Andy Kaplan-Myrth's Webstream

Russia in colour photos, a century ago

via boston.com You must see this -- it's absolutely incredible. Photographer Sergei Mikhailovich travelled around Russia in the early 20th Century taking colour photographs. He'd take three black and white images in a row with red, green and…

Long term impact of ending the long form census

Can the long-form census be saved? I fear it cannot. I fear that the announcement by Industry Minister Tony Clement to scrap the mandatory long-form census in favour of a voluntary survey has already damaged the future of…

Planet Money podcast: Monopoly, A Dangerous Game?

If Daniel Hamermesh is Monopoly's economist champion, Russ Roberts of George Mason University, is its economist defector. While Russ admits to playing as a child, these days he says the only time it's played in his house, is…

Moon over Apex, Nunavut, July 25, 2010

The full moon came out over Iqaluit and Apex last night, very low in the Southern sky. Since the moon is so bright, the sky is still light from the Northern Summer sun, and our camera is pretty…

July 24 in Iqaluit -- walking on mud flats

It was another beautiful day in Iqaluit -- it was sunny and 17 degrees. Better yet, Nili was off work today so we could all go out and enjoy the day. Tide is out during the day now…

Freida, perpetually surprised by magic

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Hiking along the river near Iqaluit

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kaplanmyrth/sets/72157624554577974 Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Nunavut, July 21, 2010

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Photos from Nunavut, July 17

See and download the full gallery on posterous Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Sensory Emotional Experience (but no information) in AQUA movie at Ottawa Nature Museum

via youtube.com I took the kids to the newly renovated Nature Museum this morning. Over all, it was basically fine: the restoration means there's a nice building that will be there for a long time, and it's clean…

Why I will not be commenting on Canada's new Copyright bill

Image via WikipediaWhen I finished law school I got an articling position at a firm that represents some major media companies, significant copyright owners in Canada. I had been at the University of Ottawa and worked with Michael…

Calling bullshit on IFPI claims about piracy in Canada

Canada has once again been singled out as an international digital music piracy haven, this time by the London-based International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) in its annual report on music sales. The global industry association said…

On naming new animal hybrids

An animal shot last week by an Inuit hunter travelling on the sea ice in the High Arctic has sparked debate over whether another polar bear-grizzly hybrid - a so-called "pizzly" or "grolar" - has been discovered. via…

Canada needs a funded, independent opengov body

Image via Wikipedia There's some great open government and open data momentum in Canada right now, with a few websites coming online in recent days. There's the wonderful openparliament.ca, and datadotgc.ca is expected soon. See David Eaves article…

Michael Geist on a new Communications regime for Canada

In answer to a question about the role of the CRTC in the transition from television (content delivery) to the internet (participatory media), Michael Geist told the Heritage committee last week:     Last year was obviously a very busy…

Creative Commons or Copyright for new band? - SparkExchange

A musician in a new band posted some questions to the Spark Exchange that many new bands probably want to ask: How should they copyright their music? How can they use Creative Commons licences and still keep their…

Tony Clement + Twitter = High-larious

Industry Minister Tony Clement joined Twitter recently and it turns out he's not only hilarious, but apparently a geek as well. In one post, he wrote, "Guilty Pleasure #16: Big Bang Theory!" (referring to the tv show, not…

Industry Minister expands on tech agenda

via youtube.com This interview of Industry Minister Tony Clement followed the speech from the throne and goes into more detail about the technology aspects of the speech, including a digital economy strategy, anti-spam legislation and copyright legislation. But…

Which Star Trek TNG episodes are the important ones?

I'm introducing my kids to Star Trek: The Next Generation. I want them to understand the series and see the major storylines, but I don't really want them to need to watch all seven seasons to do so.…

1963 train on today's Rideau Canal by Tim Wayne

via flickr.com Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Our new temporary pet

via en.wikipedia.org Art brought a leopard frog back from his friend's cottage on the weekend. They found it in the basement there and couldn't put it out in the cold, and I think Art figured we could add…

Thoughts on Age Appropriate Geek Movies

My boys are 7 and 5 years old. They love to draw. Their latest drawing craze has to draw Star Wars scenarios. They draw stick figures with Darth Vader helmets, recreate a decent picture of R2-D2 and everyone…

More thoughts on virtual property rights and advertising

In response to my earlier post on Google's move to start replacing billboard advertising in Street View, @jasonjkee asked, "Didn't this issue arise when Times Square billboard ads were replaced in 1st Spiderman movie?" It's related, but I…

Google taking "A new approach to China"

We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an…

Bamboo Keyboard, Mouse and Headphones from Impecca

via treehugger.com Beautiful! Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Lululemon openly mocking Olympic trade-mark restrictions

You know how the federal government passed a special law giving the Vancouver Olympics special trade-mark super-protection for basically any words associated with the Olympics (including "bronze", "winter" and "Vancouver")? I wrote an early analysis of the bill…

MS could have used open source but instead stole Plurk

You know how Microsoft was caught this week having stolen code from Plurk for a microblogging website in China? Well, as Mike Masnick notes at Techdirt, Canadian-based open source uber-micro-blogging platform StatusNet would have been perfectly happy for…

EtherPad goes open source

Etherpad is a web service that provides a free simultaneous collaborative writing platform. Users who visit the same page can not only edit the text but can see other users editing text on the fly. It is very…

Milk, I am your father T-Shirt

While I was helping build a Lego tie fighter this evening (awesome, btw!) this t-shirt popped into my head and I laughed out loud at the thought. It just doesn't make sense in so many ways. Love it!…

Probabilities of Cancer for Jewish women

Canadian sources are reporting today that Jewish women have a much higher incidence of the two genetic mutations (BRCA1 and BRCA2) that are associated with an increase the risk of ovarian and breast cancer. The articles are talking…

Where are the contours of privacy in a world with Blippy?

Yes, we have privacy laws in Canada that protect consumers from some evil privacy violations, but that's a difficult front to protect -- after all, companies can do almost anything with your personal information if they have your…

Why are authors against libraries?

I just read Stealing Atwood, an article by BC author Michael Elcock. I recently downloaded, at home, twenty-one copies of Margaret Atwood’s best-selling novel Alias Grace from a B.C. library. I did it by accident, but if I was…