michaela holland

 Heuristics,  Analysis,
Pragmatic Pessimist

needs : air, water, loft in london
bias: androgen deficiency
previous habitats: manhattan, cambridge, boca raton, london, tokyo
habits : Neat & tidy but not obsessively so; clean often only because dislike sneezing;
Non-smoking unless secondhand and then only from people whose company i value more than my lungs;
Play piano but only if one happens to be around;
Also party but only if one happens to be around and am invited.
Love loud music but only at parties
Not crazy about cats, love dogs, don’t have either.
Not Gay, not sad, not looking for anyrelationshiporwhatever, not overbearing, nor offensive, certainly not obtuse, nor pedantically pretentious, do possess feeble sense of humor, am great cook as long as it’s salad or pasta, love wine, do paint but in private and do not sing loud while doing so, nor do i snore ;
assets: Some antique things
Sensibility to trials & tribulation of fellow planet dwellers
Old vw, old blue jeans, old london loft
peeves : Stupendously soporific shitheads, unless they happen to be my friends.
Overbearing corporate sycophants, unless they happen to be my family members.
Interests : roe vs. wade, martin luther king jr, apartheid, ruth bader ginsburg, free speech, french kisses, avocados, behemoth, short trips, long debates, big houses, grand lofts, beautiful food, beautiful minds, sexy elves.
Favorite Movie: Citizen Kane, Bitter Moon
Favorite Book : “The Legal Status of Women under Federal Law”

bex gammon

Tech Coordinator

VOCAB: Maya 6.0, Adobe Premier, Adobe Encore, Photoshop, Dreamweaver, HTML, Visual Basic 6.0, J++, Java, Flash , SQL

Music: Minor Threat, Descendents ,Gorilla Biscuits, Youth of Today, Elliott Smith, Death Cab for Cutie, Bad Brains, Lifetime, Eric’s Trip, The Smiths, Neutral Milk Hotel, Frank Sinatra

Movies: American Splendor, Sin City, Empire Records, High Fidelity, Band of Brothers, Boondock Saints, The Incredibles, Monsters Inc, Beauty and the Beast, The Holy Grail, Life of Brian, The Meaning of Life

Comics: Transmetropolitan, Y the Last Man, Fables, The Watchman, DMZ, Black Summer, Maus

Books: Guerrilla Radio, Dance of Days, All Ages, The Animation Survival Kit, Sit Down and Shut up

Passions: Straight edge, Animation, Music, Watching live bands, Art

Pastimes: Sewing, Drawing, Watching the t.v series Arrested Development…again and again, Skateboarding

Current Personal Goals: To learn how to speak German

nessie giovanna

Project Coordinator

McGill BaCC., Author

Height: not too tall; not too small ~ translation 5f9″ (as you can see clearly from above photo…

Weight: 1 of 3 questions you should never ask a lady (the other 2 are – where did you get that dress & how old are you)

Age: I defer to my weight… (hint: take George Orwell’s popular classic and shave off a couple & you get ME!)

Sign: Libra ~ though its the 22nd which means its the last day. But there is no way I am a Scorpian. (No offence to anyone just my ma is one so its like an issue you see)

Hair: brown

Eyes: brown, though every morning I wake up and wish other wise.

Favorite Outfit: pink maryjanes that always make me happy, black t-shirt, gap jeans ‘classic fit’ and a blazer. No woman should go without a good jacket!

If I could marry anyone who would it be…: hmm Prince William in hopes of becoming Queen (since I would make a bloody great one) and eventually settle for the beautiful Johnny Depp (who is married to another French Woman with the same name! Destiny? A sign…)

Fav book: Wheel of Time Series by Robert Jorben. All my children will bare a name from these characters. I am under the firm belief that his series will replace the Bible not only because its more coherant but because it makes more sense and is just as juicy! Close (too close) second is Alexandre Dumas’ Count of Monte Crisco.

Fav Movie: Dangerous Beauty! No two, ifs, buts about it. Though I really love Dogma.

Fav music: Abba, musicals like Wiked, Miserable, Rent, Miss Saigon, etc., Shania Twain (its the Canadian in me), Celine Dion (I know no one wants to live with me) and Elvis- not to mention the Beatles (duh!)

What I do every morning when I get up: walk to the washroom and start preparing to put on my contacts then realize that I paid over 2000$ CND so that wouldn’t have to do this anymore!

My favorite thing to do at brainwash cafe: talk to customers. count the cash (with handsanitizer close by of course)

…the worst: finding something thats been displaced. I become handicap – truly!

life aspiration: to raise kids in a bookstore with no customers so that I can read to them all day.

other hobbies and interests: writing (journal, fiction, & am now working on a biography), talking, drinking espresso (what is this thing called regular coffee), shoe shopping (just because it doesn’t requirer a changing room), anything Japanese (which is sad because my uncle made a comment the other day and I blew the roof!), dancing-
ya know the usual!

lisa deere

Logistics Coordinator

Gemini

“#3 pencils and quadrille pads.” – Seymoure Cray (1925-1996) when asked what CAD tools he used to design the Cray I supercomputer; he also recommended using the back side of the pages so that the grid lines were not so dominant.

“Interesting – I use a Mac to help me design the next Cray.” – Seymoure Cray (1925-1996) when he was told that Apple Inc. had recently bought a Cray supercomputer to help them design the next Mac.

turnons; piet hein, game theory, parrondo’s paradox, von Neumann, alfred nobel, Kickboxing, Truels, Taekwondo, metaphors, R&R, Deep Sea Diving, Short Visits, punctuation, gentle people, sharp minds, large lofts, short trips, long kisses turnoffs; dull design, bad minds, ep, phantom menace, loud egos, long trips, short kisses Favorite Movies: Beauty and the Beast Favorite Music: Casta Diva Aria Favorite Books: Great Gatsby, Being There

julie nguyen

Tactical

McGill Medicine

daily needs: coffee and newspapers

Interest: cooking, traveling, chocolate, wine

Favorite Movies: Across the Universe, Beauty and the Beast

Favorite music: House, Jack Johnson, Backstreet Boys

Favorite Books: The Hite Report: A Nationwide Study of Female Sexuality

william robinson

    Tactical

Interests: Trivia, Film and Art History

Favorite Movies: Shortbus, Old Boy and Annie Hall

Favorite Music: Death Cab for Cutie, The Shins and Metric

Favorite Writers: e.e. cummings, Orson Scott Card and Neil Gaiman

Passion: Controversy. Be it sexual, moral, religious or political disagreement I am there.

Favorite Quote: When you’re wounded and left on Afghanistan’s plains, and the women come out to cut up what remains, jest roll up your rifle and blow out your brains, and go to your gawd like a soldier. -Kipling

heather robinson

 Marketing

McGill B.A. double major Psychology and Theatre, minor in Sexual Diversity Studies. Future plans include M.A. in Drama Therapy.

Background: Originally from the UK born in England, raised in Ireland. I have more recently lived in California, BC, and now Montreal

Hobbies: running, horse-back riding, reading, writing, acting, directing, playing violin, swimming, archery

Favorite colour: blue

Favorite movies: Dot the i, Good Will Hunting, American History X, Go, Suburbia, Empire Records

Favorite Books: Middlesex, The Chrysalids, The Girl’s Guide to Hunting and Fishing

lee sion

Marketing

McGill BComm, Finance and International Business

Libra

Food Craving: Everything. Really.

Favorite Movie: Boondock Saints

Favorite Book: Les Miserables, Victor Hugo

Sports: love watching hockey, soccer and football.

New Yorker at heart from Queens.

Biggest Regret: Never learning how to ride a bike.

brett knowles

Advisory Board

Profession: CEO

Interests: Skiing, cycling, reading history or crime drama, international travel (mainly to third world and impoverished countries or places of historic note), automotive sports as driver and manager of team, meeting like minded people who are driven and ambitious

giorgio torrieri

Advisory Board

Physics Post Doctorate, McGill

Is Parrondo’s Paradox really a “paradox”? This question is sometimes asked by mathematicians, whereas physicists usually don’t worry about such things. The first thing to point out is that “Parrondo’s paradox” is just a name, just like the “Braess paradox” or “Simpson’s paradox.” Secondly, as is the case with most of these named paradoxes they are all really apparent paradoxes. People drop the word “apparent” in these cases as it is a mouthful, and it is obvious anyway. So no one claims these are paradoxes in the strict sense. In the wide sense, a paradox is simply something that is counterintuitive. Parrondo’s games certainly are countertuitive—at least until you have intensively studied them for a few months. The truth is we still keep finding new surprising things to delight us, as we research these games. I have had one mathematician complain that the games always were obvious to him and hence we should not use the word “paradox.” He is either a genius or never really understood it in the first place. In either case, it is not worth arguing with people like that. .

david pourreaux

Advisory Board

Profession: Head Hunter

Favourite Movie: Braveheart

Favourite Music: Björk & Beasty Boys depending

Favourite Book: “The Butterfly” by Jay Singh

Passion: Taekwondo

If you had to eat dinner with anybody, who would it be? JESUS

What would you talk about? What did you really mean?

Motivated by: people using their full potential
Sign: Gemini, Dog-Gemini

Words of Wisdom; - be nice to Head Hunters, you never know when you’ll need their contacts…

stephanie decker

  Advisory Board

Interests: Am currently working towards my PhD at the Center for Advanced Theory and Developmental Research at the University of London. My research focuses on the emerging forms of collaborative brain activity. If you’re interested in my research, pls feel free to contact me at via email. My current project is developing Parrondo Thinklink, a freeform thinktank for offbeat innovative collaboration of ideas and brainstorming constructs. Before starting doctorate studies, I directed the Institute for Advanced Research in Neuroeconomics, a nonprofit consultancy that specializes in promoting optimized group oriented decision rendering paradigms.