#SaveOurParkBoard | A Passionate, Reasoned, Well-Attended Town Hall

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This past Thursday afternoon, Green Party of Vancouver City Councillors Pete Fry and Adriane Carr, and One City Vancouver Councillor Christine Boyle organized a spirited Town Hall — with more than 200 passionate, reasoned citizens in attendance, who oppose the elimination of an independent, elected Park Board — the event taking place in the Joe Wai Room, on the main floor of Vancouver City Hall.


Vancouver City Councillors, l-r:  the Green Party’s Pete Fry and Adriane Carr + OneCity Vancouver’s Christine Boyle

One of the most compelling speakers of the afternoon was Terri Clark, Vancouver Park Board’s Public Affairs Communications Manager from 1973 through 2008.

“In all my years at Park Board, our General Managers worked productively with Vancouver City Managers Fritz Bowers (1977-1990), Ken Dobell (1990-1998) and Judy Rogers (1999-2008). Ours was a relationship of mutual respect and co-operation.

Necessary funds were always provided by the City for the upkeep and maintenance of Vancouver’s parks, pools and community centres, in order to best serve the public interest.

               Photo credit: Elvira Lount
First row, above: l-r, Park Board Commissioner Tom Digby | John Coupar, former Park Board Chair | Tricia Barker, Commissioner, last term | Laura Christensen, current independent Commissioner; Bottom row, l-r. Michael Wiebe, former Commissioner, former City Councillor | Sarah Blyth, former two term Commissioner | Brennan Bastyovanszky, current independent Park Board Chair.

Recent maintenance problems at the Aquatic Centre or Kits Pool would never have been allowed to happen in Mr. Bowers’,  Dobell’s and Judy Rogers time as City Manager at Vancouver City Hall.

In September 2009, before Susan Mundick, Park Board’s General Manager (1998-2009), announced her “retirement“, City Manager Penny Ballem had stripped Ms. Mundick of all her duties, stating she would “help park board choose Ms. Mundick’s replacement”, a selection process City Hall had never previously been involved in.

If our pools and community centres are in disrepair today, as Mayor Sim has pointed out, such a circumstance arises from City Hall’s decision to cut Park Board out of any and all maintenance decisions, ceding those responsibilities to the City, which over the past dozen years has largely ignored the needs of what was once a world class parks and recreation system of which we were proud.”

Several past and current Park Board Commissioners addressed those who had gathered at City Hall last Thursday, including: Michael Wiebe, who spoke about the role of Park Board Commissioners in preserving the natural environment; past Park Board Chair, John Coupar, who addressed the role of Park Board in creating a livable city;  both Sarah Blyth and Tricia Barker reminded those present that “Ken Sim and his ABC Council were not given a mandate to abolish the Vancouver Park Board”; while formerly ABC Vancouver but now independent Park Board Commissioners Brennan Bastyovanszky, Scott Jensen and Laura Christensen committed to continuing their work in the community to preserve the invaluable 135-year legacy of an independent, elected Vancouver Park Board that serves the interests of all British Columbians and “those who visit our beautiful city”.

Several speakers referenced an article in The Vancouver Sun, written by Canadian gardening legend Brian Minter, who writes …

“The Vancouver Park Board maintains 242 parks that comprises 11% cent of Vancouver land. In addition, Park Board maintains 22 kilometres of seawall at Stanley Park, and walkways along False Creek. Park Board’s mandate includes 10 ocean beaches and a freshwater lake beach. Not only are they responsible for the city’s recreation programmes, services and community centres and facilities, park infrastructure comes under their jurisdiction.

In a time of significant climate change with the huge challenges of heat and drought, and the drive to expand green spaces, a high priority must be placed on the viability of parks. The importance of green spaces, the many proven benefits to both our health and wellness are well-documented, as our needs continue to grow.

The Vancouver Park Board is one of our region’s most important public assets and needs dedicated people and citizen engagement to ensure the long-term viability of  B.C.’s, and indeed, Canada’s, most spectacular green spaces, for generations to come.”

And then there’s the disposition of the 242 Vancouver’s parks, one hundred of which do not a have a protected park designation.


Former ABC, now independent PB Commissioners, l-r: Laura Christensen, Brennan Bastyovanszky, Scott Jensen

Perhaps the most articulate and moving participant in Thursday afternoon’s Town Hall was Laura Christensen’s month-old daughter, who cried throughout most of the proceeding, voicing the despair clearly felt by her mother — to whom Mayor Ken Sim had committed his support, when he asked her to run as a Park Board Commissioner on his ABC Vancouver slate — and the despair and frustration of those who had gathered together in common cause to, as one speaker, said “fight ABC’s undemocratic initiative to abolish our cherished, independent Park Board.”

Music Sundays | Norah Jones | The Discovery of a New, Young Talent

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Norah Jones’ 2002 multi-Grammy-winning début album, Come Away With Me, has become one of the 21st century’s instant classics, an album for all time.

Jones comes from formidable musical stock. Her father is the heralded sitar player Ravi Shankar, her mother the acclaimed American concert producer Sue Jones.

Jones was born in Brooklyn in 1979. After her parents separated in 1986, she lived with her mother, growing up in Grapevine, Texas. Jones’ music took its form early on in the local Methodist Church where she regularly sang solos. At the age of 16, with both parents’ consent, she officially changed her name to Norah Jones.

Norah Jones showed enormous talent as a pianist from an early age, and was soon immersed in the works of pioneering American jazz pianist and composer Bill Evans, and renowned jazz singer, Billie Holiday … which led to Jones registering as a jazz piano major at the University Of North Texas, where her collaborations with Jesse Harris and Richard Julian set her on a new jazz country fusion path.

Urged by friends and mentors to move to New York to expand her musical vocabulary, Norah Jones arrived in New York City in 2000, whereupon she began appearing in ever larger clubs in and around Greenwich Village.

After a year and a half in New York, with A&R reps from the major record labels having heard of this young jazz / country-style artist, Norah Jones, and having seen and heard her in concert, a 22-year-old Norah Jones was signed to a recording contract with Blue Note Records, a label owned by the EMI Group, and production on her début album began.

Come Away With Me was released shortly thereafter, on February 26, 2002, becoming a monolithic, out-of-nowhere success in a way that’s almost hard to imagine now, when few releases can capture more than a week’s worth of attention.

Norah Jones’ début is a mellow, acoustic pop affair with soul and country overtones, immaculately produced by the legendary Arif Mardin.

Jones is not quite a jazz singer, but on her début album she was joined by highly regarded jazz musicians: guitarists Adam Levy, Adam Rogers, Tony Scherr, Bill Frisell, and Kevin Breit; drummers Brian Blade, Dan Rieser, and Kenny Wollesen; organist Sam Yahel; accordionist Rob Burger; and violinist Jenny Scheinman.

Jones’ regular guitarist and bassist, Jesse Harris and Lee Alexander, respectively, play on every track and also serve as the chief songwriters. Both have a gift for melody, simple yet elegant progressions, and evocative lyrics.

Jones, for her part, wrote the title track and the pretty but slightly restless Nightingale. She also includes convincing readings of Hank Williams’ Cold Cold Heart, J.D. Loudermilk’s Turn Me On, and Hoagy Carmichael’s The Nearness of You.

There’s a touch of Rickie Lee Jones in the voice of Norah Jones, a touch of Bonnie Raitt in the arrangements; her youth and her piano skills could lead one to call her an Alicia Keys for grown-ups.

Jones’ début record provided listeners with a strong indication of her alluring talents, Jones and Come Away With Me winning a slew of Grammy Awards.

Debuting at No. 139, Come Away With Me reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200 within two weeks of its release. The single Don’t Know Why hit No. 1 on the Top 40 Adult Chart in 2003, and Billboard’s Hot 100 Singles Chart.

At the 45th Grammy Awards in 2003, Norah Jones was awarded …

  • Album of the Year: Come Away With Me | Arif Mardin / Craig Street / Jay Newland / Norah Jones / S. “Husky” Hoskulds / Ted Jensen;
  • Best Engineered Album: Come Away With Me | Jay Newland / S. “Husky” Hoskulds
  • Best Pop Vocal Album: Come Away With Me | Arif Mardin / Jay Newland / Norah Jones / S. “Husky” Hoskulds;
  • Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, Don’t Know Why | Norah Jones;
  • Record Of The Year, Don’t Know Why | Arif Mardin / Jay Newland / Norah Jones;
  • Song Of The Year, Don’t Know Why | Jesse Harris.

By February 2005, Come Away With Me was certified diamond for selling ten million copies, one of the top selling albums of the decade.

Stories of a Life | Redux | Raymond | Late No More

Stories of a Life Redux, VanRamblings,

In the early 1980s, I was perpetually late on almost every occasion where I was depended upon to be on time. At the time, being on time was not a priority for me.

Now, as  has been suggested by psychologists, lateness may be interpreted as a sign of passive-aggressive behaviour, a faithless statement to those who are waiting for you to arrive, that your time is more valuable than theirs.

Most people won’t bear a grudge if you’re five minutes late — but to be more than five minutes late, when people might start getting annoyed with you is a whole different kettle of fish. Let’s face it, to mature adults lateness betrays a lack of respect and consideration for those who you are inconveniencing with your lateness.

In the inverse, although being late may well be considered as an insult to others, it also serves to undermine the person who is late.

Psychologists suggest that lateness betrays a lack of emotional intelligence on the part of the person who is consciously or unconsciously “choosing” to be late, as an indication of a distinct lack of self-knowledge, will power, or empathy.

Or, it may be that the person who is late has set unrealistic goals, or underestimated the time that it takes to travel from one place to another.

There may even be a more perfidious reason for being late, than mere mediocrity. Sometimes it involve anger and aggression, and at other times self-deception. Lateness may be interpreted as treacherous anger expressed as passive-aggressive behaviour, a vigorous means of expressing aggression covertly, and doing so without incurring the full emotional and social costs of a more overt aggression.

It may be, too, that the person who is late feels inferior or unimportant, being late a way to impose themselves on a situation by attracting attention, if even it is negative attention, even going so far as to “overtake” an event, situation or proceeding.

Sometimes, being late is your unconscious (intuition) telling you that you don’t actually want to be there, or that it would be better for you not to be there — for instance, it could be that a meeting (or even a job) is not the best use of your time, or that arriving at your destination on time will work against your best interests.

Still, there are few habits as infuriating as someone making us wait.

Despite what may be running through your mind as you’re kept waiting again, it’s unlikely your friends or colleagues who are persistently late are just being selfish.

“Lateness is really a commonly misunderstood problem,” says Diana DeLonzor, author of Never Be Late Again, who has conducted research on the perpetually tardy. “Yes, it’s a rude act, but I’ve interviewed hundreds of people and the vast majority of late people really dislike being late, they try to be on time, but this is something that has plagued them throughout their lives.”

In 1982, an event occurred in my life that ended my lateness forever.

Now, in my contemporary life and with rare exception, I always arrive on time — or, more often than not, early. When I arrive early, I tend to hold back on knocking on the door or depressing the buzzer, until the exact minute of my proposed arrival time occurs — and over the course of the past 42 years, I’ve felt all the better for it.

In the autumn of 1982, having finished work on my Masters, I found myself employed in a suburban Metro Vancouver school district as a secondary school English and Drama teacher.

When I’d visited my mother one mid-autumn weekend, she invited me for dinner in her North Vancouver condominium apartment, in the coming week. “Arrive at 5pm, Raymond,” she said to me. “You know I like to eat dinner early.”

On the mid-week day of the appointed dinner date, I skeddaddled out of the school at 3:45pm, a little later than I’d planned, but I figured that seventy-five minutes to travel from the Tri-Cities to North Vancouver should get me to my mother’s house in good time. Such, however, proved not to be the case. Traffic was particularly bad on Highway One that day — there was an accident on the Ironworkers Memorial Bridge that slowed my travels, as traffic moved along at a crawl.

Note should be made, the event being related occurred in pre-cell phone days.

So, there I was stuck in traffic with no way to contact my mother to let her know I’d likely be a few minutes late.

Long story short, I arrived at my mother’s door at 5:20pm — late for sure, but I had a good reason, or so I thought. I knocked on the door.

My mother’s newest boyfriend, a tall, clearly fit, imposing man used to getting his own way — a retired commander in the Canadian Armed Forces Navy, as it happens — glowered at me standing in the hallway as I made my way into my mother’s home, whereupon he grabbed me, shoved me up against a wall and lifted me off the ground, my feet dangling below me, and set about to lecture me on how rude I’d been in arriving late, that on behalf of my mother, he wasn’t having any of it.

“This is the last time you’ll be late for any event, ever, for any reason,” he roared at me, my feet still dangling below me. “From here on in, not only will you arrive on time, you will arrive early — but wait until the appointed time to make contact with those with whom you are to meet. You will plan all of your excursions and travels, and in so doing will always leave more than enough time in order that you might arrive at your destination not just on time, but early. Do I make myself clear to you?”

I nodded my head meekly, and said quietly, “Yes sir, I do.”

And, you know what?


Visiting the Grandview-Woodland neighbourhood of my youth, where I have many friends

From that day to this, I have always made a point of leaving early, allowing myself at least an extra half hour of traveling time, often more — as when I’m traveling to Vancouver’s east side from my Kitsilano home to visit a friend for lunch or dinner,  or a couple of beers,  or a saunter through the Grandview Woodland neighbourhood, or for any other reason when I’m meeting with a valued acquaintance.

#ArtsFriday | Artificial Intelligence and Its Impact on the Film Industry

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Artificial intelligence (AI) is quickly becoming a game-changer in the film industry. From script writing and casting to special effects and distribution, AI is transforming the way movies are made and seen.

While there are many benefits to using AI in filmmaking, there are also potential downsides that need to be considered.

What impact will AI (artificial intelligence) have on Hollywood?

Who better to answer that question than ChatGPT, a thrilling but scary chatbot developed by OpenAI.

When VanRamblings asked ChatGPT about AI‘s potential impact on the film industry, it made the following points (note: only the single, numbered paragraphs represent the ChatGPT input):

1. Scriptwriting: AI can be used to analyze existing screenplays and create new ones, potentially leading to more efficient and cost-effective screenwriting.

In addition, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos recently told Business Insider’s tech reporter, Stephanie Palazzolo.

“Employing AI to create new scripts will help filmmakers deal with this task more efficiently. Being fed with large amounts of data in the form of movie scripts, machine learning algorithms analyze the data, learn from them, and come up with unique scripts. This makes the process much faster, saving significant time and resources for filmmakers.”

Sarandos went on to state, “Artificial Intelligence will also be used for analyzing scripts that will be made into a film. AI algorithms can study the script storyline, bring forward possible questions, uncertainties, and suggestions, thus making the process of script analysis much easier and faster.”

2. Pre-production: AI can be used to streamline the pre-production process, saving time and resources, including casting, location scouting and storyboarding.

“AI has great potential to simplify the pre-production process by helping to plan schedules, find locations that best fit the storylines and support in other preparatory processes,” says Disney chief, Bob Iger. “Implementing AI will automate the planning of shooting schedules according to the availability of actors that will save time, and increase efficiency.”

In addition, AI systems can analyze the locations described in screenplays and recommend  sites for shooting the scene, saving resources in location scouting.

Even now, AI is being used to improve the accuracy and efficiency of casting decisions. AI-powered platforms can analyze a vast amount of data, including past performance data and social media activity, to predict which actors are most likely to be successful in a given role. This can help casting directors make more informed decisions and save time and resources.

3. Special effects: AI can be used to create more realistic and immersive special effects, potentially reducing the need for practical effects and saving time and money in post-production.

AI is currently being used to enhance visual effects (VFX) in Marvel films. Machine learning algorithms have been trained to recognize and classify different objects in a scene, making it easier and faster to add VFX elements, saving time and money for VFX studios, as well as enhance the overall quality of the film.

4. Audience analysis: AI can be used to analyze audience data and preferences, helping studios make more informed decisions about which films to greenlight and how to market them.

Monica Landers, founder and CEO of StoryFit, acknowledges the peculiarity of using AI to evaluate audience connections with narratives or characters.

Says Landers, “Warner Bros. has turned to Cinelytic AI-based platform to predict the success of its movies and box office receipts. 20th Century Fox has integrated the Merlin system that uses AI and machine learning to match movies to particular genres and audiences, as well as provide complete demographics for any movie.”

5. Distribution: AI can be used to personalize movie recommendations for viewers and optimize distribution strategies, potentially leading to higher ticket sales and revenue.

University of Southern California film professor Siranush Andriasyan, in a recently published research paper, writes …

“Film studios have been using AI for effective advertising and promotion. Analyzing different factors such as audience base, actors’ popularity across the globe, film studios may plan their campaigns according to certain locations where they expect the highest interest from the audience. For example, 20th Century Fox has developed the Merlin Video neural network to predict the success of promotional videos.”

There are, however, potential downsides to the use of AI in the film industry, says retired USC Berkeley film studies professor, Eric Ironside.

One major concern, he states, is the potential for AI to replace human jobs. As algorithms become more advanced, there’s a risk they could replace human casting directors, screenwriters, and VFX artists, leading to film industry job losses.


Response to deal | SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher and Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, Chief Negotiator

“If you want to get hired, you have to be ready to consent to be replicated, so there are people who are out there saying that consent at the time of engagement is coercion because they won’t hire you unless you give them those rights,” Shaan Sharma, an alternate member of the Screen Actors Guild negotiating committee told Rolling Stone.

AI cloning set to impact the film industry, and jobs in Hollywood

“And it’s only those with considerable leverage that will have the ability to say no to the replication, but still be hired. That really concerns me because most members don’t have the leverage to say no at the time of engagement.”

Another potential downside is the loss of human creativity and personal touch. While AI algorithms can generate new stories and make accurate predictions, they may lack the unique perspective and emotional depth that comes from human creativity. This could lead to a homogenization of storytelling and a decrease in the overall quality of films.

For years, the idea that computers and data could play a role in filmmaking was considered anathema in Hollywood, where personal taste, charisma and talent were viewed as key to success.

In recent years, film industry skepticism about AI has lessened, suggests Largo.ai founder Sami Arpa, in part because streaming platforms such as Netflix and Amazon have thrived by using technology to guide decision making. Both use complex, jealously guarded algorithms to recommend content for their audiences, and analyze audience data to underpin their commissioning and acquisition decisions.

Make no mistake: AI is set to change the film industry in profound ways, from data analysis to virtual production.

While there are concerns about the impact of AI on the industry, it is clear that AI is here to stay, and it will continue to transform the way films are produced, distributed and consumed by moviegoers.

Those who are willing to embrace AI and learn to work with it will be at the forefront of this transformation, shaping the future of the film industry.