help Alberta with it’s oil and gas industry! I think it’s great, as long as the funding is actually used appropriately. From the CBC article:

Ottawa will spend $155.9 million to make Alberta’s oil and energy industry more environmentally friendly, Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced Thursday.

The money will also support a project in Edmonton designed to convert municipal waste into electricity. Efforts to design a coal-fired electricity plant that releases almost no emissions will also be funded.

Already the announcement has been criticized by The Sierra Club, and I’m sure many more critics will follow. Harper has good timing though, as the Alberta government today “introduced legislation requiring about 100 high-polluting companies to reduce their emissions output starting July 1.”

Maybe this is the Canadian government’s way of saying, “yes, we value the oilsands as a strategic Canadian asset.”

Read: CBC.ca

Edmonton Bloggers

Post ImageThis is something I have been thinking about for a while. I got an email this week from Pete Quily, asking if Edmonton had anything like the kind of directory he is looking for in Vancouver. Here’s what he wants:

With the large number of techies/bloggers/web workers/geeks/wired folk/internet businesses/pick your preferred word in the Vancouver area, why isn’t there a comprehensive directory of such people and organizations/nonprofits/businesses?

I want that for Edmonton too!

So just like I have been doing with edmontontech, I have started tagging blogs at del.icio.us with the tag edmontonblogs. This is really more of an “in the meantime” kind of activity, because as Pete points out, an actual directory website would be much more useful. Maybe I’ll build it one of these days.

I actually have an excellent domain name for it – blogosphere.ca. As you can see, we haven’t touched it since 2004. It probably wouldn’t be too hard to throw together some kind of directory with OPML and feeds broken down by city. BlogsCanada had potential, but it seems to have died. Another similar site is the Canadian Tech Mob, but it’s tech only, and nearly impossible to navigate (seriously didn’t webrings die in 1999?).

Okay I better go before I start writing code. I’m off to Calgary in the morning for a meeting!

Read: Pete Quily

Shopping Malls: Canada vs. China

Post ImageQuick – which shopping mall is the world’s largest? If you said Edmonton’s own West Edmonton Mall, you’d be wrong. Despite holding the title for two decades, WEM is now number six on the list. A building boom in Asia has landed that continent nine of the world’s ten largest malls (the article says eight, but Wikipedia says nine):

Just three years ago, the top 10 list would have included a pair of popular California destinations—South Coast Plaza in Cost Mesa and Del Amo Fashion Center in Los Angeles—along with the famed Mall of America in Bloomington, Minn.

Here in North America the shopping mall is kind of passé, replaced by big box shopping centres like South Edmonton Common. A logical question to ask, then, is if the shopping malls in Asia will one day be seen as passé?

I think probably not. It seems to me there are two main differences between North America and Asia (when it comes to the importance of shopping malls). The first is population density – in Canada it is a mere 3.2 people per square kilometer, and in China it is 137 people per square kilometer (and these numbers are probably even more different if you look at just urban areas). There is clearly more space in Canada to build big box stores. In China, perhaps the shopping mall makes more sense because it is a more efficient use of space.

The second difference is in transportation. More families in North America own a vehicle (or two) than families in Asia do. This is changing, to be sure, as the income levels of countries like China and Thailand continue to rise. If you have lots of cars, it’s easier to drive to big box stores. The large number of vehicles in North America has probably helped the switch from malls to big box stores.

The first difference (population density) is more important than the second (transportation), in my opinion. Even though more Asian families will have vehicles in the future, the problem of population density will probably only worsen. For that reason, I would guess that shopping malls will continue to be important in Asia for a very long time.

As for the future of malls like West Ed, I am not sure. They seem to be doing okay for now, even if growth isn’t what it used to be, but that may change in the future. I think shopping malls in North America will probably have to reinvent themselves one day to stay competitive.

Read: USA Today

Broadcast radio turns 100

Post ImageIt was on December 24th, 1906 that Canadian inventor Reginald Fessenden produced the world’s first public radio broadcast. When you consider how many technologies have met their deaths in recent decades, it’s amazing that radio is still so prevalent today (Via Engadget):

On Dec. 24, 1906, Fessenden fired up his transmitting station at Brant Rock, Mass., a small village about 50 kilometres from Boston. Together with his wife Helen, a secretary and a small crew, Fessenden started his broadcast at 9:00 p.m. with a brief speech, followed by a Edison phonograph recording of Handel’s “Largo.”

Apparently Fessenden earned over 500 patents during his lifetime, had a U.S. Navy destroyer named after him, and was paid $2.5 million by the U.S. Radio Trust in 1928 for his contribution to radio technology.

Kind of odd that I’ve never heard of him before! As broadcast journalism professor Len Arminio says:

“Fessenden was a true Canadian genius,” said Arminio. “He got lost in the historic shuffle, and that’s too bad.”

Happy Birthday broadcast radio!

Read: Canoe

Wow…Google Checkout really hates Canada

Post ImageYou may recall that when Google launched their Checkout service back in June, I posted about how Canadian merchants were left out in the cold. I went back to the site every couple weeks hoping to see that Canada had been added as a valid merchant country, but it never happened. I gave up around late August and haven’t been back to the site since, until today.

John Battelle posted this morning about a promotion Google Checkout is running for the holidays. I figured, what the heck, might as well check. Nope, still only American merchants allowed. Then I stumbled on the page titled: Google Checkout is available to buyers with billing addresses in…

I was shocked that Canada wasn’t on the list. Then I figured that maybe they left countries like Canada and the US off the list because it was assumed that they were valid countries. Nope. As you can see, the US as well as The United Kingdom are both on the list. The Vatican, Kazakhstan, and Namibia all made the list, yet Canada didn’t.

Either they screwed up and forgot to put Canada on that page, or they screwed up because they don’t allow Canadians to use the service. Unacceptable either way.

UPDATE (12/8/2006): I just checked the page again, and Canada now appears on the list. I wonder if my post had anything to do with it?

Read: Google Checkout

Passports required for U.S. entry starting January 2007

Post ImageI guess this means I am going to have to get my passport renewed. Today, the U.S. Homeland Security Secretary revealed that the United States will start requiring travelers entering the country to show passports beginning January 23rd:

The department had been expected to institute the passport requirement for air travelers around the beginning of the year. Setting the date on Jan. 23 pushes the start past the holiday season.

The requirement marks a change for Americans, Canadians, Bermudians and some Mexicans.

No more driver’s license or birth certificate to gain entry. The article mentions that only about one quarter of Americans have a passport. I wonder what the numbers are like here in Canada?

Read: Yahoo News

Maclean's sucks up to the U of A

Post ImageI don’t know about you, but today I lost all remaining respect that I had for Maclean’s magazine. The annual ranking of Canadian universities came out, and the University of Alberta placed first in the reputational ranking. Kind of suspect, don’t you think, considering the U of A led the charge to boycott the rankings due to suspect methodologies. If there was any doubt about why the U of A and 26 other universities chose to boycott the ranking, I think it’s gone now. Nothing says guilty like sucking up.

If you’d like to see past results, the University of Waterloo has a handy page with all the data – not surprising considering they have ranked first in 13 out of 16 years the rankings have been produced.

For its part, the University of Alberta stands by the earlier decision, though Provost and Vice President (Academic) Carl Amrhein said placing first “certainly feels good.” I guess that’s a fairly diplomatic answer.

Read: Maclean’s