iPhone Comes to Canada: Rogers Sales Tank Until Q4

Today "Robbers" have announced that they will be getting the Apple iPhone this year.

BoyGenius Reports:

It took them long enough! Rogers has finally announced that it negotiated a deal with Apple to bring the coveted iPhone to Canada. Details are limited at this point but Rogers states that the popular Apple handset will be available to its subscribers "by the end of 2008".

The way I read it: Rogers are shooting themselves in the foot as their sales will tank until Q4 as everyone hangs on to their crappy pre-3G Nokia's and Sony Ericsson's that little bit longer. If you are Telus or Bell, you should be breathing down RIM's neck to get the 9000 series out before the end of Q2! From the specs I've read it will please enough would-be iPhone switchers to hold off the biggest number port in history since they aloud in March of 2007.

So if you are shopping for a new phone, hold off until the dust settles or until His Steveness clears the air.

TaskBar Shuffle: Step One Cure for my OCD

I have been looking for a small Windows app that freeze the position of my icons on the desktop on Dell notebook even after I disconnect from my big 22 inch screen to go into meeting or to hook up projector. I actively use my desktop as a "cork board" as I try to gather all the items I will be using on any given task which requires a few files. However I also have a set of 20 icons which never change and always occupy the use the same space on the desktop, the only problem is that Windows would prefer to shuffle my icons randomly just to keep me busy. I you know of a tool that freezes a set of icons in place, please post the links in the comments.

One thing in I did find in my search was the cure for my second biggest Windows Pet Peeve: the insane task bar immovability. When Outlook crashes, OH we all know it does, you have to reopen and then it becomes the last item on the task bar. But if you have been clicking on the first item for the past 6 hours, suddenly your whole process gets disrupted. I know, I know! This is a little OCD, but I'm a Database guys and by nature of the job, I have become just a little obsessive, Just try and screw around with my data and you will see. On the MacBook, my OCD is taken care of politely, I line up my dock with my 15 or production tools, create a few stacks for the less used items and QuickSilver for anything else.

For Windows, half of obsessive compulsive behaviour has finally been taken care of by a neat little (262Kb) tool called TaskBar Shuffle from Jim over at the NerdCave. It looks like version 3 is on the way, however version 2.2 dated form June of 2007 is available and so far very reliable. Thanks for the hard work Jim.

Now if I can stop my icons from running a muck on my desktop.

Vlsta SP1 Rocks? = FAIL

I am ashamed to own a Dell and to call myself an MS developer.

Also Bruce Springsteen needs to sue for defamation.

Who's on first!

The Two Act from Merlin Mann on Vimeo.

There certain things that make Merlin Mann videos and podcasts just so damn funny! This video is one of them. Just one more Fat Dad embarrassing our kids.

The CBC weighs in on Net Neutrality: ISP's still Suck!

Bell and other Canadian ISP seem to have hit some type of nerve in The Great White North that is usually reserved to bad Hockey fights, bashing Celine Dion and corporate America messing with sacred Tim Horton's pastries.

So I was watching last night's big game between the Habs and the Sens and scouring Twitter between periods when I saw a Tweet from Amber MacArthur pointing to this article about National Union of Public and General Employees calling Bell Sympatico out on Bit Torrent Throttling.

A major Canadian media union on Monday urged the country's TV regulator to investigate online "traffic shaping" by Internet service providers after an attempt last week by the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. to upload a DRM-free TV program to online users via BitTorrent was severely hampered.

"On behalf of the National Union of Public and General Employees ... I am asking the CRTC to conduct an investigation into these practices and the implications for Canadian consumers," NUPGE president James Clancy said in a letter to CRTC chairman Konrad Von Finckenstein that was released to the public Monday.

I am very pleased that for once it's not just the end-user being screwed over by the Canada's oppressive telecoms industry. Our hallowed CBC.ca has taken a major initiative to offer up their DRM-Free programming in a way that not only ensures fast delivery to the user but has the potential to serve as a measure of it's popularity. let me explain this, Bit Torrent speeds rely on end users who have already downloaded the file (seeders) as well as those that are actively downloading it (leachers) to ensure the high speed downloads it is synonymous with. It's very democratic in that the files that are very popular with many seeders and leachers will in fact be offered up at incredibly high speeds, while less desired files, like bad television programming, will suffer their own demise with out the need for additional throttling by the ISP.

Who knows if Canada's Next Great Prime Minister will blow? But seeing as Rick Mercer is involved chances of success are pretty high! At the end of the day, the fact is that it's not up to the ISP's to decide this or to weigh in with their self-interest inspired editorial policy.

Last night's performance by Price, Markhov, Bégin, Lapierre and the rest of the Habs against the Parliament Hill's Senators must have inspired a few other "Canadiens" to take action, good friend and IAM.ca blogger Steven McGurn posted his thoughts on my previous article which were far too good to leave buried in comments:

Fortunately, Bell has no say as to what happens to the packets once they leave Bell's backbone, but then these poor innocent packets fall prey to the whims of all the other carriers whims between your computer and their destination (not to mention whatever path they follow on the return trip). The issue I have with packet shaping is that it is marketed as the benevolent strategy to maintain a level of service for all their customers. The problem is that they only throttle traffic that threatens their core business (skype, youtube, ...). I'm sure that videos hosted on http://sympatico.msn.ca/ don't suffer from throttling. If youtube.com pays for bandwidth, and the enduser pays for bandwidth, then they should enjoy NetNeutrlity as far as their packets are concerned, and if they run their own quota dry, then charge them after the fact.

Just don't tell me its to improve service.

Don't forget to visit: Free Our Bandwidth and talk to your local government representative.