My travels north of the border were very enlightening. It was great catching up with friends and the conversations that flowed. Toronto was refreshing after not being there for over a decade. The biggest thing I noticed was the amount of green initiatives within the city. There is a building boom with all the new condos, but a lot of the city has taken steps to greenify. From the trash receptacles on the street dividing recyclables, compost and garbage to the Steam Whistle Brewery that is nearly completely run on green energy.
Much of the new architecture within the city has also reclaimed some of the old city from Brookfield Place with an original streetscape and bank facade to the Distillery District in the west part of the city renovating existing architecture with galleries, theaters, restaurants and residential space.
The social awareness that the city as a whole has taken and developed with these initiatives shows the ease of acceptance. I’m sure there are levels of bureaucracy involved, but the US could take a lesson or two from the friends to the north. And people adopt it fairly rapidly, from the collection calendars to park development.
A mix of old and new in the era of technology.
I had a great time in Montreal and checking out the city. I also had a variety of conversations with my friend Kate which I enjoyed, as well as the topic of social networking.
She happened to be lucky #1 in this grand experiment and documentary and she agreed to sit down and talk about the social networks with me. It’s refreshing to hear her experiences about how she uses it, likes and dislikes and how she views it as a whole.
It’s a great kickoff and if her interview and the one I just finished with my friend Tony in Toronto is an indicator, it’s going to be some great insights into this world.
I hope you enjoy it.
FACEBOOK, FRIENDS, INTERVIEW, LOCATION, PEOPLE, TECHNOLOGY, TRAVEL, TWITTER 
View Comments
Some cool things I’ve noticed about Montreal. The street art is actually artful. The farmers markets are palettes of wonder. And the Bixi is a great way to get around to see it all.
Graffiti du Montreal
Marché Jean-Talon (Jean-Talon Market) farmers market
The Bixi bikes
“Well, after this I should think nothing of falling down stairs.”– Alice after falling down the rabbit hole in Alice In Wonderland
Great conversation with Terry A. regarding how teens are constantly in communication. It’s an eternal clique with Facebook. In the old days you would go to school, be in and deal with the social circles and then be able to leave it for home. There might be a phone call here and there to catch up and gossip with friends, but for the most part what happened in school, stayed in school.
Now, it’s hard for teens to escape the constant waterfall of communication. Whether it be text messaging in class with their friends, after school on Facebook posting pics and commenting on status or video chats. There is constant peer and social pressure to talk, chat, gossip, respond, communicate.
A lot of us who use technology have a level of commitment, responsibility, pressure, need or even addiction to use it. Especially within the social networking community. Tweens and teens feel the weight even more so since it is their current pipeline into everything cultural and cool.
The question is, once we’re far down the rabbit hole, can we come out?
“You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake. You are the same decaying organic matter as everyone else, and we are all part of the same compost pile.”– Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club
I had a great discussion with a few older gentlemen of the baby boomer era today during a lunch outing about how they saw social networks and Facebook. Something that was very eye opening at least to me. Specifically it was how the older generation saw Facebook.
Beyond it being a novel idea of connection, their point was that it too away the idea of being unique. Bill W. told me how he joined up after his daughter kept speaking about the wonders of keeping in touch and it’s ease of use to see what the big hooplah was all about. He enjoys the various aspects of Facebook, but when he did a search on his full name out of curiosity, including what he thought was a pretty unique last name with it’s spelling, he was amazed that not one or two people shared it, but 12 other people across the country were exactly the same. He said it was very humbling. This was echoed from a couple others as well.
It harkens back to looking back into the phone book not just in your city, but any city you would travel to. It’d be exciting to look through the white pages and see if anyone, maybe someone, had the same last name as you did. The novelty and the thrill was simple.
Today it’s beyond easy to pop your name into Google or Facebook and see who might have the same last name, let alone first name as you. There is still a rush of excitement and curiosity just before those results come up and as you scroll through, but there is also that tinge of disappointment knowing there is another “you” out there. Are they just like me? Have they taken care of my name? Do they know about me? There’s more me out there. Doppelgangers, clones and replicants. Oh my!
The wonder of that conversation was that now we can know. We can search, find and reach out to those namesakes.
Have you found yourself yet?
