Social Media | AHA Media

With Glowing Hearts – The Movie Theatrical Screening in Vancouver – Sat Sept 24 7pm

September 24, 2011 ahamedia Leave a comment

Time
24 September · 19:00 – 22:00

Location
SFU Woodward’s
149 W Hastings

Vancouver, British Columbia

Created by:
Jon Ornoy, Andrew Lavigne

More info
It’s the WGH cross-Canada screening series! Here’s your chance to see our little movie up on the big screen in a city near you. Each show will be preceded by a photo display in the the theatre lobby from photographer Kris Krug. After the film stick around for a Q+A with producer Jon Ornoy. Tickets on sale now online (wghvancouver.eventbrite.com), or at the door.

You can watch the trailer at youtube.com/wghthemovie

The social network is replacing the broadcast network as the place where the world gets its news. From the Ukraine to the Mid East and everywhere in between, people are turning on to new ways of tuning in, and joining this emerging media democracy. With Glowing Hearts is a film about Social Media in action; its power to represent, inspire and break down the digital divide.

In February 2010, the Winter Olympics stormed through Vancouver, along with 5,000 international media assigned to cover the Games. At these Games, record numbers of residents, activists and fans used their blogs, video-streaming cellphones and the Internet to connect, engage and tell the story like never before. Centered on an unlikely initiative coming out of the city’s most impoverished and maligned neighborhood to create the Games’ first dedicated Social Media center, the film offers viewers an exclusive glimpse into a potent melding of technology, activism and passion

Below is a photo of Jon Ornoy, Andrew Lavigne, Garvin Snider, April Smith and Irwin Oostindie

Categories: AHA Media, Andrew Lavigne, April Smith, Community Engagement, Downtown Eastside, DTES, Harm Reduction, Homelessness, Irwin Oostindie, Jon Ornoy, Social Justice, Social Media, Vancouver, Vancouver Downtown Eastside, Vancouver DTES, With Glowing Hearts - WGH The Movie

AHA MEDIA filmed at Net Impact Vancouver and the Vancouver Graphic Design Meetup at W2 Media Cafe

June 23, 2011 ahamedia Leave a comment

A Case Study in Collaboration & Design event at Net Impact Vancouver and the Vancouver Graphic Design Meetup to hear the inside story of W2 Media Cafe.

Irwin Oostindie, Executive Director of W2 shared the history of this six-year, collaborative project, reflecting on the organizational design that went in to bringing eight non-profits together around a compelling vision.

Below is Marie Prince of Vancouver Indigenous Media Arts Festival (VIMAF) speaking on being part of the W2 Creative Tech Incubator

Below is Eugene Boulanger speaking about the Fearless City Mobile App

Below is a photo and videos of April Smith of AHA MEDIA speaking on the history of AHA MEDIA and the need for more business mentorship

Below is Mike Rowlands of Octopus Strategies and Irwin Oostindie of W2

About W2
Opened in May 2011, W2 Media Cafe is a globally networked community media arts centre in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. Housed in the four-storey atrium of the restored Woodwards heritage building, W2 houses a 200-capacity networked broadcasting studio, community TV station, community FM radio station, media lab, creative technology incubator, letterpress studio, telepresence and mobile media programs, and more. Learn more at CreativeTechnology.org

What’s a Meetup Mashup?
Meetup Mashups are a social experiment. Vancouver is an amalgam of micro-communities, many of which never interact. The intent of Net Impact’s Meetup Mashup series is to bring together disparate groups around speaking events of mutual interest. As the networks interact, the communities connect, and fresh new ideas emerge!
EVENT ORGANIZERS

Net Impact
Net Impact is a global network of leaders who are changing the world through business. The Vancouver Net Impact Professional Chapter aims to facilitate opportunities for community impact where business professionals can leverage their skills to affect positive social and environmental change in our local communities. Learn more at www.netimpactvancouver.com

Vancouver Graphic & Communication Design Meetup
The Vancouver Graphic & Communication Design Meetup is a collective of like-minded Vancouver designer folk. We meet monthly to share new ideas, learn valuable skills and to geek out about all things design.

EVENT SPONSORS

A large thank you to our sponsors.

Octopus Strategies:
You know your mission. We’ll tell your story. We unite passion and pragmatism to build the visionary brands of the 21st century. We help leaders of businesses, charities and social enterprises to catalyze change, accelerate progress, and build a better world. We call it ‘Branding. But bigger.’ Learn more at www.octopusstrategies.com

Inkslam – Designers Only :
Inkslam – Designers Only is a new system for Canadian Graphic Designers to get cheap online printing and increase their customer revenue potential. Here’s the benefits:
• Automatically get 20% off our already cheap public prices (you can see them on www.inkslam.ca)
• Get a discount coupon to give to your customers for 10% off, which they can use on our public store, Inkslam.ca. When they use that, you get 10% of the purchase price.
• Get 1000 coupon cards with your coupon code on them for free.
• Get a swatch deck of our paper stock and coating options after your first order – great for showing your customers!

To find out more and sign up, check out www.designersonly.ca.

Categories: AHA Media, April Smith, Community Engagement, Downtown Eastside, DTES, Social Media, Vancouver, Vancouver Downtown Eastside, Vancouver DTES, W2, W2 Community Media Arts, W2 Media Cafe, W2 Woodwards

April Smith of AHA MEDIA is very honored to be a Keynote Speaker at Northern Voice conference 11 at UBC

May 13, 2011 ahamedia Leave a comment

April Smith and AHA MEDIA will be presenting a Keynote Speech at Northern Voice Conference on Friday May 13, 2011

April Smith, Hendrik Beune and Peter Davies make the letters AHA with their fingers while at Woodwards Housing in Vancouver Downtown Eastside (DTES)

April is a citizen journalist and co-founder of AHA MEDIA.

“I’m a citizen journalist and co-founder of AHA MEDIA. I have also been involved with W2’s Fearless City Mobile Project – which has presented here at Northern Voice in previous years – and I facilitate social media literacy classes at LifeSkills Centre and Oppenheimer Park. In my teaching work, I encourage and promote peer training to support education in technology.

I believe, if my neighbors in the Downtown Eastside are able to access communication and technology – as people do in other neighborhoods – I feel it will help create positive change. I know this because it’s helped me create a better life for myself.

I work with W2, which is active in this area of breaking the digital divide and believes access to technology and communication is a human right. For those who have been following, W2 is finally opening a 10,000 square foot community media centre at the Woodward’s Atrium. From this fabulous new space, W2 will help people with their digital storytelling, with a crossmedia lab that broadcasts on CJSF and Coop Radieo, and Novus and Shaw Cable, and the internet.

Programs like Fearless City Mobile and this new media centre put technology in the hands of people and will help more people overcome marginalization by connecting people with society and supporting their self-representation. I know this work is important for transforming people’s lives because it’s where I began. This is my story.

I am cheerleader for positive community building and outreach. Through art, music, and community promotion, I am a self-taught advocate for social justice and positive neighborhood unity. This is really important given that the voices of our marginalized groups are usually mediated by others, rarely do we represent ourselves. Out of W2’s Fearless project was born our social enterprise ” AHA MEDIA.”

AHA MEDIA is a small business that supports social justice by creating spaces for people to represent themselves.

My interests are documentation of daily life in the Downtown Eastside, highlighting the positive, while bringing to light the injustices that occur in the neighborhood.

I have filmed observations, both subversive and situational, over the last 3 years.

Using social media, new media, mobile technology, photos, videos and blogs, I concentrate on sharing the stories and voices of the otherwise-silenced inner city community. Through our website AHAMedia.ca we reach our neighbors, reach Vancouverites from other neighborhoods, plus a global audience

April Smith, Hendrik Beune and Richard Czaban make the letters AHA with their fingers while at Woodwards Housing in Vancouver Downtown Eastside (DTES)

I hope to inspire everyone at Northern Voice!

DVD Release of With Glowing Hearts the Movie in Vancouver!!!!!

May 7, 2011 ahamedia Leave a comment

With Glowing Hearts is a documentary about social media creating social change filmed during the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver

See the new trailer for our recently completed Feature Length Documentary Film. An intimate and inspiring portrait of social media for social change. This is the #van2010 Winter Olympics social media story.

Categories: AHA Media, Andrew Lavigne, Animal Mother Films, April Smith, Community Engagement, Downtown Eastside, DTES, Homelessness, Jon Ornoy, Social Housing, Social Justice, Social Media, Vancouver, Vancouver Downtown Eastside, Vancouver DTES, With Glowing Hearts - WGH The Movie

April Smith of AHA MEDIA is very honored to be 2011 Northern Voice Keynote Speaker for Social Media Conference at UBC on May 13-14, 2011

March 25, 2011 ahamedia Leave a comment

The Northern Voice personal blogging and social media conference is happy to announce that our Keynote Speaker #1 is none other than April Smith, a well-known Vancouver-based Freelance New Media and Social Media Maker for AHA Media, Citizen Journalist, Project Leader and Trainer for @FearlessCity with W2Woodwards – W2 Community Media Arts. Read more here

I am very honored to be the Keynote Speaker at the 2011 Northern Voice Conference at UBC on May 13 -14 ♥

I look forward to sharing with you, some of my experiences in making Vancouver media that matters!

Through art, music, and community promotion, I am a self-taught advocate for social justice and outreach and positive neighborhood unity.

Using social media, new media, mobile technology, photos and videos, I concentrate on sharing the stories and voices of the otherwise-silenced inner city community of the Vancouver Downtown Eastside (DTES) with a global audience.