Latest news with #SalishSea
CTV News
3 days ago
- Business
- CTV News
Bluesky CEO Jay Graber on Vancouver, customization and the future of social media
On opening night of the much-anticipated Web Summit conference's first year in Vancouver, the convention centre's main event space was jam-packed with attendees eager to hear from a tech superstar. Jay Graber may not be a household name, but the CEO of the Bluesky social media platform is one of the most high-profile women in the tech world and has a bold new vision for the future of social networking that could revolutionize how we connect with other humans – and maybe even make it fun again. CTV News had a few moments to speak with Graber backstage after her centre stage discussion on 'The Next Era of Social Media' and quickly discovered the Seattle resident is not stranger to Vancouver. 'I actually love it,' she said. 'I find it so interesting how it's this other city on the other side of the Salish Sea and there's a lot of similarities to Seattle, but it's also very different.' The entrepreneur has become a heroic figure for some social media users weary of the deterioration of online discourse and enthusiastic about her platform, which has been hailed as a potential 'Twitter Killer.' What is Bluesky, exactly? Any time Graber speaks about her company, she inevitably has to describe how Bluesky is different from other microblogging platforms like X (formerly Twitter) and Threads. The structure of the technology puts it in a position for other developers to design new interfaces or themes or areas of focus with the same user profile and followers. It's this flexibility and 'sky's the limit' ideology that Graber believes could usher in a whole new era of social media where users have more control over what they see and how by choosing algorithms built by different developers, for example. 'The long-term vision is that the atmosphere, the broader ecosystem of all these apps being built around Bluesky – some of them interacting with Bluesky, some of them being built more on top of it, and some of them being completely their own thing – can all start to flourish and kick off an era of innovation in social that we haven't seen in a long time,' she said. New users flock to the 'sky' It's a huge goal for an app that had been invite-only until last year, but new users signed up in droves after the U.S. election, and the platform continues to gain momentum. One of those new sign-ups was an account for Mark Carney, which popped up when he was still the Liberal leader. While his staff continue to use X, he is now the first Canadian prime minister to use Bluesky just as often, and Graber acknowledges that has helped add to the platform's legitimacy. In fact, her staff flagged the account for her early on as they sought to make sure it was, in fact, associated to the real Mark Carney. 'Now we have verifications and the delegated verification system, which means that we're able to start verifying more folks,' Graber said. 'I think it's becoming a better and better place for breaking news and a lot of this is why there's notable people joining.' So does Graber think Bluesky has the principles, flexibility, and foundation to fix or maybe rehabilitate jaded users' relationships with social media? 'We hope so, that's what we're trying to build,' she explained. 'Anyone who decides that, you know, Bluesky out of the box isn't completely what they want can go in and customize it under the hood.' Considering that's not easy for the layperson to do, Graber has an open invitation to fellow entrepreneurs and coders to come up with their own take on the social media experience. '(If) you want to zoom in on something that you like more, you can customize your corner of Bluesky,' she said. 'It can really be a 'choose your own adventure.''
CTV News
4 days ago
- General
- CTV News
Ocean Week Victoria kicks off Sunday
An annual, week-long event highlights the importance of our oceans and the work being done locally to protect them. Life on earth depends on our oceans, from the oxygen we breathe to the food we consume. An annual event in Victoria seeks to raise awareness about the work being done locally to protect 'our big blue backyard.' Nick Hammar is the Youth Programs Coordinator with Ocean Networks Canada. He says our oceans are slowing global warming which makes sense when you consider that oceans have absorbed roughly 95 per cent of the heat created by man-made greenhouse gases on earth. 'The current state is definitely not ideal,' said Hammas. He adds roughly half of the oxygen on earth is produced by life within the oceans. 'So, you can think about it as every second breath you take is thanks to life in the ocean,' said Hammas. Tina Kelly is with the Shaw Centre for the Salish Sea and says in order to move towards conservation and sustainability, you have to start with awareness. Sunday marks the beginning of Ocean Week Victoria. It's seven days of varied events meant to create that awareness. 'This is a really good week to get out there and not only learn more about the ocean but also learn about some of the organizations that are doing good for the ocean locally,' said Kelly. There will be planned beach clean-ups, paddle boarding, pub trivia, festivals and more – designed to engage and inform all age groups. 'We estimate that approximately five per cent of the ocean has been explored by humans,' said Hammas. There is still so much we don't know about earth's largest bodies of water especially as global warming becomes more of a threat. 'We need to know what's going to happen, for example, as ice melts and the temperature of the water changes,' said Hammas. He says scientists are predicting a significant increase in the amount of water is expected over the century and that, as of now, we don't really understand what the impact will be. Another area of concern is how life in our oceans will adapt to those changing temperatures – from the smallest of organisms to the ocean's largest dwellers. 'The message of Ocean Week Victoria is that we want to have fun, but we also want to be learning how to conserve and protect our oceans,' said Hammas. Because at the end of the day, life on earth depends on it.
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
How a Chinese delicacy got caught in the crossfire of Trump's trade war
SUQUAMISH, Wash. (AP) — For over two decades, Suquamish tribal member Joshua George has dived into the emerald waters of the Salish Sea looking for an unusually phallic clam that's coveted thousands of miles away. George is a geoduck diver. Pronounced 'gooey-duck,' the world's largest burrowing clam has been harvested in tidelands by George's Indigenous ancestors in the Pacific Northwest since before Europeans arrived. In recent years it has also become a delicacy in China, with Washington state sending 90% of its geoducks there, creating a niche yet lucrative American seafood export. But the escalating trade war between the U.S. and China is now crippling an entire industry that hand-harvests geoducks, leaving Washington state divers without work, Seattle exporters without business and Chinese aficionados with fewer of these prized clams. 'It's the first time in 24 years where I don't know when or if we'll be going back to work or if I have to find another job or what we're going to do,' George said. U.S. President Donald Trump's tariff-driven economic feud with China, which dates back to his first term in office, swiftly resumed in February within weeks of taking back the White House. By April, Trump had placed tariffs of at least 145% on China, which led China to retaliate with tariffs of 125% on the U.S. Top U.S. officials are set to meet with a high-level Chinese delegation this weekend in Switzerland in the first major talks between the two nations since the latest tariffs were imposed, but it is unclear where those talks will lead. Enter the geoduck, weighing about 2 pounds and so entrenched in local culture that it is the mascot for Evergreen State College in Olympia. The meaty mollusk is best described as sweet and briny, and it's often sliced raw for crisp sashimi out west while China consumers prefer it chewy in stir-fries or hot pot soups. Pre-tariff costs were as high as $100 per pound in restaurants, so it's a dish generally reserved for special occasions like Chinese New Year, or to celebrate a business gathering. Unlike other products with long-lasting shelf life and standing inventory, the trade war has had an immediate, direct effect on the delicate geoducks, which are shipped alive the same day of harvest. 'The whole market, everybody just had to stop,' said Jim Boure, general manager of Suquamish Seafoods, an enterprise of the Suquamish Tribe. 'We started getting phone calls from buyers saying orders are canceled.' Fewer geoducks are being harvested The millions of pounds of geoducks shipped annually to China come from two main sources: wild harvests on tracts of seafloor that are split between the Washington State Department of Natural Resources and Puget Sound Treaty Indian Tribes, and tideland farms. The state's share is auctioned to private exporters that often hire contract divers to harvest them. As of late April, Washington state divers had only pulled about half of the expected harvest from the state tracts, said Blain Reeves, an aquatic resources division manager for the state's Department of Natural Resources. Last year, the state and tribes collectively harvested about 3.4 million pounds of wild Washington geoduck for sale. The state generated $22.4 million in revenue for their half of the clams, which went toward paying for aquatic restoration projects locally. The state doesn't track how much is harvested by private farmers. 'If only half the pounds that were contracted are harvested, then our revenue is halved,' Reeves said. The Suquamish operation has no orders to harvest for at the moment, but it still must keep up with the maintenance to stay ready for business if and when China comes calling. On a recent April day, George's team made a quick trip to collect a handful of the clams for state lab testing. 'When we're doing the job, and it's not all this other political stuff behind the scenes and everything else, we love this,' said George, adding that diving, which takes place early in the day so that the geoducks are on an airplane by evening, has allowed him to watch his kids grow up. Fellow diver Kyle Purser said he cherishes his underwater job, but now fears it's being taken away. "When you're watching your money disappear and you've got families to feed and not knowing when you're going to get your next paycheck, (it's) very stressful,' he said. America's loss is Canada's gain The geoduck import market was already facing weaker demand in recent years due to the Chinese economy's struggle to regain post-pandemic momentum. While the tariffs have only exacerbated troubles for geoduck sellers in Washington, there's also been an unintended consequence: The American trade war has inadvertently boosted the Canadian geoduck business, which is facing a mere 25% tariff from China in comparison to the 125% for the U.S. Washington state in the U.S. and Canada's British Columbia province are the two primary places where the wild geoducks grow naturally for commercial harvest. The two countries did healthy business primarily serving Chinese appetites for decades, in part because quantities are limited. It's a labor-intensive and heavily-regulated harvest, as divers must go several feet below the surface to dig for them. 'They love the fact that it tastes like the sea,' said James Austin, president of Canada's Underwater Harvesters Association. 'It's a product that's really a hit with the Chinese. It's all about the wild coastline. It's really prestigious.' Austin said he expects there will be 2.75 million pounds of Canadian geoducks harvested in 2025, worth approximately $60 million Canadian dollars ($43.4 million USD) in revenue. While demand has been relatively low but still steady for Canadian's geoducks, Austin said they're now the leading exporters for China, which has helped them negotiate higher prices as a result. For example, after Canada got hit with a 25% tariff in March, export sale prices dropped to $12 per pound, and after the U.S. got hit with a 125% tariff in April, Canadian geoducks are now being sold for $17 a pound. 'We have no competitors right now,' Austin said. Yang Bin at Beihai Huaxiashougang Health Industry Company in Beihai city of Guangxi province in China said their seafood wholesale important business no longer gets geoduck from the U.S. 'We don't care about U.S. tariffs because we can get geoduck from other countries with stable prices,' Yang said. Waiting for geoducks On their first week back to work since the tariff fight brought business to a standstill in Washington state, Derrick McRae and his brother pulled up about 800 pounds of wild geoducks in just one April day. He donned a full-body diving outfit with an oxygen line tethered to his boat to dive under the cold waters of an inland sea channel west of Seattle. Kneeled on the seafloor, McRae used a water spray gun to move the sand covering the geoducks. In the cloud of sediment, he felt for the neck with his hand, pulling the clam and stuffing it in a net attached to him. 'We're just kind of waiting on the edge of our seats to see what happens next,' McRae said. At one of the southernmost inlets, farmer Ian Child said the tariff disruption is not just hurting his bottom line but the entire farming process. He usually places young geoducks in the sand in the summer, but he can't mix new crops with any existing unharvested clams. 'I think that the demand is still over there for the product,' he said of China. 'I think they still want it. It's just a matter of where the tariffs will land.' ___ Associated Press researcher Yu Bing contributed from Beijing.
Washington Post
08-05-2025
- Science
- Washington Post
How a Chinese delicacy got caught in the crossfire of Trump's trade war
SUQUAMISH, Wash. — For over two decades, Suquamish tribal member Joshua George has dived into the emerald waters of the Salish Sea looking for an unusually phallic clam that's coveted thousands of miles away.
The Independent
08-05-2025
- Business
- The Independent
How a Chinese delicacy got caught in the crossfire of Trump's trade war
For over two decades, Suquamish tribal member Joshua George has dived into the emerald waters of the Salish Sea looking for an unusually phallic clam that's coveted thousands of miles away. George is a geoduck diver. Pronounced 'gooey-duck,' the world's largest burrowing clam has been harvested in tidelands by George's Indigenous ancestors in the Pacific Northwest since before Europeans arrived. In recent years it has also become a delicacy in China, with Washington state sending 90% of its geoducks there, creating a niche yet lucrative American seafood export. But the escalating trade war between the U.S. and China is now crippling an entire industry that hand-harvests geoducks, leaving Washington state divers without work, Seattle exporters without business and Chinese aficionados with fewer of these prized clams. 'It's the first time in 24 years where I don't know when or if we'll be going back to work or if I have to find another job or what we're going to do,' George said. U.S. President Donald Trump's tariff-driven economic feud with China, which dates back to his first term in office, swiftly resumed in February within weeks of taking back the White House. By April, Trump had placed tariffs of at least 145% on China, which led China to retaliate with tariffs of 125% on the U.S. Top U.S. officials are set to meet with a high-level Chinese delegation this weekend in Switzerland in the first major talks between the two nations since the latest tariffs were imposed, but it is unclear where those talks will lead. Enter the geoduck, weighing about 2 pounds and so entrenched in local culture that it is the mascot for Evergreen State College in Olympia. The meaty mollusk is best described as sweet and briny, and it's often sliced raw for crisp sashimi out west while China consumers prefer it chewy in stir-fries or hot pot soups. Pre-tariff costs were as high as $100 per pound in restaurants, so it's a dish generally reserved for special occasions like Chinese New Year, or to celebrate a business gathering. Unlike other products with long-lasting shelf life and standing inventory, the trade war has had an immediate, direct effect on the delicate geoducks, which are shipped alive the same day of harvest. 'The whole market, everybody just had to stop,' said Jim Boure, general manager of Suquamish Seafoods, an enterprise of the Suquamish Tribe. 'We started getting phone calls from buyers saying orders are canceled.' Fewer geoducks are being harvested The millions of pounds of geoducks shipped annually to China come from two main sources: wild harvests on tracts of seafloor that are split between the Washington State Department of Natural Resources and Puget Sound Treaty Indian Tribes, and tideland farms. The state's share is auctioned to private exporters that often hire contract divers to harvest them. As of late April, Washington state divers had only pulled about half of the expected harvest from the state tracts, said Blain Reeves, an aquatic resources division manager for the state's Department of Natural Resources. Last year, the state and tribes collectively harvested about 3.4 million pounds of wild Washington geoduck for sale. The state generated $22.4 million in revenue for their half of the clams, which went toward paying for aquatic restoration projects locally. The state doesn't track how much is harvested by private farmers. 'If only half the pounds that were contracted are harvested, then our revenue is halved,' Reeves said. The Suquamish operation has no orders to harvest for at the moment, but it still must keep up with the maintenance to stay ready for business if and when China comes calling. On a recent April day, George's team made a quick trip to collect a handful of the clams for state lab testing. 'When we're doing the job, and it's not all this other political stuff behind the scenes and everything else, we love this,' said George, adding that diving, which takes place early in the day so that the geoducks are on an airplane by evening, has allowed him to watch his kids grow up. Fellow diver Kyle Purser said he cherishes his underwater job, but now fears it's being taken away. "When you're watching your money disappear and you've got families to feed and not knowing when you're going to get your next paycheck, (it's) very stressful,' he said. America's loss is Canada 's gain The geoduck import market was already facing weaker demand in recent years due to the Chinese economy's struggle to regain post-pandemic momentum. While the tariffs have only exacerbated troubles for geoduck sellers in Washington, there's also been an unintended consequence: The American trade war has inadvertently boosted the Canadian geoduck business, which is facing a mere 25% tariff from China in comparison to the 125% for the U.S. Washington state in the U.S. and Canada's British Columbia province are the two primary places where the wild geoducks grow naturally for commercial harvest. The two countries did healthy business primarily serving Chinese appetites for decades, in part because quantities are limited. It's a labor-intensive and heavily-regulated harvest, as divers must go several feet below the surface to dig for them. 'They love the fact that it tastes like the sea,' said James Austin, president of Canada's Underwater Harvesters Association. 'It's a product that's really a hit with the Chinese. It's all about the wild coastline. It's really prestigious.' Austin said he expects there will be 2.75 million pounds of Canadian geoducks harvested in 2025, worth approximately $60 million Canadian dollars ($43.4 million USD) in revenue. While demand has been relatively low but still steady for Canadian's geoducks, Austin said they're now the leading exporters for China, which has helped them negotiate higher prices as a result. For example, after Canada got hit with a 25% tariff in March, export sale prices dropped to $12 per pound, and after the U.S. got hit with a 125% tariff in April, Canadian geoducks are now being sold for $17 a pound. 'We have no competitors right now,' Austin said. Yang Bin at Beihai Huaxiashougang Health Industry Company in Beihai city of Guangxi province in China said their seafood wholesale important business no longer gets geoduck from the U.S. 'We don't care about U.S. tariffs because we can get geoduck from other countries with stable prices,' Yang said. Waiting for geoducks On their first week back to work since the tariff fight brought business to a standstill in Washington state, Derrick McRae and his brother pulled up about 800 pounds of wild geoducks in just one April day. He donned a full-body diving outfit with an oxygen line tethered to his boat to dive under the cold waters of an inland sea channel west of Seattle. Kneeled on the seafloor, McRae used a water spray gun to move the sand covering the geoducks. In the cloud of sediment, he felt for the neck with his hand, pulling the clam and stuffing it in a net attached to him. 'We're just kind of waiting on the edge of our seats to see what happens next,' McRae said. At one of the southernmost inlets, farmer Ian Child said the tariff disruption is not just hurting his bottom line but the entire farming process. He usually places young geoducks in the sand in the summer, but he can't mix new crops with any existing unharvested clams. 'I think that the demand is still over there for the product,' he said of China. 'I think they still want it. It's just a matter of where the tariffs will land.' ___
