Wood Mountain my hometown village has been trying to get a highspeed Internet provider for years, and the Mayor has been working on setting up free WiFi for visitors to the village. Now the NDP government has offered money to urban centers only, to get free wireless Internet going for them. Good for Saskatoon and Regina; no help for rural SK; it must be an NDP idea.
Here’s something I can agree with Jason on, though. A super duper, hypothetical tutorial on how to watch Oscar films.
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I woke up in my hotel room, and turned on the TV. Of course Canada Ad-em [sorry I mean Canada AM on CTV] was abuzz with Oscar fluff. The one reporter who attended a post Oscar party couldn’t get anything more interesting from The Queen winning actress, than what drink she likes to have after she wins an Oscar.
Then I flipped over and saw Gormley on Shaw cable’s TV guide channel. He was busy making a fool of himself by highlighting how Dr. David Suzuki is “just a geneticist” and not a climatologist. Yeah, that makes a difference to the whole climate change “debate”, when just one scientist who realizes that climate change is a real problem didn’t study climatology in grad school. It totally invalidates the thousands of other scientists who do have a background in climate study, and chemistry, who realize we are polluting too much. I’d like to see how much Gormley nods when that regular caller one-track-minded Ken phones in and every topic he twists into “what a hoax global warming is”.
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Trevis Smith got a 6.5 year sentence for intentionally exposing two unwitting women to HIV, and breaking bail conditions. He gets .5 years off for previous time served. He’s appealing the conviction; big surprise there. Suck it up Mr. Smith, you’re lucky it’s only 6 years, and you didn’t infect anyone.
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Wynyard had a small explosion and fire in a business next to A&W on Saturday Feb. 24, 2007. The fire was put out pretty quickly, but you can see there is severe damage.
A sun pillar rises above the house behind the Subway:
I had a quick look around Viscount today too:
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I came across a computer term I don’t remember encountering before, but maybe I have. Wizard Gap. If you know what it means, you’re a geek. Sorry, but maybe an old geek to boot.
@hotmail.com
![[EFC Blue Ribbon - Free Speech Online]](http://www.efc.ca/images/efcfreet.gif)
John Murney | 27-Feb-07 at 2:00 am | Permalink
Those pictures from Wynyard are mighty interesting!
Steve Jobs' Evil Twin | 27-Feb-07 at 8:20 am | Permalink
I think most people realize it isn’t a hoax. If it was though, it wouldn’t be a bad thing to trick people into polluting less. That guy seems like he is a bit of a conspiracy theorist. Does he think the moon landing was a hoax too?
scout | 27-Feb-07 at 1:22 pm | Permalink
fergit the government when it comes to wifi for the town……just have a biz who’s hooked up to the internet get a wireless unit …..people can pitch in if they want to help. oh, make sure there’s a parking lot……..is there a chamberpot of commerce there? let them bite it.
i’m hotspotting all over the place here….too many places with passwords but i usually find something :)
oh, small hotels usually have wifi , there’s another thought if it’s rourists your after.
Ross | 27-Feb-07 at 3:15 pm | Permalink
one of my cousins lived next door to a couple riders a couple years ago and got to know them, and quite a few others quite well. they would party together at one anothers places and play catch and shit like that. according to him trevis smith was the nicest one out of the group.
one of mr. smith’s accusers is currently living with or dating another hiv infected man who was infected by intervenous drug use so i question these womens credibility and motives. ill take the side of trevis smith anyday after hearing about these two women that accused him.
Ross | 27-Feb-07 at 3:42 pm | Permalink
also did you know that when mr. smith apparently breached his parole, it was because contact was made with a female. trevis did not contact this female, rather she contacted him to do a painting job for her which he gratefully accepted (probably because he wasn’t making any money). this same female didn’t report the contact but the RCMP did find out somehow and that is why he was re arrested, because he accepted a paying job to help pay for bills, and put food on the table.
also, there isn’t any argument that these two accusers were consenting adults and both heard of the rumours of smiths hiv+ status.
if i hypothetically took down some chick, even though there were hypothetical rumours she had hiv or some other std, which she hypothetically denied you wouldn’t hear me crying to the law even if it turned out it was true and i did become infected…which i feel compelled to add that neither of smiths accusers have become infected.
Saskboy | 27-Feb-07 at 7:42 pm | Permalink
Thanks John, more pictures to come too.
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Steve Jobs’ evil Twin, I think there is a lot of group-thinkers out there who do trust Fox News to tell them the reality. And now that they’ve been well trained in problem denial, not even George Bush himself can pull them back into reality after he started agreeing more needs to be done. Although we know that Bush is only saying that because he knows the Republicans will get slaughtered in ‘08 if they aren’t “green” enough.
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Scout, in Wood Mountain, there’s no highspeed provider. The only chance so far is Xplornet satellite, and the knowhow and do-it-yourself attitude of my Dad. There’s also minimal business activity there, although highspeed might help perk things up a bit, and certainly will with tourists in the Summer when they head down to the parks.
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Ross, I don’t think Trevis who was cheating on his wife, has a whole lot of credibility, even if he was a nice guy to your cousin. Is your cousin female? Perhaps Trevis is nice to other guys, but treats women like dirt - it’s just a theory…
Tanya | 27-Feb-07 at 7:54 pm | Permalink
The sentence he got was fair. He should have been more forthcoming with his infection. He lied about it directly, which makes him extremely irresponsible. The question I want to ask is, I wonder how many people he will infect with AIDS when he is in the big house.
Ross | 27-Feb-07 at 8:37 pm | Permalink
i agree that trevis smith is a scum bag for cheating on his wife, and that his wife is a dumb bimbo for standing by him.
i just wanted to point out the fact that at least one of his accusers was aware of his HIV status through the rumour mill, even though she chose to not believe those rumours.
also, his HIV tests in the states weren’t conclusive that he had the disease and at least one came back negative.
he is getting 5 and a half years for having sex with two women while he may or may not have known he was HIV+, both those women have not contracted the disease and at least one seems not to have learned from this experience because she still associates with junkies hooked on intervenous drugs and who are also infected with HIV.
5 and a half years for a crime with no long term effects on anyone except for embarrasment. but that couple in moose jaw only get something like 8 years for molesting three children, one of whom was only 18 months old i think.
its time to stop babying consenting and at least somewhat educated adults and start getting tough on people who commit horrible crimes against those that aren’t even given the choice to consent or speak for themselves.
Saskboy | 27-Feb-07 at 10:00 pm | Permalink
The court determined that the women weren’t consenting, however, and that’s the point. Given the best evidence the court was presented with, it determined that Smith didn’t do his duty to properly inform them. It wasn’t up to rumours or suspicions, it was up to Smith, and I agree that the sentence is harsh considering the outcome, but it also needed to be tough. It is nuts though, that a rapist gets less time in jail than someone indifferent about spreading AIDS.
Ross | 28-Feb-07 at 1:51 am | Permalink
who am i to argue with someone educated in the law such as the judge in this case. its just my opinion that in addition to smith, his accusers were just as sketchy as him.
Jason Hammond | 06-Mar-07 at 12:54 am | Permalink
Just to clarify, I think free wifi in the cities is a good start and obviously, it makes sense to start a program like this in your most populous centres then expand it to other places - Weyburn/Estevan/Yorkton will likely be next then Battleford/Nipawin/Tisdale/Melfort/Humboldt and so on down the line. And yes, there gets to a point where it might never be cost effective to supply certain communities with high speed at all unfortunately. It’s not a fair comparison since Wood Mountain is your *home* but we can’t get high speed at our cottage at Katepwa Lake yet for the same reason. (I suspect that’s why they’re not going citywide either, just the downtowns for now.)
But I’m on the record as saying I think free high-speed internet should be brought to all major centres across the country as a government program and then to the entire country as technology/cost allows.
http://blog.jason.hammond.net/blog/_archives/2006/6/16/2036243.html
But technology and costs are limits on that right now.
(There’s a company called Eclipse Wireless that might be worht exploring for Wood Mountain’s needs They’re supplying high speed to rural customers around Weyburn-Estevan and expanding to other areas of the province now.)
Anyhow, glad you liked my “hypothetical” downloading guide.
Saskboy | 06-Mar-07 at 8:57 am | Permalink
Jason, I might disagree again. I think starting the wireless in Wood Mountain or Weyburn makes more sense, as it lets a smaller set of people test the technology. If it doesn’t work in small places, it probably isn’t going to work well for Regina.
Katepwa has, or should have a wireless tower now, but you need to be able to see it to get it, and I doubt many people can see it without building a tower themselves to hook up to Sasktel’s wireless AKA Community Net II.
There are dozens of LIBRARIES in SK with only dialup, and if we don’t direct the $1M+ to them before offering a luxury item to Regina, S’toon, PA, etc, then this government’s priorities are seriously messed up. It’s not like those cities don’t have wireless phones with email already…
Thanks for the tip on Eclipse.
Ross | 06-Mar-07 at 12:35 pm | Permalink
this governments priorities are seriously messed up. but back to the internet issue. the closest wireless tower around katepwa is lemberg i think, and you certainly don’t have line of sight to it from the bottom of the valley.
a few years ago sasktel installed the hardware and lines in abernethy in anticipation of high speed internet. how do i know you ask, because they accidentally set one of the power poles they were woking on on fire, and when we asked what they were doing they simply told us. when ever a resident called to sasktel to see when the service would be actually offered they told them in six months. it was always six months, in the last four or five years they have always repeated six months. now that the wireless is offered people are jumping for joy, but it seems like a rip off to pay $250 for the initial set up and around $50 a month there after, especially when the wired version of high speed just has to be turned on probably.
Jason Hammond | 14-Mar-07 at 10:47 am | Permalink
I think I have to disagree with your disagreeing with me! Although I see where you’re coming from with the thought that a smaller community would be more manageable, you have to look at the penetratio of the technology you’re testing as well.
How many people in downtown Weyburn (or Wood Mountain) have laptops or at least desktops with wireless adapters, compared to cities like Regina and Saskatoon? Unless the government is willing to start providing people with these, I doubt many people will go out of pocket for them, even if it is an “exciting and exclusive new service.” Demographics play a part too - sure, Weyburn is a young community but a lot of that is b/c of oil field workers who might not have time to test the technology (working 12-16 hour days) even if they *are* tech savvy. That’s less on an issue in the downtowns of major centres where you have a more tech savvy workforce across all demographic lines (no stats to back that up - just a gut instinct.)
Finally, I don’t think the technology itself has to be “tested” per se. Similar operations have worked for the most part in Toronto and various other cities.
I do agree with you that libraries in small towns should have high speed access but thought that most do already via CommunityNet (?). But I guess if a town doesn’t have high speed, that means the library probably doesn’t either.
Saskboy | 14-Mar-07 at 10:59 pm | Permalink
“How many people in downtown Weyburn (or Wood Mountain) have laptops or at least desktops with wireless adapters, compared to cities like Regina and Saskatoon?”
Per capita? I’d guess about the same, since home wireless networks are popular anywhere.
“Finally, I don’t think the technology itself has to be “tested” per se. Similar operations have worked for the most part in Toronto and various other cities.”
It would be nice if they scaled it to fit cities our size then, like Weyburn sized cities ;-)
Disagreements are encouraged on my blog, so long as they are backed up with reasons, like you’ve done.
“I do agree with you that libraries in small towns should have high speed access but thought that most do already via CommunityNet (?). But I guess if a town doesn’t have high speed, that means the library probably doesn’t either.”
CommunityNet isn’t in every library. My Region alone has 5 libraries on dialup only with no highspeed provider in the area [aside from half-assed Sasktel wireless], and another dozen with no automation system at all. “Every Library Connected” was a noble goal, but the province gave up it seems. In all cases I can think of, if CNet is in the town, so is DSL.