I’ll start off with as simple an explanation as I can muster to describe net neutrality. You buy an internet connection for your home, whether that be from Rogers, Bell, or some other provider. You take for granted that you will be able to access the internet and all of the services available to you. Not an issue right?
Well, sort of. The reality is that the people who sell you that internet service also make a ton of money off of other services – things like cable television service, video on demand, or local phone service. If you look into the not so distant future, it’s clear that the three main revenue streams for these companies (data, voice, video) can all be delivered to you over the internet. That collapses three revenue streams into one. If you’re a shareholder in these companies you should expect that they will do everything in their power to prevent the loss of 2/3 or more of their revenue. In fact it is their duty to do so, and I would expect no less from their CEOs.
But this leads to conflicts, and we’ve already started to see examples of problems arising (click links for references):
The numbers speak for themselves, with Canada falling to near the bottom of every list that measures a nation’s readiness to enter the digital media age. Our broadband internet access is one of the slowest and most expensive in the world, our mobile adoption is at a crawl driven by exorbitant pricing. Although our geography and density is certainly a contributing factor, there are plenty of similar countries like Australia which are fair comparisons and yet still we lag.
The internet holds alot of promise for Canada. We are a creative people, we punch above our weight artistically, we train some of the best digital media minds in the world and host some of the most successful tech companies on our soil. But unless we address the reality that our onramps are at risk, that promise will be out of reach.
So where do we go from here?
The free market imperatives are clear, and for the big media companies to do anything but vigorously fight free and open access to the internet would be to irresponsible to their shareholders. But those imperatives are in direct conflict with the stated goals of our nation to become a, if not the, leader in digital media. While it almost pains me to say it, government regulation on the point of net neutrality is a necessity to balance the needs of the nation against the market responsibilities of the corporations.
Some addenda:
- Michael Geist made a fantastic presentation to the Senate subcommittee on telecommunications, I highly encourage you to read the transcript.
- As with all posts on this blog, these are completely personal views and are in no way related to my employer.
Seems some LOLMATS got into my office while I was travelling last week.
We’ve had lots of activity in the back yard this spring, including ducks in the pool, bunnies in the yard, and baby bunnies in the garden. Pictures below.
Mommy and daddy bunnies, and one of the babies hiding amidst the lily of the valley.
Frustrated squirrel, and a very lazy cat hunting for birds.
Our ducks, who are still regular visitors. They hang out in the pool, and come over to the patio to scoop up the birdseed that falls to the ground.
This is one of our regular squirrel visitors. Poor guy is having an awkward transition from winter fur to summer fur. The girls have named him “pants”.
A couple weeks ago, I was looking for some interesting places to go geocaching with the kids and came across “Twiss Caves”. We decided to give it a try, and along the way ran into my friend Matt and guilted him into joining us.
The Twiss caves are located on the Bruce Trail near Milton, on Twiss Road between Steeles and Derry Roads.
View Pete’s Places in Milton in a larger map
On our first visit, we didn’t last too long. My geocaching application for the Blackberry didn’t work, and it was apparently the prime time for blackflies to attack. We did a little bit of exploring, but for the most part decided we’d come back another day.
So, the next weekend I got a call from my brother Tim who wanted to go and check out this area with Alex and Elliot. We hopped in the car and met them there. This time it was a great weekend, with a nice temperature and no more blackflies. The kids had a ton of fun exploring the caves together.
We also had some fun with the wildlife in the area. Elliot found a three-legged toad in the rocks, and the ponds on the side of the road were filled with bass who enjoyed the amphibious critters the boys caught to feed to them.
Anyways, this area was a great little find and I’m certain that the kids will want to go back there soon.
I had an opportunity a few weeks ago to visit a customer in Geneva, and I was able to spend an extra day in town to go visit some old friends. I spent a semester in Geneva during high school, and lived with the Marti family at their home in Puplinge. I also attended Colege Claparede as a student for that semester, which was where my exchange partner Christophe Marti also attended.
I haven’t been back to visit them in over fifteen years, so it was great to be able to catch up. Christophe picked my up at the airport hotel, and took me back to his apartment downtown. He lives on the top floor of a relatively tall building, and has a pretty cool little patio on the roof which can be accessed by a pull-down ladder. I took some pictures of the view from up top.
We then met with Jasmina, his girlfriend who like Christophe is an internal medicine specialist at the local hospital. They took me for a walk around old town Geneva, and spent a few hours as tourists. Some pictures from old Geneva below, including shots from atop the cathedral bell tower.
A quick water taxi tour around the harbour, where I snapped a picture of the English gardens just to show my old friend Keith who had a memorable experience there. 
One of the things I remember most strongly about Geneva was how politically active everyone seemed to be. I think it has to do with a fairly strong referendum law, which sees most contentious issues going to referendum. The big topic while I was there in highschool was a referendum to stop the purchase of a fleet of F-18 fighter jets. Just as I was recalling this story, we walked by yet another protest about fighter jets.
We then borrowed some bikes from a pretty cool “bike lending” service with pick-up and drop-off stations scattered around the city. We decided to ride out to Puplinge to visit with Christophe’s parents. The bike ride there, uphill for several miles, just about killed me but it was fun to do.
When we arrived, we enjoyed the lovely spring weather and had some drinks and snack outside. Christophe’s brother Lucas also joined us and it was great to see him. I made special note to my own mother that Lucrezia had been out that morning hiking up a mountain and then skiing down before getting back to visit with us. I’m sure the challenge has been accepted.
On our way back into Geneva (a much easier downhill ride), we came across a group of women drinking in the park near the bicycle return stand. They asked us to come over and join them in a drink, which although I thought was weird I obliged. Christophe later explained that this is the traditional bachelorette ritual, and was surprised that I was so taken aback by a group of women standing in the middle of a field dressed up and offering strangers alcohol.
It was great to get out and see the Marti family again, I hope it doesn’t take as long to get back and visit them again.
Yes, it’s that time of year again! I put together this poster over lunch today (and man was I ever hungry too) in preparation for our team outing tomorrow. Our management was kind enough to rent out the theatre for our development and support teams to catch the new Star Trek movie.
In the poster below, you’ll recognize our fearless leaders from left to right: James McGourlay, Steffen Roller, Nick Oddson.
That’s the original poster on the right, for comparison’s sake.
We received a postcard in the mail advertising the Milton Egg Drop, which sounded really cool. It was put on by one of the local churches, and had the potential to be a great community event. Here was the plan: drop Easter eggs out of a hot air balloon, then let the local kids run out on the field to collect them.
The plan didn’t quite unfold as expected. The first problem was a severe under-estimation of the crowd who would show up. We arrived about 30 minutes early and it was clear from the early crowds and parking issues that this would stretch the Milton Fair Grounds to about the same capacity as the Fall Fair and the Canada Day celebration. The organizers had set up a roped off area in the middle of the fairgrounds, with a hot air balloon in the middle which was set to launch. We set up camp along a low wooden fence, good for climbing up on to get a better view. But the crowds kept coming, numbering in the thousands, and with each new person who showed up, a little more chaos ensued.
The initial crowd with relative calm
Watching from the fence
Before the balloon was even unpacked, some kids rushed the field which caused a chain reaction that flooded the field with kids. The organizers were unable to get the crowds back behind the line (didn’t even try to be honest), which made inflating the balloon a risky endeavour indeed. They unpacked the balloon and began to fill it, with kids running up to touch the balloon and one kid even walking under the not yet inflated balloon and then it blew on top of him. The relatively gentle wind pushed the balloon from one side of the field to the other, bumping into the uncontrolled crowd. The balloon operator quite wisely shut it down, and packed up the balloon.
Balloon starting to inflate dangerously close
On to Plan B. The Milton Fire Department brought their aerial truck with them, and brought the eggs up to the top of the ladder to drop on the field. When it became clear that this was the new plan, the mob rushed the fire truck and made it impossible for the firefighters to safely drop the eggs. They threw eggs into the crowd by hand, trying their best to cover everyone but failing miserably due to the unruliness of the crowd (video below). We didn’t even bother going to check out the face painting tent.
Plan B with the fire truck
Here was my twitter stream from that day:
Off to the Milton hot-air-balloon egg drop with the kids. http://www.miltoneggdrop.ca. 9:33 AM Apr 10th
Chaos! Bigger turnout that expected I’d guess. And a false start by one kid caused a mad rush to the field (pre-balloon).10:00 AM Apr 10th
Considering bailing on the egg drop, someone’s gonna get seriously hurt here. Unsafe in the extreme.10:14 AM Apr 10th
In the end, I kept the kids off to the side and promised them that we’d go get some eggs from the store on our way home. On our way out, we noticed the firefighters had moved into “rescue lost children” mode, and I heard later from someone that one firefighter had to search for 45 minutes before reuniting a lost little girl with her parents. In an moment of unoriginal thought, I decided I’d take the kids to McDonalds for lunch. This was an idea that many others had as well, and it was fun to overhear the other conversations about the event as well. They all had the same theme – chaos.
Let me end this post on a positive note. This was a great idea, and clearly one that resonated well with the community. The organizers were prepared, but for a crowd about one quarter the size of what they got (best estimate is that 5000 attended). I’m confident based on what I saw that next year they’ll be ready for the crowd, hopefully with support from the city in the way of police presence, and sincerely hope that they give it another try. It would also help if they required all parents to show their parenting license before entering the park, and request that parents teach and show some common courtesy. Oh wait, we don’t have parenting licenses, I guess we’ll have to go back to that police idea instead of relying on decent parenting.
On Saturday night, we noticed a bunny rabbit outside while eating dinner and wondered if that might have been the Easter Bunny scoping out the place. Although it’s not Easter related I’ll also note that we had beef ribs Saturday night mostly to give me an excuse to post this picture of Jaimee tearing apart a huge rib.
The kids had fun this morning hunting for eggs. The Easter bunny realized quite early that Katlyn didn’t like chocolate very much, so he started the tradition of hiding plastic eggs filled with other kinds of candy instead. He leaves them a note on the stairs with the colour and number of eggs they have to find, and then they go hunting for them downstairs. That may change in the years to come however, as she’s developed a taste for chocolate now and Jaimee has certainly always been a fan.
For breakfast, we prepared some super-fancy waffles and Katlyn’s special request of hard boiled eggs.
This weekend was the big skating show for the girls. It was put on by the Milton Skating Club, and the production was way more impressive than I was expecting. They darkened one of the local arenas, put up curtains all around the rink, painted the ice, and installed theatrical lighting. I was also very impressed by the skill of some of the older (aka around 10 years old) skaters who were performing really difficult routines with incredibly high precision.
Our girls did a great job as well. Jaimee went in the first half of the show and was part of a group who skated in costume to “Hakuna Matata”. The girls both got flowers after their performances from Jodie as well as from their cousins Alex and Elliot.
Katlyn skated in the second half of the show to the song “I Feel Pretty”.
When I was in Grade 11, I spent a semester as an exchange student in Geneva, Switzerland. I had a great time there, learning to speak French fluently, experiencing a new culture, and making what would become lifelong friends (yeah, I’m looking at you Keith).
I’ve done quite a bit of world travel since then, but have never found a way to make my way back to Geneva for a visit. Well the wait is over, as I’m flying to Geneva near the end of April to meet with a customer in Geneva and was able to work in an extra day to go visit old friends. After a few phone calls, I was able to track down my host family as well as my exchange partner Christophe (pictured below with the dashing young man in the shorts). My French has clearly seen better days, but I’m really looking forward to seeing them again.
