As expected, the G20 has taken over the Twittersphere the past week with users from all ages and walks of life, tweeting about the happenings downtown. Some (okay many) expressed their displeasure and outrage of what went down during the G20, provided live updates, and others even used Twitter to organize protests. So…where were you during the G20 weekend? Did you catch any of the protests? Were you a protester yourself? Let us know!

Yeah, yeah, yeah it’s summer time and if you’re like me at all, you want to push the thought of school out of your head as much as possible. But the reality is that the campus has been buzzing with activity in the past week especially as the dreaded G20 fast approaches and a new batch of graduates attended convocation. Take a look at what some students are saying on Twitter…

** Use the hashtag #UofT and you might just be featured on our weekly OH on Twitter feature!

Ah, the last day of the 2010 U.T.S.U election! It’s been quite an exciting time at U of T these past few days as our campus has been filled with orange, green, pamphlets, solicitors, music, and why yes, even scandal! At around the same time last year, I wrote a blog post that described my pretty shameful lack of knowledge about the election, campaign slates, and the U.T.S.U in general and so I promised myself that this year, I’d get myself a little more involved…actually take the to learn about each side’s platform, and why yes, even chat with a few of the candidates and campaigners that we try so hard to avoid on our way to Sid Smith (I know, right?)! And this wasn’t one of those things that I said I would do but wouldn’t actually…I’ve actually been pretty involved this election campaign. I know what each slate stands for, watched the debates, actually knew the people I voted for (and didn’t just use the innie, minnie, mynie, moe trick), and omg even read The Varsity for the first time in a very, very long time.

This is not actually me.

But here’s the thing. I’m a student and I’m a commuter. And though I’ve educated myself about both Change and Stronger Together’s campaign platform, I still feel there’s this sort of disconnect between myself and U.T.S.U. I’ve spoken to many commuters about this same issue and almost 100% of them share the same sentiments. True, this wasn’t a scientific poll and I really only talked to maybe 20 student commuters out of the thousands at U of T, but something tells me that this is a pretty general feeling. I honestly don’t see how some of these things affect me in any direct or tangible sense. The closest thing that might is probably the discount on TTC metropasses (amazing feat btw). But I don’t even buy a TTC metropass. It still comes out to be more expensive for me personally than to just buy tokens. And okay fine, fighting to reduce fees is incredibly important but I’m graduating in a year (fingers crossed) and this probably won’t happen anytime soon so once again, irrelevant and not applicable to me…

Don’t get me wrong, I care about this school and I’m incredibly proud to be a part of it but I can’t help shake the feeling that there is and might always be this unbridgeable discord between us. And with all these candidates constantly talking my ear off about how I matter…how they’re going to make student life better…and how this is our U of T and that they can and will make a difference…I find myself questioning all these broad, sweeping, and optimistic claims.

Anyway, just thought I’d give my thoughts and hopefully a different perspective. Here’s hoping that the slate I voted for will bridge that gap for my last and final year at U of T and really, make a change

jhr’s (Journalists for Human Rights) annual human rights magazine, SPEAK, is looking for article submissions! The theme of Speak this year is “Human Rights in New Media” so if you have written or would like to write a piece that is of or related to this topic, you can send it over to davidkumagai@gmail.com. This is an absolutely great opportunity to have your work published in a widely read and well-established publication so do not miss out!

Check out last year’s edition of SPEAK magazine here.

After two days of one of the most hotly contended UTSU elections in recent memory, I bring you some preliminary results – that are COMPLETELY UNSCIENTIFIC AND INFORMAL OF COURSE !!! (thanks, CRO) – but interesting nonetheless. The Sexual Education Centre has received permission from the CRO to conduct a poll of voters by inviting them to choose coloured condoms representative of the slate of candidates they support. One of the organizers of the COMPLETELY UNSCIENTIFIC AND INFORMAL poll offered to share them with yours truly after the post written yesterday and my speculation that with more data I might have a future writing for the OkCupid blog. (SEC had decided that everyone would have access to their collected data, regardless of their election affiliation.)

The numbers are in and to heighten the suspense I’m going to post them after the jump! (more…)

During UTSU elections it is always a good idea to step back from all the Orwellian0-sounded Solidarity and Unspecified Change and look at the election process itself. Like any municipal election, byelection or election in an authoritarian state, the University of Toronto Students’ Union elections tend to have a low voter turn out.

In the UTSU Elections the rules determine the outcome as much as any other factor yet electoral-reform doesn’t seem to be on the radar as an issue this year. The Varsity writes:

Gabe de Roche asked both candidates about the Elections Procedures Code. “Currently the incumbency rate over the past seven years at the UTSU is one hundred per cent. I’ve never heard of another democracy where that’s the incumbency rate,” he said.

“So to clarify what that means to the audience, candidates who are running as incumbents are winning every time?” asked Meslin [the moderator.]

“Yes, they’re incapable of losing,” said de Roche, drawing laughter from the audience.

Amendosun did not respond to the question. Maher said reform of the EPC is a top priority, and that he found the rules “restrictive” and “draconian.

The Elections Procedure Code (EPC) for the University of Toronto Students’ Union defines “Campaign Material” as “any item, design, sound, symbol or mark that is created or copied in any form in order to and / or likely to influence at least one voter to cast a ballot in favour or in opposition of a candidate” and “Campaigning” as “any attempt by an individual or organization to encourage a student to cast a ballot in favour or in opposition of a candidate. This may occur with or without campaign material.” These definitions are so broad that almost anything a candidate does during the campaign falls into the category of campaigning and therefore must be approved by the CRO (Article IV Section 1, F.)
(more…)

Sorry to all the political junkies out there about the absence of any new posts. So much has been happening both online and in meatspace, and I hope I get a chance to blog about some of it before the news cycle leaves me in the dust.

Exciting news! As of Sunday, the Change website and posters have gotten a redesign. I was looking forward to some content addition under the triangle arrows pointing to “campus life,” “social justice,” “advocacy,” and “save your money.”. (Have they always done the blinky rotation?? I’ve only just noticed it writing this post) The Stronger Together website seems considerably more information-rich in contrast (even if it’s just better layout and copy-writing), I would have thought one of the more pressing priorities would be a presenting their campaign platform in another way than a straight page of text.

Another design element that I really question is the placement of candidate videos. The clips are placed vertically in a row, one after another, requiring the user to scroll down through the page to access each video. Someone who has studied the psychology of graphic design could probably speak better to this than I could but there is a clear sense that the candidates are being ranked in some hierarchy – whether it’s importance, level of responsibility, involvement in the campaign, or some other metric. Steve Masse for President at the top. This unfortunate formatting is compounded by the lack of website space for the individual candidates. Nowhere are any of their names even mentioned on the website other than as the title of the youtube videos. What is up with that?!

As expected, the effect of the video layout can be seen in the number of views each videos get. As of posting time, Steve Masse on the Change slate has 1105 views, far surpassing any other members of the Change team. Adam Awad’s video, on the other hand, has only about 100 more views than three other members of the Stronger Together Slate, all of whose videos are within ten views of each other.