From the monthly archives:

April 2006

Good REM article with Gary Hockey

by Benson Wong

This REM (Real Estate Magazine) article, a conversation with Gary Hockey, the president and CEO of Cold Well Banker Canada has some good insight into the open data / realtor value issue. REM:With listing information so easily accessible over the Internet, how do we move consumers past the perception that the value lies in the [...]

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Getting listing data, the follow up, the solution…

by Benson Wong

I had a really insightful chat with Gord at the Greater Vancouver Real estate board yesterday. Since boards own listing photos, I asked about the implications and the likelihood of photos being placed under a Creative Commons license. Gord responded with a more interesting question, “How would licensing them under the CC license benefit our [...]

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The State of Real Estate and the Web in Canada

by Benson Wong

We’re deep in web2.0 and data is flying everywhere. However, real estate listings in Canada are pretty much still stuck in web1.0. When I read stories about listing aggregators like Zillow.com with millions of listings in the US, I can’t help but let out a long *sigh* about the state of things in Canada. Most [...]

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