Heavy is the Cost

Recently a friend commented that I am pretty opinionated. I had to stop and think but I had to agree. I don't know why but I seem to be getting more opinionated. I have always wanted to become more laid back but maybe this is what happens when you get older. At this rate, I will be one extremely crotchety old man when I retire (if I live that long).

But at the same time I feel like someone has to think about certain issues. Everyone goes about their lives not thinking about certain issues. I am reminded of the Stars song Personal where Amy Millan sings 'Sorry to be heavy, but heavy is the cost. Heavy is the cost.' I sometimes feel like I am being "heavy" but it really is the cost of life. I can't just go around not caring about anything. I am passionate about things and being opinionated is the cost.

Being opinionated is the cost.

Realistic Sound

Here is a great ad I stumbled across.

I have a feeling certain people will appreciate that.

Searchlight Winner Announced!

The Searchlight winner for best live music venue in Canada was just announced on CBC Radio3.

Here is the top 10 list:

Aeolian Hall, London ON
Amigo's Cantina, Saskatoon SK
Baba's Lounge, Charlottetown PE
Call The Office, London ON
The Capital Bar, Fredericton NB 

George's Fabulous Roadhouse, Sackville NB 

The Grad Club, Kingston ON 

Phog Lounge, Windsor ON 

Starlight Social Club, Waterloo ON 

Zaphod Beeblebrox, Ottawa ON

And the winner is:

Phog Lounge in Windsor ON

It is pretty clear that all of these places are great venues.  So now I have a new goal in life....check all of them out.  Especially the Phog Lounge.

Economic Crisis Visualized

I am one of those poor schlubs who can't really understand what exactly going on with the economy because of the big words they use in the Financial Post.  

Luckily for me some guy put together some helpful graphic videos to explain what happened in more simplistic terms and with lots of moving diagrams.  It is perfect for my graphic oriented, instant gratification generation.

Here is Part 1:

And Part 2:

Nothing is Free in this World except....

SNOWI set up this sign at the end of my driveway this morning. I saw it somewhere else on the internet and I thought it would be funny. So far no one except people I know have approached me on it (granted I am rarely at home long enough to be approached and we do live in the suburbs). Irene did see someone drive up, get out and take a picture. I'd bet it is on facebook or flickr by now.

Actually, I am hoping that someone from one of the local ski hills will take my snow.

Gobama once again

Our city of Ottawa was all in a tizzy today because of the 6 hour visit by Obama. Traffic was crazy, mailboxes removed, manhole covers welded shut, buses rerouted, roads closed, crazed Obama fans, security details, secret route to and from the airport, helicopters circling overhead. These where just some of the things that where happening in Ottawa just because some guy was here.
I was safely in Kanata away from most of the action but Irene had her own 'harrowing' experience with the transit system since one of the routes to the airport goes right by Carleton.
My father-in-law is a big fan of Obama and his speeches. He constantly uses Obama rhetoric in his lectures to spur his students on to further greatness. 'Yes We Can'. He knew when Obama's plane would be leaving the airport (as did anybody else who turned on the internet, radio or TV) and based on the wind direction he knew that it would take off over Barrhaven (where we live). So he watched for the plane to take off over Barrhaven and snapped this picture of Air Force 1 as it is leaving Ottawa.This was his great brush with greatness today. I hope it is a while before Obama comes back again otherwise the news people may start dying of heart attacks.

Net Neutrality in Canada

For us in Canada there are actually two notable things going on that have to do with bit torrents and net neutrality.  

First of all there is the more international news of the popular swedish bit torrent site 'The Pirate Bay' which is in court right now with some major record labels (Warner Bros, MGM, EMI, Colombia Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Sony BMG and Universal) in Stockholm.  It was 

announced yesterday that half the charges were dropped which is pretty significant but here is what the lawyer for the labels said:

"It's a largely technical issue that changes nothing in terms of our compensation claims and has no bearing whatsoever on the main case against The Pirate Bay. In fact it sim

plifies the prosecutor’s case by allowing him to focus on the main issue, which is the making available of copyrighted works."

This has not stopped the founders of The Pirate Bay from trying to turn the trial into a gong show.  They are showing up in a multi-coloured bus, twittering from the trial and generally getting the bit torrent community/internet all riled up.

The second big event concerns just Canada and our net neutrality laws.  Last year the CRTC ruled that it was ok for Bell to throttle the internet speed of it's customers.  Bell was doing this on the pretext of preventing illegal bit torrents.  But they are also preventing legal internet uses like Skype and Google Video Chat.  The interesting thing about this is that both of those services could be seen as competitors to Bell's phone service.  If people are using either of those free services they may not use their phones.  That, my friends, should be illegal.

So the CRTC set a deadline for all the companies to submit specific information regarding

 internet use.  That deadline was last week.  The companies of course waited till the last minute so that nobody would be able to comment on their data.  However the data was so surprising that the CRTC extended the time limit on comments until April.  One of the things that interested me was that the broadband rate of use was not as high as everyone thought.  There was a point where everyone was getting high speed and so the rate of growth was very fast.  But in the last few years that growth has slowed considerably because most people now have high speed.  That means that the internet providers claims that the internet is getting clogged by people using bit torrents is actually false.  There is quite a bit more room for growth than was

 previously thought.  Here is another article from Ars Technica that explains some other points on this issue.

So I hope the CRTC makes some good decisions here.  Canada is seriously lagging when it comes to Net Neutrality.  We aren't quite as bad as China but we are nowhere near the level of most European countries.  Even the States, especially with Obama, is way ahead of us in this respect.  This is one of the worst problems with our current government.  C'mon Steve!  I hope his meeting today with Obama (which is causing serious transportation woes in Ottawa today) will touch on this but somehow I think the economy will be at the top of the list.  One can always hope though.  It really is a very important issue.  Far more important than people realize.