My thoughts on “Youth and the News” circa 2006

In early 2006 I was kindly asked by the Canadian Media Research Consortium to give the opening talk at their Youth and the News conference. At the time I was editor at Dose. 

My talk went down about as comfortably as an, um… enema with the mostly older crowd of publishers, news directors and other execs (I had some support from the students). Anyway, obviously a heck of a lot has changed in media and technology since April 2006 but it’s fun to look back. I hope you get something out of the slides, even if it’s just a laugh. 

Wonder no longer

I spent some of last week working from the Rogers Center and just outside our window they were setting up for a Wiggles show. Ever wondered what it looks like to build a stage for The Wiggles? Wonder no longer…

Setting up for a Wiggles show from Pema Hegan on Vimeo.

Rogers wireless: “300MB for $20″

In the spirit of sharing, I thought I’d let you know about a call I had with a Rogers customer service rep tonight…

I have a first generation hacked iPhone and some very good legacy calling plans + extras from Rogers. I’ve decided not to upgrade to the new iPhone so I called Rogers tonight to see if they could upgrade my data plan to something better than the 10MB I have right now.

I end up chatting with a lovely rep. She looked into the available data plans and offered me 300MB for $30 a month. Not bad. Then she said “because you’re so nice” and offered me a $10 per month credit on my account. So that’s 300MB for $20 – a pretty good deal in my humble opinion.

I asked if this was 3G or EDGE and she said I could use the data on either. I didn’t take her up on the offer right away because I want to look at a couple of other options first. She said I could call back to activate the plan anytime.

If you are looking for a data upgrade without going for an iPhone it might be worth calling Rogers and asking about this.

Hope this helps!

Photo by: AcdBulls

GigPark is on TechCrunch :)

Just a short post to let you all know that Erick Schonfeld of TechCrunch has just written a great article about our baby, GigPark. A fantastic way to finish a fun week at work!

The killer quote: “I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather get recommendations from people I know or who I can ask about than from anonymous strangers.”

Clever people saying smart things

The Mesh Conference is coming up in a couple of weeks and, in my humble opinion, there is likely to be some clever people saying smart things. If you are in the music, media, marketing or tech startup worlds, and if Toronto isn’t too far away, I highly recommend you come along. The keynote lineup looks good and there will be plenty of interesting people to meet over the 3 days.

Some of the sessions I’m looking forward to:

• Keynote discussion with Ethan Kaplan, head of technology at Warner Music
• Michael Geist’s presentation on Digital Activism
• Founders Stories, moderated by Paul Kedrosky
• My friend Mike Masnick from TechDirt talking about the “economic opportunities of abundance“

I was also lucky enough to be invited to participate in a panel. Candice Faktor (toronto.com/OurFaves.com), Daniel Burka (Digg.com) and I will be chatting with Mathew Ingram about The New Font Page…

In the past, the front page of the newspaper or the TV news was our main source of information. Now, as media becomes social, we are just as likely to see a link on Digg or StumbleUpon, or get sent one through Pownce, or see one on a friend’s blog. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? Some feel this is making us more narrow in our interests, as we see only the content our friends agree is important, but others see these “recommendation engines” as a positive thing. Join Daniel Burka of Digg and Pema Hegan of GigPark in a discussion about how the Web is the new front page, moderated by Mathew Ingram.

I’m sure Candice, Daniel and Mathew will put on a good show. I’ll muddle along in my funny accent and try to keep up ;)

See you at Mesh!

Smart money

In mid April Rick Segal is setting out across Canada to help educate us tech entrepreneurs about funding our companies. I’ve booked my ticket. Have you?

If you’ve met Rick (or read his great blog) you’ll know he calls a spade a spade, despises bullshit, and knows a great deal about the mechanics of funding (and running) a startup.  He is a partner at JLA Ventures so going to one of these sessions might turn into more than just an education.

Even if you’re not looking for funding right now (as is the case with GigPark) these will be great sessions to grow your knowledge in an important area of entrepreneurship.

Photo by Pieter Baert.

GigPark opens to the public

After a fantastic invite only period, GigPark is now open to the public. No more invites – everyone is free to join.

Those of you who have been following this blog for a while know that I’ve been working on GigPark since early 2007. Today the whole team and I were incredibly proud to let our baby leave the nest ;).

Were were also lucky enough to have our friends Jevon and Mathew blog about the launch, and for Mashable to review the site today.

We’ve got a long way to go, but today was a great milestone for GigPark.

Silicon Valley tradition coming to Toronto

This is a great idea! If you are interested in meeting some smart entrepreneurs and technology people head over here and see if there are any tickets left.

Thanks to Leila and the team at Idee for bringing this great Silicon Valley tradition to Toronto!

The new NationalPost.com – two months in

Two months back I wrote about the relaunch of nationalpost.com. I think it was a huge improvement and it seems, from the numbers, like people agree.

There is still some work to do Vs their main competition (for newspaper websites anyway) but things are headed in the right direction.

Cautionary note: This chart is from Alexa – it’s probably a good indication of trends but actual numbers could be way off.

Want to join GigPark?

GigPark, our startup, is humming along. We’ve only been out of beta for a few weeks but already our membership has more than tripled. Yay!

You need to be invited by a member to join GigPark. Luckily I’m a member ;) so if anyone would like an invite just drop me a line: pema AT gigpark DOT com

For those that don’t already know, GigPark is a web community that lets you find the services you need with the help of your friends. Check out the homepage, about and FAQ for more info.