Monopoly

Rogers seems to have gotten on the wrong side of many people by posting higher rates (than the rest of the world) for the soon to be released iPhone. On Macrumors.com, more than 96% have rated the news negatively. One person created a website to collect names for a petition about the rates – but it seems to be have taken down – probably after high traffic after making it onto major news sources, including CNN, CBC and the Globe and Mail. It did gather about 16,000 names before going down.

Nobody needs an iPhone, however, the Rogers rates and conditions are a bit oppressive. They include, monthly rates starting at $60 – which is really about $120 after overages, ancillary fees, taxes; a three year contact; and the kicker, an absurd $7700 cancellation fee. I really could not believe it myself. It’s confusing, but if one cancels one month after signing up for a plan, one would be charged, “the greater of $1100 or $200-$400 per month left in the contract. [Edit: the cancellation fee could be a typo - but humourous that they would allow it to be published.]

This is not surprising as they are a corporation and their main goal is to make money. It’s not totally their fault as the government is partly to blame as they allowed them to buy the only other GSM network in Canada, Fido thereby creating a monopoly in GSM cell phone service. There is already an oligopoly among cell phone service providers in Canada. Hopefully the recent wireless spectrum auction will yield some foreign competition into Canada and will kick Rogers’ ass.

I won’t buy the iPhone from them (unless the rates change and are reasonable); I’m even reconsidering my cell phone service – which I’ve had with them since 1992. One website that I found, ihaterogers.ca several years ago provided me with an alternative for home internet service that was much cheaper than Rogers and Bell. I pay less than $30 per month (including tax) for an equivalent service that would cost $50 at Rogers or Bell. There are cheaper and better alternatives, you just have to look and take action.

Regardless, one way to show Rogers that this is unfavourable is to talk with your wallet. It’s time for a change.

Edit: at some point in the evening of 7.1.08, it was changed and now reads,

“The ECF is the greater of (ii) $100 or (iii) $20 per month remaining in the service agreement, to a maximum of $400. “

302,952

I managed to get most of my data copied to my new hard drive in my computer after the hard drive upgrade last week. However, to my astonishment, in my pictures directory, I had over three hundred thousand files – more than 302,952 files. The counter kept going and I had enough time to take this picture before it actually started copying files over. The actual amount was just over this number. I’ll need to do some clean up.

I also learned how to use Final Cut Express today which was relatively simple despite having tons more functionality than iMovie and likely too much functionality for what I need. I wasn’t able to load any audio into FC, because I needed to extract audio through iTunes – which I haven’t restored yet, so I just reverted to using iMovie which is able to use MP3 files. The result is the same nonetheless.

Here is the time lapse video of my hard drive replacement; two hour compressed into 15 seconds – started with Final Cut and completed with iMovie.

Promotion

When I travel abroad or meet visitors in Canada and we decide to trade personal contact information, more often than not, I receive a pre-printed card with their personal contact information on it. I experienced this first hand when I was in India at an international conference a few years ago. I received many cards from people that I met, however, I was reduced to giving out my contact information on scraps of paper.

It seems that everyone, but Canadians and possibly Americans give more importance to business cards rather than cards with personal contact information on them. I’ve always had business cards, however, when it came to friends and acquantances, I’ve always felt uncomfortable giving out my business cards.

At the raw food potlucks, people were always giving me their contact information and asking me to contact them with the website, email and event details. I met so many people and had so many pieces of paper with emails and phone numbers, I inevitably forgot to do so on many occasions. I finally did get cards for the potlucks several years ago and it made my life much easier. I thought about getting personal cards again when I first purchased a paid Flickr account because there was a Moo card promotion but thought about it more when I saw Gail’s cards last month.

Today I unboxed my new Moo cards; they contain a photo (taken by me) on one side and my personal contact information on the other side. Simple. They are a nice compact size and are more interesting than the usual 3.5 x 2 inch business card format that are one design. I had them printed with 20 different images and was entranced by them for about 10 minutes after I opened them.

23

Saturday was a long and busy day that that started before dawn at 5:00am and ended the following morning close to the same time. I managed to pack in five events and lots of food into 23 hours. What I did:

• I watched sunrise from the roof of my building with Stef;
• attended the taping of the CBC radio program GO! at the Glenn Gould studio;
• I went to the baseball game with Paul;
• I attended the Slideluck Potshow event as part of the Contact Photography Festival; and
• drank sangria at Gail’s

There was food between and during each of these events. A long but fun day.

My set from Flickr, starting with the sunrise. Click on the larger image to advance to the next image.

Postcard

Bon voyage to Rosie who is off to tour Canada for six weeks. When Maria and I dropped her off at the train station – I took a final shot of her and Maria.

By mistake, I left the film speed on ISO 1000. The image came out very grainy (which is normal) but it also over saturated the colours – so much that I didn’t have to touch the image afterwards.

The settings give the image a retro feel – almost like a vintage – well 1970s, postcard.

Shed

Crystals are supposed to be shiny and sparkle. However the Royal Ontario Museum Michael Lee-Chin Crystal does neither. Rather it is dull and grey or brown depending upon the light. This week, Condé Nast Traveler magazine named it one of the “new seven wonders of the world.” I’ve been calling it the tool shed because of the aluminum-plank exterior and the lack of glass; a friend calls it petrified dog-doo. The Globe and Mail’s architecture critic Lisa Rochon named it as, “the building most likely to come down in the next 20 years.” She also wrote,

“…it rages at the world” and, “Had it been clad in glass with the cacophony of steel beams exposed to the public, the museum would clearly represent an astonishing triumph.”

I couldn’t agree more. Beauty is definitely in the eye of the beholder.

I think Frank Ghery’s AGO, seen below under construction, will stand the test of time much longer.

Deal

I don’t think this is really a deal anymore. If I could afford such a car, I don’t think I would care about the difference in currency. Funny though.

Facets

I walk around the city a lot but don’t always pay attention to my surroundings because I’m focused on getting from point A to B. I saw this last night/this morning on my way home. I stopped to stare back for a few moments and then went on my way.

Paris

This is probably one of those cities where you can never see a fraction of what one hopes in one lifetime. I’ve been there about a dozen times and have only seen a very small fraction. However, that fraction that I have seen is very memorable. I’ve found neighbourhoods where I could live, like Le Marais or Luxembourg.

Le Marais is the first place I stayed in Paris at a youth hostel, the MIJE. Surprisingly, it was in the core of the city and walking distance (with some time) to almost everything including Hôtel de Ville and Centre Georges Pompidou. It also has a great selection of restaurants and cafés. It has almost everything and one could theoretically never leave this neighbourhood.

Luxembourg is another great neighbourhood that boasts a large park, Jardin de Luxembourg, as well as the Saint-Germain-des-Prés area which was the center of the existentialist movement.

Some images from a trip to Paris in 2005; taken primarily in Le Marais, Luxembourg, Palais-Bourbon and Butte-Montmartre.

Jardin de Luxembourg:

The steps up to the MIJE in Le Marais:

The Musée d’Orsay in Palais-Bourbon:

The view from Butte-Montmartre:

Read more »

Map

The earliest record that I have found (so far) of photos of maps that I took date from a road trip to Montreal in April 2007. We were visiting with Denis just outside of Montreal. One evening on the way back to his house, we got lost; we pulled into a gas station and asked where we were. The kid behind the counter didn’t have a clue what we were asking and wasn’t any help at all. His eyes were bloodshot and he seemed a bit disoriented; we suspect he had been doing something he shouldn’t have been while on duty.

Impatiently, I went to a display of maps and figured out where we were. Not to forget the location, I took a photo of the portion of the map that I needed and put the map back on the display. The kid asked if I wanted to buy the map. I replied, “no” and walked out. We got to our destination promptly after this.

A funny start on how I started taking photos of maps. I have an earlier photo of a map on this trip; but this is a funnier story. An image of that map; taken at 3:30 in the morning and images from a great weekend in Montreal chez Denis. Click on the large image to proceed to the next one.