Hiatus

I'm not going to be able to blog for a while. I'm leaving the site up so people can see my archives, but I won't be posting regularly any more.

*poof*- I'm back!

Finished moving and whatnot, and the internet is now working. I should be able to update more regularly now.

I am struck at the inanity of moving day in Quebec. Many people have leases stuck in a July 1st cycle- this is due to the fact that in 1973, the government decided to set all leases to end on Canada day. For the children... not politics, the children.

It kind of makes sense for the time. It meant that instead of anglos celebrating on Canada day, they would move.

meta-post

Hi all, I'm moving and have not had much time to keep my loyal reader(s?) occupied- I promise I'll be back soon :)

Montreal Grand Prix surreality

Have you ever been partied at? You know, when your roommate decides to have a kegger with precisely the subset of his friends that you have nothing in common with? You sit there, unable to do anything except weather the party?

I live and work downtown, and my life has turned into one big, involuntary party. I can't walk to lunch without being offered some sort of Grand Prix marketing giveaway, having my eardrums assaulted by some sort of DJ, or tripping over the ridiculous quantity of "organizers" seething all over the closed off streets that lay between me and my bowl of soup.

I know: it's once a year, everyone (else) has fun, and it's good for the economy. That doesn't change the fact that I will never, no matter how hard I try, ever care at all about anything to do with cars or racing. Still, it feels weird because I'm out there with all the other commoners trying to push my way through the crowd, just like them. The only difference is that I'm a spoil-sport wet blanket just trying to get home, and they just really want to touch a Ferrari.

Frustrating experience with Partnerup

Partnerup is a website advertising that they are "the best way to network with other entrepreneurs and businesspeople, get involved in businesses, find the people and resources that you need for your company or idea, and seek advice on starting and building a company"

It's an amazing idea, but it still needs some work. My experience so far has been that I had to fudge the signup page to allow me to continue because Montreal is apparently not a real city. When I was trying the search for people feature, it would not allow a search without a location, and when I finally fudged that (again) to at least let me test the feature, it told me I had to be a paying member, and suggested that I post my opportunity.

In case someone from Partnerup reads this, some advice:
-allow people to search by location, but don't force them to
-if you're going to have features tied to locations, don't exclude Canada
-if you're going to restrict a feature to paying members only, indicate that before the user starts entering search criteria.

That said, I know this is a young site, and I will try to work around these frustrations because it is just about exactly the service I need :)

More on Harper's environment

The Penumbra Institute is an environmental think tank. They looked over the Conservative party's "made in Canada" environmental plan, and according to CTV news, found it to be "riddled with loopholes, especially ones favouring the oil industry".

You know when you witness a terrible accident, sometimes it's like time slows down and you see the carnage in horrific slow motion? I'm getting that feeling right now about the Conservatives. They are going to march themselves right out of government, the way they're going. If only they would just realize that Canadian popular opinion is heavily weighted toward environmental issues...

We live in a strange political climate right now- grass roots environmentalism is surging, the Conservatives are refusing to adapt, and the Liberals still radiate the inability to be trusted with tax money. Could this be the one moment in history where an environmental party could take it all? Might we see an NDP government? I know, it's far fetched, but if it ever were to happen, it would require the factors listed above.

One think I would miss about the Cons if they did leave is that they really seem to understand the need to act in a trustworthy way as stewards of our money, and the need to pay down the debt. Those are two of my personal priorities. All the tax cuts in the world are worth nothing compared to the long term budget surpluses we would see with a smaller debt... I wonder if the NDP has a smart economist they would be able to rely on?

New neutrality.ca site run by Michael Geist

http://www.neutrality.ca/ is back up. It's a good site to read about net neutrality from Canada's perspective. From the site:

By protecting Net Neutrality, we guarantee that pro-union sites do not get blocked, that ISPs do not charge anti-competitive 'preference' fees and that independent media can compete based on content, not pocketbook, with the largest of publishers.

That's a good overview of what we will lose if the government lets ISPs decide whose traffic is more important.

Apparently, Kevin McArthur shut the site down a few weeks ago because of legal worries, and has since let Michael Geist take over and reopen the site for business.

edit: ps. sign the petition

Canada's special environmental needs

According to Stephen Harper, Canada needs to be held to a different standard than the rest of the G8 when it comes to the environment. Why? Because of our "growing economy, population, and oil industry".

Huh? we need special consideration in terms of reducing greenhouse gases because we produce lots of them for money?

I have come to grudgingly respect the Conservative government since they took over. I would say that they generally know what they have to do to properly represent the population of Canada. They have kept a lid on their more ridiculous grass-roots, and have been running a tight ship by spending our tax money the way the population wants to see it spent (for the most part).

Their Achilles heel is the environment. For every two steps forward they take, they take one back. It seems to me like Harper doesn't really share the environmental sensibilities that many of the population does. I can't help but feel that all the lip service we've been seeing lately is simply the Cons trying to appease the Liberal public while straining to not move an inch farther down that route than they need to.

As much as I hate sensationalism, maybe Harper would do well to watch "An Inconvenient Truth" which seems to have the effect of scaring people into becoming more environmentally conscious. While I would not want the government's stance on the environment to be based on fear, we certainly need to reprioritize away from basing it on the wellbeing of the oil industry.

Quebec liberals budget

$950 million in tax cuts for the "middle class"? Come on. Charest should take a close look at the polls some day... the reason they are a minority government is that people are tired of seeing our tax money mismanaged. We have a great opportunity here with the federal government's transfer payment. It's a waste to use it to lower taxes: the bottom dollar for your average person does not change enough to justify the health and education problems we've had to go through while trying to reduce the deficit.

This is a minority government- Charest may be incompetent, but he should have smart people working for him who know that their only chance to avoid losing the little power they have left is to play nice with the PQ.

Speaking of which, why on earth did Duceppe turn around so quickly to avoid competing with Marois for leadership of the PQ? He would have been a much better leader- much more capable of getting a majority than Marois. If either of them should have bowed out, it should have been the one who has consistently failed in her goal to become the leader of the PQ. Marois is not generally well liked, and has absolutely no appeal to english Quebec. The PQ is going to have enough trouble getting away from this last loss without taking another risk on a weak, unpopular leader.

Marois is the kind of person who would probably be a good holding premier; someone to run a party that has already won. In order to win the next election, the PQ needs something more- they need someone like Duceppe. Someone who's recent history includes negotiating that very large transfer of funds from the feds that looks like it's about to be wasted. Someone who could have made the next election a one issue vote and beat the Quebec Liberals by reminding the public how bad at economics Charest is.

Microsoft office format being adopted by Canadian government

It's called Open XML. Microsoft created it and Canada's considering adopting it. The problem is that "Microsoft is attempting to achieve ISO standardization of a proprietary format in order to prevent the widespread adoption of the OpenDocument format, which could threaten the dominance of Microsoft's own Office suite" (Wikipedia link)

Why is this important? OpenDocument format is simpler and better, and it's non-proprietary. It would allow you to edit and view documents without having to pay hundreds of dollars for Microsoft Office.

The government is looking for public feedback. I believe that if enough people get together and tell them why we think Microsoft's Open XML is a mistake, they may listen. OpenDocument format supports the best interests of the people. Microsoft is just trying to protect their revenue stream.

Montreal transit strike causes user protest?

It looks like Montreal Transit users are holding a protest of their own against the transit strike... Can anyone confirm this? I have heard rumors on facebook, but nothing official in the news except for that one link. The group on facebook is a little disorganized, but seems to be talking about Friday, not today.

According to the article, the protest is scheduled to start at Berri-UQAM at 4 PM today, the 24th of May.

If it happens, it will send a very serious message about the public's perception of the rights and responsibilities of unions in government tax paid work.

Transit strike- reply to Vila H.

[note: this was originally drafted as a response to Vila H.'s blog entry "On the Metroblog", but the length got out of hand]

Right, wrong, and rights: all these words are unnecessary in this situation. There are two words that are not: can and can't.

The transit maintenance union sits on the non-driving city's jugular: common, cheap, public transport. They can force the city to pay more tax dollars to them, and as a (mostly) democratic organization, the will of their masses decides their actions. While many individual union workers might have chosen not to harm the public for their own personal gain, the democratic process tends to average out that sort of thing and focus the general human desire for self-advancement.

Now, despite the fact that the public will suffer in the short term, their goal is to get more money from the city taxes collected. Most city taxes come from land owners, business, and the wealthy. I generally support reducing the gap between the rich and the poor through taxes, and any increase in city costs will tend to cost the rich more than the poor. Another source of possible money for public transport that might end up in union hands could soon come from road tolls, which lower congestion and car usage. Once again, I support these things.

The problem for me is that in order for the union to apply their leverage, they have to stand on my back. No matter how I try to intellectually justify their actions, they make more than I do and insist on hurting me to get a raise. Why should I have to pay for their raise? They will cost every single transit user in Montreal some non-zero amount in terms of lost family or work hours. Also, land owners have a tendency to pass new tax costs down to the renters eventually through raised rents.

Vila, if your mother used her right to strike to get a raise at the cost of her company's profitability, I would not oppose it. I might warn her that sometimes pushing too hard will cause a company to go under (like Ben's Deli), but in this case, I am being asked for a handout. Me. Not some wealthy corporation who makes money through "externalities" and provides millions of dollars to their management through stock options, but me. Because of this strike, I will have to work harder for the rest of my life to support the transit maintenance workers' raise, and even harder for the next two weeks for the right to pay it.

I know I can't do anything but pony up. It's frustrating and angering. But, as I said in the beginning of this post: right and rights have nothing to do with unions- can and can't are the only words they care about and I can say this:

I won't hold it against Tremblay if he decides to end the strike the hard way with scabs and the police. Just because he can.

Some guy stole my idea for the Bloc Montreal!

Allen Nutik blatantly stole my idea for a provincial party that would represent the interests of the people of Montreal, but he calls it the Affiliation Quebec though, not the Bloc Montreal. He also appeals mainly to federalists, not to all Montreallers.

Lame, lame, lame! Ottawa fan knocks down female Sabres fan

Apparently a lame Ottawa fan was bullying (yes bullying!) a Sabre's fan at the last playoffs game. Come on! What are you, 8? Who punches another fan at a game? A woman at that!

She may have made a curling joke, but that's ok! Curling is pretty lame- most Canadians make fun of it too. Either way, her team is losing 3-1... don't give the rest of us a bad name.

Jesus wept...

Bullying in high school

Just read on CNN that an Australian school was fined A$1,000,000 for allowing bullying. The kid was taunted, beaten, whipped, strangled, and had a tooth knocked out over his school years. The school said it "built character".

Speaking from experience, I can tell you that being bullied destroys rather that builds character. I was apparently quite the character before public school, and it took me years to get over what happened to me there. The worst part was the blind eye the school turned on kids like me. Sure there's no easy solution, but aside from vague "zero tolerance" policies that aren't clearly defined, there's almost no effort to make the situation better.

I was able to move on because of the strength of my family and friends, but not every bullying victim has a support net. And people wonder why it's always schools that get targeted when kids go postal...

Boston...

People of Boston, my condolences. It must be annoying to be the constant butt of jokes involving ridiculous over-reaction to obviously harmless marketing material. It must also be hard to have your mayor tell off "guerrilla marketers" just to avoid having to come clean and tell everyone that he made a silly mistake, not a justified one.

You don't deserve this ridicule- your mayor may be a twitchy luddite who can't admit that he over-reacted, but I'm sure most of you aren't.

Whistleblower Robert Read gets short end of stick

The supreme court of Canada has turned down an appeal from an RCMP whistleblower, Robert Read. He wants his job back. The court won't explain why they made this decision (as is customary with this type of case), but I'm hoping that it's a jurisdiction thing. I hope the supreme court agrees with his cause but believes that they can not in good faith interfere with the RCMP.

Of course, I worry that they are siding with the RCMP on the issue. Whistleblowers for corruption (especially in government and law enforcement) should be promoted and awarded, not fired for breaking the "oath of secrecy". He did his job very well and acted in the best interests of the country. I hope I'm not the only one angry about this too... I Googled his name and couldn't find anything in the blogosphere.

Dumb lawsuits

Found this on Boingboing. This is the dumbest lawsuit using the draconian DMCA rules they have in the states I have ever heard of- a company who provides DRM (aka crippleware) products is suing other companies that use other types of DRM because their currently used DRM systems have been bypassed by hackers. Talk about pressure sales!

Marlene Jennings, Bev Oda, I know you want to enact a Canadian version of the DMCA, but please don't. It's being used for ridiculous purposes in the states.

Very interesting read on the economics of online video game worlds

Found this on Digg- I've always been fascinated by the real world impact virtual world economies have.

I'm glad I don't live in Toronto

In addition to having to put up with all the leafs fans, I'd see this type of thing more often.

Update: the guy was a cop