Web master has faith global market will be lucrative.The church's traditional role is to serve as a great communicator, but Jason Collins Jason Paul Collins (born December 2, 1978 in Northridge, California) is a professional basketball player for the New Jersey Nets of the NBA. He graduated from Harvard-Westlake School and later attended Stanford University, where he was an All-American in 2000-01 and appeared on discovered when it came to using 21st century technology to get their message out, they were virtually Luddites. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The project manager for Faith Online Ltd., a specialized Sault Ste. Marie Sault Sainte Marie — pronounced "Soo Saint Marie" (IPA /su seɪnt məˈɹi/) — is the name of two cities on the Saint Marys River, which forms part of the boundary between the United States and Canada. Web development company, intends to tap into a mass market of worshippers with two faith-based applications this year designed to serve the needs of the Catholic Church and small independent churches around the world. Building on the success of Saultchurches.com, Faith Online is launching Dioweb this April, an online initiative built specifically for the Catholic Church. The initiative will provide each parish in the Sault Ste. Marie Diocese with an interactive Web site, allowing parishioners to contribute news, communicate by e-mail or through discussion forums, post documents and have access to church records. When finished, the diocese will become the most technologically advanced in the world with an innovative Web application linking 107 parishes and an estimated 218,000 Catholics across northeastern Ontario Northeastern Ontario is the region within the Canadian province of Ontario which lies north and east of Lakes Superior and Huron. Northeastern Ontario consists of Algoma District, Sudbury District, Cochrane District, Timiskaming District, Nipissing District, Manitoulin stretching from Callander to Manitouwadge. Despite declining Sunday attendance and an aging demographic in the North, the North American North American named after North America. North American blastomycosis see North American blastomycosis. North American cattle tick see boophilusannulatus. and global religious market remains huge, says Collins. Though the church is suffering in terms of remaining socially relevant, "people still identify themselves with the church ... and churches need to start responding to that. "I think the technology is one little part that needs to be addressed and we're going to be there." The business is located in the basement of the downtown Sault Centre building. Collins is the brainchild behind Faith Online, a three-employee spin-off company of Lucidia Studios, an award-winning Sault Ste. Marie Web development and e-marketing firm. But just two years ago, he was at wits end. Having arrived in the Sault with his wife from southern Ontario looking for Looking for In the context of general equities, this describing a buy interest in which a dealer is asked to offer stock, often involving a capital commitment. Antithesis of in touch with. a better quality of life, his four-month job search turned sour and he was preparing to pack his bags to head back. A farewell call to some acquaintances at Lucidia led to an unexpected job offer as a project manager. "I knew nothing about IT," says Collins, 30, a rookie city councillor who previously worked as a business developer in international trade, dealing in consumer and manufactured products. "But I'm full of ideas. I understand the principle of building a company." Days later, while Net surfing for a local church to attend, he typed in 'Sault churches' on the Google search Google is owned by Google, Inc. whose mission statement is to "organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful". The largest search engine on the web, Google receives several hundred million queries each day through its various services. engine. Nothing appeared. "The churches in Sault Ste. Marie weren't available to communicate online. They were not there to share with me--a seeker--what they have to offer, who they were and where they are." Collins' wheels started spinning. "Churches exist to communicate a message. They're a communication organization. That's all they are." With a vast majority of people embracing the Internet by going online to communicate with family, business and government, the church was being left behind. Collins decided he would lead them into the modern age. His strategy began with a community project--Saultchurches.com--an interactive map of local churches designed as an inexpensive Web solution geared to independent, cash-strapped parishes. The concept involved content-managed Web sites, allowing average computer users, such as a pastor or ministry volunteer with limited technical skills and no specialized Web knowledge, to build, update and manage a Web site. Eleven Sault area churches have signed on since its launch two years ago and now the application has been expanded to include churches in Hamilton, Kitchener, Kentucky, Illinois and Michigan. As an application service provider, Faith Online has constructed a software system allowing churches to build their own Web sites, with their own identity, but with all the users sharing the same code base and costs. Instead of charging $5,000 to $7,000 per Web site, churches pay a meagre mea·ger also mea·gre adj. 1. Deficient in quantity, fullness, or extent; scanty. 2. Deficient in richness, fertility, or vigor; feeble: the meager soil of an eroded plain. 3. monthly fee of $45 as a subscriber to the software service. With the final development of Faith Online completed last December, Collins is now working on developing a flexible application to sell to independent churches anywhere in the world. The company is ramping up to launch a major marketing campaign in cities across Canada Across Canada was an afternoon program that formerly aired on The Weather Network. The segment ran from early 1999 until mid 2002. The show ran from 3:00PM ET until 7:00 PM ET. by finalizing partnerships with heavyweight telecom providers, Telus and Bell Sympatico Bell Sympatico, originally and frequently called Sympatico, is the residential internet service provider division of Bell Canada. It is affiliated with MSN. As of March 2006, Sympatico had over 2 million subscribers in Ontario and Quebec and is the largest ADSL ISP in . Faith Online also struck a marketing partnership with CTS (1) (Clear To Send) The RS-232 signal sent from the receiving station to the transmitting station that indicates it is ready to accept data. Contrast with RTS. (2) (Common Type System) The data typing used in . (Crossroads Television Systems Crossroads Television System, or CTS, is a privately held Canadian television system. Owned by Crossroads Christian Communications, the system airs predominantly Christian based religious programming, most notably 100 Huntley Street, The Michael Coren Show ), the producers of 100 Huntley Street. His latest project is the unveiling of Dioweb, a fully integrated, scaleable Web system specifically developed for the Catholic church. After the Sault Ste. Marie Diocese comes online, a second deployment rolls out this fall with another unnamed diocese. Once finished, they will begin deploying three simultaneously while gearing up toward a mass deployment of multiple dioceses by 2008. www.dioceseonline.com www.faithonline.com www.saultchurches.com By IAN ROSS Ian Ross is the name of:
Northern Ontario Business Northern Ontario Business is a Canadian magazine, which publishes monthly in Greater Sudbury, Ontario. The magazine covers business news and issues in Northern Ontario. |
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