Maude Barlow and the Council of Canadians brought their 19 city tour of Ontario to Sault Ste. Marie tonight. Maude is one of those legendary people you just have to meet when the opportunity comes, so I managed to catch part of her speech between other personal activities. I even got to chat with her for a few moments before she was whisked away at the start. I was impressed by her passion, commitment and determination to establishing water as a human right.

Below is the live blog transcript of the first hour of the event, possibly the first ever event blogged live in Sault Ste. Marie. Now you know another useless piece of trivia.

Obama-mania has arrived in Canada, with the arrival of the President to Ottawa. This morning I was interviewed on CBC Radio Sudbury’s Morning North show to talk about ChangeCamp, an unconference-style event geared to re-thinking the relationship between citizens and government.

We touched on what ChangeCamp is, the inspirations for the event, namely the City of Toronto’s Web 2.0 Summit, other unconferences known as Barcamps and the new open, engagement style of President Barack Obama.

My goal is to help organize a ChangeCamp event in Sault Ste. Marie later this year, but I’ll need lots of help. I’ve created a ChangeCamp Sault page and a discussion group to get things started. If you live in northern Ontario, I encourage you to join the conversation. Vancouver, Edmonton and Ottawa are busy getting their ChangeCamp plans in motion.

ChangeCamp is an inclusive event, bringing together techno types, policy wonks, bureaucrats, politicians, and other inspired citizens to spark this conversation around how citizens and government engage each other. Imagine how the power of online communication can encourage more transparency, openness and engagement around shaping policy. We’re seeing how businesses, organizations and individuals can benefit, now is the time for government as well.

Due to a technical glitch, the recording got cut off near the end.

Listen to the interview on CBC radio – ChangeCamp

This weekend I’ll be at ChangeCamp which in the words of chief organizer Mark Kuznicki

is designed to create connections, knowledge, tools and policies that drive transparency, civic engagement and democratic empowerment. We want to start a new conversation about citizenship and government that understands and employs both the tools of the web and participant-led face-to-face meetings like this event. The hope is to begin a national movement by creating tools that people in their communities can take and use to help start that conversation in a way that is relevant to them.

I’m going for 3 reasons:

• Connect. I’ve met through Twitter a number of the people going – young, talented people motivated for social change. It’ll be great to meet many of them face-to-face for the first time to build on those budding relationships, including people connected to thmvmnt. There will be a diverse crowd: citizens, technologists, designers, academics, policy wonks, political players, change-makers and government employees there to answer one question: How do we re-imagine government and governance in the age of participation?
• Participate. This will be a chance to be at the start of a new movement, one I am passionate about. Looking forward to getting my hands (and head) dirty, excited about the ideas that will come forth from the day.
• Learn. I’ve never been to an unconference like ChangeCamp before, where the content of the day is created by the participants and anyone who wants to lead a conversation about something that they’re passionate about will have an opportunity to do so. I’d like to help organize events like this back in Sault Ste. Marie, including a local ChangeCamp.

Registrations going fast

Not many spots left at the conference, so act quickly if you want to go. I’ll be driving down Friday from Sault Ste. Marie and have room in my car for anyone living along the way. We could make it a ChangeCamp caravan.

Great response to my invitation for someone to step in as the new Planet Plone zoo keeper. Thanks to Lukasz Lakomy, Ian Hood, David Little and Rob Porter for responding. Plone community, here is your chance to find something small and needed for these willing volunteers.

I’ll now introduce to you your new contact for getting your blog on Planet Plone, a guy whose voice is destined for radio (or a Plone podcast?), John DeRosa!

John Derosa, new Planet Plone zoo keeper

John is Director of Web Development for Fisher Communications, where he’s working on new technology initiatives, and doing some Phone theming and customization in an open-source environment. He’s a coder at heart, and enjoys Python quite a bit. Before Fisher, he worked in a number of start-ups, the most successful of which was Singingfish. He lives in Seattle. You can find more details about him on his blog or on LinkedIn.

John looks forward to connecting with Plone people and helping out in this simple but important job.

Planet Plone is the blogging voice of the Plone community. Not following Planet Plone? Add the feed to your favourite feed reader. Want your Plone blog posts on Planet? Submit your name, blog url and feed url to the Plone.org issue tracker. I’m sure John will take good care of you.

Plone has been good to you. You’re earning a living thanks to the efforts of many, and perhaps your sanity has been saved on a few occasions by the kind folks in the #plone chat room. You’ve been thinking for a while about some way to help out, but can’t take on anything too big, and your Plone coding fu is in its infancy.

Well, have I got the perfect job for you!

Become the Planet Plone zoo keeper

Planet Plone is the blogging voice of the Plone community. There are now 115+ blogs registered with Planet Plone. People share all kinds of tips, ideas, rants and news on upcoming events through the Planet. A big thanks to Wichert and others who have done most of the leg work to make Planet Plone what it is today.

Not following Planet Plone? Add the feed to your favourite newsreader.

The Planet needs someone to process requests for blogs to be added or changes made to existing ones.

Maintaining Planet Plone is super simple. Each month, there are at most 2-3 requests to add or change a blog. Trac is used to manage blog submissions. You receive an email notification whenever a ticket is submitted.

All changes are made in one config file. Each entry looks like this:

[http://feeds.feedburner.com/KirkThoughts-Plone]
name = Gerry J Kirk
link = http://www.gerrykirk.net

The first line is the content feed, the second is the name of the author, and lastly a link to the author’s web site.

If you are still with me, then congratulations, you are qualified.

But wait, there’s more

For the more technically inclined (that’s not me), you can if you wish maintain the software that runs Planet Plone. Right now, Alex Clark (aclark on IRC) and Lennart Regebro (regebro on IRC) leap to action whenever there are small fires to put out.

How do I sign up?

Those interested can contact me directly. I’m the current zoo keeper, looking to move into other Plone jobs, marketing in particular. It’s been a fun ride, but now its time to move on to something more substantial.

How can I add my blog to Planet Plone?

Right now you have to go to the plone.org Trac ticketing system, register an account, then create a new ticket. Include the following information:

• Your first and last name
• Web site address
• Feed address to Plone community-related content. If you also blog about other topics not related to the Plone community, then please provide a filtered feed, like all posts with a Plone tag or category.
• Select Planet Plone from the Component list

I have some ideas on how to improve the process, we’ll see what is possible. Stay tuned!

The first World Plone Day event is now finished. New Zealand WPD organizer Tim Knapp was pleased with the results:

Just so you all know, we just had our first WPD Plone Day event (in the world) in Wellington, New Zealand and about 31 people turned out, we had 6 presenters and a grand old time.

What you can do to join in the efforts to showcase Plone:

1. Digg this article TODAY: http://tinyurl.com/worldploneday and post it to Facebook.
2. Vote up this Slashdot article TODAY: http://tinyurl.com/wpdsd
3. Write a blog post sharing what you love about Plone and the Plone community. Tag it with worldploneday2008.

Don’t forget to catch the LIVE coverage – video, IRC, live blogging, Twitter posts and Flickr pics – http://tinyurl.com/worldplonedaylive

Digg this post Plone is an open source CMS (Content Management System), recently awarded the Best Other (non-php) Open Source CMS award.

Plone, together with an array of add-on components is used for a variety of needs:

• Websites, extranets, intranets
• E-commerce
• Workflow management
• Blogs, podcasting, videocasting
• Collaborative workspaces like Open Plans

As part of World Plone Day, Friday, November 7, here are 10 compelling reasons for choosing Plone as a web site solution:

1. Stable future. Plone is owned, supported and protected by the Plone Foundation, similar to the Apache Foundation. Growth of Plone in code and community has risen at a steady pace since inception in 2000.
2. Avoids vendor lock-in. Plone uses the same open source license as Linux. This avoids vendor lock-in, expensive licenses, and gives you a predictable future — and the freedom to innovate.
3. Easy to use. Plone’s focus on usability makes it easy for users to manage content. Watch a video to see for yourself.
4. Secure. Security is considered one of Plone’s key strengths. Fine-grained role-based security model secures your content. Plone’s sandbox architecture ensures that intruders will not have access to your server or your network.
5. Standards compliant. Optimized for search engines, works in all major browsers, supports Open ID, support for web services and relational data storage.
6. International. Translated into over 35 languages, including Chinese and right-to-left languages like Russian and Arabic.
7. Solid documentation. Hundreds of how-tos and tutorials. Screencasts on plone.tv. Seven books published on Plone, including an end user manual. A new book on how to get the most out of Plone without touching code on its way. No other Open Source CMS has an end user manual.  You can buy the hard copy or download the PDF for free.
8. MS Desktop integration. No other Open Source CMS has a Microsoft Windows Desktop integration for free. Enfold Desktop enables everyone to have a first class Windows desktop experience.
9. Nestle Plone inside an MS shop. Enfold Proxy enables people to deploy Plone in a possibly hostile to linux IT department. How many Microsoft organizations want to run Apache? Enfold Proxy is *not* free.  It costs money.  But you get support.
10. Separate content management and delivery. Use *any* software to deliver the content from the Plone CMS. Java, .NET, PHP, Ruby. Whatever presentation-tier technologies the customer is most comfortable with can be used.
    Static publishing. Look at http://www.cia.gov/ and http://www.fbi.gov/
    Dynamic delivery.  Look at http://www.povertylaw.org/ and http://www.aci-na.org/ for examples of Entransit.  Using very very simple and fast technologies to serve Plone content dynamically.

Want to know more? See if there is a World Plone Day event happening near you, or visit online:

• Plone.org – is the main site to read more information, download copies, access documentation and products (add-on functionality)
• Plone.net – find a provider that supports Plone, read case studies and press releases, browse the directory of Plone based sites.
• Plone.tv –  a diverse collection of training and interview videos about Plone
• Plonegov.org – a collaborative software ecosystem where government organizations, NGOs and private enterprises work together to share the cost of enhanced capabilities.

Ok, time to start figuring out what sessions I want to go to at the Plone conference. I work mainly as a project manager / scrum master, so I tend to avoid the techy stuff. Here is my preliminary list:

Wednesday

• The 10% manifesto and further — Methods for organized contribution to strategic development of Plone. I need to get better at this, interested in approaches to “building in” time to contribute back to Plone.
• Usability Testing: From High End to the Dirt Poor. An area I don’t have formal knowledge in, always interested in how to better capture what users need.
• Real world intranets. It’s Joel Burton. ‘Nuff said.

Thursday

• Hybrid Vigor: Plone + Salesforce Integration. We (ifPeople) have done a couple of Salesforce + Plone projects, thanks to Andrew and ONE/NW’s fantastic contributions. Interested in doing more of these projects.
• What Makes a Great Development Team? I’ve heard great things about Michael, who works with Martin Aspeli. I’m passionate about Agile, so interested to hear his talk, which I expect will have an Agile flavour to it.
• The Future of Plone’s User Experience. Being Alexander Limi, I expect something entertaining and visionary.
• Simplifying Plone. Some bleeding edge thought and real examples from Martin Aspeli and those attending.
• Using Deliverance to Theme a Website. Ok, finally getting my geek on here. I’ve been wanting to understand Deliverance better, never got my head wrapped around it. There is your challenge, Mr. Bicking, one really smart cookie.

Friday

• Repoze.bfg – a Zope explosion. Geek fix #2. Probably won’t ever code with it, but want to understand when it is a good solution.
• Plone.org Documentation Team Panel. Interested in how the panel wants to make documentation on plone.org rock even harder. Hope to contribute some thoughts.
• High performing teams: What’s the secret sauce? Good idea to attend my own presentation in case no one else does.

So that’s my list. What interests you? Let’s get some discussion going.

Of course, the discussions that happen outside of sessions are valuable also. I’m looking forward to seeing *so* many people, this being my first Plone conference after 5 years of being in the Plone community. Lunch anyone?

Plone plays frisbee too

Part of what makes conferences like Plone Conf 2008 so great is the chance to meet and hang out with many of the people we only “see” online from a distance. This is especially true for me. I’ve been involved with Plone since 2002 but have yet to attend any conference / sprint. Thankfully, that will soon change!

My organizational personality twitch wants me to make it easier for people to meet and do stuff, so I created a page for people to suggest and sign up for activities to do, things like ultimate frisbee (maybe we can design a Plone disc – yeah!).

Maybe you want to visit the Smithsonian, tour the national monuments, or go for a walk up Mt. Vernon after sitting on your butt all day in sessions.

To add something to the page, request access to the project.

Wow, it’s been a millennium in blogging terms since I last posted here. That’s not to say I haven’t been blogging. I’ve just found my interests have been elsewhere.

I’ve been working on a few initiatives, now that family life is a little less demanding. Now that the twins have passed the one year mark, we’ve managed to catch our breath a little more often.

Blogging on parish life after losing pastor

In April, a few days before Palm Sunday, my pastor was granted leave by the bishop. My response to this shocker was to set up a blog to try and keep people informed as to what is going on and also to spark conversation. I see blogging as a voice for the people in the pews, who sadly often don’t have much say or influence over the affairs of their own parish. So far, the responses have been mostly positive, it’s affecting what happens in the parish in a good way (I think) but most people are afraid to post comments. I’m hopeful that fear will fade over time.

Building local sustainable living network

One of my passions is the environment and sustainable living. My inner fabric pushes me to make healthy, positive choices in all that I say and do, choices that benefit me, those around me and creation. Here in the Sault, the envrionmental movement is small and not welll connected, especially for individuals. I want to help build a network that can support and encourage people, business and local government to make sustainable choices. I’ve started a local mailing list called Rocks and Trees (lots of that around here) to connect people, and we get together on a monthly basis for good eats and conversation. Each month more people are signing up, which is encouraging. On Earth Day I launched a blog at greenmeans.ca. It’s a pitiful start to a bigger project I’ve wanted to do for a while, but hey, it’s a start.

Organizing the home-based remote worker scene

Working from home is great, but I do miss the personal interactions from an office environment. In January I started yet another mailing list for people working from home, in particular people working remotely for an employer. We also do the monthly lunch thing as we’re all happy to escape from our tower or dungeon every once in a while. There has even been some talk of sharing some office space for a social working experience every now and again. I think it will happen eventually.

So there you have it. I do need to get back to this blog, and there are plenty of blog posts waiting to emerge. I’ll have to set aside some work time I guess.

My family moved into its first home just over a year ago. The previous owners weren’t concerned at all about energy conservation, judging by the excessive use of track lighting. We also discovered a lot of extra “air conditioning” around windows, doors and the attic. Sadly, I didn’t have much time to deal with the air leaks before winter arrived as we were pre-occupied with moving in before our twin boys arrived in November. Needless to say, there was no time after their arrival for anything but survival.

A lot has changed in the past year to cut down on our energy costs. These steps were easy to do, and didn’t cost much:

1. All bulbs inside and outside the house replaced with compact fluorescent lights (CFL). Replacing five standard incandescent light bulbs with CFLs will typically save around $30 every year here in Ontario.
2. Hot and cold water pipes are wrapped with insulation.
3. All doors and windows are sealed with caulking and weather stripping. There were some gaping holes behind window and door frames and underneath one door I could fit a screwdriver through the worn out rubber that was supposed to be sealing the gap. All baseboards on main and top floor have been caulked also.
4. Electrical outlets on the inside and outside of exterior walls have insulation gaskets sealed with caulking to restrict air flow. Basically, any where there is a hole in the wall, air can get through!
5. Installed programmable thermostats for the electric baseboard heaters. I don’t have time to run around to every room and change the settings for when we’re there and when we’re not. Now the heat comes on a little before we get up and goes down around bedtime.

Save $$$ on doing the work

I am taking advantage of rebate programs to save hundreds of dollars making these upgrades. In our area, there are rebates to buy CFLs, water pipe insulation, programmable thermostats and many other energy saving products. The everykilowattcounts.com site has more information on rebates for purchasing these items.

Another program every home owner in Canada should take advantage of is the ecoENERGY Retrofit grant. An approved inspector comes and does an energy evaluation of your home. In return you get a report telling you what you can do to reduce energy use, and what money you’ll get if you do it. There’s some good money to be had, considering the provincial government is matching the federal grants. For instance, I’ll get $300 back for improving air leakage, and another $150 if I exceed the standard by 20%. Nice! There are grants for improving insulation ratings of the attic, basement, even getting a more water efficient toilet, plus several others. I like knowing exactly what I need to do, how to do it, and then getting paid for doing work that will cut my energy costs. Even part of the evaluation cost is covered. Highly recommended.

This post was written as part of a global effort called Blog Action Day to raise awareness and get action on climate change.

Climate change is front and centre in the news again today, with the announcement of the Nobel Peace prize being awarded to Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

This Monday, October 16, 13,734 bloggers at latest count including myself reaching an audience of nearly 12 million will unite together to put the issue of climate change on everyone’s mind. It’s all part of Blog Action Day.

If you write a blog, it’s easy to take part, and I encourage you to do so. Climate change affects all of us. The fact that the Nobel Peace committee considers climate change a real threat to world peace underlines that we all need to commit to changing how we live – right now.

I’ll be writing about ways I’m improving the energy efficiency of my home, which helps both the environment and my pocket-book, especially during those cold Canadian winters. I’d like to keep enjoying those cold winters, too, but climate change is already diminishing the snow levels here in Northern Ontario. Our last Christmas was a green Christmas. Snowmobile tourism is dying out.

On Monday, be part of the solution.

I’m not getting much blogging done here lately because I am focused on getting people to vote for change in the upcoming electoral referendum in Ontario, Canada. Elections Ontario is trying so hard to be neutral, in my opinion that it is not doing its job to educate voters, so it’s up to ordinary citizens to make this happen. This is an historic opportunity for Ontarians to finally say farewell to its antiquated First Past the Post voting system and join most of the world’s democracies who dropped it 50 to 100 years ago. It’s also the first referendum since Ontario joined the Confederation in 1792. That’s heavy, important stuff, and why I’m using whatever free time I have to organize a local campaign.

Here are my latest articles:

• The new voting system – more or less representation for the North?
• The most important vote you’ll ever make
• Back to school: a crash course on MMP, the new voting system proposed
• 5 easy things you can do to promote ‘yes’ to election reform on Oct 10.
• This week: Marie and David are on EZ Rock

Technorati Tags: Citizens Assembly, electoral reform, MMP, Ontario, referendum

Data centres consume vast amounts of energy, and the situation is only getting worse. Luiz Andre Barraso of Google stated in a published paper last year that every gain in performance has been accompanied by a proportional increase in overall platform power consumption. ZDNet UK reports that the average energy costs of running a data centre in the UK will double over the next five years. The European Commission is now considering a voluntary code of conduct on energy efficiency for data centre operators to help address this issue.

No wonder consumers are looking for greener hosting choices. A potential client of mine is interested in hosting his site with a provider that uses green energy. This interests me as well, in my pursuit of leaving a smaller footprint on our planet.

The one he found uses 100% renewable energy (wind and solar), plants a new tree for each client, and believes in social responsibility through how they work, including telecommuting and a mostly paperless office. Unfortunately, their offerings aren’t suitable for Plone, and that is the same story with every other hosting provider I found, including ones listed at TreeHugger.com. If there is a “green” option out there for Plone, I haven’t found it.

So, is there an option for environmentally conscious organizations / individuals who want their Plone site consuming less of our natural resources? Let me know by posting your comments.

Technorati Tags: environment

The following editorial is my first entry as a temporary columnist on SooToday, a local online newspaper here in Sault Ste. Marie.

People of Ontario, this might be the most important vote you’ll ever make.

On October 10, we the people of Ontario will be given a historic opportunity to change democracy for the better, for our province and ultimately for our country. On that day, in addition to voting for your elected representatives and for a new government, you will choose the voting system for future elections.

Why should I care?

Why does it matter, you say? What’s the big deal?

I believe our voting system is the root cause of much of what is wrong with democracy and governance here in Canada. Really.

But don’t take my word for it, listen to why the members of the Ontario Citizens’ Assembly voted for change, and why they chose MMP.

October 10 is Decision Day

So what will you do?

Will you stick with the current 200 year old model, known as First-Past-The-Post (FPTP)?

Or will you choose the voting system chosen by the Ontario Citizens’ Assembly on Electoral Reform, known as Mixed Member Proportional, or MMP?

Can’t Sit Still

I’m no different than you. I’ve got a busy life, especially with a 3 yr old girl and 9 month old twin boys. Spare time is more rare than spare change. Despite that, I’ve decide to coordinate the local Vote for MMP campaign, because I believe a proportional system will finally make democracy work for the people who mark the X’s, and darned if I’m going to sit back and let this opportunity pass me by!

For the next 5 weeks or so, you can expect to read:

• In-depth analysis of the two voting systems.
• An article from David Viitala, our local representative on the Ontario Citizen’s Assembly.
• What’s going on locally
• Ways you can get involved in the campaign. The government and media aren’t doing enough to spread the word, so it’s up to us to make it happen.
• Opinions from prominent individuals on both sides of the debate.
• Your thoughts! Let’s have a healthy debate on this topic, using the Response option at the bottom of each column. The more insightful comments will be mentioned in future postings.
• Obligatory bad jokes about democracy and voting (I’ll try to be gentle)

–

Vote for MMP web site – www.voteformmp.ca

MMP supporters Facebook group

Technorati Tags: democracy, electoral reform, MMP, referendum

#plone is the online chat room where people hang out to learn, help and talk about their favourite CMS Plone. There are always lots of people online and it’s a great resource for anyone new to Plone who needs some immediate help. And if your brain is slowly turning to cheese on a Friday afternoon, hop into #plone for some low powered entertainment. Here are some samples for you:

andym : lol UndoError: Undo error None: non-undoable transaction

[3:20pm] PloneUser684958: sdfjdlskfljk

[3:20pm] PloneUser684958: slkfjsdlkfjlskfjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjsd

[3:20pm] PloneUser684958: jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj

[3:20pm] PloneUser684958 left the chat room. (“Bye bye”)

[3:21pm] gkirk: a keyboard streaker!

[3:21pm] darci|lunch: LOL

[3:21pm] ErikRose: Good, I was almost out of j’s!

[3:21pm] limi: ErikRose: that’s Perl

[3:21pm] ErikRose: Oh.

[3:21pm] limi: or, hang on

[3:21pm] limi: ^T$@(*#)^* is perl

[3:21pm] andym: limi: no its readable

[3:21pm] limi: my bad

MatthewWilkes: andym: Did you remember to uninstall plone.app.randomlyfuckupmysite? It removes the requirement to specify yes_really_i_didnt_call_this_api_for_amusement

[3:41pm] runyaga_: do we need a reality check?

[3:41pm] runyaga_: is it a CMS ?

[3:42pm] runyaga_: is your adapted result a CMS?

[3:42pm] runyaga_: or a nuclear powered semantic web engine?

[3:42pm] runyaga_: Plone is a CMS

[3:42pm] runyaga_: if you try to make it a semantic web engine or a ERP system you are going to hate your life

Do you have a favourite quote / conversation from #plone? Add yours to the comments.

Technorati Tags: community, funny, irc, plone

I found this funny captioned photo (original at LOLnptech.org), taken at the recent Plone4Artists / Multimedia sprint. Hint: the sprint was held at the Christian Science Monitor.

Technorati Tags: funny, jazkarta, plone

SaveDarfur is organizing a weekend of prayer and action Dec. 9-10 to demand government leaders take immediate action to stop the genocide in Darfur.
Congregations are being asked to sign up to a letter to President Bush as part of the weekend activities.
From the web site:

“Nobody knows the exact number” of those killed in the conflict, said David Rubenstein, executive director of the coalition, although he estimated 400,000 have died in the violence. “There are people dying every day, and at risk of death every day,” Rubenstein said during a Dec. 5 conference call with reporters.

Have your church join in speaking for those who cannot speak for themselves. Raise awareness. Do not be silent.

Technorati Tags: activism, causes, darfur