If you just so happen to be a mom, or a future mom, today, this is probably one of the most important days we’ll pass through this year. Enjoy it, and try not to work too hard–that’s why you have kids. If you’re not a mom or expectant mom, or even if you are, take yours out to breakfast or something. Now. Do it right now. She’ll thank you. Particularly if you pay for it. For everyone else, happy Sunday. Have a pint or two for me–I’ll be busy paying for mom’s breakfast. And loving every minute of it.
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Happy mommy day, moms.
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Popular posts (April, 2010).
It’s been one piece of news after another the last few weeks, some of which weren’t spent in the relative safety of my non-secure apartment building. Still, I found the time in the last few days of April to get one last blog in. So, here, have a late compilation of last month’s interesting reads, according to people who read this thing and Google Analytics.
- Back in March, I challenged the government of Ontario to actually talk to us common folk about what they’re planning on doing for people on welfare and/or ODSP. The premier sent me back a form letter, and I pasted both here.
- Convergys closed its doors in the middle of last month. They’re being given a leg up by city and provincial governments, at last check. Possibly even the federal government. My opinion on that is here, but summarized, where was this 2 years ago?
- Speaking of the provincial government, let’s continue the theme. An attempt to throw sex education at grade 3 students didn’t go over very well in the province–hence Dalton McGuinty’s rather quick retreat within a day or two of it making headlines. It didn’t go over well here, either.
- And, because themes are meant to eventually be broken, that’s exactly what we’re going to do here. Speaking of broken, Canada is dangerously close to breaking braille. At least if the rumours are true–I still haven’t heard one way or the other. Anyone feel like offering something factual? Google’s got nothin’.
- Again with the brokenness of things, this time from a tech perspective. I’m still a user of LiveJournal. In the sense that this blog cross-posts to LJ, and I’ve hacked something together to read my friends list via RSS feeds. It wasn’t easy. And, it’s rather quite well documented–including what I eventually decided to do to kind of make it work. So far, it seems to be working.
Hey now. More productive than I thought. Who knew? There is promise in this.
Also: There will undoubtedly be a celebratory hockey post in the next few days, barring a disaster. Montreal isn’t doing so hot. Thank, freaking, God. Yes, unrelated. You’ll live.
Update: Clearly, I fail at HTML and spelling. Tonight, I cannot brain. Fixed. Now, stay pretty, goddammit.
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And back to school I go. Or, rather, I try to.
I mentioned a few days ago I was looking into options that don’t include me spending the foreseeable future on ODSP. One of those options, which as I expected didn’t pan out, was a conversation had between the employment assistance service I’m going through and Online Support, the only really non-retail/construction/what have you company in town who I’ve been turned down by before on matters of accessibility–specifically, they didn’t particularly feel very inclined to be accessible. The end result of that conversation was exactly as I’d expected, so that option was quickly shelved in favour of a more constructive, if more expensive–for either me or the government–one. Specifically, a return to the environment of school.
Ontario has a sort of second career program, in which if you’ve been laid off as a result of the recession folks are now saying we’re coming out of, and fall into certain criteria, you may or may not be able to secure funding to head yourself back to school and either expand on skills you currently have or gain new ones. This is supposed to make you more marketable/hireable/generally approachable by employers. Unfortunately, before I ieven get to figure out if I do or don’t qualify for the appropriate funding, there’s about half a million bureaucratic hoops I have to jump through, some of them twice. first in the apparent mountain of boxes I have to check off is a crap ton of research I need to do to figure out exactly what course I want to take, at what college, and how much more x course at y college is than the same course offered at z college–hello, OCAS. Long time no see.
Then, I call my person on Monday, bury him in the accumulated course list he’s asked for, answer a few dozen more questions re: exactly what I want to do/where I want to end up/how much I want to make/how many houses I plan to own in the next 5 years, probably book an appointment, go in and fill out a crap ton of paperwork, then cross my fingers and hope for the best. All of this to try and get me into some course, somewhere in Ontario, by the fall semester. Lucky for me, I already have a pretty freaking good idea where I want any future education I get a crack at to put me. Now, the trick is to put it on paper, find relevant options in Ontario, pray our otherwise stingey government doesn’t laugh at me, and see what comes next. If everything goes well, I may not have a clue where I’ll be living in a year or two but I’ll know where I’m going to college/university/whatever. Or I’ll be working. And if all doesn’t go well, I’ll be in the same situation minus the college thing. Can’t argue with that. Well, I can, but it won’t do much good. So, instead, I do believe it’s research time. Thank God Ottawa’s still got a ton of techy courses, even if the tech market in general’s kind of drying up a little.
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And here comes another plus for piracy: it’s not broken by the FCC!
It seems like only yesterday, I wrote this entry on why it is I have absolutely no problem downloading TV shows etc. What I wish I could have included in that entry? this.
How badly do you want to see new movies in your home close to the date they’re released in theaters? Badly enough to let the movie industry reach through your front door and break your TV? Well, good news for you.
The Federal Communications Commission decided on Friday that the movie industry can remotely disable analog video outputs on your home theater equipment to prevent you from recording certain programs–namely, first-run movies available on demand before DVDs are released or while they’re still in theaters.
So, legally record that episode of CSI, or that new movie they’re showing while you’re being called into work, and get branded. Illegally download a torrent of same, and get branded. I’d rant, but it’s been done before. Once again, the MPAA and government regulators are providing a worse atmosphere than the pirates. One wonders how long before the CRTC, infamous in its own right for some pretty screwed up rulings, jumps on the bandwagon. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got about 4 or 5 torrents to queue up. Screw you, MPAA.
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Officially screwed… by an ISP I’m not actually with.
I promise, there’s an actual update about, well, me coming eventually. But in the meantime, have a techy rant.
I’ve never really been an overly huge fan of Bell Canada. Usually, I’d default to them only because the alternative–which, at the time, was Rogers–isn’t exactly a whole lot better. I’d heard halfway good things about some of the smaller ISP’s, but couldn’t be bothered to switch–most noteably because they still escentially sold their services over Bell’s equipment. Then they started throttling their customers for doing anything they didn’t agree with–like, for example, downloading a season of a TV show via torrent. Then, because the kicker for the smaller ISP’s was they could start advertising they didn’t do that, Bell decided shortly thereafter to start throttling the smaller ISP’s in much the same way. Meanwhile while this was going on, they were inventing new and creative ways to try and screw me over entirely.
In May of 2008, shortly after word came out about Bell’s throttling of third party ISP’s, I switched my internet service to TekSavvy. While yeah, they’re still borrowing Bell’s services for their own uses, at least my money wasn’t going directly into their pockets this time. And I ended up paying less of it overall. Apparently, Bell’s decided users from third party ISP’s should be paying through the nose for their services, much like they would be through Bell directly. So they’ve opted to introduce a rather ridiculous overage fee on a per-byte basis to the third party ISP’s. It amounts to, according to the linked article, roughly $1.13/gigabyte. And naturally, it has CRTC approval, so prices will probably start going up even while the appeals by the affected ISP’s are being drafted. Way to go, Bell. If we had a third option, you’d get none of my money entirely. Sadly, I’m still not entirely enthusiastic about the alternatives.
And, of course, while I was writing this post, a friendly neighbourhood nag agent from Bell itself thought it might be fun to call me up on a Saturday afternoon and inform me my apparent new phone bill is now approximately $11 higher than it should be for same service. Once again, Bell’s got the wrong idea here. Here’s a random thought. You already lost me on your internet service–largely because your internet service, and the folks who support it, fail–contrary to the regular junkmail I’m still seeing in my mailbox encouraging me to reconsider. Are you trying to lose me on your phone service, too? You’re succeeding, if you are.
Update: And now I read Bell’s doing exactly the same thing to its direct customers. So much for unlimitted plans.
The CRTC noted almost all the individuals who voiced their opinions were “unanimously opposed” to Bell’s application.
And yet, the application was approved anyway. Officially screwed, again.
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Yes, please do shut the fuck up on third world abortion.
There’s a huge blow-up in Ottawa over one senator deciding to say exactly what, on this ages old debate, a lot of Canadians–at least the ones I talk to, anyway–are thinking. We can’t even seem to make up our own minds on how we plan to deal with abortions within our own borders–there is, at the moment, no real clear law one way or the other on the subject. And now, Canada’s liberal party’s pushing to have a portion of our tax dollars going towards funding abortions overseas, in countries wherein it’s probably no more clearly legal than it is here. Naturally, the pushers were rightly told by senator Nancy Ruth to “shut the fuck up about it”.
Now, before I get half a dozen people commenting on what a cold-hearted asshole I am, which wouldn’t be too far from the truth, let’s put it into some common sense perspective here. I have no problem whatsoever with the whole abortion thing. I, personally, think it should be up to the person(s) involved as to whether or not they want one. As the diehard pro-abortion folks are so fond of saying, yes, it’s your body. So do with it what you want. But if it’s not medically necessary, don’t expect me to willingly pay for it. And if you’re not a Canadian citizen currently in Canada getting a medically necessary abortion, I’ll be even less willing to see my taxes go up–and they in all likelyhood will–to pay for it.
Put even more simply, abortion is not birth control. If you don’t want to get pregnant, try birth control. Or try not having sex. And if you try birth control and still end up getting pregnant, put the kid up for adoption. There’s a lineup of families probably 5 miles deep, and that’s just in Canada, who are perfectly capable of raising a child and yet perfectly incapable of having one. They will thank you. If you want to lower the amount of poor people in third world countries who end up pregnant, make the various methods of birth control available to them for free and/or cheap. But don’t take money from an already negative balance to put towards someone who decides to get an abortion for the simple fact they don’t want to be pregnant. Most especially if that someone who just simply doesn’t want to be pregnant is in Afghanistan or somewhere equally, well, problematic.
So far as this new idea that a package without abortion is not family planning, yes, please do shut the fuck up about it. Particularly if it involves my tax dollars. I already don’t have very many left.
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Why I’d vote for this James Moore guy if I could.
james Moore, a junior minister in Canada’s federal cabinet, has a real talent for stirring up the politically paranoid. Granted these days it doesn’t take much, but the bar’s officially been set about 5 miles lower as of this week. When asked escentially which team he’d be rooting for in this year’s playoffs, he had the unmitigated gall to pick Vancouver over Montreal. This despite, you know, the fact he lives in BC when he’s not in Ottawa being criticised for his choice of hockey team. Hey, I’m cheering for Vancouver over Montreal too. Is the conservative party still looking for members?
Dear overeasily offended politicos. In the words of one James Moore on Twitter, lighten up. It’s only hockey, not Canada’s economy. No love, a Leafs fan.
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Piracy, justified. And rightly so.
Contrary to what many from the industry will continuously insist on saying, no, those of us who subscribe to the mentality that torrents are better are, in fact, not all cold-hearted lawbreakers. More often than not, we actually genuinely just don’t have much choice. From the linked article:
The easiest way for me to watch TV shows on my computer is to illegally download them. You are competing with pirates, and the pirates are winning. Why? Because they provide me a better service than you do.
I genuinely don’t want to illegally download shows. For starters, downloading torrents is slow and annoying. Secondly, I strongly believe in financially supporting creative output that I enjoy – music, movies, television shows, books, comic books, etc.
Why do the commercial TV options fail me?
Each of the various TV companies insist on having complete control of their shows. This means that they only stream their shows on their own websites. So I find myself needing to keep track of many different websites. (Which network shows CSI again? I can never remember.) This gets doubly tricky for me, because most American websites don’t stream in Canada, where I live.
Indeed, that’s pretty much the crux of the issue right there. Whether or not you subscribe to cable/satelite/what have you, you’re restricted to watching the newest releases of TV shows when, how, where and for however long the TV networks–not the cable companies–choose. Let’s say CTV has the rights to a show Fox is originating. Fox has sold those rights to CTV. If CTV decides to air a show at midnight and I can’t stay up to watch it–occasionally, I do actually go to bed before midnight, I’m escentially screwed. Particularly if I’m not aware CTV has the rights to that particular show, and therefore might, possibly, be streaming it on their website–at least for a few days.
And, since the originating networks in the US don’t actually allow streaming in Canada, I’m left–like the author of the original article–with trying to remember where it is a show is being originated in Canada, and hoping that doesn’t change–I’m reminded of a short-lived show brought to light by Fox during the TV strike of a couple years ago, which in its first season was shown on CTV, I believe, and for its second and final season was shown on a network that escapes me, also on a different day and time.
The original post was apparently prompted by a cease and desist notice handed to him by his ISP, which was handed to them by CBS. They were slapping him on the wrist because he had the nerve to download a show otherwise not available in Canada lest he pay extra to subscribe to the Movie Network. In the letter, he’s advised he can watch the show on demand from CBS’s website. Except, being in Canada, he can’t. He could watch it on the Movie Network’s website, except they’re only streaming one episode of this show on their website, and apparently you have to be a subscriber to that channel in order to gain access to watch that one episode.
Let’s take it a step further, however. At the end of February, I was bouncing around somewhere between my apartment and my parents’ place on one end or another of a month of oh my busy. As a result, I missed the gold metal hockey game between Canada and the US. Yes, I know who won, but I’d planned to actually watch it. Think I could find a means of streaming it online, legally, when I finally had a minute to sit down and actually do that? If you said yes, give your head a shake. CTV, who carried the olympics, didn’t offer it. Nor did I find a listing for it in my search, admittedly online, of Shaw Direct’s on demand options. Which meant exactly what? You guessed it–torrents. Within 5 minutes of looking, I’d found exactly the feed of the game I was looking for, completely free and without needing to go digging any deeper than the official sources for such things. Now, imagine if that’d been the official legal source of what I was looking for? I’d of been much happier. And so would the network doing the broadcasting. I’d offer an opinion on that, but once again, the original article says it better than I could.
As a Canadian consumer, wanting to do the right thing, now what am I supposed to do? You tell me.
Are you starting to understand why piracy is more convenient?
I have money in my hand, and I’m looking around the Internet for the product I want, and it’s just not for sale. This is a situation I find myself in regularly. I want to download a digital copy of an album, but the musician is only selling CDs. I want to pay to download a videogame, and the company insists on sending it to me in a box. I want to watch a streaming TV show, legally, and no one is streaming the show.
In all of these cases, the pirates are standing right next to me, whispering, “You want that video game? You want that music? You want that TV show? Here you go. No charge.”
Fast, convenient, easy to find. They do it better than you.
Indeed, as a Canadian consumer who can’t aford to subscribe to every network that might possibly be offering a show I may or may not want to watch, “What am I supposed to do?” is pretty accurate. I’m still waiting on an official answer for that that doesn’t equate to “subscribe anyway”.
H/T: Kill Everything
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MPP couldn’t survive on welfare.
MPP couldn’t survive on welfare
Sarnia-Lambton MPP Bob Bailey did the math and says Ontario should do more for people on social assistance.
Bailey is one of 18 MPPs who filled out a “Do The Math” survey for the Social Planning Network of Ontario — a group asking the government to give more money to people on Ontario Works and Ontario Disability Support Program benefits.
MPPs estimated their own basic living expenses and came up with an average of $1,314 a month — $729 more than a single person receives from Ontario Works.
Bailey, who estimated $987 a month, said, “Something’s got to give.”
The network’s Put Food in the Budget campaign wants Ontario to pay a $100 monthly healthy food supplement to every adult on social assistance.
“I know with the deficit it can’t happen overnight but we certainly have to do something,” Bailey said.
He added he also supports Haldimand-Norfolk MPP Toby Barrett’s private member’s bill that would allow people receiving disability support benefits to keep more of the money they earn working.
Social assistance clients make up about 30% of the 1,800 people visiting the Inn of the Good Shepherd food bank each month, according to executive director Myles Vanni.
“The assistance amounts are well below what you really need to survive,” he said.
Bailey, a Tory, said the Liberal government hasn’t acted on the campaign’s call because the poor don’t have a voice at Queen’s Park.
“They don’t have high-paid consultants or lobbyists to work for them, like all the other groups.”
He added he finds it “disheartening” a government that wasted “billions” in the E-Health and Ontario Lottery Corporation scandals won’t do more to help people on social assistance.
“We’re talking minimal amounts of money to help people who are the most vulnerable.”
Mike Balkwill, co-ordinator of Put Food in the Budget, said Ontario’s government doesn’t see “any political advantage” to helping the poor, even though studies show that can lower health care and other costs over the long-term.
“As many other people have said, the poor are ignored in good times and forgotten in bad times,” he said. “So, we just have to raise the political price for them.”
pmorden@theobserver.ca
The NDP gets it. The conservatives, at least one conservative MPP–just not the one for Pembroke and area, gets it. When can we expect the governing liberal party to get it? And when can we have that conversation I’ve been talking about? I feel another open letter coming on.
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So Ottawa says they’re getting new buses.
City council has approved a $155.7-million deal that will replace 226 articulated buses on OC Transpo’s fleet.
Does this mean the 118 will stop suffering from a rather depressing lack of air conditioning during the hottest days of summer? Yeah, I didn’t think so either. Ah well, can’t really shake your head at progress, can ya?