Christopher Mackay’s Blog

I’m not sure that one more link will make that much difference, but please donate what you can to the Canadian Red Cross.

CBC.ca is reporting that the Federal Court of Appeal has ruled that the $25 levy imposed on iPods and other portable media players is to be dropped.

That’s good news as far as it goes, and the court should be applauded for the decision, but while the court agreed that the Copyright Board of Canada didn’t have the right to impose taxes (a well-exercised right reserved for Parliament), the story leaves some questions unanswered:

1. When (and from whom) do I get my $50 back for the two iPods I’ve owned?
2. Why does this ruling not cover blank optical media?

According to the story,

The court declined to extend its decision to blank recording media, such as cassettes and recordable CDs, so the levy on those items will remain in place.

The distinction seems arbitrary and artificial to me. How could technical details such as optical vs. magnetic media in any way influence these legal issues? An iPod is blank recording media. It’s a hard disk with buttons on it. I record meetings with mine using Griffin’s iTalk, and I store all of the music I’ve ripped from my CD collection or purchased through the iTunes Music Store on my iPod. So how is that not blank recording media? Where’s the court’s logic?

At work, we archive all of our jobs onto blank CD-Rs and DVD-Rs, and for this we have to pay a levy on all this blank media — a levy that compensates musicians for the fact that they haven’t gotten their fair share for our work. After all, why shouldn’t Anne Murray or Shania Twain be paid when I archive a web site I’ve built or a QuickTime VR photoshoot I’ve produced?

Likely the Copyright Board will appeal this ruling… Hopefully the next court to hear this case, if any, will broaden this ruling to include blank optical media, too.

According to Information Week, Penn State’s IT department has urged its 80,000 students and faculty to dump Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (for Windows) because “because the threats are real and alternatives exist to mitigate Web browser vulnerabilities”.

Equally interesting was the language employed: “The University computing community [should] use standards-based Web browsers…”

Could this be the beginning of the end for IE as a default?

One-tonne challenge. What a great idea.

This is truly thinking outside the box. It might work in Australia, but I’m not sure how it would stack up against a Canadian winter…

Aliant has announced a re-branded PureTracks online music store.

The site won’t work for you if you’ve chosen any of the following:

• an iPod (Mac or Windows)
• Netscape (Mac or Windows)
• Firefox (Mac or Windows)
• Opera (Mac or Windows)
• Internet Explorer (Mac)
• Windows Media Player (Mac)
• Linux

Guess what that leaves? Internet Explorer for Windows, Windows Media Player for Windows and, uh Windows.

Hey, Aliant; I hope that works out for you.

Does this picture remind you of anything from a James Cameron movie? I wonder if these things can be modified to carry food or medical supplies? More at Wired.com.

Apple has launched their music store in Canada, and it works pretty well (see my previous post for a very minor interface complaint). This is welcome news. If only it were full.

As you might imagine, there’s lots of U2 (all of it, actually; more than even a rabid fan like me already had). But I can’t buy Roger Waters’ two new songs, or any singles from Coldplay, or much of anything by The Orb, Moby, Tangerine Dream, Sting, Skydiggers… Aside from the ‘Diggers, these are all in abundance on the US store.

Well, I’m currently downloading 31 tracks from Apple’s freshly-launched iTunes Music Store (Canadian edition). The verdict? Well, given Apple’s reputation for careful attention to user interface design (witness the iPod), I’m surprised at how long it took me to find the shopping cart…

Yes, it’s easy to add things to your cart, but you have to think to open the “twisty” — the little triangle next to the “Music Store” entry in the “Source” pane — to reveal the Shopping Cart. I’m no fan of hiding crucial interface elements like that. Presumably this is either because they a) would rather I used 1-Click to avoid the shopping cart entirely (thereby encouraging impulse buys) or b) they didn’t want to mar iTunes’ perfect appearance with a more prominent “Shopping Cart” button.