Here’s an interesting thread:
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=81203
I was really surprised to find out that some people are actually starting up companies focussing entirely on Facebook applications. What’s the revenue model behind that?
My understanding is that you don’t get a thing for your Facebook app, except for exposure. Facebook doesn’t send you a cheque for developing something wonderful, people don’t pay you to use your app — so how do you make money?
The CBC reports on a highly accurate scientific study demonstrating that tasers are completely safe:
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2007/11/16/ot-taser-071116.html?ref=rss
Okay, so we’re left to believe that with a sample size of one, tested on a healthy individual –I’m willing to bet that the police officer didn’t have any sort of heart condition, pace maker, or other condition that may cause death when zapped with 50,000 volts — that tasers are completely safe.
I’m not a doctor, nor do I have in depth knowledge of what would happen if someone with a pace maker was tasered, but I’m willing to bet that the results wouldn’t be good. So, how can police determine if an individual is fit for tasering prior to administering the shock. Last time I checked, most heart conditions can’t be diagnosed on sight.
I saw the video off of the CBC web site of Robert Dziekanski at the Vancouver airport. There is no doubt that he was acting erratically. The biggest problem, as I see it, is that no attempt was made to communicate with him. No Polish interpreter was brought in. There were 4 officers, together they couldn’t just manually subdue Mr. Dziekanski and get him in handcuffs? It was just sort of like “oh, you’re acting crazy and we can’t understand you — here, let’s electrocute you”. From the video, it didn’t look like he was an immediate threat to anyone’s safety. I don’t know why they didn’t just contain it until they were able to communicate with him.
TD Bank phishers remind you to please ENTHER your SIN!
Remember fraudsters, always proofread your scams!
Hey, so I know that the video of a guy getting tasered to death at a Vancouver airport is WAY more interesting than my lack of electricity, but if you’re one of the few people that stays up late enough to catch more than just the top news headline, we had a pretty major storm out here in West Coast-land Sunday night that knocked out our power for a couple of days.
Waking up to complete darkness at 6:00 Monday morning, I felt my way downstairs to grab a flashlight. After unsuccessfully trying to talk the kids into going back to sleep for a little while longer, we collected some candles and headed downstairs to light a fire (we have electric heat too, it was a little chilly).
We had a quick, cold breakfast and then decided to venture out to see if it was just us, or if the whole island was powerless. Little did we know, at this point, that it was all of the Gulf Islands that were powerless. Nevertheless, we headed out, and at the top of Edith Point Road, meet three men who tell us that we can’t go down Waugh road, there is a power line down. No problem — Campbell Bay road it is!
You know when you’re watching TV, and you see footage of a place that has just been hit by a violent storm, and you think “wow, thank goodness it never gets like THAT around here”? It was like that. The road was literally blanketed in tree branches, pine boughs, and, as we were soon to discover, trees. As we rounded a bend on Campbell Bay road, our progress was blocked by a good sized elm tree that had fallen across the road. Ever prepared, I leapt from the car with my hand saw ready (okay, so I had to return home to get it first — you called my bluff) and cut the tree in half. Rachel dragged one half off, I cleared the other, and we proceeded on our way.
We hit town and noticed that nothing was open, and that the power was off. It’s the whole island then, not a big surprise. Wonder how long it will be? We drove around a little bit and noticed half a dozen lines down. It’s at that point that Rachel and I came to the realization that the power’s going to be out for a couple of days. Better figure out what we’re going to do.
We were going to head over to Victoria later in the week anyways to re-supply, so why not bump up the trip and do an overnight? We opted for that, and jumped on the 12:00 ferry.
Then we heard that the power was out to some 200,000 BC residents, including all of the Gulf Islands. Good, we made the right choice then. The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. We checked into the hotel, the kids slept pretty well, we ate at a really good Greek restaurant in downtown Victoria.
Next morning we get up and do our grocery shopping. As we’re leaving Costco, Rachel complains that her abdomen’s hurting. I ask her what “hurting” means — should we go find a doctor, and she answers maybe. We head to a walk-in clinic where, after an hour, she learns that she’ll have to go to the hospital to find out what’s wrong. The doctor’s got the good sense to call ahead though and order the blood tests, so she won’t have to wait to see a doctor in the ER before we find out what’s going on.
I drop her off at 2:30 and take the kids to a park. I’ve got my cell phone, she’s got hers. She’ll call me when she’s done. 5:00 rolls around and I still haven’t heard a thing. We head back to the hospital (the kids and I). She had just got in and had the blood work done.
I’ll fast forward 3 and a half hours here (yes, the kids and I were in the ER with Rachel during this time) to when she still hadn’t seen a doctor and I couldn’t get an answer as to whether they were admitting her or discharging her that night. We had missed the last ferry of the day, so we went back to the hotel where the kids passed out, they were so exhausted. Rachel was discharged about 45 minutes later after talking to a doctor for the first time that night. They told her that her blood work is all normal, she’s healthy, and that the hospital would be calling her tomorrow (today) for her to come in for an ultrasound (they never did).
She took a taxi to the hotel.
We had breakfast that morning, but Rachel wasn’t given anything to eat, or drink for the 7 hours she was in the ER. We still don’t know what caused the pain — the doctor guessed it was a cyst that burst (harmless), but that’s what the ultrasound was supposed to pinpoint.
Okay, friends and family in Alberta. Next time you want to complain about how bad Ralph made the health care system, know that the BC government has managed to do worse. 7 hours of no information, starvation and dehydration to find out nothing. The ER was a zoo, the waiting room was packed. I’ve never seen a bigger gong show. If I’m sick, PLEASE DO NOT TAKE ME TO VICTORIA GENERAL HOSPITAL!
We returned to Mayne tonight after a good night’s sleep in the hotel. The electricity is back, looks like it was restored earlier today. Rachel is doing much better, very little pain, so it seems that the ER doctor was probably right — but who knows for sure?
C’mon, not even having the fake sender address match! They really should proofread their phishing attempts, they may have a higher success rate.
ATT in the states has just updated their International Wireless plans for iPhone users. For $24.99 per month, you can have 20MB of data. $59.99 buys you 50MB of data. This covers data use in 29 countries (Canada being one of them). Data overages are billed at $0.005/kB.
Compare that to Rogers ATT data plans available to Canadians. For $5 per month, we can have 5MB of data. $10 buys us 10MB. Data overages are billed at $0.03/kB.
1 MB of data = 1024 kB so:
I’m not comparing US data rates to Canadian data rates here. I’m comparing as someone using an ATT data plan IN CANADA. Where they’re paying $24.99 for 20 MB of data, we’re paying $317.20 (plus system access fees, etc.) If you dare to use 100 MB of data in a month, an American will pay $315.99 using the Rogers ATT network, whereas a Canadian will pay $2,774.80!
