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Author: Stephane Daury

  • Zoo York AM Getting Paid 2009 – Semi-Finals and Finals

    [vimeo http://www.vimeo.com/5813517 w=600&h=345]

    Zoo York AM Getting Paid 2009 – Sunday from Stephane Daury, for Thrasher Magazine.

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  • Zoo York AM Getting Paid 2009 – Saturday

    [vimeo http://vimeo.com/5812019 w=600&h=345]

    Zoo York AM Getting Paid 2009 – Saturday from Stephane Daury, for Thrasher Magazine.

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  • Zoo York AM Getting Paid 2009 – Photo Gallery

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  • On Twitter Follow Fridays and Why I Rarely Participate

    I’ve been feeling more than a bit guilty about very rarely returning the favor for people who include me in their Twitter “Follow Fridays“, so I felt a short explanation was in order. Please do keep in mind that there are the exceptions that do break the rule and do not fall under the following umbrella, but:

    1. I find this practice loses most of its impact as posters try to cram as many users in 140 characters as possible, therefore not explaining why you should or might want to follow the people they list. This ultimately shifts the effort to whoever decides to go investigate the suggested users on their own, which in and of itself rather defeats the purpose of human-powered suggestions at its base.
    2. Compound the latter with the fact that people do not want to offend anyone and end up posting (or reposting) dozens of them throughout the day, and the value of such a practice is now quasi-entirely diluted, often annoying even.
    3. An increasing number of people (aka: spammers) really use the #followfriday (or #ff) tag to ultimately bring their own follower count up or similarly, to increase the follower count of users that are in fact directly tied to themselves (pseudonyms, their clients, etc) and for their own benefit.

    In the end, you pretty much end up with two types of new followers through the above patterns:

    1. people who will not take the time to find out why they should follow you and will just follow anyone in a sheep-like fashion (meh, rarely valuable from a conversational perspective)
    2. or people who once again will simply add you in hope that you will automatically follow back and possibly bring their own follower count by one more person.

    All this said, I do truly relate to the concept of recommending people as subjects of interest to your friends and I in fact do follow a few very good individuals discovered through the Follow Friday meme. This is in part why you will find me reposting (retweeting, redenting, etc) other people’s posts maybe more than others do (or would want), which I think gives a much clearer indication of why following (or sometimes avoiding) a person could be valuable to you.

    So there you have it. Since I’m not against the concept, just its increasingly usual application, I’ll try to add my own twist to it all instead, aiming to retain its intended spirit while making it as valuable for you, the subject(s) and myself as possible. The other perspective here is that I’d also very much like to do the same for services other than Twitter, such as Identica, Vimeo, Flickr, etc.

    So in the end, I have decided to start proceeding with something that I somewhat did in my post on WordCamp Montreal 2009: I’ll use my blog to not only tell you why you might want to follow the people I’ll showcase, but also why you maybe should follow them on some services rather than others (EG: someone might post incredible photos on Flickr, yet be a total waste of your time on Twitter).

    For this week, you can refer to the post on WordCamp Montreal that I’ve mentioned above, the subject being rather self-explanatory, and I’ll start the series next week.

  • WordCamp Montreal 2009 High and Complete Lack of Lows

    WordCamp Montreal 2009 PosterAs Arach said it best, even a day later:

    Seems to me like most participants of #wcmtl are still on some sort of high. Meeting smart and nice people is better than drugs.

    It was indeed too much geeky goodness crammed into one weekend for most attendees, just as much as for yours truly, to wean ourselves off all of it by Monday. 🙂

    I’ll have to admit right away that I missed most of the actual sessions, because I kept “being volunteered” for such duties as WordPress Gangsta doorman and sit-down-next-to-me-during-my-talk-in-case-I-have-a-panic-attack’aid (true, ALL of it was fun). But from what I read, people seem to have enjoyed what they’ve seen and to have gotten answers to the questions they might have had.

    On the other hand, being so heavily invested in WordPress through Praized Media and other projects/contributions/pipe-dreams, learning wasn’t what I was expecting for myself at the event, but mostly to get to “tribe up” with other people as passionate about the platform as I have now been for years. And, boy, was my wish ever granted!

    Apologizing profusely for not being able to list everyone I’ve had the pleasure to meet, I truly had wonderful talks and/or plain old fun with the following people. Most of which is leading to enough ideas to keep us all busy until WordCamp Montreal 2010 (which I hereby predict will be twice as big and happen during the Jazz Fest again. Somehow… 😉

    Here we go, in alphabetical order, by Twitter username, no bias:

    • @alexaclark – Alexa Clarck, with whom I had as much fun talking about her Cheap Eats Toronto and Cheap Eats Ottawa books/blogs/venture as I did talking about and enjoying Montreal’s food and restaurants.
    • @amoyal – Arié Moyal, who if nothing else (and there IS more) has lit the way to me desperately wanting to watch the Hebrew Hammer.
    • @arach – Arach Tchoupani, a skilled Python charmer with whom I had a great time talking about World politics, and thanks to (or because of) whom I was delivered the best pickup line by a woman in a bar in my entire life. A bit late for that girly-girl, married and 3 kids: can’t touch this! (♫ ta tadada tada tada ♫)
    • @digibomb – Brendan Sera-Shriar, who beta launched FlashPress, and with whom, I was apparently (and rightly so) “separated at birth and reunited at #wcmtl“. I’d say we clicked on so many levels, along with Pier-Luc and Arié, it’s actually kinda scary. 😉
    • @erinblaskie – Erin Blaskie, who despite being a fiery ball of lifestream smarts and energy, slept through her 12PM checkout on day 2. ☚ Ha ha! That’s what Montreal will do to ya. 😉
    • @evablue – Eva Blue, indie photographer extraordinaire, with whom I had a few extra-hilarious moments and who in my humble opinion, took most of the coolest shots of the weekend.
    • @photomatt – Matt Mullenweg, with whom I had a fun and casual chat ranging from high availability/fault tolerant database architectures, as well as the OpenMicroblogging specification and how it could pertain to our favorite codebase(s). I do have to call him on being a BIG TEASE though, because he left me with a maybe-not-so-utopic-web seeekreeet cliff hanger at the after-party Saturday night from which I still haven’t recouped from. Shame on you Matt. J’accuse!
    • @pluc – Pier-Luc Petitclerc, with whom I had a blast, pure and simple! Nothing new there, really. Business as usual.

    All in all, I do not think that Sylvain Carle (@afrongnthevalley [en], @sylvaincarle [fr]) and Jeremy Clarke (@jeremyclarke) could have done a better job of organizing this first WordCamp Montreal. I mean, 160+ attendees/speakers from 2 countries for a quasi-free ($30, including free food/drinks) and theoretically local/regional-by-nature tech event spells success to me. Mega-props to these two for making this event happen, and to all of the speakers and attendees for making it the success it has been.

    And then of course, there were the Brooklyn Sailors moments. Coz that’s how we roll [out kickass Open Source software]! 🙂

    wordcamp gangstas 3

    Brendan (left) and I (right) being our usual silly selves. Photo by Eva Blue.

  • BMX/Skate Spots: Rails, Rails, Rails, and More Rails

    Montreal, July 1st 2009: Not sure why, but I got stuck on a rails trip as I was roaming the city this Canada Day. I’ll be frank, I wouldn’t even try quite a few of the following, but I thought I’d “document them” anyway. 🙂

  • Confined Spaces: 360 Over Spine to Flare, in a 10' Space!

    The Taz Skatepark‘s staff rolls in two quarterpipes at night to leave room for speed skating on Sunday morning. So the monthly BMX jam crew decided to give the unusual setup a try. Here’s what Charles Deschamps did with it. 🙂

    [vimeo http://www.vimeo.com/5357597 w=500&h=288]

    Here’s more riding by Charles for your enjoyment.

    [vimeo http://vimeo.com/4883471 w=500&h=281]

  • Fresh Batch of Montreal Street BMX/Skate Spots

    If you’re a Montrealer, you’ll probably know most of these spots. If you’re not and happen to be in our great city, finding yourself wanting to ride them, I guess you’ll just have to ask me where they are. 😉

  • Death of the 'Stache

    I never thought I’d blog about a TV show, but learning that My Name is Earl has now officially been canceled, and this despite the grass root effort to save it on Twitter (@EarlTwitition, #SaveEarl),  is really kind of bumming me out…

    picture-4

    For once that there was a show that was “preaching” for simply being a good human being, with no pedantic or overly religious aspect… Yes, the belief in karma is indeed anchored in religion (arguably philosophy), but it was so far removed from the environment featured in the show (White Trash America) that it had no theological bearings in this context.

    All in all, it’s big shame and I’m going to miss the Hickey crew.

    Well, I guess it’s back to professional skateboarding for Jason Lee then. 😉

    [googlevideo]http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8243576639201311670[/googlevideo]

  • Spots Spots Spots! Or How I See my Daily Bike Commute.

    Well, I enjoyed posting Montreal BMX/skate spots pictures the other day, so here’s a fresh batch. These are some if the most obvious “drive-by” spots right on the path of my daily bike commute to/from work. 🙂