24 - North Shore News — Wednesday, Apri! 12, 2000 Company picks up employ Freis pave 18 “Twas hangiag out, I did the party thing for a couple of years like every other 20-year- old should. [ got a job eventu- ally at Airwaves (Airwaves Sound Design), which was audio for film and television, radio spots, TV spots.” She saw TV and the Internet converging and moved on to Stratford. As a production coordina- tor Holm’s job is “to keep everybody else organized.” She works with 10 anima- tors. Among the projects on her plate at the moment: Mondo Media’s the God & Devil Show, and work for the upcoming . Said Holm, “I love my job. It’s a lot of fun and [work with really great people. You Come In and Browse can imagine the seriousness of animators. You never stop laughing. I like dealing with people and organizing stut? so it. works for me. With the Internet, it grows so quickly that opportunities just arise. Fe only been on my job for a couple of weeks but I'm lov- ing it,” she said. Kent Ohira, 25, graduated from Carson Graham sec- ondary in 1993. He moved to Vancouver in 1990 from Kanagawa, Japan. Ohira has been with Stratford for almost two months. In his role as a creative developer Ohira is responsible for the Virtuallydating.com project. Said Ohira, “It’s a chat room with animation and more user interactivity. [I'm getting up to date with the on Sundays project management and the Flash editorial part. ~ Ohira initially went on to flight school after high school. He earned his commercial helicopter pilot's licence. “f wasn’t thinking about getting into computing at all. Iwas upgrading a couple of courses at BCIT and [ took some programming courses and got into computers and then went to film school after that. It’s a drastic change. 1 didn’t do anything involved with computers in high school,” said Ohira. While taking the Vancouver Film School multi- media program Ohira special- ized in Flash programming and HTML. He believes he made a geod choice to focus on dot- coms. “So far I think this is the only industry in Vancouver that’s — getting somewhere. You've got to learn new things every day almost. Even if you get good av one thing, there are new softwares to learn. It’s excit- ing and I never get bored.” Chris Breikss, 24, is Stratford’s Internet marketing, strategist and Webmaster for Discover Vancouver. Breikss’ job is to. secure high search engine rankings and drive traffic to Web sites. Breikss tracks — search engine ranking algorithms and works on client strategy and site development. He uses www.discovervancouver.com, one of Stratford’s proprietary applications, as a proving ground for search engine tac- tics. “That's getting about The Right Paint For Every Room In Your Home! Ask about No Nonsense Leasing REGENCY NISSAN 700 Marine Drive North Vancouver 935-9911 wrwtwmregencyauto.com \. A DRIVEN. 2000 Xterta voted “Best New Spon Utility Vehicle” by Automobite Journalists Association of Canada. Competitive results determined on 2001 Pathfinder, 2000 Teyota 4Runner SAS V6 Value Pack “B", and 2000 Grand Cherokee Laredo “E” package with 4-speed automatic transmission. See your Nissan Dealer for details. siete penetrance 3,500 people a day. It’s a great place to make mistakes and learn from them. We're also testing out our banner ad Management system with demographic targeting for advertising. Once we test it on Discovery Vancouver it’s a service we can offer to our clients itom an Internet mar- keting perspective,” he said. He’s been with the compa- ny for almost 10 months. This makes him a grizzled veteran at Stratford. Breikss, Holm and Ohira enjoy the benefits of Stratford’s forward-thinking direction in building a corpo- rate culture. The Yaletown ees’ lunch tab company pays its workers to take lunch with each other, for example. Here’s the — free-lunch catch: it has to be with some- one you don’t know too well. The aim is to encourage col- laboration and information sharing. Lunch costs the com- pany about $6,000 monthly. Said Breikss, “You must go on three lunches a month paid for by the company with peo- ple you don’t really know, in order to qualify for the monthly draw of $2,000. “One thousand you are asked to donate to charity, the other thousand goes into your pocket.” Study your options From page 16 decision-making process. So the Web puts you back in the driver's seat in develop- ing, tracking and evolving your portfolio and the strate- gy behind it. Be aware, how- ever, that the Web docs not make you infallible. Just because you did yout research and made even the purchase of your investment online does not make it a sure thing. You have to be as demand- ing and specific with yourself as you might have previously been with a financial advisor or broker. Ensure that you have all the information you want about an investment before making a decision and do a little comparison shop- ing. P on financial products such as mutual funds, the Web offers you a wonderful mecha- nism for doing so as most mutual fund companies offer extensive background on ail their products at their Web sites. In addition, Web sites such as this one provide you with a way of putting any given investment product in context with its competitors and with trends in the indus- try. “ So do your homework. Online investors who don’t bother to do so are like trainee pilots that don’t pay attention during ground school and then End them- selves panicked the first me they have to fly solo in a real plane. Be empowered and use your power wisely. wh Vancouper resident Geof Wheelwright is Chief Operating Offscer at . _ Wheelwright bas more than 18 years of experience in working with technology companies, newspapers, magazines, book publishers, television and radio programs. 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