Walking the streets of Beijing and exploring the night market..
I always wanted to eat scorpion, snakes and a few other things..
This is not the snake i am looking for, but will do for now..
24 hrs later i am still alive and not sick!

Cross-posted from: BBC Sport | Olympics | Beijing Diaries

Background: Raincity Studios CEO/Founder Robert Scales and Pres/Ambassador Kris Krug are on the ground in Beijing to document and study the 2008 edition of the Olympic Games. They are publishing dispatches to a variety of news outlets including the venerable BBC. Here’s Scales’ first installment of his Olympic diary.

ROBERT SCALES, MONTREAL, CANADA

Robert runs a web development company based in Canada

Since Autumn 2007, I have been living in China in preparation for the upcoming Summer Games.

I can honestly say that I have been an Olympic fan, or a "fen zhi" as the Chinese say, since I was a little boy!

I remember watching the 1976 summer games in Montreal on the TV, and
that has always stayed with me. In 2006, I had the opportunity to go to
the Winter games in Torino, Italy. This lit a flame in my heart and
since then I have been working on securing new opportunities to attend
future games such as Vancouver 2010 and London 2012.

Over the next couple of weeks I will be sharing my Beijing
experience with you. I like to shoot low quality, single take, unedited
videos.

I am also travelling with my friend and business partner, Kris, who
is a photographer extraordinaire, so there will be no shortage of
pictures to share with you folks.

Some of my goals over the next 16 days are to attend the
Olympic fencing, which I have several tickets for on 15 August. I also
plan to visit some of the nation houses around the city to make new
international friends and meet athletes.

Other goals are to enjoy some of the local food and culture, and to have a great time.

Now, I must make myself ready to go and venture out into the Beijing
wild, in hope of finding the perfect spot to watch the opening
ceremony, since I have not been blessed with a ticket.

Citizens On the Ground

Raincity Studios Sino-Away-Squad of Scales and KK, are on the ground in Beijing to cover and participate in the Olympic experience as citizen journalism, technology experts, social pundits and cultural ambassadors.

The Glimmer Twins’ tasks are diverse and their methods varied so here’s a preview:

• participating in the 9th International Symposium on Olympic Studies, in Beijing, August 5-7 with Olympic scholar Dr. Andy Miah’s
• documenting the scene for crowd-sourced new site: Now Public, Vancouver radio station: Crave 95, and BBC Interactive – among other media outlets



• shooting Creative Commons licensed photos delivered via Flickr
• extolling about the new, improved Bryght web community hosting product – available in free, cheap or fancy varieties
• meeting up with prospective clients to extol Raincity Studios’ status as an approved weblog vendor for Vancouver/Whistler 2010
• cheering for Team Canada at the Archery, Fencing, Women’s Softball, BMX and more summer games sports
• spreading international goodwill in the fun-loving/hard-working style they honed whilst at the Torino 2008 Winter Games.

Get Friendly

Follow along with their content via your RSS feeder, Facebook or whatever you prefer … or, if you are in Beijing, track Scales/Krug down for a photo walk, meetup, excursion, interview, geekout or just a tasty beverage. Leave a comment to or message via the arsenal of communication funnels at their disposal.

Scales’ coverage:

• Now Public – dispatches from Beijing
  episode 1: kk and Scales at the 2008 Beijing Olympics!
• Scales’ Beijing tag on Flickr
• Facebook videos (ask Robert to be your friend)
  
• Youtube videos
• Scales on Daily Vancouver

KK’s collections:

• Beijing 2008 photoset
• Facebook updates (ask Kris to be your friend)
  
• Youtube videos
• KK on Daily Vancouver

Chinese Theme and Version

Meanwhile, back in the tubes, … we are playing along with a Chinese
styled blog theme to celebrate the Games – birdsnest and everything.

Also worth reminding you that Raincity Studios’ site is
available in Mandarin for
Chinese readers. Even if you don’t read Chinese, you gotta say the site looks
really cool in kanji .

Also, the new improved Bryght hosting platform is available in Chinese for your international-minded web community hosting projects.

Approved Olympic Weblogs

In case you didn’t happen to know … Raincity Studios is an approved weblog vendor for Vancouver/Whistler 2010:

“Along with the good people at Raincity Studios, Bryght has been successfully passed an RFQ process to provide weblog services to the BC Olympic Games Secretariat.

We want to work with teams, countries, athletes, non-profits, and businesses who are preparing for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games and want to take advantage of emerging internet technologies.

We can help you get online, start blogging, podcasting, posting video, sharing images, building a community and sharing your news and messages with a global audience hungry for information about the 2010 Games.

We’re experts in syndication, aggregation, web development, community development, search, microcontent, blogging, online publishing, Drupal, PHP, CSS, ecommerce, content management and hosting.

We have an experienced network of partner companies who have also been approved as Olympic vendors who we work with to offer comprehensive integrated marketing and communication campaigns from your browser or mobile phone at the front end to the web server at the back end as well as normal, real world marketing and communications.”

Have a Luge team needing a communication platform? Maybe a site to keep athlete’s and families in-touch? An interactive training diary for your entire team? We’d be pleased to help.

No matter your idea, Raincity Studios is ready to deliver a top-notch performance. Contact Raincity Studios to begin the conversation.

Bonus: Archive & Related

• Beijing coverage at Daily Vancouver
• Torino coverage at Daily Vancouver
• Symposium on Web 2.0 and the Future of Sport – Torino 2008
• Coffee talk with Gold Medalist Ross Rebagliati podcast from Symposium in Vancouver 2008
• Vancouver 2010 – Official site for Vancouver/Whistler – Media Centre
• Web Services for International Sporting Events – Bryght
• China Access Eases the Way – Raincity Radio – podcast with Andrew Gilkes of China Access 2008
• Olympic Outsider podcast Blog – iTunes – Feed
• Mobile Muse
• Scales’ at 2010 New Media Day

Vancouver writer Jonathon Narvey
interviewed Raincity’s CEO, Robert Scales and President Kris Krug, and
chatted with some of the Raincity Studios crew, for an article in Business in Vancouver magazine.

He discussed the Raincity Shanghai office including the work/lifestyle, communication processes, team building across oceans and technical challenges and advantages of working with a very multi-cultural team.

Having attended open source software and blogger symposiums in Beijing
and Shanghai, Krug has seen China’s Web 2.0 dynamism up close. With a
team of 13 employees in Shanghai, mostly open-source online publishing
software developers, and their CEO Robert Scales, Raincity now has an
established beachhead in the country.

The article also explored the size of the Internet market in China and the rise of open source software and inpact on innovation.

“Web 2.0 is exploding in China,” said Raincity Studios president Kris
Krug. “The Chinese are totally wired, totally online, using web phones
and all the mobile technology we use here.

“There’s a growing middle class wanting to use all these open-source
tools, in part because that means they don’t have to worry about using
proprietary software and pay licensing fees to western companies.”

He also dug deep into the personal expression issues around the Beijing Olympics – a topic we’ve discussed a lot recently in the China, Social Media, Olympics, etc. series and Scales’ article at Now Public.

“Last time I was in Shanghai, the Chinese government announced they
had just hired 100,000 new cyber-police,” Krug said. “That’s on top of
however many they had to begin with.”

{snip}

Krug has also learned how easy it can be to run afoul of vigilant Chinese cyber-regulators.

“We were running a bar camp (an informal Web 2.0 drupal tutorial
seminar), and our wiki was totally open. Anyone could register and
write on it.

“Within a couple of days, we received a letter [stating] that we had
to change our site in accordance with the rules in China. Users had to
be pre-approved, content had to be moderated and we had to make changes
on the website. We scrambled to make the changes in 24 hours.”

Mr. Narvey also checked in with Olympic pundit Maurice Cardinal of OlyBlog.com for his opinion about the regulations of athletes telling their personal stories online.

But the flip side for all these Chinese Web 2.0 enthusiasts is how
online communities and new media will be allowed to operate when it
comes to the Beijing Olympic Games.

This is a topic i’ve watched closey (see: Blogging, Athletes and web sites – to be continued … and listen to Olympic Outsider Podcast #3 – Coffee talk with Gold Medalist Ross Rebagliati) and I am curious to see where the line between personal and professional is drawn.

The article is available at: “Internet technology to grapple with the Great Firewall of China – Beijing Olympic Games will test the host country’s ability to control information gathering and distribution.” We invite your comments about Narvey’s area of research and findings.

Hat tip: thanks to Jordan Behan for the paper copy.

I’ve mentioned some pre-Olympic and Olympic Games related activities coming up in passing. Now, as topics are piling up and the Beijing Summer Games are nearing (complete with controversy), henceforth begins a blog mini-series called, “China, The Olympics, Social Media, Symposiums, etc.” – I think I’ll need a better name for the series though. Suggestions are welcome.

Background

As you likely know, Raincity Studios actively conducts business in China with an office in
Shanghai and the Raincity Studios site is published in English and Mandarin (French underway) and we collaborate with Chinese colleagues and some of us (not me) study Mandarin language and foodery. Just so ya know where we’re coming from.

Social Media at Olympics

As for the Olympic games, RCS crew were at Torino 2006 – documenting the Olympic events as social media journalists using the Torino Piemonte Media Center and creating heaps for grassroots coverage (see Torino Flickr pool, DailyVancouver Torino, coverage) as well as participating in BC House activities on a professional basis.

Along with Scales, BMann and KK in Turin, Roland, Will Pate and I linked up for a cross-ocean symposium “Web 2.0 and the Future of Sport” about tech and athletics featuring gold medalist Ross Rebagliati (Flickr coffeewithross).

Among other topics, we discussed the restrictions (or lack thereof) put on self-expression by athletes as well as ways the participants can use technology to better communicate with friends and family back home. Really so many athletes will never make it to TV and their families seek the micro-coverage possible only by crowd sourcing e.g. the first ever Nepali winter Olympian (SLC 2002 Olympics collection).

Olympian Politics

With the 2010 Winter Games coming to our HQ city of Vancouver, and the resultant controversies (mostly concerning tax money spent on events rather than poverty and homelessness), we, like much of the world, are watching as the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing is becoming increasingly politicized and watching the reaction of the government and the citizens of the world.

The most visible conundrum is the torch relay which was used as a rallying point for anti-China protesters and widely reported about on Now Public among other citizen journalism and mainstream media sites.

Certainly political gamesmanship is a staple in the modern Olympic games and the heavy handed security surrounding the torch parade is only the beginning of a conversation about the perceived emphasis on tight security and enforcing the stringent policies of the Chinese government rather than using this global event as a springboard to openness.

Having met several Olympic athletes who are eager to chronicle their experience freely, I am curious if athletes will be allowed and encouraged to speak openly while at the Games? (Blogging, Athletes and web sites – …). Can they report on their experiences in candid fashion? Can they explore the region and travel the country without hindrance? or will the world see just the parts of China which look good on TV?

Make Your Own Media

Beyond the political conversations, as social media content creators and advocates of journalistic access for indie producers, we are also watching carefully as the policies about social media coverage are created (by who?).

So far there are mixed signals about athletes not/allowed to blog, and how amateur created content can be used (is posting your personal Olympic photos Flickr OK?) How about creating podcast coverage of the games with reaction to in-person and/or televised coverage?

International Symposium

Well, we’re not the only ones with these questions. Olympic scholar Dr. Andy Miah is organizing a panel at the 9th International Symposium on Olympic Studies, in Beijing, August 5-7, 2008.

Before we get too far along, what is the ICOS?

The International Centre for Olympic Studies, established at The University of Western Ontario in 1989, was the first of its kind in the world. It remains the only such Centre in the Americas. It has as its primary mission the generation and dissemination of academic
scholarship focused specifically upon the socio-cultural study of the Olympic Games and the Olympic Movement.

And the event blurb:

The Symposium’s theme, “Deconstruction and Discourse: Odysseys in Olympic Socio-Cultural Matters,” focuses on research studies dealing with the history, sociology, anthropology, and philosophy of the modern Olympic Movement.

Emerging Journalism Panel

Dr. Miah (who is a Reader in New Media & Bioethics, School of Media, Language & Music, University of the West of Scotland)’s topic is “Emergent Journalistic Practice at the Olympics” will feature a panel of Ana Adi, Beatriz Garcia, Raincity Studios President Kris Krug, Raincity Studios CEO Robert Scales,Garry Whannel, and Tina Zhihui.

Here’s the panel description from the abstract:

{Ed note: Paragraph breaks mine to make easier reading}

Research into the role of the media within the Olympic Movement has focused predominantly on representational questions. Far less research has investigated the journalistic culture of an Olympic Games or the Movement more generally, besides analyses of its contribution to sustaining the Olympic Movement.

Moreover, nearly no research has examined the work of those journalists who are peripheral to the organizational staging of the Games.

This category includes journalists who are associated with accredited media institutions, but whom might not have formal accreditation due to restrictions on numbers of passes. It also includes journalists who are from major media organizations, but whom have no intention of working from Olympic facilities. However, it also includes non-accredited journalists, which encompasses professional journalists from a range of organizations, along with freelance or citizen journalists, whose work is utilized by the mass media and is duplicated in independent domains.

This panel engages some of these issues in the form of a round table debate about the future of journalism at the Olympic Games. It reviews some of the implications of emerging new media platforms, arguing that the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games can be characterized as the first Web 2.0 Summer Games. While some principles of Web 2.0 have been visible since the Internet’s inception, critical aspects of its current architecture began to flourish around 2005. Applications from this era, such as YouTube, MySpace and Facebook, more adequately enable users to report the Olympics as citizen journalists.

The implications of this within China and for the Olympics more broadly are considerable. As mass media organizations begin to strike partnerships with new media institutions – for instance, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) purchased a YouTube channel in March 2007 – questions remain over how the Olympic Movement will protect its intellectual property, as the base broadens over ownership claims and via distributed publishing syndication.

Next up, More Questions

Now that you are briefed with sufficient background, the next post will pose a variety of questions which the panel will discuss so you can share your opinions about “China, The Olympics, Social Media, Symposiums, etc.”

Foreign Newsprint and Blogging on Mainland China

Last week, The Vancouver Sun published an article featuring a Richmond-based Digital Newspaper company, NewspaperDirect Inc., which has just signed the first deal for foreign newsprint to be printed on Mainland China. Founder Easiprint Co. Ltd. in Beijing will print foreign newspapers for same-day delivery – a historical first for China.

Wency Leung, the writer of this piece, interviewed Robert Scales and Kris Krug, from Bryght, back in May, prior to their first trip to China. Having had met with political and prominent business figures in China, Rob spoke with Wency again last week, to give her a sense of what the blogosphere does in fact look like on the ground, and what his feelings are of the Chinese approach to the media in China.

Here is an excerpt from her article:

Robert Scales, president and CEO of Vancouver-based web development firm Raincity Studios, said he hasn’t seen any indication that foreign bloggers and online journalists will be restricted during the Beijing Olympics. The company is aiming to work with Chinese web hosts and other companies in preparation for the 2008 Games. On a trip to China in May, Scales said he posted blogs on his site from Beijing without any difficulty.

You can read the full Vancouver Sun article online.

Rob and Kris are heading back to China in September to further their research and establish more business relationships in conjunction with the China Access 2008 project.

Robert Scales from Raincity Studios and Kris Krug from Bryght are featured in today’s Vancouver Sun article, “Canadians Trying To Land Beijing Contracts”. Vancouver Sun reporter Wency Leung came into our offices a few days ago to interview Robert and Kris and spoke with them about their upcoming trip to China, getting a scope and understanding on how Raincity and Bryght is looking to effect and learn from the tech and new media industry in Beijing, in conjunction with preparing for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.

Vancouver Sun Article Excerpt:

Vancouver-based new media partners Bryght and Raincity Studios, which are working with China Access 2008, also see opportunities at the Beijing Olympics for B.C.’s technology companies.
“We think there’s a huge market opportunity for us to do work with Chinese Internet service providers, and Chinese hosts and Chinese web development shops,” said Kris Krug of Bryght.
He added that a presence at the Beijing Games will also help Bryght and Raincity Studios prepare for the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver and Whistler.
“We have an interest in learning as much as we can [at the Beijing Games] so that we can find out what companies and teams and countries are looking to do online around the 2010 Olympics,” Krug said.

Kris and Rob head over to China on Thursday for 2 weeks, getting on the ground and exploring first-hand the opportunities that potentially lie ahead.

Tomorrow they will be attending the China Access Forum, meeting people from other local BC companies who have already successfully initiated business in China.

You can register for the event on the China Access website and mark it on your upcoming.org account as well.

Listen Live to a reading of the article.

Wency Leung will be tracking Rob and Kris in China and will be following up with their progress upon their return.

Over the past month, Kris Krug of Bryght, Robert Scales of Raincity Studios and various other Vancouver companies have been working together with New Media BC and Leading Edge BC to coordinate a technology symposium at the BC Canada Place next month during the Torino Olympics in Italy.

This morning as part of my first assignment for Urban Vancouver, I attend Vancouver Mayor, Sam Sullivan and Vancouver 2010 CEO, John Furlong’s announcement at the Vancouver City Hall.

In just one month, Sam Sullivan is to accept the Olympic Flag at the closing of the Torino Olympics, making him the first quadriplegic to have such honor.

I managed to video the announcement on my PDA2K while Kris Krug took some great pictures of Sam and John.

Here’s an extract from the official press release

The flag ceremony protocol begins with Torino Mayor Sergio Chiamparino returning the Olympic flag to Dr. Jacques Rogge, President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). Dr. Rogge will then present Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan, the only elected Canadian official in the Closing Ceremony, with the flag, symbolizing the official beginning of Vancouver’s responsibility to host the world in 2010.

Mayor Sullivan is then required by IOC tradition to wave the flag back and forth eight times. Because of the physical challenges to Mayor Sullivan inherent in his participation, a number of innovative accommodations are underway, including a custom-made holster on the Mayor’s motorized wheelchair and the installation by the Torino Organizing Committee of a customized elevator within the stage.

“I’m greatly honoured to represent Vancouver and Canada in Torino,” said Mayor Sullivan. “We are thrilled to be the host of the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games and invite the world to our beautiful and progressive city and country.”

“Mayor Sullivan will be acting on behalf of all Canadians, and I can’t think of a better person to represent this nation’s spirit, determination and commitment to ability over disability, said Vancouver 2010 CEO John Furlong.”

Upon the Mayor’s return to Vancouver the Oslo flag will be put on public display in Vancouver City Hall and a replica flag will be raised outside City Hall on Tuesday, February 28. The flag raising event is just one of the activities planned in Vancouver to celebrate the flag handover. For more details, visit Vancouver.ca.

Great Shots from KK

Picture by Kris Krug

More information to come over the next few weeks, it looks like we are to cover more events from both Vancouver and Torino.

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