Wikipedia: Starting with the execution of John Boyd in January 1908, [[hanging]]s at the Don took place in an indoor chamber, which was a converted washroom, at the northeast corner of the old building. Previously, condemned men had been hanged on an outdoor scaffold in the jail yard. The Globe: 1908 John Boyd is thecontinue reading
September 2007 Archives
The brave bloggers of Burma
In 1989, I was glued to the television for weeks watching the pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square make their peaceful case for democracy. The entire world could watch because of the footage that was broadcast. In Burma, foreign journalists are banned. In 1988 information about the junta’s crackdown was limited, and verbal. But thanks tocontinue reading
Fight the Power
Would-be car buyers launch a class action suit claiming sticker prices on Canadian cars are illegal. One analyst points out that when the C$ was at US$0.65 — not so very long ago — prices here were actually lower and no one was complaining. What the plaintiffs ignore is that Canada is a different countrycontinue reading
Dollar daze part 2: don’t blame the bookseller
More from the frontlines of C$ surge, aka the US$ collapse: – I have to question the Star’s dollar headline on its front page today (check your local Star copy or box as it does not appear online). The story is fine, but it’s topped by the ubiquitous pic of a loonie and, in somethingcontinue reading
MEC
While I’m still on my Hamilton kick (‘It’s 905!’/’But so authentic!’), I’m embarrassed to say that I missed this entirely: MEC’s planned Burlington store, which I’m sure there’s a good business case for, is supposed to be a model of environmental design … “Sustainability is a driving force at MEC, and the Burlington store willcontinue reading
Dollar daze*
Woo-hoo! Parity at last! Where were you in 1976? Etc. Except: we live in Ontario consumer prices aren’t budging plus, don’t know if you’d noticed, but housing and food prices, which represent a sizeable part of the average household budget, are rising. Core inflation is actually a bit softer — you know, the type that doesn’t includecontinue reading
Totally Toronto
– is CBC Radio 1’s slogan at the moment, unless they’ve taken it off the air out of embarrassment – it’s hard to miss. One the one hand, this is just truth in advertising – CBC Toronto, which serves all of south-central Ontario, at least in principle, has always been indifferent to the large partscontinue reading
Good news for newspaper readers
…and another failure in the long list of failed online newspaper ventures. From business headlines on CBS Marketwatch: 7:24[NYT] New York Times: Free access to Web content to start Wed. 7:23[NYT] New York Times to open up free access to online content 7:22[NYT] New York Times ends TimesSelect online service Prepare for more liberal sprinklingscontinue reading
I hope this involves some papier mache
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Frustrated by one of the worst situations in air travel — passengers kept waiting in grounded, crowded aircraft for as much as 11 hours at a time — a consumer group is planning to stage a recreation of an extreme tarmac delay in the nation’s capital next week. p> The expectedcontinue reading
The evil that is Comic Sans
I’d be perfectly happy to never see it again, and apparently I’m not the only one. There’s a whole movement advocating its abolition. I did not know that it originated with Microsoft Bob, but that explains a lot, doesn’t it?