Boasting Corner - sharing some fond memories

In Albert Einstein: The Human Side, I read that Einstein has a “Boasting Corner“. So I am going to start one myself to keep track of a few fond blogging memories and have some fun sharing these memories with you. (smile)

Note: Einstein’s story is much funnier as he hid most of the awards and honours except one. You can use Amazon’s “Search Inside” function to search for the word “Protzenecke” and read why he picked one to frame on page 7 in Einstein’s words.

Some friends I got to know from blogging

1. I’ve been reading Kevin Roberts‘ ideas (articles, interviews, etc.) and learning from Kevin for over 10 years now. (Kevin is the CEO Worldwide of Saatchi & Saatchi.) At one point, I even had his quote “ideas are the currency of the future” on my professionally printed business cards (until I ran out on that 500 cards). So I was thrilled to receive and review Kevin’s wonderful book Lovemarks (and later Lovemarks Effect) from his PR company. And then one day out of the blue, I accidentally discovered that Kevin has kindly linked to my blog (see right column under “LINKS”)! And in one entry, he even personally spotlit three of his regular blog readers including me. (smile) So I guess it is nice to gain a new blog friend in Kevin.
2. Angela Wang and I are just like old friends these days, even we only knew each other since April 2007 after Angela left me a comment in an entry about my documentary “Long Hair Revolution”. Later, it was only with her introduction that I finally got to fix up Prof. Steven N. S. Cheung’s Wikipedia article with a few economists. I have been a big fan of Prof. Steven N. S. Cheung for over 20 years and it was an honour for me to help fixing up his Wikipedia entry. (Incidentally, Angela and I both love Gilmore Girls!)
3. Austin Hill, Canadian entrepreneur & angel investor, and I started to notice each other after our somewhat heated online comments/debate over the merits or problems with of CBC Dragons’ Den (I have changed a tiny bit to closer to Austin’s view now (smile)). And we became friends after we had lunch when he visited Calgary. And then he helped instigated DemoCamp and BarCamp in Calgary at his following visit to Calgary.
4. With Mike Dillion, Sun Microsystems’ General Counsel, I’ve been reading his blog since day one as I read about it from the Wall Street Journal Law blog in 2006. Later, I was thrilled when I got email replies from Mike answering my questions and reading his praise of my blog. And Mike and I have become blog friends (and friends), even we have not met nor talked on the phone. Well, that will change as I have scheduled a phone interview with Mike for my blogs. Stay tune as it should be fun.

Some of my fond blogging memories

1. The wonderful report by the tech website Boing Boing’s Cory Doctorow in “Canadian DMCA rally in Calgary — photos, videos, reports” was fun because a spotlight has been shone on the embedded challenges in the new Copyright law for Canadians across the land and also let tech people around the world to know about the issues.
2. I feel really warm & fuzzy & proud to be mentioned and discussed in the wonderfully titled “The Canadians Again Show us how to do things” by William Party, Senior Copyright Counsel, Google (note: Google is doing some great work in the Copyright front, e.g. Google’s book scanning and book search project).
3. Having CBC Radio Search Engine reporter Danielle reporting on the Copyright rally in Calgary (mp3 audio file available for listen).
4. Writing the pair of postings “AAA game with philosophical twist” and “Followup on the AAA BBB CCC DDD game” to try to shine some light on the chain-mail/virus of the terribly time-wasting AAA BBB CCC DDD game (which was very popular on Internet and Facebook, etc.)
5. And me taking apart arguments written by a national newspaper columnist in Deconstructing “The Telecom Trotskyites”
6. To write and create my own Great Minds Of Our Time series of people. Thinking about this, I should create an entry for one of my most admired former Supreme Court Justice Louise Arbour. She is just great and gutsy.
7. After attending Banff as a CTV Fellow in 2006, I was excited in providing extensive blogging reports on the 2007 Banff World TV Festival where I reported on and video interviewed Broadcasters and content creators from around the world.
8. Getting to know the CBC anonymous blogger Ouimet a little more. Mind you, I still couldn't tell whether if a post was a practical joke or not. (smile) Assuming this wasn't a joke, it was my pleasure to be mentioned in an Ouimet-style positive post. How can I complain about a post that talks about my increased chance of getting some action (Copyright becoming sexy). (smile)

The above are some of my fond memories in blogging. Now, I want to end this entry on a personal note. I want to dedicate the Cat Stevens’ song “Father and Son” (YouTube video) to my dad who reads this blog.

Dad, I know you are both “proud of” and “puzzled by” what I am doing and trying to do these days. (big smile) Dad, may be I am trying to change the world one small thing/goal/objective at a time. Just may be.

P.S. Kevin, thanks for the Cat Stevens’ song “Father and Son” (lyrics). I think I am growing to love it more and more every time I listen to it.