Every few months I do a slough of Vancouver Blogger Profiles. Admittedly, some of the profiles are not for those in or from our fair city, but they’re important and entertaining all the same. I should have a few mini and formulaic interviews lined up for this week so here’s the first on this season’s series, featuring Mostly Lisa.
Who are you? I am Lisa Bettany aka Mostly Lisa.
What is your blog? I blog at MostlyLisa.com. I’m currently looking at doing some guest spots on a few mac geeky sites, but right now I find it challenging enough just keeping my own blog up to date.
Are you originally from Vancouver? I’m a Prairie girl by birth. Saskatoon specifically, but I spent most of my childhood in Victoria, BC. As soon as I was finished high school, I trekked all over Canada to pursue my ice dance dreams. Male figure skating partners are hard to come by, and the ones you do find rarely have an amicable personality or a personality that didn’t clash with mine, so I had to move around a lot in search of a new partner almost every year. After I was badly injured (dropped by partner from lift onto back… ouch, I returned home to finish off my Bachelor’s degree and Master’s degree in Linguistics at the University of Victoria.
When I graduated, I moved to a gorgeous, but tiny and overpriced apartment in Coal Harbour. After 6 months of trying and failing to find a job in my field, I decided to throw in my academic towel and do something creative. I put more effort into my acting and modeling careers, started a blog, wrote some music, learned photography, video editing, and started a multimedia company. Just like that: one, two, three: Easy peasy…. Mostly.
What’s your favourite thing to write about? Anything I can be sarcastic about, which is pretty much anything.
In your eyes, what is the BEST part of blogging… or if you prefer, the worst? Best part is the connections you make with amazing people, and getting to peak into the happening of their life. The feedback is also lovely. Sometimes it’s just nice to know other people are going through the same things you are.
The worst part is the 404s that literally crop up everyday. I am a perfectionist to a fault, and I edit and re-edit my posts, even after I’ve posted them. It’s never ending. Sometimes I find a typo on an old post, or just some bad grammar and I literally turn bright red.
Do you write for yourself, your readers, for Google, for a living? Tricky question. I’ve always had a passion for writing. I was in a journalism program in university, before I switched to linguistics. I started my blog as an anti-blog of “diary-style†bloggers who write about every mundane, inappropriate, and sexually explicit thing in their daily lives. So from the very beginning, I wrote for the sheer joy of expressing myself.
Lately, I’ve found myself posting a lot for my readers by keeping my blog dynamic and constantly changing. If I talk about tech stuff for a few days, I’ll flip it and do a photo post, or a silly video.
But, I would be lying if I said that I never consider the google, digg, technorati bot in what I write. I think every blogger is pushing for a bigger readership, respect, and recognition. There is a point where blogging becomes more than a hobby and starts infringing on the amount of time you can spend actually earning money. So at that point, you have to push your blog to next level and go after sponsors and ads.
Would you ever censor yourself/Do you feel the need to censor yourself? I don’t swear. Ever. Unless, like my mother, you consider “bollocks†a swear. I don’t talk about politics or religion or really controversial issues. I want people to come to Mostly Lisa be entertained, not get angry. I’m not interested in angry debates. Sunshine, lollipops, and iPods!
PC, Mac or Speak n’ Spell: I am quite partial to my Speak & Spell as it is sharp as a whip and without it I might not be able to spell very gud. But my Mac is my everything. I literally hold it in my arms and feel all my dreams coming true. Well, until an app crashes. Then I curse all things Steve Jobs.
Blogs you read or would recommend: I subscribe to about 100 blogs and sites that I check frequently. First, how could I not read Miss604? I would not know a single happening in Vancouver without it.
I also check my good friend, Christina Warren’s blog , who writes for TUAW. She has some serious sass and tech know-how.
For Photography inspiration, I hit up Strobist.
For design inspiration I’ll go to Best Web Gallery, or Web Designer Wall.
For productivity advice, I love Merlin Mann’s 43 Folders and the sweet illustrations & advice at Put things off.
& to find out the latest, greatest 2.0 trends, I go to iJustine’s jam packed media smorgasbord. I also love Gavin Strange’s weekly super long posts of his life as a skateboarding designer extraordinaire. And Jake and Amir is always good for a laugh.
Just a quick update on the UGM website and blog that was recently launched.
As the official blog of Union Gospel Mission in Vancouver, BC, The Street aims to share stories of hope from our daily work with people in need here in the Lower Mainland
I met local web monetization guru John Chow when we were given a preview and tour of the social media tools the Union Gospel Mission in Metro Vancouver is using to connect with their donors, workers, and those in the community. That day John pledged on his blog that he would match donations made by his users, up to $1,000 a piece. The grand total from John and his blog readers came to an amazing $7,517.91 for the UGM.
As a side story, Kevan was telling me about the naming of the mannequin, Gertrude, at the UGM Thrift Store and I suggested they use the power of their Flickr account to show her off and get some exposure for some of the fashions available at the store.
You can now view the Gertrude set on their Flickr and you can see her in person at the store located at Heatley and E Hastings.
I think this just might be my 20th live blog. I’m heading over to Workspace in a bit to take in An Evening of “Green” Web 2.0:
Social change makers and web innovators come together at NetTuesdays to mix, swap stories, and collaborate on new ideas. Whether you’re working in the nonprofit/social change sector or in Vancouver ‘s technology hub (or somewhere in between!) – you’re invited to join us for great conversations, networking, and community building! [Upcoming]
This is a part of the NetTuesday / NetSquared group of events and is sponsored by Communicopia, Workspace, and Write Image. More to come from Workspace in about an hour then I’ll have some quick writeups from the speakers’ talks.
Update – 17:38: I just took the elevator up to Workspace with Darren Barefoot and Nancy and walked into my first NetTuesday event. I talked a little shop with Nancy before finally meeting Cinci and her colleague Phoebe, and had a brief chat with Narvey who is sponsoring this evening’s snacks. I’ve also just been handed my first bit of swag (ChalkWork stickers) from James.
Update – 18:03: Raul just popped on by toting a cup made of corn, a paper plate, and I’m sure if what he was eating warranted it, he’d have one of those utensils made of potato as well. Chilling out with Karen Parker, and Colleen Coplick, it looks like things will be getting underway shortly with an intro first by Joe.
Update – 18:08: First up is Owen who is speaking on behalf of Earth Hour, an event I was invited to attend on Facebook a few months ago but was unsure of the premise until today. The idea is to “unplug” for an hour and disconnect all non-essential lights. This will be taking place at 8:00pm on March 29, 2008 and reminds me of “Turn it Off” that I blogged about last year, it was quite the sight to see a very dark Lions Gate Bridge.
Owen’s company will also be helping companies and organizations (like UBC) reduce their energy emissions and green house gases.
Update – 18:14: “Locally based sustainability projects are the most important,” states Ron who is the founder and mastermind behind happyfrog. Ron speaks to communities, cities, countries etc. and their footprints on the earth. With happyfrog Ron wanted to step forward with an independent media project that could harness web 2.0 and social media tools to accelerate and nurture green, local, and alternative resources within a single database. “Think of happyfrog as the economic 100 mile diet.”
Lastly, Ron promotes the EPIC expo (April 18-21) where happyfrog will have their own media team blogging and pondcasting.
PS – Nancy is live-twittering and Raul is liveblogging.
Update – 18:25: Rex from TheGreenPages.ca is up next, “sharing your stories about the environment,” since 1996. It’s aimed to be more than a ‘yellow pages’ of environmentally conscious listings, it’s to share your stories, news and events as well. Rex’s presentation focuses a lot on the story of the website, even since its creation with Netscape Communicator back in the day. It’s taken a lot of maintenance, administration, live chat moderation etc. but with today’s web tools the site’s management has become a breeze – at least I hope as this guy’s paid his dues, even by creating his own CMS in 2001.
Note, Rex is using a travel mug for his beverage.
He’s gone from cataloging a hundred links, to several thousand, even inspiring Environment Canada to update their systems using his directories as templates. Rex added book reviews, commenting capabilities and creating user accounts for contributors, realizing that the way to go was with blogging and blogging tools.
Update – 18:51: Darren is speaking on behalf of his company, Capulet Communications who developed DeSmogBlog. He’s got a nicely laminated piece of cardboard that features a tag cloud. The audience gets to pick the tag of their choice so he’ll speak to “widgets” first. “DeSmogBlog said hey why don’t we create a counter widget that counts up based on humans’ environmental footprint on the planet,” Darren pauses, “I thought my, how incredibly depressing.” Along with DeSmogBlog, they were able to create the first climate change website widget (per Apple’s widget database).
Moving on to another tag in the cloud, Darren explains how they are using digg to “clear the PR smog,” by appealing to its users that who controversy and climate change. This also ties into the blogger outreach cloud, which uses community (link love and shared digg traffic) to get messages out. As for YouTube videos, they’re not always the best way to go when you compare the amount of work involved, compared to views and links back to your website. FYI, Facebook ad click-throughs are pretty close to horrible. However, creating a flash web game that sorted celebrities based on their “green-ness” proved to be an interactive way to engage a broad audience and people could even embed it on their website.
David Drucker just asked a question, remind me to go say hi to him after this.
Darren speaks to measuring the success rates of these applications, widgets and campaigns by simply using Google Analytics and Technorati although, “it kind of sucks now and there’s not really a better replacement yet.”
The objective this evening was to find ways to use the tools of the internet to get an environmentally sound message out to the widest audience possible. Whether you’re an activist, a green-thumb, a PR professional or a website developer, these are some of the mediums you can use that all encompass different aspects of social media. Why is social media important? It’s a cheap, often free way to branch out to millions of users around the globe, informing and encouraging participation in these movements.
With that, we’re done for the evening. Some folks are heading to Steamworks to catch the rest of the Canucks game but I have a man at home who is hopefully keeping a spot warm for me on the couch.
Aside from Raul, who is finishing up his doctorate in environmental studies, and DaveO who works for happyfrog and was there at Clayoquot, I’d have to say Keira’s one of my most eco-conscious friends.
A few weeks ago she wrote a blog post inspired by words printed on the side of a Starbucks cup. As a result, she was asked why she gets the paper cups in the first place, and was told she should be using a travel mug. Her explanation to me was that her coffees just don’t taste the same coming out of a travel mug.
Talking with John yesterday, he said he’s the only person in his department at work that actually recycles his paper coffee cups. He said he’d try a travel mug if it didn’t insulate so well – as in, it still allowed for a slow cooling of the coffee so it becomes a drinkable heat by the time you get it back to your desk.
As for me? I try travel mugs but I always end up forgetting them at work. I need to make sure nothing will spill out the top on my way in, and then remember to wash them out when I’m done. If I don’t wash it out I won’t put it in my purse to cart home for the next morning cause it’ll be dirty and drippy. It soon becomes a part of the dish washing machine at work that I perpetually forget to recover.
I suppose save for my general laziness when it comes to the travel mugs, I could spare some lovely trees from a venti-sized doom if I simply found an ideal cup. Let’s put it to a Miss604 poll (since coffee and Miss604 polls seem to be a trend [1][2]) although unfortunately is the only one now in existence since the others got nuked when I upgraded my WP and changed hosts.
[Poll Closed]
If you don’t use either or have a reusable cup of choice, leave a comment below. Also, Salt Spring Organic Coffee…. is amazingly tasty.
Since my niece walked up to me a few months ago and said, “Miss604 dot com!” I figure she may be watching today (and that I need to remember to keep things pretty clean around here).
She is the oldest sister of 4 brothers, and was my Oma’s first great-grandchild, my mother and father’s first grandchild, and the reason they started calling me Auntie Becky in the first place.
She’s one of the most clever little people you’ll ever meet and by the age of two was able to tell you in which country she lived, the capital, and who was the Prime Minister. She’s not an overly girlie girl, like her mother and I, she’ll tell you what’s on her mind and her intelligence is never to be underestimated.
Throughout her 8 years she’s been speaking two languages, and has been able to crack a knock knock joke that can simply turn any frown upside down. I have saved every card she ever made for me and mailed over when I lived in Boston – from my birthday, to Valentine’s and Easter. She’ll always have a special place in my heart, even moreso that in every way she reminds me of one of the most important people in my life.
We’ve come a long way from the year 2000, when it took my sister and I twenty minutes to prep a stroller to take her baby girl for a walk to the store, and I can’t wait to be here to watch my niece grow. Happy Birthday Lexi!!
