Justin McElroy discusses media through the lens of the Ubyssey, the University of British Columbia’s campus newspaper.

Justin McElroy has been Coordinating Editor of The Ubyssey, UBC’s student newspaper, since April 2010. In that time, The Ubyssey has redesigned its website, print product, and seen web traffic triple. During his time at UBC, Justin [...]]]>

Justin McElroy discusses media through the lens of the Ubyssey, the University of British Columbia’s campus newspaper.

Justin McElroy has been Coordinating Editor of The Ubyssey, UBC’s student newspaper, since April 2010. In that time, The Ubyssey has redesigned its website, print product, and seen web traffic triple. During his time at UBC, Justin has been involved heavily in campus media, previously serving as News and Sports Editor of The Ubyssey, volunteering for CiTR, working for Maclean’s OnCampus, and thinking far too often about UBC President Stephen Toope.

November 5th, 2011. University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
Filmed by Craig Ross: Video edited by David Ng

About TEDx:

In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)

Paige Zhang talks about HIV and stigma. Although HIV has only been around for 30 years, this stigma is heavily prominent and important to address and correct. Part of this process is to educate the public on the need to undergo routine HIV testing.

Paige has had experience working with the S.T.O.P. HIV/AIDS project [...]]]>

Paige Zhang talks about HIV and stigma. Although HIV has only been around for 30 years, this stigma is heavily prominent and important to address and correct. Part of this process is to educate the public on the need to undergo routine HIV testing.

Paige has had experience working with the S.T.O.P. HIV/AIDS project and doing HIV outreach, Here, she has encountered a lot of misconceptions around HIV – a lot of which is hurtful and disruptive to public health outreach. She hopes that her talk will not only explain origins and causes of stigma but also inspire others to look past misconceptions as an important way of fighting the HIV epidemic.

November 5th, 2011. University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
Filmed by Craig Ross: Video edited by David Ng

About TEDx:

In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)

Ratib Islam provides a measured look at the rhetoric of alternative medicines, and explores its lack of distinction between evidence based and non evidence based claims.

Ratib is a 6th year B.Sc. student, majoring in biochemistry with a minor in philosophy. He became interested in alternative medicine in 2009 when naturopaths were recognized as [...]]]>

Ratib Islam provides a measured look at the rhetoric of alternative medicines, and explores its lack of distinction between evidence based and non evidence based claims.

Ratib is a 6th year B.Sc. student, majoring in biochemistry with a minor in philosophy. He became interested in alternative medicine in 2009 when naturopaths were recognized as physicians and doctors, capable of prescribing drugs previously restricted to physicians with MDs.

As a result, he co-founded a club, with two medical students and a medical graduate student, called UBC Students for Science Based Medicine to educate the public about alternative medicine from a critical approach. There aim is not to debunk or offer medical advice, but to educate and empower consumers by translating otherwise inaccessible information and obscure concepts. This is largely due to the risks of relying on unsubstantiated therapies and the lack of people engaged in this kind of service.

Club website: http:/www.sbmubc.org

November 5th, 2011. University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
Filmed by Craig Ross: Video edited by David Ng

About TEDx:

In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)

There are some amazing lectures occurring at UBC this week. Usually, it’s good to supplement lectures with [...]]]> Each week, the Terry team will highlight events in and around campus that we happen to be interested in. As usual, the focus will be on global issues with an interdisciplinary angle. Be sure to check out events.ubc.ca for more.

There are some amazing lectures occurring at UBC this week. Usually, it’s good to supplement lectures with some hands-on experiences, maybe a workshop or an artsy film to broaden your horizons… but this week, I suggest you sit back and just let these people talk at you.

Jan 30

8-9 pm @ Coach House, Green College: Jonathan Lanman is a coordinator at the Oxford Centre for Anthropology of Mind, and he is a Visiting Post-doctoral Research Fellow at UBC for the 2011-2012 year. (Distinguished and temporary… get it while it’s hot!) He’ll be giving a talk entitled “Ritual, Community, and Conflict,” which will address a research project that is being conducted by both UBC and Oxford. This project, and Lanman’s lecture, explores the mechanisms of ritual that underpin child development, social behaviour, and the evolution of political systems.

Jan 31

8-9 pm, UBC Campus (just walk around campus and you’ll run into it… kidding. This is part of the St. John’s College Junior Fellow Speaker Series… exact location to be announced? The Magic School Bus fiend within me couldn’t resist posting about this other-worldly lecture, though at this point, I can’t tell you how to find it. But I can direct you to the Magic School Bus’s Outerspace Episode…): Mike Alexandersen will be speaking about the unknown objects in our solar system. Recently, the team he is working with has just discovered two more of Jupiter’s moons!

Feb 1

5-7 pm, Coach House, Green College: Fabio Rossi, the Canadian Research Chair in Regenerative Medicine, Bill Milsom of the UBC Zoology department, Nelly Auersperg of UBC Obstetrics and Gynaecology, and Dan Weary of the UBC Animal Welfare Program will be giving a four-pronged lecture and discussion. The topic is “Who Benefits from Animal Research?”, and this series of lectures will examine various sides of the debate: What is the value for humans of animal research? What is the value for non-human animals? What role do culture and corporate interests play in the discourses on human disease and security?

Feb 2

5-7 pm: C.K. Choi Building, Room 120: The UBC Buddhism and Contemporary Society Program presents a seminar by Dr. Jan Walls: “Corporate Craving and Buddhist Compassion: Is there a Middle Ground for Buddhism in Business?” A fascinating lecture about maintaining Buddhist mindfulness amongst corporate greed. Especially since every person and their cat is now trying to embrace yoga practice, the compatibility of Buddhism with contemporary Western society is particularly pertinent. And if you go to yoga, and this doesn’t interest you, then your commitment is shallow at best…

To start with, here is a question for though: [...]]]> It’s been a long time since I blogged last time. Life has been extremely busy and tough for me, but fortunately I recovered. For some reason, this phrase keeps surfacing in my mind, so much so that I think it warrants a post about it–”intangible values”.

To start with, here is a question for though: how much are you willing to pay for a white leather bag? Does it matter that it was produced by LV or Hermes? Does it matter that it actually carries the logo of these brands? And what if you can pay half the price you are willing to pay and get a replica that no one can tell from a real one?

I bet (virtually of course) that after you think of a number after the first question mark, you were thinking about revising it at one of the subsequent question marks. And that is about perception, and this is something that constantly amazes me. Once you add an LV logo or Hermes logo to a plain leather bag, all of a sudden many people are willing to pay ten times more to get it. People are paying a lot of money for practically the same bag and yet happy about it.

Some of my radically rational friends would say this is “cheating”, “lying to the customers” and people should start realising this reality. In this case of a bag, maybe. But in many other cases, the kind of intangible value created by perception is, to my opinion, a good thing.

Once we complained about the long flight home, and at the end I asked, so what does it take to make the flight better? Almost all of my friends would say a shorter trip time or more legroom on the plane would be nice. These things are absolutely important in making the journey home better. But it would cost a lot to have planes that fly faster or bigger, even though I have no background in engineering.  So I said to my friends, what if the airline simply hires famous movie stars or supermodels to walk along the plane? I would imagine it costs far less than researching a faster plane and a lot of passengers would stop complaining the trip takes too long!

This is one of the reasons I believe that advertising companies are essential. From the economists’ point of view, advertisements provide more information to the consumer and to some extent correct the asymmetry of information. But most importantly, it creates intangible value, it creates perception. So what it does essentially is to create value in the economy without using much labour or machinery.

Material, as in real, values are important, as it would be quite difficult to generate the perception of being full or warm. However, as we adopt more and more internet in our life, lots of things are now virtual.  Millions of exchanges and transactions are never materialised but billions of revenues generated. So while many would till call this perception/intangible value an “illusion”,  it has great value and we need to accept the fact that we are willing, if not happy, to pay for it.