Steve Tannok – Programmer, Community Activist, Business Man, Ultimate Player, Gamer, Dad

Who are you?

I’m Steve Tannock. I’m an entrepreneur, programmer, parent, technojunkie & ThinkCity board member. I also help out the Vision Vancouver Park Board caucus when I can, although I spend far, far too little time on that compared to what I wish I could spend.

What do you do for fun?

Well…..hmm… Any time I’m coding, I’m having fun, so in many ways my work is fun, and when I used to have lots of spare time, I’d spend it programming. But I do less of that these days. Much more time is spent exploring the universe with my son Liam. I also spend lots of time thinking about civic politics, and spend a fair amount of time doing things related to that. Pure bliss is found on the ultimate field and on the ice playing hockey, or time lost listening to music on my head phones.
What is your favorite community, and why?

The Vancouver tech community. It’s not a physical community or a neighbourhood, but it’s as vibrant, creative & as important as any locale. No group of people challenges me more than my fellow techies here in Vancouver. Our community politics range from extreme left to extreme right, but there’s a common thread: We all tend to believe in empowering the “common man” to do what they want; we all tend to be self-starters, creative, thoughtful people; we all tend to believe that being socially/politically engaged is a duty. The interesting thing about our community is that, while insular, our lives are lived in public – on blogs, on twitter (less so on facebook), and so people can watch how we interact and react. It’s why arguments blow up huge so quickly, but also, also why no one remains isolated. If you’re having a shitty time and tell us? Someone’ll make the time to talk to you – there’s an incredible (virtual) support system in the Vancouver tech community, even if we’ve never met in real life.

What is your superpower?

I’m an endless fountain of ideas – both original, and counterpoint to your ideas.

How would you use this superpower to build community?

I work really well with small groups of people to help them shape their BIG IDEA into something workable. I’ll question your intentions, I’ll counter with other ideas, but with the goal of finding ways to make your beautiful idea a reality. I love taking a topic and riffing on it for ages, slowly moulding it. And while on my own I come with endless ideas, it is the debate, the back and forth with others that ideas take shape, become realistic, and often, in the end, get implemented.

My three favourite things about Steve Tannock are…

1. He has no fear bringing different worlds together to form community. Recently I had the opportunity to attend a BBQ at Steve’s new home in South East Vancouver. At that BBQ there was an eclectic group of people ranging from nurses who worked with his partner, kids (and their parents) who like to play with his son, his board gaming crew, ultimate friends, and work colleagues. In effect it was a smorgasboard of different people with different interests. Many would shy away from bringing together such diverse worlds and would seek to keep them seperate – not Steve, cause that’s not how he roles. The result was a great confluence of different people bringing ideas – literally – from everywhere.

2. He’s a really nice guy who exudes kindness wherever he goes. With some people, wherever they go, they exude a kindness and soft spoken thoughtfulness. That’s Steve and it makes me want to be part of his communities.

Steve 2.0

3. He has his own icon. That’s right, Steve has his own icon. And you only get to have your own icon when you’re part of a gazillion online communities. Want to join Steve in one of his online communities and see what he’s talking about? It’s only a click away:

http://tannock.net | http://www.flickr.com/people/stv | http://twitter.com/stv | http://www.facebook.com/steve.tannock

And that’s the story, as told by Kurt Heinrich…