10. Because you don't bring down a government without at least trying to hold some civil-but-firm negotiations.
9. Because criticizing a plan without offering any specific alternatives is wack.
8. Because the Bloc is crazy and you shouldn't get into partnerships with crazy people.
7. Because St]]> Tue, 02 Dec 2008 01:32:19 -0800 http://virb.com/kevan/posts/text/958796 http://virb.com/kevan/posts/text/950268 As of November 4, 2008, the future of non-profit fundraising has been sealed: it's on the web. I am sensing a frenzied agitation and excitement amongst business leaders who are CRAVING the type of raging success demonstrated by Obama's online fundraising campaign, and it's reaching a frightening level of hype.

I am feeling the frenzy too. I'm reading The World is Flat right now, and it's making me realize that there are trends well underway that I should have been aware of at least 3 years ago. All non-profits need to be actively pursuing a strong, thorough strategy for the web, tightly integrated with ALL other communication tools the organization is using. It can't be ignored anymore.

The web is both attractive and urgent right now, but we need to maintain temperance and caution in any strategy we pursue. Of course it's the future -- it has been for years. But let's not be rash about it. Here are a few rules to help us keep our heads on straight:

1. SOFTWARE IS NOT THE ANSWER

There is absolutely no point in buying an expensive donation management system if you have no internal strategy behind it. If you're investing in your online giving technology, please, please, please make sure that your staff know what to do with it: does it integrate with your donor database? Does it issue tax receipts? Is the transaction fee reasonable? Have you shopped around to compare services and features? Have you looked at the free and open-source alternatives? Do not swoon at the first software salesperson that comes digi-knocking.

2. PEOPLE ARE THE ANSWER

Even as we explore all the different Web 2.0 tools, online giving options, and social networking sites, one fact remains unchanged: it's the people behind these things that make them work. Never lean on Facebook to deliver results: it's not a machine made up of parts, but of people and faces. People who are passionate about your cause will do more to promote you than your constant Twittering and YouTubing will ever do. Make sure you show them love.

3. GET EXPERTS ON BOARD

Hire a social media expert for your Development Department, and do it this week, if you haven't already. Hire somebody who know about the web, who knows social networking, and who is involved in the culture of the web -- and hopefully, somebody who knows about ROI, too. Trying to craft a viable online strategy if you don't even know about RSS is pretty risky, and you won't get the same kind of support and insight by outsourcing this kind of work.

4. IT'S YOUR CAUSE, NOT THE COMPUTER

The web is not "easy money." Yes, transactions are quick and simple, but people only give when presented with a cause they connect with. Please, learn from Obama, because his team used the web brilliantly, but don't fool yourself: his success is only 10% due to the technology, 90% due to other supporting factors, such as:
- A compelling personal narrative
- A well-controlled brand
- A captive nation-wide audience and presence on every single media outlet for the past 2 years
- A role of historical significance unparalleled in America's recent history
...to mention only four factors.

You've got more work to do than just "get up there" on the web. It's wonderful start, and by all means, run with it, but don't forget to be a well-rounded organization.

5. THE WEB IS WORTH INVESTING IN

As a direct counter-point to Rule Number One, sometimes you have to pay for services and software if you want to do the job well. Assuming you've done your homework and checked out the existing free or low-cost options, don't be afraid to part with some serious cash if you're getting a good product. Do the math, do your homework, and make sure that you're going to be getting an adequate return on your investment...then pay up.

6. JUST DIVE IN

Go to http://search.twitter.com and type in your organization's name. Read the results: that's what people are saying about you right now on Twitter. You don't have to stay on the outside looking in: you as an organization can start participating in that discussion within minutes.

This clip is "produced by" the South Park guys (Trey Parker and Matt Stone), but I put "produced" in quotes because all that means is their money and name is behind it, not their actual work and ideas and efforts. Nonetheless, the video make a deft comparison between the end of a musical score and the culmination of a life well-lived, and it made me stop at the end of the video and stare at the screen for about 20 seconds before moving onto other things. That kind of pause is, like, Remembrance Day on the Internet.

For repeat visitors to this blog of mine, you'll notice that the old homepage, with its magazine-like template, has been replaced with a new look, one which scrolls endlessly like a "conventional" blog. Why? An analysis of this year's usage patterns showed me that visitors weren't really clicking on the original homepage links, and just wanted the content quickly. Like any good blog owner, I listen to my readers. Or, rather, I spy on their browsing behaviour through sophisticated tracking software and then implement changes without consulting them.

Here's a look at what's been happening since I last published actual words on the Internet:

1. Aaron Fedora: A vote for Aaron is a vote for...eternal happiness

My friend Aaron Fedora is running for School Board Trustee in Langley, BC, and I've had the privilege of helping him out with some campaign advice over the past month, from copy-editing to design. Residents of Langley should visit Aaron's site and learn how Fedora's role on council could help the city out, and consider voting for Aaron Fedora on November 15.

2. Google Adsense: Baby, I'm a rich man

This month, I received my very first payment ever from Google. After a year and a half of running Google AdSense on this site, I finally made enough to receive a deposit of $100! Actually, thanks to the lousy Canadian dollar, the total come to $119. I took my wife to Chambar to celebrate. While it's probably Vancouver most delicious restaurant, it unfortunately means I now only have five bucks left from the original deposit.

3. Twitter: All the cool kids are doing it

The Internet's lamest-sounding service keeps getting cooler. Like many of you, I've been hearing about Twitter for over a year, but steadfastly ignoring it because of how stupid it seemed. However, as of a couple weeks ago, I'm now fully on board and loving it. So, an explanation: Twitter is a way to transmit tiny, 140-character blog posts to a network of friends, ideal for posting news updates and on-the-go commentary. Twitter played a big role in both the Canadian and American elections, with all major new outlets referring to Twitter users' commentary to instantly gauge public opinion. Companies and non-profits are finding Twitter to be a great communication tool, too. If you're a user of Twitter, be sure to follow Union Gospel Mission's Twitter updates to see what I mean. And while you're at it, add kevangilbert to your "following" list and say hello.

4. Elbowruminations: Now with the double the awesomness

Elbowruminations, possibly the most underrated blog ever known to man, is still extremely awesome. Neil and I just re-launched the site with an all-new design, courtesy of Lethbridge designer and developer Chris Morris. This is a website is that geared to designers and small-business owners, and will supply you with a tips, trends and review pertaining to all things designery.

And with that, the spell of negligence and publisher's block has been broken -- nay, shattered -- and the Internet continues, unfazed. Thanks for reading!

About the Article: When I was contacted by the editor of my old student newspaper about contributing an article for their "Secret Lives of Former Freshman" issue, I couldn't tell whether to sigh or high-five someone. The "Writing for Publication" series is supposed to be about progress -- getting published in new, larger publications with audiences, not in publications that you used to work for. Nonetheless, Mars' Hill, as the student publication of Trinity Western University, reaches an audience of about 3000 readers, which is a step up from this tiny blog o' mine...and besides, since it's a cute story, I'm republishing it here in the spirit of Writing for Publication.

How I Married My Freshman Sweetheart

When Kendra and I met each other in Orientation Week in our freshman year, it was as if the very hand of God reached down from the heavens and slapped a "This Is Your Spouse" sign on our foreheads. In fact, if I remember correctly, a chorus of swallows was chirping "I'm a Believer," and I saw a thousand gleaming angels cheering excitedly from atop the roof of Douglas Hall.

Asking Kendra, though, who has always had a sharper mind for the facts, it was more like a series of brief conversations where we barely remembered each other, followed by a couple talks where we remembered each other a little better, and then another where I asked for her phone number. Eventually, after a sequence of late evenings involving rolling abandoned tires down hills, climbing onto campus roofs and holding picnics on the train bridge, there was a lurching and awkward conversation around 3:00 am in the Lower Caf which included me somehow saying the words: "I like ya, kid."

That was when we started dating: in October of our first year, only one month into our four-year TWU experience. Like many couples before us such as Milo and Otis, Bonnie and Clyde, or Harold and Kumar, we began our adventure with no sense of what we were getting into, unsure of where we were going, and especially not what we'd do during the summers apart. (The answer was: write email. Megabytes upon megabytes of it.)

Starting in freshman year and successfully fumbling through second, third and fourth years, we both grew a lot: Kendra in maturity, and myself in body mass (I've gained over 50 pounds since first year, and I'm now at the record-smashing weight of nearly 160 lbs). To grow up, we had to remain independent, but to get to know each other, we had to keep together. It was like being the European Union, pre-1993.

It wasn't until two months after our Lower Caf DTR that we had our first official date, which involved walking into Fort Langley and eating Elvis Burgers at Planet Java's 50's Caf]]> Mon, 13 Oct 2008 08:43:06 -0700 http://virb.com/kevan/posts/text/870305 http://virb.com/kevan/posts/text/842890

Why not induce some premature nostalgia? This episode of The Pianimal unearths forgotten pop songs of the yester-decade, and gives them a pianamalistic makeover. Cher's "Believe" leaves the dance-hall behind, and becomes an earnest, folksy song about jaded love, while N'Sync's "Bye Bye Bye" kicks out the straight-eights and turns up the piano-amp to 11 to provide a near rock-'n-roll experience.

As you'll remember from episode 1, The Pianimal is recorded "semi-live," in only one take, with absolutely no edits in post-production. That means that any and all mess-ups (and hot damn, there are LOTS in this episode, with me still being mostly-sick and all) are left unchanged just for the live, living-room concert vibe.

This episode's tracklist:

1. Cher: Believe
2. Backstreet Boys: Larger Than Life
3. Britney Spears: Baby, One More Time (instrumental interlude)
4. N'Sync: Bye Bye Bye

Got nice things to say, or constructive feedback to send my way? Please comment, I promise I'll wait until you're out of earshot before I succumb to my urge to throw up from sheer nervousness.

Listen In:
The Pianimal: Episode 2 - Nineties Pop Songs (MP3 file)
Subscribe to the Pianimal podcast (includes all Kevan Gilbert Online content)

Previous Episodes:
Episode 1 - Tom Waits Covers

type="text/javascript" src="http://mediaplayer.yahoo.com/js">>

The Pianimal is a bi-weekly, one-take, four-song, piano-based podcast, each song chosen to suit a new theme each episode. In the debut episode, I brandish my fingers, dust my ivories, and polish up my vocal cords to deliver a performance that critics are calling "lackluster" and "a good start." The theme is Tom Waits Covers, and here are the songs I chose this week:

1. New Coat of Paint
2. Big in Japan
3. San Diego Serenade
4. All The World is Green

Episode 1 was recorded live in Vancouver, BC (well, technically, Burnaby) on Monday, August 25, 2008.

Next episode's theme is 90s Pop Songs, which is sure to make you fall in love with the Backstreet Boys all over again. Future themes you can look forward to include Miserable Sap (consisting only of the saddest songs ever), Duets With My Wife and the completely unplanned Improv Night.

The Pianimal: Episode 1 - Tom Waits Covers (MP3 file)
Subscribe to the Pianimal podcast (includes all Kevan Gilbert Online content)

type="text/javascript" src="http://mediaplayer.yahoo.com/js">>

Somewhere south of the year 2000, a trio of loud-mouthed white dudes from NYC called the Beastie Boys finished up fighting for their rights to party, and released an album called Hello Nasty. The opening track was a blitzkrieg of hip-hop and hollering that went by the name of Super Disco Breakin'. Leaving no room to breathe, the three MCs spat out two minutes of thoroughly energetic diatribes about making money, drinking coffee, and something about an 808.

Super Disco Breakin', the original, is filled with party shouts and mixed-up metaphors about pancakes, records and head-hunting. The track cannot be called sincere by even the most Gumby-like truth-stretchers: it is bereft of introspection and completely lacking in melody, and that's exactly why we like it.

I was compelled by fate itself to transform this 90s rap track into a piano ballad - one that could turn even the coldest, darkest heart into a flourishing rainforest of love. Folks, this is the piano version of Super Disco Breakin'. The money-making anthem has been given a melody, and I have viciously injected this tune with enough sap and sincerity that even the Beastie Boys wouldn't recognize the song. Please have your 'kerchiefs at the ready. If the concept itself doesn't bring you to tears, then having to listen to my Alanis-like voice wailing about the disco certainly will.

Download the file: Kevan Gilbert - Super Disco Breakin' (Beastie Boys cover).mp3

Super Disco Breakin': The lyrics

Verse 1:
50 cups of coffee and you know it's on
I move the crowd to the break of break of dawn
Can't rock the house without the party people
Cause when we're gettin' down we are all equal

Chorus:
Money Makin', Money Money Makin'
Super Disco, Disco Breakin'
Money Makin', Money Money Makin'
Super Disco, Disco Breakin'

Verse 2:
There's no better or worse between you and me
But I rock the mic so viciously
Like pins and needles and words that sting
At the blink of an eye I will do my thing

[Chorus]

Verse 3:
It's like a needle in the cartridge when the record spins
Like diggin' down deep in the record bins
Everybody gettin' down make no mistake
Nothing sounds quite like an 808

[Chorus]

FLEA MARKET START

It was approaching winter when Rob Snopek carefully loaded up the back of his pick-up truck with over 2000 vinyl records. A collection cobbled together thanks to years of careful searching, lucky finds and generous friends, he was ready to bring his prized albums out of his apartment and into the marketplace.

On this particular Saturday in 2006, he drove his record-laden truck down to the flea market, and threw open the tailgate. "One dollar each," he said to any buyer or bystander dropping by to bargain. A steady stream of shocked visitors found themselves the new owners of early Beatles albums and mint condition Pink Floyd records, and by the end of the day, Rob's truck had nothing left in the back except for a few lonely Anne Murray albums.

"I had no idea what any of that stuff was worth," Rob laughs. "You wouldn't believe the kind of records I let go for a dollar."

Over the next year, after posting dozens of "records wanted" flyers up in local Laundromats, Rob's record collection slowly began to grow again. By the time I came across Snopek's legendary supply in the autumn of '07, the number of records was estimated to be well over 30,000, and his personal reserve was already turning into the new mecca for Vancouver vinyl hounds.

DISCOVERIES

"Private vinyl showroom," said the ad. "Thousands of records, old and new! By appointment only." The bizarre combination of words intrigued me. I had been idly collecting records for a few years, and felt I could use a fresh new source, outside the traditional musty thrift stores and overpriced retail shops.

The phrasing of the ad made me cautious. Craigslist has the bad habit of attracting boatloads of creeps, and I wasn't in love with the prospect of showing up at a "private vinyl showroom" only to discover that private, vinyl and showroom had very different meanings than what I was expecting. I pitched the idea to my friend and fellow vinyl-liker Harrison.

"Why is it by appointment only?" Harrison wanted to know. "Why is it in his apartment? Where did he get all those records?"

"These are very good questions," I responded. "It sounds like it could be a trap. Maybe he's an axe murderer."

"Let's do it," Harrison replied. "Could make for a good story. On the news. After we die."

I picked up the phone to make an appointment. The voice on the other end supplied directions, and said he'd be waiting in the parking lot for us in one hour.

PRIVATE VINYL SHOWROOM

Wearing a denim jacket and blowing cigarette smoke into the October fog, the man was waiting for us as we pulled into the parking lot of a high-rise by Lougheed Mall in Burnaby. I couldn't have known it then, but the sight of Rob Snopek, king of Vancouver vinyl, waiting at the base of his apartment complex would soon become an iconic sight.

"Hello, great to meet you!" said Rob, extending his hand. He spoke with a faint but implacable Eastern European accent, and his demeanor exuded a hospitable pride as he prepared to welcome us into his showroom. He gestured for us to follow him.

"So what types of records d'you like?" Rob asked, as we darted down down a short cement stairwell. He held the door for us at the bottom, and we stepped into a smokey hallway, the sounds of a sports game and clinking glasses drifting over from a basement bar to our left. "Um," I said, trying not to give away my lack of education on the matter. "Been really getting into the blues lately," I tried. Harrison stepped in for the save: "I'm specifically looking for early funk and soul records," he declared, as Rob unlocked a door across the hall from the bar. We entered another hallway, this one dimmer than the last, and the door shut behind us. "Motown albums, Curtis Mayfield, that kind of stuff. And I'd also love to find anything by Nina Simone or Billie Holiday."

"Perfect," said Rob, pausing in front of a set of imposing, medieval-style wooden doors. He swung the doors open, and we stepped inside the Private Vinyl Showroom.

Tables and boxes overtook our vision. From ground level to waist height, along every wall and every spare surface, U-Haul moving boxes had been carefully stacked, tops opened to display the thousands of records within. Some boxes featured filing-style dividers indicating genres or artists, others had Sharpie'd labels on the front. Looking closer, each record had a transparent plastic slip-cover, with a small label in the top right corner. Every record was hand-labeled with the year of its release, the album's genre, and this particular record's key features, whether it was "first edition" or "coloured vinyl." It took a second for the fact to sink in that this entire collection was curated by one individual.

Rob swept his arm across and room. "Dollar bins are under the tables," he said. "Discs sorted by artists are on the left, and records by genre are right here," he said, tapping the table in the centre of the room. "These boxes," -- he touched the row of boxes on the right -- "contain fresh arrivals I have just finished pricing." He pointed towards a turntable at the back. "I can put on any record you want to listen to, and if you have any questions or if you are looking for anything, just ask me. Okay?"

Harrison and I moved like magnets towards the boxes. The record collection in front of us was a veritable museum of music history. Like portals into the past, the album art was transporting us into times we never knew. As I flipped through the Jazz section, I saw Ella Fitzergald send a wink in my direction, and nearby in the blues box, Muddy Waters had a serious bone to pick with me. I saw Johnny Cash stomping his foot at Folsom Prison, while Jimi Hendrix was wrestling a guitar that looked like it was on fire, and meanwhile, four hippies were in mid-stride on a British crosswalk.

It only took about twenty seconds for Harrison to find his Nina Simone, and maybe thirty for me to pick out the blues record I wanted, but it took us two more hours to emerge from our trance. Harrison had selected 30 albums to bring home, and was only paying $30 for the whole set. I had found an original, mint condition pressing of Bitches Brew (a timeless Miles Davis double album from 1969), and in addition to Abbey Road and a couple other standouts, my bill came to only $20. For price, variety and style, the private vinyl showroom and successfully upstaged every record-hunting experience I'd had at places like A&B Sound, Beatstreet Records, thrift stores, pawn shops and eBay. I knew I'd be coming back.

ON THE MOVE

From the record player at the back of the showroom, over the speakers around the room, a bassline was keeping a messy band on track. It sounded like surf music meeting James Brown, or maybe like Weezer meets the Clash, on the inside of a tin can. "What is this?" I asked.

"It's the Blues Magoos!" Rob replied. "1967. British psychedelic garage music. Amazing band. This is the first edition, very rare."

Rob was not even ten years old when this Blues Magoos vinyl was released, yet he is able to rattle of encyclopedic info on it as if he had been waiting at the record store on the day of its release. He can provide this kind of snapshot on virtually record in his possession, whether it was released last year, or some time in the 1940s. "I have been loving vinyl almost since the day I was born," Rob says. And it shows.

Since moving from Czechoslovakia (the Slovakia part) in the late 70s, Snopek has remained settled in Vancouver, but his love of vinyl has kept him constantly on the move. "I pretty much have to hunt all the time," he admits. "I've traveled to Alberta, through the States, all over the place, trying to find records."

Reciprocally, his customers come from as far away from San Fransisco to pick through his collection. Thanks to the web, word of his business has spread faster than his early Laundromat-ads could have done. In recent months, he has sold and shipped batches of over 5000 records to two separate buyers in the States, and still, his collection remains sophisticated and diverse.

It's hard to find new sources to dig up good vinyl for the showroom, but for Rob, it's a worthwhile endeavour. Before Rob's records ever roped in any real revenue, he worked as a GIS Technologist, performing digital mapping in real-time environments. These days, Rob only needs to find the occasional mapping contract to keep him afloat: selling records brings in 90% of his income.

"A lot of people have tons of records, just sitting in their basements, and they just think they're junk," Rob laments. "I need to find those people."

ELEVATOR MUSIC

The gentleman sharing my elevator was eyeing the two records I had tucked under my arms.

"Are those LPs?"

"Yup," I replied. It was early 2008, and I was just returning from another successful visit to Snopek's showroom. An Ella Fitzgerald/Oscar Pederson collaboration was my prize discovery, and the other was a Louie Armstrong live double-album.

"Neat," said Elevator Man, trying to make conversation. "I have a big whole box of records down in storage."

I wished I had a card to hand him, but all I had was Rob's name and a story too long for an elevator ride. For all Elevator People of the future, dutifully hoarding un-spun stashes of records, and for those of us on the hunt for vinyl old and new, appointments to drop by Rob Snopek's showroom can be made over email at robsnopek@shaw.ca.

Credits:
* Drawings of people: Kevan
* Drawings of food, mountains, airplanes and luggage: Kendra
* Subtitles & live motion: Kendra
* Camera work: Kevan
* Fake snow: The 3-hole punch
* Music: Illinois Street Lounge internet radio

The 'Tube lets you create custom playlists from any movie on the site. Harnessing this simple feature, I put together my first YouTube playlist. It's called Please Begin Dancing Now.

Heavily indebted to Bruce Mans' The New Balaeric podcast, this playlist consists of quirky electronica -- danceable indie stuff that you'd probably hear in commercials. In fact, the first track is straight off the recent iPod Touch commercial. This collection ends up being a pretty enjoyable, breezy little list of songs, and I hope you dig this foray into fun and simplicity as much as I have.

The Playlist:
1. Cansei De Ser Sexy - Music is My Hot Hot Sex (Don't worry, the song isn't actually sketchy)
2. Project Jenny, Project Jan - 320
3. LCD Soundsystem - Daft Punk Is Playing At My House
4. Le Tigre - Fake French
5. Fujiya & Miyagi - Collarbone
6. Beck - Ghettochip Malfunction (Hell Yes)
7. Death From Above 1979 - Black History Month (Alan Braxe Remix)
8. Justice - D.A.N.C.E
9. Prototypes - Who's Gonna Sing?
10. Junior Senior - Can I Get Get Get
11. Gorillaz - Kids with Guns
12. Simian Mobile Disco - It's The Beat
13. LCD Soundystem - Tribulations
14. Datarock - Fa Fa Fa

A quick note: This video playlist contains videos I've never actually watched - I can't vouch for their goodness, or warn you of their badness. I just click play, and let the music rock me into a trance of productivity.

That's all. Please begin dancing now.

• Singing songs at the piano but not recording any of them.
• Adding pictures to my Flickr account but not telling anybody about them.
• Discovering great things on the internet but not sharing them.
• Customizing the look and feel of my blog but not writing anything for it.

I've decided that if I am ever to survive in this cold, harsh wilderness called blogging, I think I will simply have to come face-to-face with my fears. Slash through this delicate, unproductive silence like Conan the Librarian.

First off, this piano thing. My mini-studio has been languishing like a forgotten child in the corner of my condo for months. Besides the occasional group singalongs to "Hey Jude" when our friends come over, I never actually do anything useful with my piano and microphone and mixing board trio - for instance, hook up my computer to lay down the tracks. So tonight, being Thursday night, I opened up the lid of my laptop, busted open some recording software, and decided to just RECORD whatever the deuce happened to emerge from my fingers and lips.

The resulting improvisation was a slip-shod cacophony of absurdity; a lyrically inept, musically unlistenable, unforgivably painful ballad that I think I will call "Transportation's Got Me Down."

No wonder I never do this. I really have nothing else to say about it, other than "Oh sweet heavens please prepare yourselves for this fearful audio experience." Let's move on to the Flickr thing before somebody realizes what they've just listened to.

It has taken me a while to get accustomed to the idea of purchasing items that are completely and utterly intangible, but I finally went ahead and purchased a Flickr Pro account. With my newfound bandwidth freedom, I have uploaded over 130 photographs from my family's photo archives. These are archaic shots from the 50s and 60s that document my mom's upbringing with her eccentric family in the city of Burnaby, and my dad's fascinating history being raised with his lettuce-farming, six-sibling'd family in Australia. The pictures demonstrate a bygone, now-foreign era that is bewildering to behold. Click here to check it out.

Somewhere else across the vast divide of internet-dom, there are even more intriguing things to discover. One item which has successfully held the interest of both my wife and I for over a week is the new(ish) Google Image Labeler. It's a game you can play, and it's also a way to help the search engine. Like a cross between Pictionary and Taboo, you are shown a picture and have to describe what you see. Up to five words will be "off-limits," but once you and your randomly assigned partner both type in the same words, you score points. Our best score ever placed us at #12 in the day's top rankings.

You may have noticed that I have introduced a new attempt to attract advertisers to my website. The green rectangle perched on my sidebar is a weak effort to farm out space on my blog to anybody who would like to pay a mere $5.00 Canadian dollars. However, since nobody seems to think this would be a worthwhile investment, I've decided to hold a contest instead.

I invite all readers of this post to leave a comment on my blog, and answer this question: if this ad space was yours for free, what would you advertise? You can tell truths, fictions, confessions or lies. At the end of four days time, I will put all of your names into a hat (or maybe a bowl, or perhaps a basket) and draw out one name. The person whose name emerges will receive an entire month of free advertising: any message you wish to cram into the 250 x 90 space is all yours. You can design the ad yourself if you wish, or work with me to create something pleasing.

Alright, that is certifiably all of the mutterings I can muster for one evening. In an attempt to reduce my carbon footprint and help meet Kyoto protocols for blog emissions by 11:30 pm, I'm signing off. See you in the comments!

Sometimes, when an episode of Gilmore Girls shows up on my TV (I'm not sure how they keep doing that, although I'm starting to suspect my wife might have something to do with it), I find it hard to focus on all the Stars Hollow drama. It's not that Luke's Diner doesn't have enough gossip to go around: it's just that the dialogue hogs all the attention. It seems the screenwriters are hijacking each piece of dialogue as means of showing off their own cleverness.

It's like that with the movie Juno: the leading lady's mouth produces a non-stop stream of well-written idioms and clever proclamations that seem uncomfortably out-of-place in a 16-year-old. It's less like character development, and more like ventriloquism. While Juno's motormouth provides the bulk of the levity in the movie, it certainly makes it a little harder to believe she is anything more than a deliberately constructed container for the screenwriter's ideas.

"It's just that you're so cool and you don't even try," confesses Juno near the end of the movie, to a shuffling Paulie Bleeker. "Actually," he stammers back, his voice squeaking a bit. "I try really hard."

Like Bleeker, Juno is a movie caught awkwardly between earnestness and pretentiousness. The visual and sonic ideas are precious and artful, but its cleverness kind of clouds the sincerity. By the time Juno and Bleeker are playing their acoustic duet at the end of the show, it's hard to tell if Juno has actually changed that much from the Stooges-loving 70s-punk-rock chick she claimed to be, or if it's just another excuse to include a great song.

Best moment: The opening credits, a live/animated hybrid accompanied by a great folk song called "All I Want is You," by a guy I've never heard of named Barry Loius Polisar.

Most questionable moment: The abundance of Napoleon Dynamite-isms. One of the very first spoken lines in the movie is this: "Jeez Banana, shut your friggin' gob, okay?" I kept expecting Juno to bust out the "Vote for Pedro" t-shirt.

I hope that 2007 has brought you a satisfactory sequence of months and weeks. For me, this year has been like attending an auction on the roof of a train: mile-a-minute decisions and actions proceeding with dangerous speed, resulting in an overabundance of unexpected blessings that I keep expecting to fly away.

As advent calendars, Rick Dees and that guy who announces NASA space shuttle launches would love to tell you, there are only 14 days until Christmas. Soon, there will be 13, and depending on when you're reading this, it might even be Christmas already. Since my impending holidays will involve precarious wintertime road travel, I'd like to give you your Christmas gifts early. Only for the sake of alliteration, I shall not call them "gifts," but "contributions."

Christmas Contribution Number 1: A Christmastime Podcast

This 45-minute, 16-track Christmas mix brings you a cheerful smattering of Christmas songs that are both piping-fresh and well-aged. If you are looking for a little bit of seasonal music to spice up your Christmas parties, road trips, work days and iPods, this mix is here to help. It's called "Yuletide Cheer."

Tracklist:
1. Ron Sexsmith: Maybe This Christmas
2. Sufjan Stevens: Come On! Let's Boogie to the Elf Dance!
3. Beach Boys: Little Saint Nick
4. Hawksley Workman: Common Cold
5. The Rat Pack: Have a Holly Jolly Christmas
6. Aimee Mann: Christmastime
7. Otis Redding: Merry Christmas
8. James Brown: Santa Claus Go Straight to the Ghetto
9. Brian Setzer Orchestra: Zat You Santa Claus?
10. The Blind Boy of Alabama (featuring Tom Waits): Go Tell It on a Mountain
11. Son Seals: Lonesome Christmas
12. Chuck Berry: Merry Christmas, Baby
13. Charlie Parker: White Christmas (King Kooba Remix)
14. Erlend Oye: Last Christmas
15. Johnny Cash: Silent Night
16. Sufjan Stevens: O Come, O Come, Emanuel

"Yuletide Cheer" is the name of the mix, and it comes in the form of a podcast. "What on earth is a podcast," you ask? Well, in this case, it's one giant MP3 that contains 16 songs, which you can burn to CD, or throw on your MP3 player, or play from your computer.

Click here to download the podcast (41.2 MB).

Christmas Contribution Number 2: Website Remix

Just in time for the holidays, I'll soon be unleashing a completely redesigned "Kevan Gilbert Online" upon the internet. While the new look won't exactly be Christmas themed, I decided that 'twas the season to for some serious website renovations.

Depending on when this Christmas missive reaches your retinas, the new site might already be live. If not, keep your clicking constant and your refreshing rampant, because this site will be "off the hook." Indeed, it will embody a term I have just now decided to call "profunktionalism." I haven't been this excited about the internet since I discovered that you could make sideways smiley faces by combining colons, dashes and brackets.
:-) <----- See??

Anyway, let me tell you about the new look. Thanks to a brilliant WordPress theme by Darren Hoyt called Mimbo, the old Kevan Gilbert Online has been replaced by a tighter, cleaner, shinier version of itself. The site's design fuses clean professionalism with decidedly hip typography and colour usage, giving it a spit-shine polish that makes things easier to read and funner to click around. I truly hope you like it as much as I do.

Christmas Conclusions

I'm afraid those are all the Christmas contributions I've got for us this season. While you can always recycle the old tradition of reading "The Real Story of Christmas" around the family tree, I am essentially all out of yuletide offerings. So in closing, I'd like to wish all of my loyal friends and imaginary readers (or is it the other way around?) the merriest of Christmases, and the happiest of New Years. Download a podcast, click around the new site, and make sure to leave a comment or two.

The mysteries of addiction and pain, buried inside people, are only explored through dialogue. I don't have time for that, I assure myself, fumbling with my security pass. I'll be late for work.

But work often lends itself to distraction, and this week I solved a mystery that has tugging at me since 2006. It's the mystery of 645 East Hastings Street.

This building, nestled between a drycleaner's and a clothing shop, is painted a reserved, uninviting gray. From the stucco to the security bars, the paint is like a blanket, covering even the windows. There is no signage -- only a touch of graffiti -- and the three black digits on the door, reading 645. It's the cleanest building on this stretch of Hastings, but also the most austere.

645 E Hastings has a twin: a residential building covered by the same heavy coats of triple-thick concrete-milkshake paint. This twin is situated at 640 E Cordova. The narrow alley between Hastings and Cordova finds the rear ends of these two buildings situated diagonally across from each other, trying so hard to blend in.

Rarely does anybody enter or emerge from these twin buildings, save for the occasional vehicle being driven out of the heavily secured garage in the alley. The gray colour makes the buildings incredibly evasive - in fact, it's such a subtle colour that the buildings are virtually invisible. I've often wondered why these buildings exist. What is their purpose? What function requires this much privacy, security and ambiguity? Is it a mob thing, a cult thing, a sex thing?

On Thursday, a lunchbreak stroll with a co-worker brought me through the alley where the mystery buildings connect. For the first time, the rear doors to 645 E Hastings were flung wide open. A young man was painting some very tall doors a very white colour. Inside, I saw white walls, white floors and a white ceiling. One or two workers moved about inside, amongst ladders, shelving and other unidentifiable gear in piles on the floor.

"He's got an amazing studio space," said my co-worker, shading his eyes to try and peer inside better.

"Wait, who does?" I asked. "It's a studio? Whose studio? For what?"

"It's Jeff Wall," he said. "Jeff Wall, famous photographer?"

Jeff Wall, Jeff Wall, I repeated to myself, preserving the name until a convenient Googling time arrived. The web search quickly turned into an all-out Internet-wide info-hunting expedition, and I soon learned that Jeff Wall's technical proficiency, creativity and iconoclasm has been a driving force in the international photography scene for decades.

THE WORK OF JEFF WALL

Born in 1946, Jeff Wall has been creating art in Vancouver, BC since the late seventies. He takes pictures as if he were making an entire film: that is, each photograph is meticulously constructed over the course of weeks, months, and sometimes years.

Wall is known for his giant-sized photographic transparencies mounted on back-lit boxes - think bus-stop ads or X-ray screens. He specializes in elaborately composed shots that look either unfathomably complicated, or confusingly mundane. The shot below falls into the former category. Completed over the course of two years, the final image was composed from 75 different photographs, taken in two different Vancouver cemeteries and within Wall's own studio. Wall worked with oceanographers to create the tidal pool in the open grave.

The Flooded Grave, 1998-2000
Read more about this image at Tate Modern.

Early in Wall's career, he began experimenting with documentary-style compositions. Because his lightbox transparencies required large-format prints, a portable camera (in the 80s, at least), couldn't provide the clarity he required to capture candid moments on the street. Still wishing to catch the genuine, street-level vibe of the occurrences taking place around him, Wall would instead hire amateur actors to recreate street scenes in studio. The shot below, titled "Mimic" is from 1982, and recreates a racist exchange Wall observed on a Vancouver sidewalk.

"The gesture was so small," explains Wall. "I was interested in the... physical mimesis. The white man was copying the Asian's body. Mimesis is one of the original gestures of art."

Wall's words are what gives his photography added significance. Critics might be less equipped to read into Wall's work if he wasn't so actively doing it himself. Having served as a professor at three different colleges and universities (including UBC), Jeff Wall has published a significant amount of essays relating to photography, philosophy and art, and of course, his own work.

Take a look at the photograph below, titled "The Storyteller." Evidently one of Wall's most iconic works, it exemplifies his mastery of elaborate set-ups that don't seem elaborate, but which turn out to be loaded with intentionality and significance.

The storyteller in this image is the woman in the bottom left-hand corner. Wall has stated that this woman represents "the historical crisis of the Native peoples of Canada, whose traditions of oral history have been eroded by modern life." By setting up the shot in a typically overlooked locale, he emphasizes the distance between Native history and contemporary existence.

Wall's writing about this work are academic and dense, using words like "archaism" and "figura" in his descriptions. His inaccessibility is charming, illustrating an enchantment with intellectual explorations, but a detachment from popular art. In a way, Wall himself is the Storyteller, passionately providing fervent lectures on photography and art, just off the beaten path.

THE INVISIBLE MAN

Hastings Street is certainly a curious corridor to choose for studio space, but I imagine that the veil of poverty lends itself to considerable privacy. As the annual Eastside Culture Crawl demonstrates, there are plenty of artists who find this part of town to be an ideal venue for their work.

Wall's obscure studio is incongruous with such a prolific career, but provides such a captivating legend:

"I heard there's a famous old photographer with a high-tech studio just two doors down from Union Gospel Mission."

"I heard he lives there too, surrounded by photography gear."

I don't know anything about Jeff Wall beyond what I've learned this past week. I don't know if he resides in his studio, if he's connected to his community, if he ever emerges from the darkroom or the lightbox. But every time I walk past the gray walls, I imagine Wall at work in a situation similar to the one he created with his 2000 piece, "Invisible Man." With 1,369 illegally connected light bulbs strung together over the ceiling, the subject lives quietly and unobtrusively in a New York cellar, going about his business under the otherwordly glow of leftover lightbulbs, completely separate from the city around him.

EXPLORING MORE JEFF WALL

• Wikipedia always offers fascinating tidbits, including this gem: did you know that Wall's photograph "The Destroyed Room" was used as the cover shot for a Sonic Youth EP of the same name?
• Read "If You Build It They Will Come," an article in Time Magazine from February 2007 and written by Richard Lacayo. The revealing essay explores staged photographs and includes Wall in the exploration, calling one of Wall's shots the "photographic equivalent of a Jackson Pollock drip painting." (Ouch.)
• TateModern has created an exceptional interactive online exhibit of Wall's work from 1978-2004, featuring detailed views and write-ups for many of his signature pieces. All of the images I have used in this entry have been borrowed from the Tate site. Visit this page to see read up on Wall's work and career. Be sure to explore my favourite from Wall's photographs, called "A Sudden Gust of Wind (after Hokusa)" from 1993:

If you're on Xanga or in a Reader, click here to get started.

Anyway, what's this referral spam I'm talking about? Well, most website operators like to see which websites are linking to their own site, and they check up on their referral statistics almost daily. Referral spam is when malicious and devoted spammers try to get your attention by flooding your statistics with fake links to their own sites.

Normally, I can check out my "referrals" page, and it gives me a nice and easy-to-read list of all the sites that are linking to me. Unfortunately, with the spammers at work, now all I see is a mile-long list of fictional, non-existent, over-the-top porno URLs. Take a look: this is the text-only file of all the sites that have "linked" to me so far in May. As you can see, most of them are ridiculous, bogus XXX sites. None of these sites (the sketchy-looking ones, anyway) actually contain links to my site. It's all zombie spambot computers sending out signals just pretending to have links there.

LAME. They do this JUST in case I happen to have my blog set to automatically publish the list of sites that link to me, which will in turn boost their own sites' ranking in Google. Obnoxious, meddlesome and kind of offensive, to say the least. Anyway, stopping this kind of spam turns out to be just as obnoxious.

Here's what I've tried so far:
- Modifying a file called .htaccess. Tried that, but it turns out it's an easy way to destroy your website. Don't do that unless you know what you're doing.
- Using a plugin called Bad Behavior. Been using that for two months, still no luck.
- Using a plugin called Referrerl Karma. Tried that: it hasn't been updated since 2005, installation is absurdly complicated for a third-party WordPress plugin, and it's not even compatible with the latest version of WordPress.
- Asking Metafilter. No help there.
- Reading about it. Nobody seems to have tackled this topic since around Jan. 2006. Informational sites abound on diagnosing the problem, but none on curing it.

Anyway, long story short, I've still got spammer troubles, but the website's back up again. Thanks for your patience, and if you haven't already done it, go tell me what you love & hate about this website on my First Annual Readership Survey.