Will Pate’s Blog - Tales from a Gen Y internet guy

Why I Humbly Ask for a Northern Voice Travel Bursary

Published on 31/01/07
by Will Pate

This year, my favorite un-conference (or “learning party” as I call it) Northern Voice has some travel bursaries to give away. Normally, I wouldn’t ask for one and either pay out of pocket or expense it as a business trip…well worth it. But right now I find myself sans full time gig, and having paid for two moves in four months (the latest to Toronto only yesterday).

Why should I get sponsored? What do I bring to the table you ask? Well, I think the folks in Vancouver know how passionate I am for the local tech community. I’ve been very lucky to see it grow and mature over the past two years and to count many people inside as colleagues and good friends. What I want to do at Northern Voice is soak up that community wisdom and spirit and bring it back to Toronto’s TorCamp community. I want to become an ambassador between Canada’s two strongest geek/tech/new media communities. I want a dose of the west coast flava to take back to the east with me and give to others.

The only criteria for selection I have a bit of a hard time meeting is diversity. Being a white guy doesn’t help me much in that respect. But I’m also an Acadian and Prince Edward Islander - and I bet probably the only one of either of those present. ;)

But seriously, I do bring my own viewpoint - that people and the communities they form are of the utmost importance, how problems get solved and the whole technology matters. Sure I get excited about shiny technologies like any other geek, but to me I’m thinking “how does this help regular (non-geek) people, is it easy enough for them, how does it make their lives better?”. That’s an unfortunately rare way of looking at things and makes me somewhat unique, or at least part of a small minority.

So there it is, there’s why I humbly ask for a travel bursary. If I don’t get it, I hope I can work some magic and find a way to come somehow. Hope I see you there!

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