Archive for the ‘Activism and Politics’ Category
Final thought on the Vancouver 2010 Olympics
As much as I was extremely happy for all the Canadian athletes at the Vancouver 2010 winter Olympics, especially the speed skaters, I’ve had this nagging feeling I want to get off my chest.
Maybe it’s too early to say it, but I didn’t like the blatant Canadian nationalism on display at the 2010 Olympic games [...]
Wódka or Vodka? Or why being Polish is tough.
The team at Vice, recently put out this great, short little documentary-style film about the origins of vodka. As the writers allude, many countries lay claim to being vodka originators the way the Russians do, but none with so much difficulty (and legitimacy) as Poland.
Despite starting off a little slowly, and not doing the Ruskies [...]
Bridging the digital divide between rich and poor using cellphones.
Today is the 20th birthday of the World Wide Web, and in celebration there was this telecast on French TV from CERN about the future of the web. Stéphane Boyera’s five minute talk stood out as being particularly interesting to me.
There is a digital divide in the world, as there are 5 billion people that [...]
Opportunity Cost
The older I get, especially the more I involve myself with business and with daily capitalist living, the more I hear the term opportunity cost.
It’s best explained with an example: It doesn’t make sense to spend three hours shopping for groceries, standing about in the kitchen, and making a sandwich because it will always be [...]
Palin’s clothing budget: so why do you care?
This week there has been a tremendous amount of controversy generated about Sarah Palin’s clothing budget, which reportedly amounts to $150,000 USD. I am not the type of person to rush to the defence of any GOP candidate, but this controversy smacks of a lack of understanding of just what a vice-presidential candidate is. They are not an “every-day Joe,” nor should they be expected to act like one. Quite the opposite, actually.
Ontario’s Bill 203 – Traffic laws gone too far
In the last year, to much fanfare, the government of Ontario passed Bill 203 – Safer Roads for a Safer Ontario Act. According to the MTO website, along with new blue lights for Police, the law also:
Increases fines for street racers and aggressive drivers, including those who drive 50 km/h or more over the [...]
How to get invited to Web 2.x betas
It seems that the most interesting up-and-coming web applications go through a private, invitation-only beta phase before being launched to the public. This was certainly the case with Google Mail, the Yahoo! Mail do-over, and one service that I’m particularly interested in: grono.net. Unfortunately, none of my friends or relatives use that [...]
Graduate Tuition – Guelph vs. USA
In the next few weeks tuition for Graduate students at the University of Guelph is probably going to go up again. As a student, this obviously bothers me. What is that, 14% in three years? 120% in the last 12 years?
Since many of us know the tuition increase is imminent, and aren’t really [...]