James Wanless » reflection

Persona non grata in the United States of America

James — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 02:30:08 +0000

I’m just trying to come to terms with what can only be described as one of the single largest fusterclucks I have ever experienced in my 45 years on this planet. Even with a day to digest what happened, I really can’t get my head around the magnitude of the absurdity, nor just how significant the long-term impacts may end up being. Upon a little reading and thinking back 27 years, it’s entirely possible that bad luck, a mispoken word or two, and complete honesty on my part, has rendered me inadmissible to the U.S. I should note at the outset that I have traveled to the U.S. several times a year throughout most of my life without so much as a sideways look.

I have provided a couple pieces of information below from a paralegal business web site that assists inadmissibles to obtain waivers. It’s a comprehensive page that essentially agrees with and summarizes information I’ve found in various locations.

An expensive shopping trip

Saturday morning we headed down to the Seattle outlets to do a day of shopping. We were planning to save the big shopping for our time in Hawaii, which was to start two weeks today, but is now going to be canceled thanks to Saturday’s events. After two hours in the lineup at the border, our turn came to answer the obligatory questions regarding our reason for traveling to the US, where we were from and whatever else the border guard felt like asking.

As is sometimes the case, on this trip we were asked if anyone in the car had ever been arrested and, as always the case, I answered honestly that I had been arrested for what I will simply refer to as a minor infraction, in 1983. Unfortunately, this infraction, no matter how tiny, falls within an area that is subject to zero tolerance in the U.S. We were then pulled aside for a closer inspection – something that occurs hundreds of times a day at every border crossing, but which I had never experienced before. Usually when I say that it occurred 27 years ago and that I received a pardon 24 years ago, that’s where it ends and I’m allowed on my way into the US. Not Saturday.

Self-incrimination

Once we snaked through another hour-long lineup inside the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) building, I was asked exactly the same questions again, with a twist. I was asked what happened with the arrest and …. I drew a blank. When I again said that I’d been pardoned in 1986, I was informed that the U.S. does not recognize foreign pardons and the CBP agent wanted to know whether the arrest had ended in conviction. Frankly, I hadn’t even thought of the disposition of my infraction in probably twenty years, only that I’d been pardoned. Even when I obtained a top-secret security clearance from the RCMP to work in their E Division Strategic Communications section in 2006, my teenaged transgression didn’t pose any kind of issue or very much discussion at all. Unfortunately, the RCMP isn’t in the U.S. and that fact meant exactly squat when I relayed it to the CBP agent.

I was on the spot and responded that I wasn’t sure what had happened with the arrest. When pressed for an answer I said that I thought I may have been convicted but, again, had been pardoned. That was all it took and, after another hour for the interaction to be processed, and for me to be fingerprinted and photographed so that it could be entered into the CBP database and presumably correlated with my S.I.N., we were turned around and sent on our way back home. To get my passport and driver’s license back I had to sign a copy of the report the CBP agent entered and when I asked for a copy, was told that I could only obtain it through a FOI request.

I was told that, despite CBP running a check which turned up nothing on me, my admission of a conviction rendered me inadmissible to the U.S. I was given a form to apply for a temporary waiver to cross the border, one which includes several attachments, requires I obtain several more official documents and include $545 U.S. My understanding of the aforementioned form is that I would have to apply in advance each and every time I wanted to go to the U.S. I was also told that if I could produce court documents indicating that my charge did not end in conviction, it is possible that I could have this new record expunged. However, there’s a chance that file may not even exist any more.

From the Canadian Legal Resource Centre, Inc.:
However, it is possible that old pardoned files and court documents may eventually be destroyed (usually this only occurs when the criminal record is small, minor and very old).

Upon further reflection

When I got home and cleared my head a little, I did some research and reading of various resources on the net to figure out what my next course of action might be. As I had time to think a little I realized that I had, in fact, not been convicted but had received a discharge, as I now recall at the time my parents were concerned about how a conviction might impact my ability to travel abroad. The fact that I misspoke, as it turns out, may not matter though. Apparently, a conditional discharge (which is what I recall I received) ‘may’ be viewed the same as a conviction.

From the Canadian Legal Resource Centre, Inc.:
Even though a discharge is not a conviction, it is still evidence of guilt, and may still render a person inadmissible to the United States.

Unfortunately, the only documentation I’ve ever had is a copy of the Federal Solicitor General’s letter and the pardon I received, both of which mean nothing to U.S. authorities. To unearth court documents regarding my charge, I’m guessing my search may need to begin with Public Safety Canada (the Solicitor General’s role was abolished in 2005), but that accessing what are likely only paper records from nearly three decades ago will be a time consuming process. Even if I can acquire such documents, what they say may not help me much.

There are also apparently circumstances under which I may be able to apply for a waiver to my inadmissibility if I can’t prove I was discharged to CBP’s satisfaction, but I am not sure of what they are and will need to speak to a lawyer first. Some sources I’ve read suggest these waivers are for 1-5 years, but I’m unclear as to their duration right now. I don’t like to muse and second-guess too much when this is so fresh and I’m not really in possession of enough facts. The notion that I could now salvage the family trip to Hawaii in two weeks is pure fantasy. Did I mention that attempting to cross the border when you know you are inadmissible to the U.S. can be punishable by anything from vehicle impound all the way up to being taken into custody?

As I’ve been thinking about what I’ve read on various legal sites and on the U.S. CBP site, it’s entirely possible that I’ve always been inadmissible to the U.S. and have simply been lucky for almost three decades. In particular, the following applies to me:

From the U.S. Embassy Consular Services web site:
If you have any criminal record, no matter how minor or how long ago the offense, you may be refused a visa or entry to the United States. There may also be problems in traveling through U.S. airports. Under U.S. law, a pardon issued by Canadian authorities is not recognized for purposes of entry into the United States. Even though you may have entered the United States without hindrance in the past, you may be denied entry at a future date based upon disclosure/discovery of your criminality.

It seems to me that for cases where this much time has passed and where a person can demonstrate that they are no risk whatsoever to the U.S., some sort of mitigating factor could come into play. The word ‘wrong-headed’ doesn’t begin to cover the application of this law to cases like mine.

If only that’s where it ended

The Hawaiian trip is the second piece of this puzzle, which is only adding more salt to the open sore. We’ve been trying in vain to confirm our trip cancellation insurance through both Expedia and the insurance provider, Mondial, since we booked the trip in April. Expedia has the money and has given us a policy number, but Mondial has never received the order and has no record of the policy being issued. I’d bet we’ve contacted each of them between six and ten times, escalated our issue past the customer service reps and gotten nowhere. While the policy number and our payment probably gives us legal grounds, getting the money back may well take some doing. Expedia stipulates that claims must be made directly through the insurance provider – the one that presently has no record of the policy.

Since we hadn’t received the actual policy we had only looked over the conditions provided by Expedia in a cursory fashion. After yesterday’s ordeal, a closer look suggests that the hotel may be subject to neither cancellation nor refund. Again, this is early and I’m not going to over react without first going through the process of trying to cancel the trip. In the end we’ll likely end up in cyclical conversations with Expedia, Mondial and perhaps even the Hilton Hawaiian Village and Westjet. At this point where it will end is anyone’s guess.

Regardless of this new, major wrinkle, we had already decided that we would never use Expedia or Mondial for anything again, and will use in-person travel agents only from now on. Online agents do not provide particularly good deals any more and you’ve got no real person who’s accountable to you as a paying client.

Moving forward

While I take full responsibility for being a teen who made the type of mistake that thousands of teens do, and realize that not being in possession of specific details regarding that mistake as I crossed the border clearly didn’t help matters, I’m having a little trouble with the premise of the whole thing. I do cut myself a little slack for a fuzzy memory given the amount of time that has passed. This has me wondering just how many people have very old issues come back to bite them in this way and, further, how many people inadvertently phrase something in such a way as to incriminate themselves?

If the zero tolerance nature of these grounds for inadmissibility to U.S. soil is designed to keep risky people out of their country, it’s done the exact opposite in this case. That the CBP agent wasn’t prepared (or perhaps even able to) consider the lack of anything incriminating against me, my dozens upon dozens of trips to the U.S. over nearly three decades, nor my suitability to be employed with Canada’s national police force in a sensitive role as mitigating factors, suggests that this particular law/policy is inherently flawed. This doesn’t even take into account what I would be dealing with if, say, my job depended on routine travel to the U.S.

What is, perhaps, the most difficult to understand in all of this is how, at 45 years of age, almost thirty years after my incident, with decades of U.S. travel and a history of numerous complete disclosures of my past to U.S. border security, I am now considered a threat because one conversation happened in a way that it never had before. Unbelievable. Unfortunately, I’m at the very early stages of understanding just how screwed I may end up being as a result of Saturday’s events. Unless an option I’m not presently aware of appears once I’ve consulted with a lawyer, what I’m left with is either providing evidence of my discharge from a file that may well no longer exist or applying on a regular basis for expensive waivers to cross the U.S. border.

Is it Cancer or Walmart?

Rush: Beyond the lighted stage

James — Sat, 01 May 2010 06:54:06 +0000

This looks like it will be awesome. I’ll let the trailer speak for itself.

You can get more on the background from the CBC.

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Turning the corner on a new decade and year

James — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 05:31:14 +0000

This was originally going to be a post about beginning to track my workouts again, tackling a new year by getting fit and all that kind of crap. The workouts have been a bit haphazard though, so I thought I’d just reflect on the past few weeks and where things are going in the next while.

My ability to sit down and write anything meaningful has generally been hampered for some time by the MA I’m doing. Reading and writing a lot of very focused material so you can prepare another paper or do a literature review doesn’t leave much brain power for updating your journal online. Sometimes it’s two months or more between posts right now. I’m going to try to change that by just doing a little reflection. I think it will help me as I head into the crunch period of my thesis. Future reflections will be shorter and more focused, but what follows is akin to taking out the mental trash that’s been sitting at my cerebral curb for the past bit.

In no particular order

The things that sustain me and probably bore you my dear reader …

Fitness

A lot of my usual activity has been curtailed by the injuries and surgery I’ve sustained over the past year or two. I’m pretty healthy now, but do still suffer from a little left groin tightness if I run hard or long. I’m still exploring options on that, but I may just have to deal with it. It’s a lot better than it was while training for Boston, my inguinal hernia is all healed up and even my right knee is behaving with the right exercises and a couple daily glucosamine dosages. For the longest time the effect was essentially to stop getting out with my running friends, stop playing ultimate, stop going for road rides, etc, etc, etc. Given the amount of coursework I was doing during this, I felt that the timing was OK.

Now that I’m feeling well enough to train again and I’m keeping track of my workouts through Garmin Connect, I’m in the throes of data analysis and have absolutely no time to anything other than my job, my thesis and some forced workouts. Group runs and a possible return to ultimate will have to wait until I’m past the data analysis stage and strictly working on the never-ending writing and revision process that will begin in a few weeks.

Haiti

I can’t help but thinking right now, about two events at polar opposite ends of the spectrum. Due to my particular circumstances I’m not able to do much about or with either but they strike an odd juxtaposition in my mind. The Haiti quake of nearly three weeks ago still is present in my mind almost constantly. My wife and I donated some time ago and I’m dumbfounded by the generosity of Canadians. Some $90 million and counting. When you think of how many people don’t or can’t give and we’ve still give roughly $3 for every man, woman and child, it’s quite astonishing. The suffering and need is immense and I am hopeful that progress begins to escalate soon, as infrastructure is hampering aid getting to those who need it.

The Olympics

Then there’s the Olympics. Polls show that British Columbians are more pessimistic than anyone else in Canada. I know that the mildest January on record is giving John Furlong and his ilk convulsions and, as a taxpayer bound to foot the bill, I am very hopeful for a finanically successful games. What gnaws at me, however, is that locally most of us care more about that than the death toll and human suffering in Haiti (and many other places around the world). While the human ideals embodied in the original Olympic movement should be what international athletic competition is all about, what it has become about is money. Corporate money, government money and the economic spin-off we’ve been told is to come, but which may ultimately not, due to the lagging world economy. The timing of the warm weather and financial meltdown has been a bitch for Vanoc, but then again I bet the mild nights are nice for the homeless folks that Vanoc promised would get all kinds of help as a result of the games. I have a feeling we’ll be waiting a while to see that one.

Work

My brain doesn’t stop there. When not occupied with thesis research, international sport or disaster, I come back to what takes up 40+ hours of my week. Two big projects on the front burners mean there’s not much space for reflection during the day either. Rolling SharePoint 2010 out to BCIT is finally taking shape and I’m beginning to do needs analysis on a new Part-Time Studies course catalogue for the BCIT web site.

While finally settled into my new role doing my old work, the trailer I call home during the day gets no better. It’s a difficult physical space in which to work, with bad lighting, bad furniture and a persistent faint chemical smell emanating from the carpet or floor. It is what it is, but a creative or productive space, it is not.

Going forward

The training break I’ll be taking for five weeks to do a big chunk of my first thesis writing draft is coming in two. What probably gives me my fair share of stress right now is that I likely won’t have either my work projects or my thesis data analysis to the point where I’ll be productively writing the first draft of my paper right off the bat. It’s not due until the beginning of April, but that time will come more quickly than I expect.

I don’t expect most of my reflective posts to be rambling like this one and in a perfect world each of the ideas above would have been a more timely created piece of well-crafted prose. That’s the hope for future bits of mental flotsam but for now this one will have to do.

Images of Haiti – please donate

James — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 07:36:40 +0000

From the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies on Flickr …

Or, from nj.com …

The CBC has put together a micro-site with regular updates on the status of the Haiti quake. Please take the time to donate to this terrible tragedy. There are a number of organizations that do exceptional work on the ground, who are accepting donations. Following are just a few:

The Humanitarian Coalition (Oxfam, Care and Save the Children
Medicin Sans Frontiers (Doctors Without Borders)
Plan Canada (formerly Foster Parents Plan)

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250,000 gainers can’t be wrong

James — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 21:09:28 +0000

Ewan McGregor - cheeky devil?

Imagine my amazement. In Sunday’s Vancouver Province I saw a double-page spread that said I could get a free sample of the “Rolls Royce of male enlargement.” Say no more and sign me up.

What really caught my eye was the ad, pictured at left, showing a curious looking Ewan McGregor with the headline beside it, “What Celebrities Had To Say!” If this thing is endorsed by Ewan, how can I go wrong? It’s also “already tested with success by GQ Magazine” so it must be for real.

The JesExtender is apparently the latest in a slew of penis stretching devices. Upon reading the tiny details, Ewan was actually among three guests on the same UK show in which this device was also featured. What, you mean this isn’t a real endorsement? A major motion picture star at the height of his career isn’t coming out in support of a set of penis stretching weights? The celebs were apparently quoted as saying they’d try it if they needed it. So what if one of them was also Michelle Pfeiffer. Maybe it stretches other stuff too.

According to the ad, “the numbers are impressive” …

Backed by more than 1200 doctors, scientific studies, the FDA, Health Canada, and already tested with success by more than 250,000 people in 78 country … [sic]

Hell, even with only an implied or ‘flaccid’ endorsement from Ewan or Michelle, with other endorsements like these, I really can’t go wrong.

The jaws of life?

And then I saw it, at the very end of the article, and I decided I’d better forego this purchase for now. The box, pictured at right, has a number of different sized weights, two pieces of rubber tubing and a couple of pieces of plastic that look kind of like a pair of jaws. While the low introductory price of $79.95 is still damned enticing, and the offer of a free set of comfort pads and unlimited VIP access to a forum for the exchange of ‘tips’ with other men around the world suffering a similar affliction only sweetens the deal, I’m just not ready to strap weighted plastic jaws onto my tiny willie just yet.

Maybe if Michelle Pfeiffer also came with the package, I’d have to reconsider.

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Clearing cobwebs and groinal eggplants

James — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 00:06:29 +0000

So, when I finally sit down to write my first journal entry in more than a month, what do I write about? Why, my recent sports hernia operation, of course – and getting out of holiday mode and back to job work and thesis work. Truth is, I’ve got two or three partially written posts floating around, but they need more time. I just couldn’t bring myself to write over the past few weeks due to a number of issues, so I’ll just do some reflective personal catching up, starting with my gut.

Puffy abs

This past Monday, I finally had surgery which has been a long time coming. I felt the first lower abdominal pop close to a year and a half ago now on a tempo run, and have been through a complete 2008 cessation of my racing and ultimate seasons and a reduced and less effective version for 2009. After countless examinations, x-rays, physio sessions and running with lower abdominal and groin discomfort for a long time, I had sports hernia surgery Monday. The illustration at left shows a typical sports hernia location, though what I ended up with a day after the surgery was not dissimilar to a small eggplant jutting out of my lower abdomen with a two inch incision on top. The swelling and bruising is finally reducing and I’ve been able to stop taking the Tylenol 3s (thankfully, as pain is not the only thing they stop). I would post a photo, but there’s no way to not make it pornographic.

The surgeon actually found two weaknesses/ruptures and dealt with them both by placing the obligatory mesh patches (but not these ones) across them. I’ll spend the next week or so still only walking and will move to light cycling the week after, with very light short jogging the week after that. I should be mostly back to normal within about another 5-6 weeks. Only then will I really know if the surgery was effective. There are no guarantees but it works about 85% of the time. And, truth be told, the surgery itself was a breeze. 30 minutes on the table with a sedative and local anesthetic. I was drinking coffee 3 hours after they began cutting me open.

Since they don’t really know what causes sports hernias (and they aren’t actual hernias either), I’m lucky enough to be taking part in a study examining the role the hip may play in their cause. I feel there is some connection because for some time before I felt the full rupture in the abs, I was having some hip problems. I had an MRI the day before the surgery and should get some idea if anything is going on in my hip, along with whatever they publish as a result of the study. By the way … I think the experience of the MRI was worse than the surgery. Never had one before and not in a big rush to have one again.

Other distractions

While I just finished three weeks vacation, you’d not really know it. I spent a good chunk of the time repainting all room and closet doors in my home … in our garage, in the middle of the worst heat wave Vancouver has ever had.

Between painting days were car shopping days and plunked down in the middle of it all was a four day stay at the Galiano Inn for a very quiet getaway. A beautiful room and stellar view was a little marred on the last evening by a sub-par meal, but it was a really beautiful space to unwind and my wife had a wonderful spa treatment.

Back to the grind

After three and a half weeks away from work, it can be a bit of a challenge to get your clock back into early weekday rising and following someone else’s schedule. While I’ve been doing edits here and there on my thesis proposal, this ‘mostly ready’ document still needs a few tweaks and the nod from both my supervisor and the program head, before I get into ethical review processes at both RRU and BCIT in September.

I feel kind of guilty because, while I’ll be on my own through the next 9-10 months in completing my thesis, this summer the cohort in my program (the rest of whom chose more coursework and a smaller project) have been going straight through their second residency and moving into the remaining four courses before undertaking their 6 credit research project. Later on I’m sure the guilt will be assuaged, when I’m so busy I can hardly see.

If doing the thesis weren’t enough for the next while, I’ll be moving into a slightly different role – and desk – at work, and I can already see four or five significant projects beginning to pile up to hold me over well past Christmas.

The worst customer service I’ve ever had

James — Sun, 24 May 2009 02:29:48 +0000

Who’d have thought getting new glasses could be this complicated? I’ve had a customer experience that I am still finding hard to grasp. I’ll make this short, but writing about it is a bit therapeutic too, I guess. I got an eye exam a few weeks ago with my normal optometrist, who also runs a small optical store in the same office. It’s close to home and convenient. However, I also find it difficult to find frames I like, so I did a bit of shopping around before settling on a pair at my optometrist’s office about a week and a half ago.

I paid $308 in full upfront for glasses that were to arrive this past Tuesday (after the $85 it cost me for my exam). When I went in to pick up the glasses and tried them on, I could see nothing clearly past about 12 feet, though they were great for anything within six feet. They originally gave me two prescriptions; an extended wear one and a close-up one, with an option for progressive lenses. My eyes are still pretty good so we opted to ‘tweak’ the extended wear prescription to make it a little stronger to aid in reading and computer use.

The owner does all the fitting and purchasing recommendations and, when I told the receptionist that the glasses were not acceptable and left them there, the owner called me back within about a day and we arranged that I’d come in yesterday to look at options. He indicated that his notes suggested I had decided not to use them for extended wear and only for close-up, while my recollection was that they were for extended wear but would be adjusted to make them a bit stronger. If not, why would we make adjustments and not just use the close-up prescription?

Yesterday was a day off work that I arranged specifically so that I’d be in between 12:30 and 1:30, when he committed he’d also be there. Arriving at almost exactly 12:30, he’d apparently forgotten the appointment altogether because he’d just left to do some errands. I was pretty unhappy and indicated to the receptionist that it would probably be a couple of weeks before I could get into the store again and that I simply wanted a refund (I’m not good when a business stands me up, and has my money to boot). I was informed that he’d have to cut the cheque, so I said I wanted to be called.

I heard nothing the rest of the day yesterday and left a voicemail for them this morning, recounting my issue, providing two phone numbers and asking for a call again. When I hadn’t heard anything by 2pm, I called them. The receptionist said that he was with a customer and would call me back. When I asked why no one had called me, she said that the dial tone hadn’t indicated there was a message so she hadn’t checked their voicemail.

Fast-forward to 4pm:

Me: Hello, is Derek there?

Receptionist: Is this Mr. Wanless?

Me: Yes …

Receptionist: I’m sorry, but he had to go out to his other clinic. He said a cheque will be available for pick-up some time next week.

Me: But I asked to have him call back.

Receptionist: Yeah, he’s sorry but he had to leave.

Me: You mean he’s had three opportunities to return a requested call and he couldn’t even be bothered? Hmmm, is he aware that he’ll be losing four customers by this treatment?

Receptionist: Why?

Me: Because my whole family are patients/customers and none of us will be spending another dime there. Please tell him that.

She also confirmed that she had, indeed, got the earlier voicemail. After a long pause of stunned silence, we had a bit of back and forth and I assured her that while I was annoyed, it was not with her. She understood my frustration, however, I was also getting a lot of vagaries with regard to when a cheque would be available and it took a bit of work to make her understand that I wanted to be called Monday and told exactly when my refund would be there. Given that I was previously told that he writes the cheques, I’m not sure why he couldn’t have simply done it today.

I fully expect he’ll make me wait and also try and deduct some kind of fee. All the while I get to keep hunting for frames and go through the whole process again. I guess it’s the lack of foresight that gets me here. Even as late as yesterday afternoon, a simple apology and assurance that he would fix the issue probably would have saved my business. That he couldn’t bother calling, apologizing for missing the appointment, or simply had the guts to deal with an unsatisfied customer is inexcusable.

The worst thing that could happen to Bell now

Poor experience takes away from nonprofits

James — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 05:34:20 +0000

A couple experiences I’ve had in the past week left me wondering whether a nonprofit would suffer from bad customer/user experience in the same way a business would. I figure that good causes can be cut a bit of slack because they usually operate on very small budgets and, if some process isn’t great, I still feel good helping something important. Both of the problems I encountered were with fairly large endeavours and were either about the security of my data or my ability to raise funds for them.

IMHO, it’s all the more important for NGOs and nonprofits to ensure their constituent relationships are good, with the economic situation undoubtedly impacting donations. In the second example below, I’d think that the CIBC title sponsorship or ownership of Run for the Cure would ensure that the web application is usable and helps runners actually do their fundraising.

What are your thoughts? Is the first dialogue over reactive? What about the second web user experience issue?

Amnesty Canada

I’ve been a monthly supporter of Amnesty for some time. This past week I received the following email:

Your 2008 Income Tax receipt has been returned to us by Canada Post. Please e-mail me your correct mailing. Address so we can re-mail your 2008 receipt.

They had my name and email address right, but I have always updated my information via a secure online form. Since I moved a year and a half ago, and had forwarding on my mailing address for a year, it’s possible they wouldn’t have the correct one.

I went to their secure online form, updated my contact information and then sent them the following reply:

You should never ask customers or subscribers to send personal information by email. From a security and theft identity perspective this is horrendous. You have a secure web site (where I’ve just gone and ensured you have my correct mailing address – but it’s been the same for a year and a half) and you should direct people to update their information through there.

This really makes me question how secure my data is with you. I’ve also sent this to the info email address for Amnesty and I would like a response as to, first, the validity of this note and, second, why this would be a practice for you.

My biggest concern about this one is that I asked for a response, CC’d their official contact email address on my note and haven’t heard a thing in a week.

CIBC Run for the Cure

Far be it from me to say anything negative about this event; my problem is with their web site. My wife’s a cancer survivor who ran an all-woman’s team last year, raising an impressive $12,000. When she decided to do a co-ed team this year, I was definitely on board. I finally got around to signing up to be on her team this past weekend. The experience of, both, signing up and having the slightest clue about making use of the fundraising application afterward, are failures of epic proportions (I will not say EPIC FAIL any more, but if ever it applied …). My wife confirmed that a lot of people had difficulty knowing what to do last year and that she provided considerable feedback on the experience.

What’s the problem with the email invite, below?
It would be nice if ‘Click here’ was actually enabled in this. In other words, I was forwarded the invitation to my wife’s run team, but had no way to sign up without asking her.
Trying to sign up
This small tile was in the middle of the left-hand column. Since everything is pastel and pink hued, it doesn’t stand out, but I still found it.

I then had this page open in a new window, but all that draws my eye is the large form assuming I have a user ID. I still have no idea what to do. A HA! There’s a little pink link to register above the login text inputs. Everything on this site is pink and I can only imagine what this would be like if I was colourblind. Signing up as a new registrant should be the biggest single thing on the page, as returning users have already interacted with the site!

If you can imagine, after self-identifying as a new registrant, I’m taken to another page which still presents a returning user login as the biggest single item and a small pink link at the far right side of the page for me. So far, that’s three different pages and I’m no closer to my objective.
Joining a team
I won’t continue presenting screen captures at this point because, while it was still not great, I got through it and didn’t have another surprise new window open on me. I’m pretty sure it was at least another 5 or 6 clicks and page loads to get to the point where I had an ID on the site and had found my wife’s team. OK, so I joined.
Now what?
You’d think that I’d get some kind of information after that, right? Nope. No email confirmation of my registration, no email notification to my wife that I’d joined her team and absolutely no instructions of any kind as to how to use their site for fundraising, what link to send people to so they can donate – absolutely nothing.

How would either of the above experiences, repeated multiple times, affect the bottom lines of each of these organizations? More than they would understand, I’m willing to bet.

High hopes on a bar set so low for eight years

James — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 19:51:51 +0000

The camera zooming down on the mall is pretty breathtaking. A couple quotes which stood out for me:

A man 60 years ago who might not have been served in a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

And …

People will judge you on what you build, not what you destroy.

A truly great day and optimism for better things to come south of the 49th.

I have problems so I don’t need manners

I have problems so I don’t need manners

James — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 19:38:36 +0000

The following encounter at the mall is, unfortunately, exemplary of public mall etiquette at the holidays – all the more when immersed in gadget chatter. I had quickly met my sons at the mall this morning while they were pondering a gift for their stepmom. As we stood looking at the item, a woman talking on her cellphone proceeded to push past each one of us, making shoulder contact, without so much as an apology or making eye contact. How do you feel about the following? Do you believe that you simply cut the person slack?

Me: Excuse me works really well …

Woman (clearly stressed and raising her voice): Well, I have a sick daughter and I thought it might be her ….

Me: I’m sorry you have personal problems, but manners still help.

Woman (yelling, storming off and still on her phone): Merry Christmas!

I’ve had very stressful times in my life, including when I was on pins and needles as I expected my mom to be passing away, or waiting to find out if my ex-wife would get custody and move my kids across the country. I never have felt that having problems dismissed you from courtesy or a simple excuse me.

Merry Christmas, indeed.

No related posts.

How to (hopefully) ruin your career

James — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 18:16:59 +0000

It’s par for the course when athletes let their mouths run off – more so when the athlete in question is Sean Avery of the Dallas Stars. What’s kind of amazing about this, aside from the complete lack of class Avery’s comments show, is that everyone – from management on down to his teammates – is pretty much abandoning him.

The big question? What do you do about the remaining $13 million or so on his contract? He’s poisoning the team, not performing up to expectations, and is at least one of the major reasons the Stars are in the Western Conference cellar.

No related posts.

BC politics and social software platforms

James — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 08:08:59 +0000

I read with some interest this week, that the two dominant political parties are both taking a page out of Obama’s campaign book with their approach to online politicking. The governing BC Liberals open platform is going head-to-head with the BC NDP’s rapid responders to engage the clicking fingers (and hopefully, minds) of British Columbia’s voters, who may have severe election fatigue by the time May – and the next provincial vote – rolls around.

On the surface, there’s very little to distinguish these two sites. The Libs open platform promises that, by joining:

you can share your thoughts and help make an important difference for our province. You can participate in surveys, web panels, social networks, digital “town hall meetings” and policy forums on all sorts of topics. You can also submit videos, photos, art and music that will showcase the beauty, strength and diversity of our province and its people and cultures. Many of those submissions will be selected for use on this website and profiled in various ways throughout the upcoming provincial election campaign.

For their part, NDP’s rapid responders are:

people like you who care about the issues and want to make a difference. Here’s a quick list of the top three things you can do as a Rapid Responder (scroll down the page for more options):
* Write a letter to the editor about a hot topic and help us get our message out.
* Add interactive tools and BC NDP content to your blog or Facebook profile.
* Use social networking tools like Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr to connect with other BC NDP supporters and share information with your friends.

In other words, while both parties have built their own social platform, the NDP are leveraging existing tools more as the Libs want to frame the discussion. It’s hardly surprising that the underlying strategy is that Gordon Campbell wants a little more control over how the content is developed, while the NDP are more about sharing what’s going on on existing sites, including your own. The NDP are tracking issues but want you to take action and share what you’re doing. The Libs want to define what you talk about.

Libs provide a dis-engaging user experience

I can’t tell you what the actual Liberal social platform is like, but signing up was pretty bad. Right on the landing page, it asks me to provide first name, last name, email address, and to choose a user name and password (which wasn’t hidden as I entered it). I obliged and was redirected to the same page with my user name pre-populated. I received no email confirmation, logging in with my password did nothing and I have no idea if I have an account at all. I’m guessing not, because clicking on the topics they’ll let you talk about reveals nothing.

A little advice to the Libs? When you ask for information and presumably provision an account, confirmation pages and/or emails are crucial cues to your audience that something has happened. Worse yet, I couldn’t find anything telling me what to expect and, as of this time, have no idea if there’s an account in the works or not.

NDP don’t seem to really get it either

While I like the fact that the Dippers seem to want the swell to grow organically and not carefully control it, signing up for an account was awful. They offer the ability to do so, built on Drupal, but I can’t tell you what that looks like, either. It threw a bunch of SQL errors my way when I signed up. It gave me the standard Drupal welcome message with the one-time account confirmation link, but because of (I’m guessing) the SQL error, the link wouldn’t allow me to finish signing up. Then again, there’s some conflict in the messaging, so who knows?

Other than that, I can sign up to stay in touch, but most opportunities to engage seem to happen by design off-site. I’m glad they’re giving me lots of places to go and ways to follow them, but a simple discussion forum on the site would turn rapid responders into interactive responders (which I’m hoping the Drupal instance provides). It has to be about more than email and postal mailing lists, if you’re really going to leverage social media. It’s called social for a reason.

Do something with your social capital

Excuse me if I don’t believe Gordon Campbell, when he says, "This is a chance to have your say and help shape the policies that Premier Campbell and your BC Liberal Team will put to the people as part of their election platform on May 12, 2009." Campbell has shown a flagrant disregard for any opinion but his own in his tightly controlled approach to governing. Again, though, I have no idea what the tools look like or how they are possibly being used to develop policy going forward.

In the recent US election, Obama did a marvellous job of engaging his base through a solid online strategy. In his promise of change, he suggested the status quo will no longer do. However, as Charlie Smith of the Georgia Straight says, it’s still about keeping your promises, regardless of how cutting edge you try to be when you make them.

Can we trust Carole James or Gordon Campbell to develop policy in an open and accessible manner and then do what they say they will?

Being too busy can help you focus

James — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 01:03:45 +0000

Apologies to my wife for my lack of social presence notwithstanding, sometimes when you reflect on being overloaded you realize that it made you get things done. My last couple of weeks have been intense, but when I look back I realize I’ve now got about a week with a little breathing room because of meeting multiple overlapping deadlines.

Editing

During that time I ended up doing two large editing jobs and my own final paper. I have to provide a course evaluation before the end of Friday, but let’s just say it was pretty heavy. Since it was all online, in addition to two individual papers, we collaboratively wrote a group paper as well. Each of five units consisted of significant reading, which we discussed via Moodle forums, with group members then taking turns and posting discussion syntheses on a class wiki.

With the group paper, we all worked collaboratively with Skype and Google Docs and then I did a fairly big final edit and turned it in. The last group discussion synthesis also fell to me and both were completed within about a week of each other. On their own that wouldn’t have been too bad.

Work

In the past two weeks, I’ve also been head-down project managing a large social media site which we soft-launched on Monday. Particularly last week, time flew and there were a couple of late days in the mix. There are some ads running and a little traffic coming in, but a few remaining bugs leave it not quite ready for heavy promotion. Given the timeframe and requirements, I think the contractors we worked with did a good job. I’ll do a proper post on that when we get the last few bugs ironed out.

Paper

Even that would have been manageable, but if I wanted a break between the course I finished this week and the next one (starting next Monday), that final paper also had to be done. So, what I ended up with was outlining the paper every night when I got home from the project work. I ended up with most of a four day weekend intact through yesterday, so in big blocks of time, I churned out a paper yesterday afternoon.

Funny how, just when you think you can’t breathe, you suddenly get a huge injection of fresh air. Maybe it’s all about just holding your breath and keeping your head down.

Goodbye W, hello Generation WE

James — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 08:48:39 +0000

It’s all about empowerment and taking back our society. Resonates beautifully with the Obama win though it’s about much more than that.

Are you looking forward to the next four years south of the border as much as I am?

Goodbye W.

High hopes on a bar set so low for eight years

The funniest Palin

James — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 18:33:37 +0000

Originally found this via pkulak.

In honour of our election day north of the 49th, another US-based reason to make sure you vote.

No related posts.

Facebook in real life

James — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 17:12:29 +0000

From the Center for Internet and Society at Stanford. Funny stuff.

The real reason for C-61

Digital rights and access under assault

James — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 07:23:12 +0000

It doesn’t seem to matter what kind of access you want, or what you want access to. You’re under assault, plain and simple. With the news last week that Bell and Telus customers will pay at both ends for text messages and the obscene Rogers iPhone rate packages, we just have two more issues to deal with on this front.

Ed. Note: It should be noted that since I started jotting down notes for this post, Rogers has improved their data packages, but only for a two month promotional offer and not to the point where the prices aren’t still ridiculously high.

Reusing a legally purchased song on multiple personal devices, saving a recorded program for private viewing later, or even embedding a copyrighted video for comment on your blog could all land you in trouble if C-61 passes in the fall. Mind you, cellular rate plan issues are part of a much larger problem that includes throttling. Web companies understand the implications to their businesses. Throttling is mostly related to large bandwidth activities like torrenting, and would seem to be moving in lockstep with copyright issues. After all, making it illegal to possess something is more effective if you choke the ability to get it in the first place.

If all this isn’t enough, Canada’s complicity in ACTA will ensure that your digital equipment can be confiscated due to nothing more than an over-zealous border guard. Whether you got it back or not, it may well not include what you originally had on it. Plus, it would seem a Biker-chick lovin’ industry minister did a did a better job standing up for our rights than the current one. Mind you, today Jim Prentice did call out for Telus and Bell to justify their messaging grab.

That’s likely to really make a REAL difference.

Canada already has some of the highest wireless rates in the world. And, we have a government who is:

moving toward a complete lockdown on how we use our digital media
in lockstep with US government and big business marching orders
trying to kill innovation by (perhaps unwittingly) supporting walled gardens and closed source intellectual property
helping create a digital divide by allowing the high cost of access to continue unabated

The Harper government seems completely oblivious to the shit-storm C-61 and ACTA are causing, or perhaps they simply don’t care. All we can hope for is that cooler heads will prevail in the fall session of the Commons, or opposition parties will act in unison and defeat C-61 if it goes ahead as currently proposed. I know it’s on the radar of the NDP, based on canned email responses I’ve received from Jack Layton. Unfortunately, they’re not in a position to do much on their own and the federal Liberals have been silent enough on these issues that one could be forgiven for thinking they’re simply unequipped to formulate a position on that. Then again, it takes a lot of energy to focus singularly on a carbon tax.

Regardless of where C-61 or ACTA land, in truth the problem is lack of transparency and the Canadian government’s lack of public consultation on federal legislation and an international treaty framework.

Harper’s a guy who claims to want less government intrusion in the lives of ordinary citizens. That is, I guess, unless personal freedoms distract from his core goal – keeping his Bush administration and business buddies happy.

Canned responses to C-61 letters

James — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 04:33:11 +0000

While I haven’t yet printed, signed and sent any of the copyright petitions, I did manage a bit of an email writing spree regarding this hideous proposed legislation. Would it surprise you to know that I haven’t had a real response from anyone yet?

To be fair, our politicians might just be getting a tiny earful on this one, so I’ll reduce my expectations to … nil? I would have thought Ujjal Dosanjh (my MP) might have responded directly. However, why would he start doing anything now?

The first email I sent directly to him and the second I sent to Stephen Harper, Josee Verner and Jim Prentice, with copies to Ujjal, Stephane Dion and Jack Layton.

My email notes

The snippet below is the substantive gist of the first email:

As long as I’m not distributing what I buy for profit, I can’t understand why the Harper government is so willing to pander to business in this regard. I can’t understand why governments are so slow to understand that using my own media on multiple devices does not hurt the copyright holder. And, in fact, sharing will generally increase sales.

Copyright law this stringent does nothing for Canadian citizens and stifles the creativity and ingenuity that open standards and open access to technology and digital media creates. Plus, this is doomed to failure in any regard as people will simply expend more effort to go further underground in how they access, acquire and share digital media.

When you combine it with ACTA, which the feds have also been negotiating (and also not consulting their constituents regarding), normal people will be under attack every day, defending what they own and likely forced into expensive and unnecessary legal fights.

And the second, with more of a pleading tone:

Since this bill was introduced last week, there has been near universal opposition to it. Media coverage has been solid and comprehensive and has spanned the globe. The only ones who seem to be in favour of this are the US trade reps who have been pushing the Canadian federal government into crafting it in the first place. They still feel it does not go far enough. Far enough for what? A complete stripping of our rights? Or, is this really only about ensuring closed wall licensing to make big business copyright holders richer, at everyone else’s expense?

Most independent artists understand that, in a business landscape dominated by large labels and distributors, they need audiences to be built through open sharing of their works. This is how careers are often built and sustained. This bill does nothing but discourage this behaviour. The lost leader provisions around time-shifting are made useless by the fact that this content is not someone’s to keep and use for their personal entertainment. Plus, since the software used to allow this behaviour on locked works will now be illegal, I’m not sure how you expect people to avail themselves of that provision. That using a legally purchased digital media asset on more than one device, again for my personal entertainment, might somehow make me a criminal, would be laughable were it not so sad.

Who do you think is doing most of the file sharing and digital media posting to the web? Teens and younger folks. So, you’ve effectively targeted them as criminals, blindsiding them via over-zealous and poorly thought out legislation. Do you seriously think you’ll be able to extract the $500 penalty for peer to peer sharing, or the $20,000 penalty for sharing via aggregate platforms like YouTube, Flickr, or other social media sites? And what about someone who wants to comment on a copyrighted video via their own blog, which they saw on YouTube and further embedded on their own site? Does that make them a criminal?

Mr. Prentice and Ms. Verner, I honestly doubt you could even answer this last question, as it’s fairly clear to me that you don’t really understand how online social media not only works, but is completely changing the way people connect and communicate. If nothing else, I ask you to think of the innovation this will kill. I also ask you to do some real consultation across this country to understand why this legislation is bad. That is, if the firestorm you’re presently enduring is not helping you to understand.

Should this legislation go to the Commons for a vote in the fall, it could go either way. If it succeeded it would just be a sad harbinger of where this country would be headed under a Conservative majority, and likely means the Liberals were more frightened of an election than they were concerned for the rights of Canadians. However, what I hope, should it get that far, is that it would get voted down and actually trigger that election. Mr. Harper, if the Conservative strategy is that the next election deliver you the majority you crave, misreading public sentiment on this issue may actually have the reverse effect.

The spot-on responses

First I got Jack’s response, ~~eerily similar to~~ exactly the same as what Michael Geist shared from a commenter:

Thank you for sharing your concern with the Harper government’s Bill C-61, An Act to amend the Copyright Act.

The NDP is strongly opposed to this legislation. We are calling on MPs from all parties to listen to their constituents and join the growing chorus of those who are against C-61.

New Democrats are pushing for proper legislation that will ensure artists and creators are compensated for their work while allowing consumers reasonable rights of access. Over the past two years we have urged the Conservative government to consult with stakeholders and develop relevant legislation that would protect artists, innovators and consumers in the 21st century. However, this government has completely ignored all calls to bring forward reasonable copyright legislation and regrettably this bill is worse than originally feared. There is no evidence of any attempt to strike a reasonable balance to protect both either artists or consumers. Instead, C-61 represents a full capitulation to the U.S. corporate lobby that will pave the way for the criminalization of perfectly reasonable behaviour–like format shifting of most legally purchased content.

What can you do? If you haven’t already, you can contact the Ministers of Industry and Heritage, the Prime Minister, the leaders of the other opposition parties and your local MP to tell them of your opposition to Bill C-61. Encourage your friends and families to do the same. For contact information, please visit: http://www.parl.gc.ca/common/index.asp?Language=E.

Please know that your participation is important to building an opposition to this bill that will be hard for Parliament to ignore.

Again, I appreciate the time you have taken to contact me on this critical issue. Feel free to pass along my email to anyone who may be interested.

All the best,
Jack Layton, MP (Toronto-Danforth)
Leader, Canadaâ€™s New Democrats

But, surely Stephen Harper would be paying attention, right?

Dear Mr. Wanless:

On behalf of the Right Honourable Stephen Harper, I would like to thank you for your recent e-mail.

Please be assured that your comments have been noted and that they will receive due consideration from the Minister, who has already received a copy of your correspondence.

L.A. Lavell
Executive Correspondence Officer
for the Prime Minister’s Office

For his part, Dion is as informed and articulate as always:

On behalf of the Honourable StÃ©phane Dion, we would like to acknowledge receipt of your correspondence and thank you for taking the time to contact the Leader of the Opposition.

It is an extraordinary feature of our democracy that there exists clear lines of communication with our elected representatives. However, due to the high volume of correspondence that we receive it may take some time before we can reply.

Mr. Dion always appreciates hearing from Canadians and being made aware of their views. Please be assured your comments and concerns have been reviewed and noted.

We are confident that by working together we will achieve StÃ©phane Dion’s vision for an economically prosperous, socially progressive and environmentally sustainable Canada.

Sincerely,
The Office of the Honourable StÃ©phane Dion, P.C., M.P.
Leader of the Opposition
Leader of the Liberal Party of Canada

And, finally platitudes and nothingness from the dynamic duo, Prentice and Verner (whose presser was really sad commentary on how far over their collective heads they are) which didn’t address any of my points:

What does Bill C-61 mean to Canadians? Specifically, it includes measures that would:

expressly allow you to record TV shows for later viewing; copy legally purchased music onto other devices, such as MP3 players or cell phones; make back-up copies of legally purchased books, newspapers, videocassettes and photographs onto devices you own; and limit the “statutory damages” a court could award for all private use copyright infringements;

implement new rights and protections for copyright holders, tailored to the Internet, to encourage participation in the online economy, as well as stronger legal remedies to address Internet piracy

clarify the roles and responsibilities of Internet Service Providers related to the copyright content flowing over their network facilities

provide photographers with the same rights as other creators

What Bill C-61 does not do:

it would not empower border agents to seize your iPod or laptop at border crossings, contrary to recent public speculation

What this Bill is not:

it is not a mirror image of U.S. copyright laws. Our Bill is made-in-Canada with different exceptions for educators, consumers and others and brings us into line with more than 60 countries including Japan, France, Germany and Australia

Draw your own conclusions. I know I have.

The real reason for C-61

James — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 21:48:02 +0000

American pressure is nothing if not intense. It starts with big business and media bending the ear of the Bush administration, who in turn, essentially forced Canada’s hand. Did we just become the 51st state? Sovereignty, anyone?

The following speaks for itself, courtesy Michael Geist:

The public campaign was obvious. U.S. Ambassador to Canada David Wilkins was outspoken on the copyright issue, characterizing Canadian copyright law as the weakest in the G7 (despite the World Economic Forum ranking it ahead of the U.S.). The U.S. Trade Representatives Office (USTR) made Canada a fixture on its Special 301 Watch list, an annual compilation of countries that the U.S. believes have sub-standard intellectual property laws. The full list contains nearly 50 countries accounting for 4.4 billion people or approximately 70 percent of the world’s population. Most prominently, last year U.S. Senators Dianne Feinstein and John Cornyn, along with California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, escalated the rhetoric on Canadian movie piracy, leading to legislative reform that took just three weeks to complete.

The private campaign was even more important. Sources say that emboldened by the successful campaign for anti-camcording legislation, U.S. officials upped the ante at the Security and Prosperity Partnership meeting in Montebello, Quebec last summer. Canadian officials arrived ready to talk about a series of economic concerns but were quickly rebuffed by their U.S. counterparts, who indicated that progress on other issues would depend upon action on the copyright file. Those demands were echoed earlier by the USTR, which, according to documents obtained under the Access to Information Act, made veiled threats about “thickening the border” between Canada and the U.S. if Canada refused to put copyright reform on the legislative agenda.

Faced with unrelenting U.S. pressure, the newly installed Industry Minister was presented with a mandate letter that required a copyright bill that would meet U.S. approval. The government promised copyright reform in the October 2007 Speech from the Throne and was set to follow through last December, only to pull back at the last hour in the face of mounting public concern.

In the months that followed, Prentice’s next attempt to bring the copyright bill forward was stalled by internal cabinet concerns over how the bill would play out in public. The bill was then repackaged to include the new consumer-focused provisions such as the legalization of recording television shows and the new peer-to-peer download $500 damage award. The heart of the bill, however, remained largely unchanged since satisfying U.S. pressure remained priority number one. Just after 11:00 a.m. last Thursday, the U.S. got its Canadian copyright bill.

Help me understand C-61

James — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 04:37:43 +0000

I really don’t get this legislation, purely from a political standpoint. I completely understand that Harper will tend to swing between supporting a business agenda or toeing the American line, depending on who he’s pandering to at any given time. However, you have to wonder about the strategy of this. When I add the ACTA treaty, which Canada is negotiating on the international stage, I’m really confused and frightened about where this country is headed.

Is Harper baiting us? With his minority in the Commons, things could go either way. On the one hand, he gambles that the Liberals will vote with something like this to avoid bringing down the government and causing an election. This strategy counts on gaining seats under that scenario. However, legislation like this is so thoroughly repugnant that the voter backlash could very well lose them seats.

Since my fomenting would only add more noise to a very loud protest, all I can say is that we should be very scared. Michael Geist‘s key points about the fine print:

However, check the fine print since the rules are subject to a host of strict limitations and, more importantly, undermined by the digital lock provisions. The effect of the digital lock provisions is to render these rights virtually meaningless in the digital environment because anything that is locked down (ie. copy-controlled CD, no-copy mandate on a digital television broadcast) cannot be copied. As for every day activities like transferring a DVD to your iPod – those are infringing too. Indeed, the law makes it an infringement to circumvent the locks for these purposes.

And more fine print ….

Canadians can’t actually use these exceptions since the tools needed to pick the digital lock in order to protect their privacy are banned. In other words, check the fine print again – you can protect your privacy but the tools to do so are now illegal. Dig deeper and it gets worse. Under the Canadian law, its up to the government to introduce new exceptions if it thinks it is needed.

Still more ….

The other headline grabber is the $500 fine for private use infringement. This will be heralded as a reasonable compromise, but check the fine print. Canadian law already allows a court to order damages below $500 per infringement, so the change may not be as dramatic as expected (though $500 in damages is the maximum for private use infringement). Moreover, it is already arguably legal to download sound recordings in Canada. Under the proposal, there are exceptions for uploading or posting music online (ie. making available) and even the suggestion that posting a copyright-protected work to YouTube could result in the larger $20,000 per infringement damage award.

And finally, why this bill might actually be good for open source development (likely contrary to what the Conservatives and their business buddies probably want) ….

In other words, online materials that are available under a Creative Commons license are fair game (as they are already), but most everything else is still potentially subject to a restriction. This was precisely what many feared – rather than pursuing the far superior expansion of fair dealing, the education community got a provision that does little to enhance classroom learning.

Jonathan Zittrain writes about these very kinds of issues in his new book and makes the argument for allowing digital property and the access to it to remain unfettered. Unfortunately the worldview of the Conservatives seems to favour closed gates and the concept of wealth-building licensing.

The access issue is already being threatened as ISPs begin clamping down on customers suspected of downloading bit torrents and similar large media files. It has nothing to do with, as Roger’s asserts, managing network resources, and everything to do with managing access to content and looking toward leveraging access for higher fees.

Don’t worry, though, the aforementioned ACTA treaty will ensure any modicum of privacy you had with regard to what you are accessing or downloading would be completely gone.

Canned responses to C-61 letters

Don’t help ACTA squash your rights

James — Wed, 28 May 2008 17:53:17 +0000

As often is the case when government either can’t control, or can’t understand something, the current drafting of ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) is more about ensuring citizens have no right to privacy, than it is about addressing counterfeiting in any significant way.

Unchallenged, this could spell trouble for the movement to data portability and open technology in our ever-expanding information age. Of course, how would you really know what’s being proposed? The negotiations have happened in complete secrecy, with virtually no public consultation, yet the rumour mill is indicating that this agreement could come in with a whole host of significant measures, including search and seizure, mandatory cross-border disclosure and intermediary liability.

In other words should you end up under some cloud of suspicion, you have no right to your own information, no right to your own digital equipment and anyone along the line could be culpable. What does all this mean? Since these measures would presumably be defined by a document with no public scrutiny or consultation, defining the criteria is equally as nebulous. Is your ISP guilty for your illegal download? Who knows?

While it is ostensibly an international treaty, can there be any doubt its major driver would be the US? After all, this kind of knee-jerk stripping of personal liberties is not far off what the Patriot Act did under the guise of the war on terror.

Part of living in a free, democratic society is that some people will do the wrong things sometimes. We, hopefully, draft laws that protect the greater good AND individual liberties and define those wrong things via that mechanism. One key tenet of this whole notion is that one’s suspicion of guilt will, both, pass a considerable litmus test and that this suspicion is just that – suspicion.

Are we unwittingly aiding an erosion of privacy?

And, while our personal freedoms risk becoming more restricted, people are becoming ever more open in their approach to sharing their information. Why else would Google gear up to launch a suite of applications allowing any site to become a Facebook knockoff. Seems to me that’s creating the potential for a real problem in the not-too-distant future. For example, if we continually expose more of ourselves through social media tools and there are fewer protections of our rights, that information becomes very easy for the powers-that-be to get a hold of.

Personally, if I was an American I’d be very leary of using Google Health. This is not because the idea of managing my medical information through a stable, centralized online application is without merit. Rather, that another piece of my very personal life is exposed. As soon as, for example, I have a centralized commercial account that’s importing prescription and health condition information from, say, Walgreen’s, suddenly this stuff is in the hands of for-profit businesses and vulnerable to uses I may not be comfortable with.

Now, I realize that Americans are used to having their health information in the hands of commercial businesses, but it’s very much a foreign concept to me and one that I’d staunchly oppose. It’s not drawing too long a bow in my mind to combine this issue with over-zealous IP treaty privacy policing to effectively lose complete control of my personal life. Is there anything more core to one’s being than that of health?

What about extending that to health coverage by HMOs? Since one of their mandates is to keep claims low, does exposing your health information, however minimally, risk a claim being disallowed? The US health industry has done a great job of buying votes to keep the US healthcare system private. Is it even just possible that the collusion therein presents a problem with your personal data getting into government, and then, commercial healthcare’s hands?

While an entity like Google is not a social network, are the EU’s concerns still applicable? While your data seems to be more secure with Google, is the wider the net they cast for data partnerships placing your personal information at higher risk?

I certainly wouldn’t have a clue, but I don’t think I’ll risk my health to find out.

Digital rights and access under assault

How will Harper stall InSite next?

James — Wed, 07 May 2008 08:50:52 +0000

There is significant research available pointing to the success of InSite, the Vancouver Downtown Eastside supervised injection site, run by Vancouver Coastal Health. The conservative government has been tepidly extending its life in bits and pieces while they continue to fish for red herrings, allowing them to justify closing it down, as they have been wont to do since coming to power. The current extension ends in just under two months.

Recently, the operators of the facility themselves have mounted a constitutional challenge in a pre-emptive attempt to stave off their closing, arguing that the government doesn’t have the authority to close their doors:

“This case is about whether the federal government has the power to impose jail time for the use or operation of that health service,” said Ryan Dalziel, counsel for the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, which has intervener status in the case.

More recently still, it came to light that last year, UBC medical staff wrote to prime minister Stephen Harper, pleading the case of InSite. They’re concerned that mounting medical evidence of InSite’s efficacy in preventing overdoses and the spread of disease is being ignored in favour of philosophical bent:

“And so they’re concerned, as they should be, about the health of patients in Vancouver and elsewhere. And I think they (InSite operators) thought policy decisions were being made that were not in the best interests of patients,” said Hepburn.

“Closing down Insite would immediately put a stop to the research. Allowing Insite to continue would allow more valuable research to be done,” said Provincial Health Officer Perry Kendall.

Finally, the government’s own researcher and a key witness in the BC Supreme Court case regarding InSite’s legal status has come forward to the Ottawa Press Gallery with positive findings about the facility:

“There is no doubt that InSite has made a positive impact for the individuals who use InSite, the residents, service providers and business operators in the neighbourhood, and for the greater public health of the community,” said Professor Boyd.

The original news release, with further background, can be found here.

The conservative government has waffled for years on a longer or permanent exemption allowing InSite to operate and plan for the longer term. They refuse to look at opening more similar facilities in inner city areas and continue to study the issue, citing conflicting research, while producing nothing to support their position. Now their own researcher and key witness doesn’t support them.

I’m waiting for a new federally-funded study, engaging witch doctors and faith healers, to be announced. The conservatives are running out of rocks under which to look for their conflicting evidence.

Don’t help ACTA squash your rights

A reversable food crisis

James — Thu, 01 May 2008 04:08:17 +0000

The biggest problem with the current food crisis is not that it exists, but that it never should have happened in the first place and can definitely be reversed. And it’s not just the wrong-headed rush to create biofuels, but the products our food system produces the most of (and how it produces them), which exacerbate the reduced availability of crops to directly feed people.

Biofuel

When you consider that the 25% of US corn crops currently used to produce ethanol will rise to over 30% next year, and is mandated by George Bush to double present levels by 2015, there would seem to be no relief on the horizon. As the flavour of the day, Corn’s price is going up and farmers are beginning to convert other crops to corn in order to cash in. It’s an answer to high oil prices, but it hardly seems the right one. We use roughly the energy we produce in making biofuel, and there are environmental impacts to that production, too.

The reduction in other available crops as food, in turn, drives their prices up. Basically, there’s a shortage of everything, it’s becoming more expensive and a lot of it is related to biofuel. Canada has been insulated from these price increases due largely to a strong dollar. This is about to end. Plus, it’s not really us in North America who are truly feeling the pain. When the price of maise, rice or wheat doubles it’s others who are really paying the price.

On this particular issue, the only question I really have is why we should do it in the first place. Sure, they’re cleaner burning, but given the current state of affairs their production is not without significant issues. It almost feels like we’re in a tug-o-war between climate change and starvation of the world’s poorest people. And, while countries like Canada pony up money for the food crisis with one hand, we enact energy policies mandating the production of biofuels with the other.

Food production systems

It’s not just the growth of biofuels and diminishing availability of other crops causing problems. In particular, the agricultural methodologies of multinationals like Monsanto and the resulting loss of biodiversity due to some of these same approaches will affect the planet’s ability to produce food. Some even make the argument that climate change in general is creating food shortages.

Calorie conversion

While I’m a vegetarian, I don’t like to rail about meat-eating, as I feel people need to make their own choices. In the developed world, we have a lot of options if we choose not to eat meat. However, the fact is that most of the world will eat whatever they can and simply cannot afford to be choosy. When looking at the efficiency of meat production, though, there’s really little room for debate.

A calorie conversion ratio of 54:1 means that you get one calorie of edible meat for every 54 you put into the process. This factors in all energy put into the process, such as the burning of fuel, but doesn’t account for the ethical or environmental problems associated with meat production. When you allow for ground water pollution, transport-related air pollution, loss of first-growth forest and jungle, the impact on indigenous societies in the developing world, the horrific conditions of your typical factory farm and the health impacts of a protein and fat-rich, omnivorous diet I’m just not sure that liking the taste of meat adequately makes amends.

Plus, the developing nations of the world, while often not getting enough to eat, don’t develop the western health problems related to a meat and dairy centred diet. That is, until they begin to eat more like us. Meat is sexy and symbolic of affluence. Rising methane levels for the first time in a decade might mean world demand for meat is on the rise. Sure, there are scientific advances which may make traditional animal husbandry and slaughter irrelevant, but in truth how many people do you know who would want to eat their meat if it was made in a lab? If we get to that point, let’s just please all become veggies – it’s far less creepy.

Putting it all together

As long as oil prices continue to rise, countries defend biofuel production, and more people eat more meat, this problem will continue and worsen. So what to do?

Governments must start feeding grains directly to people, instead of cattle and SUVs.
While vegetarianism is a difficult argument to make for many people, we must eat lower on the food chain. Our bodies, our planet, our pocketbooks and the world’s poor will all benefit.
Ride a bike, take public transit or walk. Even just one less car trip per week by each of us would make a huge difference in the demand for fuel.

Do we really want children being sold because their families are hungry and poor? Just one of the seemingly disconnected consequences of a planetary food for fuel swap that has reached utterly unsustainable proportions. The UN is demanding change because it knows that we are headed for catastrophe.

Are we smart enough to avoid it?

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Unsubscribe me

James — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 02:27:19 +0000

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The scary side of social media

James — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 20:11:52 +0000

Would you like to be extricating yourself from a relationship with this woman? This came to my attention courtesy of Boing Boing.

The sad thing here is that it’s just more indication that we’ve lost our collective minds. And, as a divorce-wars survivor myself, I can tell you from first-hand experience that airing your laundry in such a public, vindictive way as this is almost certain to backfire to some degree (even if some of the points you make are valid).

Even if that doesn’t prove true in the land of litigation down south, shouldn’t good taste and pride count for something?

Iraq war photo essay

James — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 14:47:11 +0000

Are you a mud person or a sand person? In this piece the narrative is just as important as the pictures. Courtesy Slate.

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