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Beijing: The Olympic Games 2008

-> www.cbc.ca/olympics/

HD » Need to find out the results of an event, read an article or watch a high quality video clip of a race then the CBC website is a pretty good place to go, they have done an excellent job. (Our taxes pay for good media coverage of sports but not so much for good athletes. :) I googled and googled to find the results of the Men’s 100 Meter race and to watch a video of it and couldn’t find what I was looking for and then I went to the CBC website and quickly got all the results and a high quality video clip of the race. That Mr. Bolt from Jamaica is one fast dude, he could have gone even faster than 9.68 if he hadn’t shut it down at the end.

Posted: 17 Aug 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Websites, Opinions, Sports | Comments: No Comments

They’ve bullied our wallets for too long. I’m calling for a coup.

This year marks the 100th birthday of the Canadian penny, and like a mean-spirited, bigoted old relative, some are trying to get rid of it. Citing a 2007 study by the Dejardins Group, NDP MP Pat Martin introduced legislation in April that would eliminate the penny for good. The basic argument: nothing, not even a single Swedish Berry candy, costs a penny on today’s market. And we probably wouldn’t even miss the penny, seeing as we’ve already relegated it to the nursing home of currency: the take-a-penny/leave-a-penny tray.

In short, it’s high time to say a few comforting words to this old geezer, and pull the plug.

And while we’re in the rare spirit of currency reform, I’d like to make another suggestion, something a bit more radical, but far more pressing: axe all these $20 bills. They’re everywhere, they’re unwieldy, and they simply don’t work. This bill has enjoyed hegemonic reign over my wallet for far too long, and I’m calling for a coup.

-> www.thetyee.ca/…

HD » Once you crack a Twenty, even for something that only costs 99¢ (plus tax of course), you can kiss that Twenty good-bye, all you have left is a pile of change and small bills that because they are small you tend to spend thoughtlessly. But what’s the alternative, wads of small bills, which for some reason are all on the precipice of rippage having seemingly been in circulation for at least 20 years, or a wallet of Fifties which sounds nice but in reality are even harder to part with still have the once-cracked-consider-them-gone problem. Then again this really is a silly middle-class problem, if you are poor you would love to have more Twenties and if you are rich then you have an endless supply so who cares. Anyway:

Nothing is more satisfying than exact change. It’s the feeling of absolute completion, like a cigarette after sex, or a joint before your child’s piano recital.

Posted: 01 Aug 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Articles: Culture, Opinions, Humour | Comments: No Comments

The author of “Stuff White People Like” skewers the sacred cows of lefty Caucasian culture, from the Prius to David Sedaris.

Stuff White People Like is a satirical blog about a particular segment of Caucasian culture. It’s like an extended “you might be a redneck if” joke recast for a more upscale set. It gently mocks the habits and pretensions of urbane, educated, left-leaning whites, skewering their passion for Barack Obama and public transportation (as long as it’s not a bus), their idle threats to move to Canada, and joy in playing children’s games as adults. Kickball, anyone?

…

Lander is firmly in the demographic he’s ribbing. By his own definition, he screams white. A grad school dropout, he studied film and literature in a master’s program at the University of Arizona before bailing on a Ph.D. program at Indiana University. In his author’s photo, Lander illustrates a number of things he spoofs in the book: He wears a beard, chunky glasses, shorts, a performance athletic vest, New Balance shoes and an iPod, while riding a bike and carrying a reusable water bottle, a Macintosh laptop, organic vegetables and a copy of the New Yorker.

-> www.salon.com/…

-> www.stuffwhitepeoplelike.com

HD » Enjoy!

Posted: 13 Jul 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Articles: Culture, Books & Authors, Ideas, Humour | Comments: No Comments

The Pirate’s Dilemma
by Matt Mason

“With pirates, it’s never just for the money, is it?” — Videodrome (1983), written and directed by David Cronenberg

Today, being pirated is less of a worry than not being pirated. If nobody thinks enough of your album or movie to seed it on BitTorrent so it can be downloaded for free, odds are nobody thinks enough of it to buy it in a store either.

Last year, peer-to-peer file sharing accounted for 74 per cent of all German Internet traffic, according to German network traffic firm Ipoque. One of the hottest technologies right now is rapid replication, desktop factories that one day might make creating a new pair of sneakers as easy as downloading a music track. All of this hints at a future in which anything can be pirated, leaving a lot of people in business wondering what to do: watch your business walk out the door because you didn’t do enough, or clamp down on your property and alienate your customers in the process? That’s the Pirate’s Dilemma.

-> www.thetyee.ca/…

HD » An interesting little article about the ethics of pirating copyright content and its place in the business world. But even more interesting is how the comments associated with the article immediately turned into a dialectic of the merits and demerits of Apple. Is it that hard to focus on an important subject when things like Bill C-61 are coming down the pipeline rather than turning the conversation into a discussion about the makers of gadgets who have of course, long since passed the phase of being pirates and now concentrate on making money, just like every other corporation. Businesses need pirates but nobody needs Bill C-61, not even the movie business, that is outright ludicrousness that needs to be stopped.

Posted: 03 Jul 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Articles: Culture, Articles: Technology | Comments: No Comments

They’re naive, self-important, and perpetually plugged in. This is a call to arms against Millennials.

When the technology blog valleywag.com posted the entire hilarious exchange, the story spread like a San Fernando Valley wildfire. It was everywhere.

In Kevin’s defense, most of us have lied to our bosses and played hooky. Still, I found myself hoping that his boss, Mr. Davis, fired him with a pointed “and don’t let the door hit your wand on the way out!” for good measure. But before you dismiss me as cruel, let me explain my reasons.

My lack of empathy for Kevin comes from my sense of loyalty to the generation born between the years of 1961 and 1981. Generation X. Kevin is part of the generation born between 1982 and 2002—a Millennial, formerly known as Generation Y. (They got renamed after whining too much.) They’re younger. They’re healthier. They got to do anal in high school. They think updating a spreadsheet while simultaneously posting to a Twitter account about the latest gossip on perezhilton.com is an essential corporate skill. And, like Kevin, they’re always doing stupid shit, but rarely getting called on it.

What’s more, Millennials pose a vital threat to my generation’s cultural legitimacy, not to mention our position in the workplace. A recent article in Time warns: “Older workers—that is, anyone over 30—need to know how to adapt to the values and demands of their newest colleagues. Before too long, they’ll be the bosses.”

-> www.radaronline.com/…

HD » The guy just looks like such a schmuck I thought I’d post this so that the likelihood of everybody seeing him in this humiliating state increases. And I like articles about Gen Xers.

Posted: 25 Jun 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Articles: Culture | Comments: No Comments

International agreement seeks to curb piracy

OTTAWA — The federal government is secretly negotiating an agreement to revamp international copyright laws that could make the information on iPods, laptops and other devices illegal, according to a leaked government document.

The deal could also force Internet service providers to hand over customer information without a court order.

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement would see Canada join the U.S. and the European Union in a coalition against copyright infringement.

Federal trade agreements do not require parliamentary approval.

Border guards and other public security personnel could become copyright police under the deal. They would be charged with checking laptops, iPods and even cellphones for content that “infringes” on copyright laws, such as ripped-off CDs and movies.

The guards would determine what infringes copyright.

The agreement says any copied content would be open for scrutiny — even if it was copied legally.

-> www.canada.com/…

HD » This is insanity if this law passes. Besides the seeming illegality of such an infringement against unreasonable search and seizure and rights to privacy that you would think would cause this law to be overturned by the Supreme Courts the logistics of enforcing this law are mind-boggling. I do not want my taxes wasted on searching people’s electronic equipment for possible copyright infringing materials. It is totally asinine. Can you imagine the line ups for security checks at airports as those people search every computer-enabled device for possible illegally obtained songs and movies? Those poor security guards are going to have to be experts and all kinds of facets computer use, from operating systems to software and internet protocols and encryption and who knows what else. I bet half of the high school students out there can run laps around the majority of security personnel when it comes to computer savvy. And even if the guard could locate a dvdrip on some kids customized Linux install with this and that security and encryption and proxy what not who is to say that movie was illegally downloaded and not a rip of a movie Grandma bought them for Xmas — they both look exactly the same. Fuck you government, stop being such corporate yes-men. Once the music and movie industry figure out how to distribute their content in the way people want — anytime, anywhere and at a reasonable price — then the current environment of illegally sharing our cultural entertainment will cease to be such a problem.

Posted: 27 May 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Opinions, Articles: Politics, Articles: Technology | Comments: No Comments

I visited the Soo three years ago. Even then, the border was a serious issue. The DHS would have been a source of derision, with its fleet of Turtle-waxed SUVs and its speedboats churning the river, if it hadn’t make a quick run to Canada such a pain in the ass. “They’re not fighting terrorism,” griped the wife of a Canadian tour boat captain whose business was suffering. “They’re fighting tourism.”

-> www.salon.com/…

HD » I laughed out loud when I read “they’re not fighting terrorism, they’re fighting tourism.” Paranoia and ridiculous laws are surely another sign of the collapse of the American Empire.

Posted: 06 May 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Articles: Culture, Quotations, Articles: Politics | Comments: No Comments

Carnegie Mellon Professor Randy Pausch, who is dying from pancreatic cancer, gave his last lecture at the university Sept. 18, 2007, before a packed McConomy Auditorium. In his moving talk, “Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams,” Pausch talked about his lessons learned and gave advice to students on how to achieve their own career and personal goals. For more, visit www.cmu.edu/randyslecture.

-> www.youtube/…

HD » This video may be 76 and a half minutes long but that won’t be time wasted if you watch it all. Can you say, inspirational?

Posted: 13 Apr 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Opinions, Ideas | Comments: No Comments

X Saves the World

Somewhere in between the ceaseless celebrations of the baby boomers turning 60 and the millennial generation discovering they were suffering from a quarter-life crisis, the cultural powers that be forgot to take note of a major milestone: generation X began to turn 40.

Molly Ringwald, of the quintessential Gen X film The Breakfast Club, celebrated her 40th birthday earlier this year. Prozac Nation author Elizabeth Wurtzel might well be spending her days taking notes on perimenopause — she’s turning 41 in July. And if Kurt Cobain were still alive, no one would be thinking of him as an angry young man. He would be 40-plus too.

Yet generation X, those born roughly between 1965 and 1980 (it’s worth noting that demographers disagree about the group’s exact parameters, preferring to use the dates 1963 to 1977), remains forever young in the public imagination, still those 20-somethings sitting around Seattle and Austin grunge bars and coffee houses exchanging ironic witticisms about life and doing not much else with their time. “Somebody seems to have forgotten generation X,” writes Jeff Gordinier, American author of the just released X Saves the World: How Generation X Got the Shaft but Can Still Keep Everything From Sucking. “The stodgy old species known as the 30-something has been shuttled off like Molly Ringwald herself, to some sort of Camp Limbo for demographic lepers.”

-> www.thetyee.ca/…

HD » Being a Gen Xer I relate and am thus interested in the subject. However, the significance of this article for me was that I am now sure that Obama should be win the Democratic nomination because even though he was born in 1961 he is more of a Gen Xer than a Baby Boomer.

Posted: 10 Apr 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Articles: Culture, Books & Authors, Ideas | Comments: No Comments

With my Canucks on the golf course after a March collapse that left them drafting 10th overall my playoff interest is pretty marginal at this point. But I still feel the need to make a prediction, I am a hockey fan(atic) after all. (It certainly does take the pressure off the playoff season not having my team in it.) Anyway, I think this is the year Joe Thornton puts it all together and the SJ Sharks win it all. The dark horse representative for the Western Conference could be Colorado, they have a lot of offensive potential and Theodore has been playing well, even out-played Luongo in their last few meetings. And you can’t underestimate Sakic and Forsberg, they know how to get the job done.

The Eastern Conference is seemingly more of a crapshoot, but I will say that the Rangers prevail, they have a bunch of guys who have finished the job before and I don’t think Pittsburgh is quite there and the Montreal-ride simply has to end, I just don’t believe they are that good and Price can’t really be the reincarnation of Dryden and Roy.

Posted: 09 Apr 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Predictions, Sports | Comments: No Comments

Musings and Pop Culture on the Political Trail

-> www.mccainblogette.com

HD » Is it just me or does this site also make you want to puke?

More Info: www.salon.com/…

Meghan McCain is, like, totally a genius

Remember when Meghan McCain was known only as the somewhat vapid, overbleached narrator of that disturbing McCain ranch barbecue video? Since then, various news outlets — including GQ, the Associated Press and “yours truly — have run profiles of John McCain’s ever-un-Chelsea-like daughter and her Web site, mccainblogette.com, where she chronicles such newsworthy information as how to use concealer as lip gloss base and the fact that her mother has the amazing skill of determining whether a beer is fresh “depending on the taste.”

Posted: 09 Apr 2008 | Author: Xander
Categories: Websites | Comments: