Photo Credit: Roland Tanglao

The people I have featured in my What The Surrey or Surrey File series are not your stereotypical products of Surrey that other Metro Vancouverites or Canadians tend to imagine.

I’m extremely proud to have been born and raised in Surrey and the people of the city are hard-working, dedicated, determined, unbelievably driven and intelligent individuals. A prime example is Paul Hillsdon, a high school student who will be running for City Council in 2008.

Over the past year or so, as my projects have come and gone I’ve become frustrated. I developed policies and plans to fix many of the problems I encountered in daily life. I created the South of Fraser Transit 2011 proposal because transit is lackluster out here. I created the Surrey Cycling Initiative because biking anywhere wasn’t a safe or viable transportation alternative in my city. I created the Transit Metropolis Vancouver vision because I wanted to be able to move around the region quickly, comfortably, and cheaply. [Paul Hillsdon]

I first discovered Paul after he found me, leaving a comment on a blog post of mine about transit in September 2007. I’ve been following his projects since including my current favourite, Civic Surrey. We then met in December at TransitCamp Vancouver [PaulHillsdon][Miss604].

Paul is also the brains behind numerous transit and sustainability initiatives and proposals in the region and by running in the municipal elections, I think we’re all hoping his well-researched ideas come to fruition. His platform revolves around four pillars: Sustainable Development, Green Spaces, Transportation Options, and Vibrant Communities.

According to the Surrey Now, “If successful is his bid, it’s believed Hillsdon would be the youngest member to ever hold a seat on council.”

You can find all of this information and more on his campaign site, PaulIn08.com which contains a blog on which you can ask him questions. It’s times like these I still wish I lived in Surrey, but I’m pretty sure I could get my family members to rally for Team Hillsdon (at least they better!)

If you would like to support Paul’s effort consider clicking on that donate tab on his site, writing about his efforts on your blog (or newspaper… or talk about him on your radio station) and look for his name on the Surrey City Council ballot this fall.

Due to family business this morning (which always comes before the blogging world) I had to miss about 85% of DrupalCamp Vancouver.

The good news is that John was here all day and the first words out of his mouth when he saw me were, “whoa! there’s some really cool theming going on.” This leads me to believe he’ll have much better wrap up posts than I will so I’ll simply syndicate some information and pics.

All photos here are © Roland Tanglao, click on the pics for their links on Flickr.

Information from the sessions can be found on the DrupalCamp Vancouver website and I’ll try to get a couple posts out of John as well.

VIDFEST (Vancouver International Digital Festival) 2008 is fast-approaching and I’m just now beginning to comprehend how many elements, conferences, galas and events all fit under its 4-day festival umbrella.

The Vancouver International Digital Festival is an event for the top creative minds working in digital media. Join visionaries from games and digital entertainment, Web 2.0, interactive design, animation and mobile applications, at this annual ‘must-attend’ in Vancouver, Canada. [VIDFEST]

Here is some more info from their “core facts” sheet:

There are several local webby companies up for PopVox Awards and anyone is encouraged to head to the website and vote for your favourite in categories ranging from Best Digital Animated Short, Best Mobile (Game) to Best Do-Gooder site (Social Change Initiative) or Homegrown Award (Best BC-based Venture).

Some nominees close to my heart include, ChangeEverything, Strutta, MemeLabs, Now Public, and the Knob Hockey folks (just to name a few).

Here’s a quick condensed version of the festival schedule overall:

May 21st – VIDFEST and VIGS Opening Reception at the Vancouver Art Gallery

May 22nd – International Partnering Forum (IPF) and Convergence 2008 (featuring my panel, yay!), then Happy Hour

May 23rd – Creative Exchange Conference (featuring speakers such as Heather “Dooce” Armstrong and Chris Anderson of Wired with the Keynote), Schmooze Lounge and the PopVox Awards

May 24th – Pitch ‘n’ Play and Recruiting Fair

There’s a TON of action going on having to do with all facets of digital media. You can purchase single tickets for Chris Anderson’s keynote, or daily passes for each of the mini festivals within starting at $50 for the PopVox Awards ceremony only, going up to $375 for VIP, and $875 for a joint pass for VIGS and VIDFEST.

Here are a few more tips and tricks that I’ve come across in the Twitter microblogging community:

Twemes: First introduced at DemoCamp by Rochelle Grayson, Twemes is a website that comprehensively sorts and categorizes the things people Twitter about as long as they put a hashtag in front of it. Example, those currently at DrupalCamp Vancouver will be Twittering and including #DCV08 in their updates. If I go to Twemes, or the DrupalCamp website that is aggregating the Tweme, I can see filtered updates specifically pertaining to #DCV08 because of that tag.

Hashtags: I discovered this months after Twemes was released and it follows the same concept although you need to add a “bot” to your account to use it. For Twemes, you don’t need to do anything except start using a hashtag in your keywords/updates.

TwitBin: An alternative to Twitterfox, this slips your Twitter steam into your Firefox sidebar.

Twidget: Add a Twitter widget to your Mac’s dashboard.

Twitter Local: Hat tip to Jeremy Latham for Twittering about this earlier. You can filter updates to only view those from people within your geographical vicinity

Twinkle: Hat tip to Jenn Loether and John Biehler: “A location aware Twitter client. It features a slick presentation not unlike the web version of PocketTweats but also locates you and enables you to see who else is using Twinkle near you.” – [JohnBiehler.com]

Twitter Tweet Sheet: “There’s one things that annoys me about Twitter. Okay, there are two things: 1. They are always down. 2. There doesn’t seem to be one official place (including their own site) to get a complete list of mobile and IM commands.” – [Jason Theodor.com] Jason compiled an “easy to print” card that you can take with you for on-the-go Twittering.

From TweetClouds

And just for kicks you can read more about “Top Twitter Apps” on these lovely sites:

Thanks to the effort of many hardworking folks, DrupalCamp Vancouver officially launched this evening at Flux Bistro in Gastown.

Drupal is a free software package that allows an individual or a community of users to easily publish, manage and organize a wide variety of content on a website. [Drupal]

Until Saturday evening the city will be overrun with Drupalists from across this great nation to learn, discuss, code and partake in some of the following:

John and I had a chance to talk to Glenn of Image X Media, chat with a few familiar faces, give DaveO lots of hugs, then send our tired selves home.

If you’re heading to the sold out DrupalCamp make sure to tag any photos on Flickr with “dcv08” and hashtag your updates in Twitter with “#dcv08“.