As the challenges before Generation Squeeze gained greater media attention over recent weeks, a number have tweeted, emailed and written that I remain in the 20th century when it comes to communicating.
Sure, I have a blog, they observe. But I treat it as a website.
Evidently, this is sooooo passé. Websites are static, people tell me, and require a lot of work for readers to figure out what information may be newly posted. Blogs, by contrast, are supposed to be dynamic, because they create a conversation through routine posts that offer others the opportunity to comment.
As a farmer morning and night, I have to say that I find some passé technology pretty handy. I start and end each day cleaning manure from my barn with a pitchfork and wheelbarrow. This back to basics approach works well. My partner Andrea and I even had aspirations to harness our horses to old fashioned farm equipment to maintain our fields and spread our compost.
But it turns out that finding this old equipment is very difficult. There is so little demand, and little supply. As a result, a few years back, we modernized the farm by purchasing a little tractor. I must confess, it is FANTASTIC, and very efficient.
So just as the farmer in me has embraced modern technology, so will the communicator in me. With this post, I announce that I am formally transforming my website into the blog people want it to be.
I created the website over the summer to inform Canadians that our country risks no longer working for all generations. My intention was to attach weekly observations as a result of my regular column in the Vancouver Sun, which started this past September.
As I transition from the website, I want to ensure the blog posts capture the narrative in its entirety. I therefore start the blog by re-presenting the initial material in four introductory posts. These are followed immediately by a re-printing of some of the initial Vancouver Sun articles, which I composed for the column “Think like a Beaver.” Thanks to the Postmedia group for granting me copyright to reproduce material digitally for my academic blog.
For some, these introductory posts will be repetitive. But any good teacher knows that the key to pedagogy is repetition, repetition, repetition. Why else do advertisements repeat the same phrase as many as 7 times in 30 seconds?!
For those bored by repetition, there is no need to read the initial blog posts if you have either scanned the blogsite before, or been enthusiastic readers of my Vancouver sun columns. The most recent posts will be new material, often featuring material I prepare for the Vancouver Sun column.
As I start the blog, I promise readers to shovel manure only morning and night at my farm in Pitt Meadows, which will remind me to refrain from spreading any BS through my writing. Not all will agree with my commentary about Canada’s bad intergenerational deal, Gen Squeeze, or the New Deal for Families we require to make Canada once again work for all generations. But I promise all of my ideas will be based on solid academic research.
I look forward to the conversation. Regards,
Paul
