Greetings, interwebz! It is I, anonymous internet blogger and commentor HabsFan29. My good friend Allen Mendelsohn has turned over the blog to me for just this one time, so that I may opine gracefully and eloquently on the wisdom of forcing people to comment on the internet using their real names, as Conservative MP Dean Del Mastro wants. Thanks, Allen! Anyway, here’s what I think. Fuck Dean Del Mastro, that useless ignorant piece of crap election-frauding fat fucking dipshit.
Topic Uncategorized
Media whoring alert! [updated with audio]
I’ll be on CBC Radio Noon today at about 12:10 to discuss the Liberals’ use of Facebook video for their Pauline Marois ad. And possibly taking questions from listeners! There’s a listen live link at the top right of that CBC page. As usual my biggest challenge will be not to swear.
UPDATE – that’s good work CBC getting this online so fast, and embeddable too. Someone understands social media.
UPDATE #2 – nothing pisses me off more than autoplay files on a web page. That’s bad work CBC. I’m removing the embed, here’s a link to go listen. Sorry for any inconvenience.
Anonymous vs. Vic Toews (or, The Thrilla on The Hill-a)
Anonymous is all over Canadian news yesterday and today. I have been trying to avoid discussing them (it?) since I started this blog for fear of alienating any potential future corporate clients. I do have to make a living, you know. But I cannot ignore a big story that is all about law and the internet in Canada. Let’s dig through the muck after the jump.
Amen, Rick!
Since both of my most faithful readers have sent this to me (tap of the gavel to Steve and moe), I guess I should post it. Also, all video of evidence of my CTV Newsnet appearance seems to have vanished due to the vast anti-privacy conspiracy, so you need something to watch.
“The State has no business in the hard drives of the Nation.” I want that on a T-shirt, pronto.
A personal snark-free (well, mostly) note
The above video is a wonderful documentary about the Mile End Legal Clinic, an organization that did more good in the last month than you’ve done in your lifetime. The Clinic helps people who can’t afford a lawyer get access to justice and know their rights, thanks to the efforts of lawyers and law students. Notwithstanding its name, it serves people from all over Montreal and Quebec. And I am proud to say that last week, I was named to their Board of Directors.
Now, you may say “but we have legal aid to help people who cannot afford a lawyer.” Well we do, but the system is pretty fucked. To qualify for legal aid as a single person in Quebec, you must have an annual income of $13,007 or less. Stats Canada’s Low Income Cut-off (essentially the “poverty line”, but they’re too chicken-shit to call it that) for a single person in Montreal in 2010 is $18,759. So basically, you can be poor and not qualify for legal aid. That’s fucked up. And that’s why clinics like Mile End are so important, and why I’m excited to help them as a Board member.
So let’s start with this – give them money. Your personal tax year is coming to an end, and you need some charitable deductions, don’t you? Or, you know, helping people.
Google FAIL
Pretty slow news week in the world of internet law in Canada. Apparently we can’t have a big CRTC decision every week. Tragic, really. So let’s have a little fun. We’ve got some internet news that’s not law-related out of Google, as yesterday they announced that they are killing off seven Google products due to suckiness. Let’s take a look at the products you won’t miss after the jump.
Allen
Mendelsohn
is me.
I am a lawyer specializing in internet law working out of Montreal, though sometimes I do it in front of the U.S. Capitol. That should tell you what you need to know about internet law in Canada. I also warp young legal minds at the Faculty of Law at McGill.
More about me