Home Blog Page 1411

Ishmael: The Book

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By Ben Buckley at Seemed Funny

Ski Ninjas: Coffee Shop

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By Kyle Lees at The Daily Snooze

Survey begins search for WebCT replacement

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By David Dyck

University looking for a general assessment from student body

Last week, SFU launched a survey to gauge student opinion on a new Learning Management System to replace the current WebCT. WebCT is to be replaced by another learning management system (LMS) in 2014.
The survey is part of the first phase of the WebCT replacement program, and is taking place alongside focus groups and public forums. It will end in May of 2012, with the beginning of phase two: the “selection and implementation planning” phase.
The survey is made up of over 30 questions, with a $150 random prize draw. According to project organizers, the survey has garnered over 4,500 responses in the first week. The survey will be available to students until Monday, January 30.
Stacey Robinsmith is an SFU graduate student who has over 10 years in education experience. He’s worked with WebCT and other LMS in classroom settings, and described WebCT as “clunky” and not as intuitive as it could be. Robinsmith took the survey last week, but thought that it was too broad to be very effective. “They were pretty weak questions. The example would be: how important is it to be open, [or] user friendly? . . . who is not going to say that they want one that’s easy to use or open so that I can understand that system?” he told The Peak. Robinsmith stated that he would have liked to have seen questions about what platforms others have used, and their experiences with them. “More questions that they could have looked into were open source solutions. I don’t know if that’s on their radar or not,” said Robinsmith. He added that he was impressed with how long the consultation process is going for, and that he had been invited to a consultation group.
Mark Bachmann, communications officer for the Teaching and Learning Centre, responded to these concerns. “Obviously everyone wants an easy to use platform, but the survey will let us know for example how strongly they feel about a certain aspect of the LMS. For example, if ease of use comes in very, very high, that’s a factor we’ll take into account when we compare two systems that might be similar otherwise,” said Bachmann. He added that although they will not get specific answers from the survey, they plan to get those from other parts of the consultation process, such as the focus groups and open forums.
There are two more open forums this week on Burnaby Campus, on January 24 and 25 at Student Central.

TransLink pushes back gondola project

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By Graham Cook

Fiscal concerns raised in business report

Following the sentiment of a recent business report, TransLink has decided to put a hold on the creation of the Burnaby Mountain gondola. The Gondola was slated to take passengers from the Production Way SkyTrain station to SFU’s Burnaby campus.

The firm found that the new project would save current riders 1.5 to 1.6 million hours annually of travel time with 26.1 to 29.2 million fewer vehicle kilometers travelled annually and a score of other benefits including lower auto operating costs, collision costs, and greenhouse gas emissions.  These benefits were valued at over $500 million dollars for a benefit-cost ratio of 3.6, indicating that benefits surpass the costs.

However, the estimated cost of the proposed gondola is $120 million with operating costs equating to about $3 to $3.5 million a year.  This totals to a 25-year combined cost of $157 million; $10 million more than what it is estimated that it would cost to maintain and expand the bus service.

Jeff Busby, TransLink’s manager of infrastructure planning spoke with The Peak and shared that “had the cost of the gondola been less expensive we could have considered in in our plans . . . we essentially could have used the savings from the bus service to offset the project within our existing plan but because the project requires more resources it would compete for resources with other projects and so it needs to be considered in a future plan.” This is due to the fact that if TransLink wants to provide a service that is more expensive than the services they currently provide they must create what is known as a supplemental plan. The most recent supplemental plan was called, “moving forward” and was concerned with building the Evergreen Line.

In an email release, SFSS president Jeff McCann said that “the student society has been in favour of the gondola for several years, and I think that the campus community could be enhanced by the gondola.” He added that he feels it will make the student experience at SFU better while being more sustainable both financially and environmentally.

Despite TransLink’s decision, SFSS at-large rep and SFU Community Trust board member Arry Dhillon remains optimistic about seeing a gondola at SFU in the near future. In an interview with The Peak, he stated that his best estimate for when the school would have a gondola would be within the next three to five years.

According to the business report, there are four routes being reviewed, including one from the Lake City station, two variations from the Production Way station, and one from the planned “Burquitlam” station that will exist on the Evergreen line.  “Route two”, which is one of the Production Way options, has emerged as a front-runner and would swap a 15-minute bus ride for seven-minute gondola trip.


Mystic Gary: Weight Loss

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EIC
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By Gary Lim

Dear Mystic Gary,

I hate myself for this, but over the Christmas break, I might have overindulged just a teensy bit too much.  An extra piece of shortbread here, a warm mug of festive spiced rum there. Who really even knows many times I splurged? (My thighs, that’s who!)

But to tell you the truth this happens every year and I spend the rest of January working off my holiday jelly-belly in time for Valentine’s Day. It can’t be good for me. I’ve tried Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, South Beach, heck, even North Beach! Just kidding about that one.

Well Mystic Gary, I was hoping you might now one of those oriental remedies made from rattlesnake skin or any other ooglie-booglie that might give my metabolism a kick in the behind.

 

—Lady Already Regretting Diet

 

Dear LARD,

Don’t be ridiculous. Compote of snakeskin for weight loss? You might as well be taking powdered badger thighbone. Hahaha. But the time for laughter has been completed.  Now onto serious matters,  oh LARD, the weight of your plight flattens my soul like so many crumpled lawn chairs.

Now as for any Chinese remedies, traditionally a paste made from powdered shark fin heated in shell of galapagos turtle is said to be very good for building of strong leg muscles as well as  metabolism, though that’s mostly from having to outrun the animal rights activists.

Personally I would recommend acupuncture.  Not only because acupuncture is already recommended by many doctors for everything from pain relief to giving metabolism a boost but because the threat of being pierced with hundreds of tiny needles, which are then later set on fire, is a great motivator for losing of weight, as well as silence from any political dissidents. I’m looking at you SFP!RG.

 

May the Year of the Dragon help burn off those pesky calories,

 

—Mystic Gary

Movie review: Red Tails

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EIC
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By Will Ross

It’s important that films start to have casts that feature visible minorities, but Red Tails is just counterproductive to the cause

Red Tails has everything you’d expect from latter-day George Lucas, who produced the film and directed reshoots. This will delight everyone except fans of well-crafted movies. Red Tails is the story of black pilots proving to white people that racism is bad because they are equally or more capable of shooting down aircraft. It’s a depiction of race relations which is as honest and responsible as its claim to being “inspired by actual events.” Sure it was, just like the creators of Spider-Man were inspired by seeing an actual spider.

Granted, the Tuskegee Airmen were a real group of heroic black pilots who proved their worth in combat by amassing an exemplary record. Red Tails dramatizes this by having them make monumentally stupid decisions for which they are not punished, like piloting four planes against a heavily defended airfield. They slaughter Germans with videogame efficiency and earn begrudging accolades from brass. “You chalked eight kills in the air!” (By my count, it’s not possible that they got more than five on that mission. Nice proofreading, guys.)

Then that happens four more times. Red Tails’ repetitiveness is hell — which, we are unconvincingly told, war also is — and its episodic narrative isn’t helped by the complete lack of development or insight of its stock types (I refuse to call them ‘characters’). Every performance is terrible; unavoidable, with dialogue like, “This red paint will definitely make these planes distinctive!” Even more so with a plot that refuses to give them any ambiguity or intrigue: the film’s moral seems to be ‘black people have the right to the same clichés as everyone else!’ Not the Luftwaffe, though: they’re restricted to being zee evil Germans, cartoon villains whose deaths are unqualified victories.

I don’t have space to properly diss Red Tails’ aesthetics. It’s an ugly, ugly movie: uniform lighting, clunky tonal shifts, choppy editing, and CGI backgrounds that scream, “Oh my God, somebody forgot to finish me!” It’s so incompetent that major portions of the film are out of focus.

I must credit Red Tails for its political courage, though: it’s refreshing to see a film brave enough to give its sole female role no characterization or purpose beyond being the object of the male lead’s affections.

Word on the Street: SOPA/PIPA

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EIC
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By Gary Lim

“Arrr, why ye be asking me fo-arrr? Now gangway lest ye yearn for feel me cutlass!”

Victor Barbarossa

Wrong kind of pirate

 

“I never trusted the government’s internet and set up my own Bar-Net  for my online needs.”

Gregory Barnett

Man in tin foil hat

 

“*CENSORED*“

Wikipedia

Information repository

 

“Who’s pushing my soap through the crab grass? I need that for my laundry!“

Moira Eddleston

Werther’s enthusiast

 

“No comment. Just the wet schlorping sound of an industry fucking over the commonfolk.”

Hollywood

Industrial Complex

Club PuSh: at the heart of art

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By Sonya Reznitsky
Photo courtesy of PuSh Festival

Tim Carlson, co-curator of PuSh Festival’s creatively promiscuous little sister, speaks on its successes

A gala at the Waldorf marked the opening night for PuSh Festival, a three-week collection of dance, theatre, music, film, and multimedia performances set throughout the city. Club PuSh, its nighttime half, acts as a space for fans and artists looking for a place to hang out — Club PuSh, hosted by Performance Works on Granville Island.

“We wanted to offer PuSh attendees and artists a meeting place, provide an experimental platform, and also have a place foreign artists could feel at home,” explains Tim Carlson, who founded Theatre Conspiracy, a local theatre production company, and also co-producer and curator of Club PuSh.

“As the festival grew, it drew in more artists from out of town. We took the opportunity to also offer a space for experimentation for pieces that have less technical requirements.” Performance Works is an ideal venue for performances focused on storytelling, cabaret, improv, standup, and music.

Some shows are commissioned by the club — in 2009, it debuted a one-night show called Do You Want What I Have Got? A Craigslist Cantata, a cycle of songs based on Craigslist ads. The show was so successful that they were invited back this year with an extended performance as part of the main festival.

Another act, Trunk, marries theatre performance with live rock ‘n’ roll music in the same space. “Those are the kinds of ideas we like — smart concepts artists can try out for a few days, and if they do well, they can use the performances as a platform for a tour,” Carlson noted.

Selecting the shows is a yearlong process. Armour spends much of his time travelling the world scouting for new acts, watching other festival shows, talking to artists and producers, seeing who’s travelling with other shows, and producing exciting work that gets people talking.

Attitudes towards the club have shifted over the years. In Club PuSh’s inaugural year, people were only attending to see performers they already knew — festivalgoers didn’t understand the concept, so the crowds were smaller. Now the profile has been built and people talk about the club as much as festival itself.

“Nowadays, people head downtown to watch their show, then to Granville Island for music — they make an evening of it.” Carlson explains. “And since we’ve made a name for ourselves as an experimental platform, artists recognize our club as a place to try out new ideas, so the number of pitches we get is constantly rising.”

Social media has played a key role in growing the fan base — the club’s shows have gained new followers from friends sharing with friends and creating a buzz online. With CBC Radio 3 onboard as this year’s media sponsor, the festival will be able to reach out to the indie music crowd as well.

So how does the club stay afloat during a period begrudgingly noted for its arts budget cuts? “We got started thanks to funding from the Vancouver Cultural Olympiad in 2009,” says Carlson. “That helped us get our club off the ground and start off the first year. Nowadays, we employ a variety of avenues: we work with the B.C. Arts Council, Canada Council Grants, and the Vancouver Foundation. Wine and beer sponsorships, as well as individual donations also help out. Combined with our box-office and liquor sales, we manage to balance it out.”

Ready to get your tickets? Carlson’s top picks are Taylor Mac’s Comparison is Violence, and Charlie Demers and Ryan Beil’s Making Art Noises.

 

SFU researcher looks for creativity in texts

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By David Dyck

Guilbault compares text messages to graffiti

Christian Guilbault, an SFU researcher in the French department, in collaboration with the University of Ottawa and the Université of Montréal, is collecting text messages in order to better understand how language is used to creatively communicate. Their goal is to collect 100,000 text messages for the corpus.

“We want to see if people who speak different languages use different languages in their text messages,” Guilbault told The Peak. He explained that code-mixing and code-switching is common with spoken communication, and since text messages are very close to spoken language, there may be code-switching occurring in text messages.

Code-switching occurs when a word or phrase from one language is used seamlessly with another language. “People can easily say, ‘Let’s go for dim sum.’ Last I heard, dim sum wasn’t an English word, so that’s an easy example of code-switching,” explained Guilbault. “We want to see if people are using that a lot in their text messages or if they’re just using it here and there.”

Although this type of corpus has been compiled before in Europe, they’ve mostly been done in a singular language: French. What makes this corpus more interesting for Guilbault is that the data will be in multiple languages. The project is called Text4ScienceHe is also hoping that the collection will act as a record of a significant sample of communication that would not otherwise be preserved. “It’s very unlikely,” he said, “but if people don’t laugh any more and just say ‘lol’, there you go. It’s unlikely, but you never know.”

Guilbault also believes that this collection can correct some misconceptions about text messages. One of those misconceptions is that text messages are incomprehensible to someone who is not part of the group. Guilbault believes that text message communication is much simpler than people think. Another assumption that Guilbault believes will be proven wrong is that text message lingo will become the norm in other areas of literature, such as term papers or newspaper articles, replacing traditional grammar. “It’s the same way you would talk to members of your hockey team, for instance. You may talk to them in a very specific, unique way, but as soon as you step out of the dressing room, you switch to a different register, a different type of language. We think it’s the same thing.”

He explained that the current generation is using the written word to communicate more than any other generation. “When I was young I used to write only when I had to write letters to my grandmother or when I was in school. Maybe I’d write a few pages a week at the most, whereas younger generations write constantly, they’re always writing text messages or emails or writing on a blog, or writing for school as well. Younger people are developing writing skills much more than we were at the same age,” he said.

What makes texting different from other text-based mediums such as Twitter or Facebook, is the personal nature of texts. Guilbault explained that people feel much more free to experiment with language in texts in a more intimate setting. He compared the idea to graffiti: “People play with graffiti, obviously, it’s made for fun. Text messages are a little bit the same way because a lot of people just have fun with it, and you would never do that with any other form of language.”

SFSS board shorts

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EIC
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By David Dyck

• On January 11, the board passed a motion recommended by a working group regarding a new student union building, now referred to as a “student activity complex”. The motion dedicated $27,500 to be allocated from the space expansion fund to finance half of the “architectural fees and materials for initial drawings, models, and supplies” for the new complex. The university will match the other half. There will also be a student activity complex information room to be placed in MBC 2270B.

• Last week, results from the online survey regarding student space were released by the student space working group. The survey, which went out last December, sought to determine what kinds of spaces were important to students. Preliminary results from 686 respondents indicate that individual study space is valued highest.

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Simon Fraser University’s independent student newspaper since 1965.

Contact us: [email protected]

© The Peak Publications Society 1965-2024

Simon Fraser University’s independent student newspaper since 1965.

Contact us:
[email protected]

© The Peak Publications Society 1965-2024