Dr. Tanya Pobuda
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tpobuda.bsky.social
Dr. Tanya Pobuda
@tpobuda.bsky.social
1.1K followers 2.3K following 370 posts
PhD. Northerner. Settler. Snoop. Maker of lists. Best friend to genius type guy. Mother to fierce daughter. She/They. #BLM #COVIDisNotOver #MaskUP

http://drtanyapobuda.substack.com/
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tpobuda.bsky.social
🤯🎹🍁Okay... THIS IS A HUGE, HUGE, HUGE DEAL!!! One of #Canada's leading Canadian music luminaries, DJ, author and creator of the Ongoing History of New Music, Alan Cross, just gave #OperationCanCon a shout out!!!!

#Gamebook #InteractiveFiction #ChooseYouOwnAdventure #ElbowsUp
With Cancon in the news these days, there’s a new book on the subject. June 10, 2025 Alan Cross The Canadian Government and the CRTC are finally looking at the definition of Canadian content for the digital age. The last time anyone seriously talked about this was in 2005 (when nothing was done) and before that, 1996 (before the internet took hold). Add in the debates over Bill C-11 (which would require streamers to chip in for Canadian content development and news coverage), Cancon is going to be in the news a lot for the balance of the year. Derek Schraner has a new book on the subject which is part of a trilogy of books on Cancon–but it’s not a stuffy academic book. Instead, it gamifies things in an interesting way. Here’s Derek talking about Operation CanCon: Canadian Classics Music Shopping Gamebook.
June 10, 2025 at 4:44 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
100% I haven't set foot in the U.S. since 2016. I've turned down speaking opps, a fully paid for trip to #MIT, guest lectures, etc.

I will not go to the #USA for any opportunity or for any amount of money. It isn't safe. It isn't right.

The world agrees with us.
Fewer international tourists are visiting the U.S. - economic losses could be 'staggering,' researchers estimate PUBLISHED WED, MAY 28 2025.6:00 AM EDT I UPDATED WED, MAY 28 2025.12:59 PM EDT
June 4, 2025 at 3:14 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
I'm incredibly proud of my partner and this love letter to #Canadian music, bands like the Tragically Hip, Grapes of Wrath, Chalk Circle, Rough Trade, National Velvet, etc.

The #interactive #game addresses the threats to #Canadian identity, culture.

You play a hero attempting to save #Canada.
May 2, 2025 at 12:21 AM
tpobuda.bsky.social
Do you miss shopping at gone-but-not forgotten #Toronto #musicstores like #HMV #SamTheRecordMan and #TowerRecords?

Me too. This solo #gamebook is your chance to recapture the feeling of bin-driving for physical media in a mission to save #Canadian culture and #identity from those.
An image of Sam the Record Man storefront with the big record neon sign.
May 1, 2025 at 1:02 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
📀💿☎️Another one! Operation CanCon: Nineties Released!

As a lone collector on a mission, your goal is to target a checklist of tracks scattered in iconic #Toronto music shops.

Part interactive fiction, part solo roll-and-write #game, every visit is a gamble, whether for ten minutes or a campaign.
Launching Operation CanCon 90s Edition. Celebrate the brilliance of Canadian music and save Canada
May 1, 2025 at 12:56 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
Oh please oh please oh please.
Poilieve trailing in his riding.
April 29, 2025 at 2:51 AM
tpobuda.bsky.social
This is such a relief!

#CDNPoli
CBC Declares Liberal Government
April 29, 2025 at 2:29 AM
tpobuda.bsky.social
⚡ ⚠️ 🚨 🍁 One thing is clear. #PierrePoilievre who ran on the slogan, "Canada is broken" does not seem to care much for #Canada. I've been watching #podcast interviews like this one, and I was struck by how much the current leader of the #CPC seems to dislike our country.
April 24, 2025 at 2:08 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
🍁#Toronto #Scarborough folks: Please Re-Elect #SalmaZahid

#CDNPoli #OnPoli #LiberalParty #MarkCarney
Re Elect Salma Zahid Scarborough Centre - Don Valley East Liberal
April 9, 2025 at 6:13 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
Want to #timetravel back to #YongeStreet and its record stores in the #1980s? Now you can with this new solo #Canadian #gamebook

This slice of pure #Canadiana has already hit the No. 31 slot on #Canadian #history #bestsellers.

This is a gameifed way to celebrate #Canada and its culture #ElbowsUp
Operation CanCon already #31 on Amazon Canadian History Best Sellers
April 4, 2025 at 9:05 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
This was written in response to @charlieangus104.bsky.social #PledgeforCanada initiative because #Canadian #culture is spectacular, and must be preserved and celebrated.

You play a Choose Your Own Adventure game loaded with retro Canadian 'Easter Eggs' that Canadians will recognize.

#strongasfuck
The cover of Operation CanCon A Canadian Eighties Music Shopping Gamebook.
April 3, 2025 at 8:22 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
The strangest, most personal roll-and-write #game ever made about living like a hermit?

Yes.

#Swiss #Canadian author Derek Schraner presents Hikikomori, an immersive “lucky lockdown life simulator” inspired by the social isolation. #remotework #boardgame

lockdownludonaut.com/2025/03/08/h...
I don't tend to like surprises even the good one without some warning. Hikikomori https://lockdownludonaut.com/2025/03/08/hikikomori-released/
March 31, 2025 at 1:36 AM
tpobuda.bsky.social
🍁💯#Canadian music and musicians are the best in the world. My partner, inspired by the groundswell of national pride in our #Canadian culture, wrote a #Canadian #music #shopping #gamebook for anyone who remembers #YongeStreet record stores in the 80s.

P.S. And we are 100% voting for you!🍁#ElbowsUp
A Mission to Save the Music and the Future of a Nation Dive into the interactive world of Operation CanCon, where your mission is to collect Canadian Content. Navigate Eighties music stores in search of iconic songs. The hope of a country’s future will depend on preserving its cultural artifacts. Using dice and a checklist, take your chances with the Sweep minigame, a treasure hunt where every roll reveals another hit. It’s not all random chance, however. Your decisions really matter. Choose which tracks to target, which stores to visit, and how long to search. How will you spend your limited time in Toronto? Whether you play a single game or a multi-day campaign, you’ll discover opportunities for tactics and strategy. Advanced modes, tweaks, and New Game Plus provide even more challenges. Perfect for gamers, music lovers, and fans of Canadiana, Operation CanCon is a new take on nostalgia. With an interactive narrative, flexible gameplay, and customizable goals, it’s more than a game, it’s a retro celebration. Sample https://lockdownludonaut.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/20250303-occ-sampler-20250330.pdf https://lockdownludonaut.com/works/
March 31, 2025 at 1:16 AM
tpobuda.bsky.social
You can get in on Amazon now.
www.amazon.ca/Hikikomori-l...
Hikikomori: A Lucky Lockdown Life Sim captures the boredom, despair and joys of a life led in quiet resistance to a world that uses and discards people to accelerate the rise of the New Robber Barons. This ground-breaking game book, art experiment and conceptual worker protest captures the repetitive daily grind of basic survival in a world gone mad. While you play, you will uncover and capture glimpses of the designer’s real life, laced through the game play like whispered secrets. You will experience a life spent in safe and often happy isolation …but your time is running out.
March 14, 2025 at 7:15 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
I am so proud of my partner. They have published their very first gamebook, entitled Hikikomori: A Lucky Lockdown Life Sim.

It is by Swiss-Canadian game designer and author Derek Schraner. #gamebook #rollandwrite #postcapitalism #hikikomori #COVID19 #boardgame

open.substack.com/pub/drtanyap...
The game Hikikomori: A Lucky Lockdown Life Sim by Swiss-Canadian game designer and author Derek Schraner is a post-capitalist meditation and gamebook on the drudgery of daily survival in a world of extreme income inequality, epidemics and pandemics. https://www.amazon.ca/Hikikomori-lucky-lockdown-life-sim/dp/B0DZWCH5JX/ref=sr_1_1?crid=11L73FLHZP7ZY&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.qZm5cUMcd0oL1hNmycSU7Q.9aKHcy3WFxAor5fazVQWgJV5lEdQW7MOLHQrLWYOauw&dib_tag=se&keywords=hikikomori+schraner&qid=1741978183&sprefix=hikiko%2Caps%2C104&sr=8-1
March 14, 2025 at 7:13 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
#SlavaUkraini 💛💙
March 1, 2025 at 1:46 AM
tpobuda.bsky.social
🗳️🗺️Ontario is a province of nearly 16 million people (15,996, 989 in 2024) people, and 2 million (2,158,952) Ontarians have decided their future. #DougFord, the #Ontario #Conservatives, is the premier for the third-straight election.
2,158,952 Ontarians Voted for this. https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/elections/ontario/2025/results/#/ Progressive Conservative 40.740.7 75 5 80 2,158,452 43% New Democrat 23.623.6 25 2 27 931,796 18.6% Liberal 24.124.1 13 1 14 1,504,688 29.9% Green 66 2 0 2 242,822 4.8% Independent 0.40.4 1 0 1 54,278 1.1%
February 28, 2025 at 6:25 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
🗳️Please, #Ontario, #vote today. Yes, I know this is a snap election during the worst time of year in Ontario.

🥶Yes, I know, it is icy and the weather is horrible on election day today, Feb. 27, 2025, 9 AM to 9 PM EST. That was the point.
They want to prevent you from voting. Ontario, Please, Fight back and Vote.
February 27, 2025 at 4:53 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
💰 Reason 12 to #Vote in #Ontario: #DougFord has defunded #public #healthcare in the province, and is now paying for-profit hospitals and clinics MORE in an effort to divert funds away from public healthcare.

🤑A chief of surgery said: "The overpayment for these minor things is egregious." #OnPoli
February 20, 2025 at 9:04 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
🍁 Reason 9: #DougFord REMAINS a hashtag#DonaldTrump MAGA supporter. I am reupping this video clip was recorded *last week*. Doug Ford said he was "100% happy that Donald Tr*** won the 2024 election.

The #Starlink deal for $100 million to #ElonMusk is STILL moving forward. #OnPoli
February 20, 2025 at 8:51 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
🗳️Reason 8 to #Vote in #Ontario: Ontario's unemployment rate now is 7.6%, higher than Ontario's long-term average of 7.37%.

🔓DougFord's leadership has been a disaster for jobs creation in #Ontario despite the slogan: "Ontario: Open For Business".

Under #Liberal govt, unemployment rate was 5.4%.
🗳️Reason 8 to #Vote in #Ontario: Ontario's unemployment rate now is 7.6%, higher than Ontario's long-term average of 7.37%. 🔓DougFord's leadership has been a disaster for jobs creation in #Ontario despite the slogan: "Ontario: Open For Business". Under #Liberal govt, unemployment rate was 5.4%.
February 20, 2025 at 8:49 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
⚡ 🔌Reason Seven to #VOTE: Doug Ford ran on a campaign of lowering home energy and electrictity costs. Now, these costs to Ontarians are higher than ever and they are about to get WORSE.

Ontario #Energy Board (OEB) has approved a 20% increase, resulting in spiking energy bills.
🔌Reason Seven to #VOTE: Doug Ford ran on a campaign of lowering home energy and electrictity costs. Now, these costs to Ontarians are higher than ever and they are about to get WORSE. Ontario #Energy Board (OEB) has approved a 20% increase, resulting in spiking energy bills.
February 20, 2025 at 8:46 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
🚨 🚨 🚨Reason 6 to #VOTE:🔌❌ Doug Ford premier of #Ontario has pulled the plug on #wastewater #surveillance, a program that only cost the province $15 million in 2023-24.

Now all #Ontario government-funded #wastewater analysis ended six months ago in #Ontario 🚨 🚨 🚨
🚨 🚨 🚨Reason 6 to #VOTE:🔌❌ Doug Ford premier of #Ontario has pulled the plug on #wastewater #surveillance, a program that only cost the province $15 million in 2023-24. Now all #Ontario government-funded #wastewater analysis ended six months ago in #Ontario 🚨 🚨 🚨 😷 🐓 With COVID19 cases ongoing in #Ontario and #H5N1 spreading in the U.S., the timing could not be worse.
February 20, 2025 at 8:44 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
Reason Five to #Vote in #Ontario: #DougFord ran on a campaign promise of eliminating #hallway #healthcare. Instead he made the problem SIGNIFICANTLY worse.

Now, hallway #healthcare is UP DRAMATICALLY under Doug Ford. There are now 2,000 patients a day experiencing 'hallway healthcare' under Ford.
Reason Five to Vote in #Ontario: #DougFord ran on a campaign promise of eliminating #hallway #healthcare. Instead he made the problem SIGNIFICANTLY worse. Before Doug Ford took over from #Liberal Kathleen Wynne 1,000 people in Ontario a day were kept in hallways, storage rooms and other unconventional places in #hospitals.. It got as low as 826 patients in June 2018 under #Wynne's government before Doug Ford took power. Now, hallway #healthcare is UP DRAMATICALLY under Doug Ford. There are now 2,000 patients a day experiencing 'hallway healthcare' under Doug Ford.
February 20, 2025 at 8:38 PM
tpobuda.bsky.social
Reason Three: Doug Ford remains a #DonaldTrump supporter despite his recent fiery rhetoric over the U.S. #tariff threat. Over the years, Doug Ford has pledged his "unwavering support" for the #MAGA movement.

#DougFord even argued that #DonaldTrump had "strong moral fibre."
February 20, 2025 at 8:31 PM