Edge Message #33 from Brian Sweeney, producer NZEDGE.COM
TO NEW ZEALAND EDGE GLOBAL COMMUNITY
RICHARD PEARSE’S LEGEND AS FIRST FLYER
Print for the holidays: 2003 will bring the 100th anniversary of the first flights of Richard Pearse and the Wright Brothers. How historians and institutions such as the Smithsonian deal with “the Pearse problem” will be worth buying tickets to. Meanwhile in the most requested NZEDGE HERO story published today, we call Richard Pearse “First Flyer” (there were, after all, two of the Wrights). Richard’s is the most amazingly inspirational story and I believe a proud cap to The New Zealand Edge’s 2000 publishing programme.
/richard-pearse/
NZ EDGE END OF YEAR REPORT
Thank you for being part of The New Zealand Edge community in 2000. The idea is robust and alive in 36 countries, 25 US states, 80 towns and cities in NZ, 250 locations worldwide, plus nomads. Auckland, Wellington and London are the most wired-in cities. From the dangerous to the exotic, Kosovo to Beverly Hills. Atlanta to Vienna. Through Asia and all parts of wider Europe.
Occupationally, nzedgers are generally extraordinary, from chefs to ceos; actors, activists and accountants. A simple of occupations beginning with “P” show partner, passionate optimist, pastor, patent attorney, peoples advocate, performance coach, personal assistant, personal trainer, PhD student, photographer, physician, pilot, planner…
NZEDGE is probably best placed in a genre that reads “post-modern nationalism to cast New Zealand in a global context.” Our greatest imaginable challenge is “winning the world from the edge.” Edge theory is closely aligned with biology, geology, geography and demography.
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE NZEDGE.COM YEAR
1500 people registered for updating around the world.
462,000 words published
800 stories about New Zealanders bending the globe
30,000 (annualised) hits on media page making newzedge the most popular index /category/newzedge/
35,000 Hero and Hot stories visited
/category/legends/
https://www.nzedge.com/hot/index.html
34,000 pictures viewed, Silver Ferns most popular index, Kylie Bax most viewed picture.
https://www.nzedge.com/pictures/index.html
10,000 speech downloads 450 messages
Traffic in lowest month Feb 2000: 2840 downloads; highest Nov 2000: 26500 downloads (must try harder)
Acclaimed heroes, ranked from peak:
Edmund Hillary (2600, equalised)
Ernest Rutherford (2450, actual)
Nancy Wake (my favourite of 2000))
Kate Sheppard (etc)
Bruce McLaren
Arthur Lydiard
Maurice Wilkins
John Money
Rewi Alley
Tex Morton
Colin Murdoch
Keith Park
/category/legends/
We honour these people and their fellow travellers on nzedge.com.
There are about three dozen things left undone at nzedge.com at this late stage of the year, we’re on the verge of a number of them, look for nice upgrades in February and April (probably late in the month, the day job is a little stretching.
My personal thanks go to my senior writer Paul Ward from Oxford England, who has written brilliantly, my web publisher Carla Hofler who has been a wonderful revelation, Anna Liversey who has stoked the fires of newzedge for these past months, and to my co-founder and great mate Kevin Roberts who has continuously pushed the New Zealand Edge out into every part of the world
We’ll be back in 2001. Godspeed and thank you.
BRIAN SWEENEY
Co-founder, Editor
The New Zealand Edge
www.nzedge.com
brian@nzedge.com
Thumbnail: Southern Tip, Kapiti Island
