tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-85548272011-04-21T23:34:18.480-04:00Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.comBlogger211100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1118068174220112552005-06-06T10:13:00.000-04:002005-06-06T10:34:00.076-04:00

Just a quick post to say that the Wireless Toronto site is now live. I'm a member of this (new, new) group and we're hoping to roll out a bunch of free to use WiFi hotspots around Toronto.The Wireless Toronto model is based on all the work that Île Sans Fil have been doing in Montreal over the last few years. We will be using the WiFi Dog authentication/captive portal system - it's open source

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1108919266596369372005-02-20T12:03:00.000-05:002005-02-20T12:10:14.276-05:00

If the idea of a depressive 19th century Swedish writer (August Strindberg) and his inflatable, cartoonish sidekick (Helium) sounds like it might be funny, then you should check this out:Strindberg + Helium

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1106798517836877872005-02-19T17:00:00.000-05:002005-02-19T18:59:15.690-05:00

There is plenty that I do like about TV, but there is plenty that I don't like - highest on the list would have to be the damn ads. Since I moved to Canada from the UK I have cut my TV viewing to virtually zero, mostly because I can't stand the quality (low) and frequency (high) of the adverts over here.This combined with my natural attraction to technology (geekiness you might say) means getting

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1107018187476088302005-01-29T11:45:00.000-05:002005-01-29T12:03:07.476-05:00

To me this is one of the most interesting aspects of the online world, when it leaks out or affects the real world. I good example of this can be seen over at Metafilter (a sometimes fascinating and sometimes car wreck like online discussion) where a community sponsored scholarship fund with attached online competition has been suggested. This idea really appeals to me as one that makes a real

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1106799423336994872005-01-26T23:16:00.000-05:002005-01-28T16:55:53.973-05:00

This is just going to be a postlet. I was talking to a friend who was looking for good prices in Europe to Canada flights and hadn't heard of the web sites I use - which made me think maybe it was worth tossing into the WWKB (World Wide Knowledge Bucket). I fly between Canada and Europe quite regularly, so have a reasonable amount of experience in getting cheap flights (cheap is my single

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1106538348184878962005-01-23T22:33:00.000-05:002005-01-24T07:46:41.553-05:00

Jon Garfunkel has written an interesting, if somewhat rough, piece Solution for Transparent Hearsay about a theoretical system for polling individuals on their opinions on a host of a topics, the results of these polls are then aggregated and published. Jon suggest many different uses for this technology, from political polling to product development. However the potential use that is of most

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1106533901974122092005-01-23T21:18:00.000-05:002005-01-26T21:57:29.466-05:00

Tod Mafin, the CBC technology columnist is currently running an open source/Creative Commons inspired experiment where the public can help to shape a short CBC radio piece, to air January 31. The piece will include parts of an interview from Dan Gillmor, who himself used a similar method , of allowing anyone who was interested to contribute to the development of his book on grassroots journalism,

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1105831748694143812005-01-15T18:05:00.000-05:002005-01-15T19:07:06.350-05:00

* Please note: All cooling provided by green cover and thermal mass, no refrigerants were used to generate this cool. If you are in any way interested in architecture, particularly renewable and environment friendly design, I would recommend checking out the C2C (Cradle to Cradle) Home competition. There are some very interesting entries for 'friendly' home concepts. But the on paper entries

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1105818054489269282005-01-15T14:28:00.000-05:002005-01-15T14:57:38.776-05:00

I am not usually one for things like New Years resolutions. My philosophy in life has typically been to drift along and see what comes up, sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn't. However this year I felt like maybe I would make a resolution or two - perhaps this change in attitude is a function of my advancing years (I have twenty-seven of them now). Here are a few of my New Years plans (I

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1104463656789355442004-12-30T22:10:00.000-05:002004-12-30T22:27:36.790-05:00

I don't think that I can adequately put into words anything useful about the situation in Asia at the moment. But I can urge anyone who is reading this, and who hasn't already done so, to give as generously as you can to the many organisations who are trying to provide relief to the victims of this disaster. Doctors Without Borders, Oxfam Canada and The Canadian Red Cross are all good places to

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1104366791585457962004-12-29T19:24:00.000-05:002004-12-29T20:01:17.313-05:00

It has been recommended to me that if I wish to increase the readership of TTAW beyond single digits, I should lay off on writing about garbage cans. But I'm going to ignore that advice at least long enough to write this post. To catch up on what an EcoMupi is you can read previous posts here and here. The short version is that an EcoMupi is a 7.5 foot tall billboard masquerading as a garbage

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1103915822030797872004-12-24T13:23:00.000-05:002004-12-24T14:17:02.030-05:00

I came across an article on mental health which I found interesting today. The piece was in the free Toronto paper Eye Weekly by John Sewell, an ex-mayor of Toronto, and dealt with a session on mental health he had chaired at George Brown College. The thrust of the article was that mental health problems should be acknowledged and dealt with in a more open way than they currently are in our

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1102640644339764312004-12-09T19:45:00.000-05:002004-12-09T20:04:04.340-05:00

Today the Canadian Supreme Court released a unanimous opinion that same sex marriage is constitutional. There is a detailed, but readable, summary of what the opinion means from a legal point of view here and an interesting and informative discussion on the opinion here (wins the award for the most constructive Metafilter thread I can remember for a long time). Personally I think that the

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1102126178711794082004-12-03T20:50:00.000-05:002005-01-15T15:06:24.373-05:00

While googling for a site comparing effectiveness of Canadian Charities (which I didn't find yet) I came across this 'Generosity Index' produced by the Catalogue for Philanthropy to indicate the relative generosity of American tax payers when it comes to charitable donations, broken down state by state. The generosity rank is calculated like this: Having Rank, ranks each state by their average

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1101510985709489152004-11-26T17:47:00.000-05:002004-11-26T18:16:25.710-05:00

Well it is a Friday night, I just got home from work and my brain is tired. But it has been too long since my last post (if I had an audience they would be getting restless), so here are some things I've been thinking about, in no particular order: a) Timber framing, see the Timber Framers Guild for what I'm talking about. Basically the art of making building structures out of large timbers (not

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1100135969533588702004-11-10T19:44:00.000-05:002004-11-10T20:19:29.533-05:00

OK, now I am trying to write this post once more, following the third Internet Explorer lockup in half an hour. However I am going to look at this philosophically and say it is a good thing, because it will make my post less wordy, being tired of the words I have written 3 times. So here are the technology thoughts that have come to me while planning this post: 1) Google desktop search seems

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1099506216940465902004-11-03T13:42:00.000-05:002004-11-03T15:50:00.896-05:00

I won't go into too much detail about yesterday's U.S. elections. I think I can illustrate my feelings on the (apparent) results by saying that I was up at 2 am crunching numbers on Ohio votes in a desperate hope that things weren't as they seemed. It looks like they were, and I will just have to live with that. I have been reading a lot of blogs these last few weeks, particularly on American

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1099265821877498602004-10-31T18:25:00.000-05:002004-10-31T18:45:43.680-05:00

Last night I visited a new to me restaurant in Toronto, Addis Ababa serves up Ethiopian food in it's Queen West location (1184 Queen W., just east of Queen and Gladstone). I would definitely recommend this place, the food is good (spicy to mild meat or vegetable curries), atmosphere is pleasant and relaxed and the prices are very reasonable ($44 for generous main course for two and 1/2 a litre of

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1099257560860477832004-10-31T16:50:00.000-05:002004-12-29T19:49:41.273-05:00

I have previously blogged about the new Eucan EcoMupi design of recycling bin that the City of Toronto is considering for our sidewalks, something like 2,500 of them. In my research on these bins and what they will mean for the streets Toronto I have come up with some interesting (to me anyway) questions. A lot of what I know about the EcoMupi design comes from a Toronto staff report to the

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1098566558905272192004-10-23T16:47:00.000-04:002004-12-29T19:54:01.133-05:00

Now this really won't mean a lot to people outside Toronto, Ontario. But for those of you from the GTA you may well have heard about the proposal that is currently being considered in council to install 5,000 new recycling bins on the cities sidewalks. These 5,000 bins would come from the company Eucan and replace the existing Eucan SilverBoxes as well as some city owned garbage only bins. There

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8554827.post-1096664259376152732004-10-01T19:50:00.000-04:002004-10-03T12:58:50.316-04:00

Perhaps I will start with a manifesto, yep I think I will. 1) I will try to publish at least a few things that are interesting to a few people every once in a while. 2) I will not write about what I had for lunch today, difficulties finding matching socks or other topics which really add little to the sum of human knowledge. I don't promise to add a lot, but I will try for adding at least

Patrick ASDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02375768207873115180noreply@blogger.com0