I’m no expert on hair so I don’t know if it’s the haircut or just the hair (they all seems to have straight bland hair…), but seriously the hair looks bad. And all that bad hair seems to defeat the whole purpose of trying to sell shampoo, doesn’t it?

Why it is creepy:
1. He cuts a whole in their wall! Seriously, that’s going to far. If they were only leaking air before, it’s now blowing out the whole in their wall!
2. The people are clearly freaked out by David Suzuki, not like the first commercial where “Bob” is just a little confused by his presence.
3. He throws things through the hole he just made at the couple.
4. It then asks some random person on the street if they need some “caulking.”

Clearly David Suzuki’s ramage needs to be stopped before he cuts more holes and breaks into more people’s houses.

Here is why it is creepy:
1. He entered Bob’s home without his knowledge (and assumably no knowledge from Bob’s clearly preoccupied family).
2. He know’s Bob’s name.
3. He is lurking in Bob’s basement checking out his fridge.

Bob then goes off and acts crazy unplugging everything and turning everything off in an effort to save a a few bucks so her can get drink more beer and we forget all about the creepy that started the commercial.

Since then I’ve gotten a job and have a renewed apathy for the news.

And who am I kidding there are a million sources of news on the internet, especially nowawadays with the incredibly slow demise of the physical newspaper.

So what will this blog be about from now on?

Commercials and Ads

I realize the irony of getting people to choose to watch commercials and look at ads when they are bombarded by them everywhere, but some really stand out because they are just that bad and inappropriate. (I also realize that is not the exact definition of irony, but it’s that close enough definition that people use nowadays, so deal with it) So I’ve decided to blog about commercials. Please enjoy.

The biggest TV part of the Election airs tonight at 9pm on most Canadian stations. The English Debate is very important to English-speaking Canada, but I feel that the ads are too. TV ads are always present from the start of the election to the end. You would think the parties would put more effort into them or in the case of the Liberals at least have some.

I will start with are current leaders, the Conservatives. Their main campaign is “Not Worth the Risk”, referring to Stéphane Dion. This theme is shown in their Gamble series of ads. They say we will lose if we vote for him because he is going to raise taxes and take away the $1200 given to families (which in my opinion a questionable program anyways). I like how the ads give little information, but lots of graphics and sound effects. The best parts though are the 3 word quotes from Dion, no sentences for him. My favourite ad is the Slot machine one (best sound effects and least info):

http://www.conservative.ca/EN/4579/104099

Then there are the fatherly sweater-vest series of ads. In these ads he talks about being a great father, defining Canada and being tough on crime. Are these elections issues? Do other candidates hate veterans and are soft on crime? My favourite is the family ad (because I want my prime minister to be able to play cards AND piano):

http://www.conservative.ca/EN/4579/102768

Finally there are some ads that talk about election issues. There is one attacking him specifically on the $1200 family plan. This ad presents an issue in a direct and straightforward way. So that means 1 out of 11 ads on their website do that.

http://www.conservative.ca/EN/4579/104379

I am sad to that are not showing the ad that ends with the girl saying “I am voting for the first time and I am voting for the Conservative Party of Canada.” There were also other people interviewed who said they like Harper because “He’s a family man” and “Tough on crime.” Too bad I cannot find it anywhere. There are a few other ads I saw before on TV that do not seem to exist anymore.

Next up is the Liberals. I would talk about their ads, but they do not have any. You can check their website for their online Harpernomics Ads. They seem decent enough, but I have never seen any of them on TV.

Next up is the NDP. Their main theme is “A New Kind of Strong.” Everytime I see an NDP ad I think it is a Liberal ad attacking the Conservatives, but then Jack Layton pops up and surprises me. The ads are high quality with sharp and intelligent graphics. There are only 3 NDP ads, but quality over quantity definitely makes a difference. I do not know how reasonable their ideas are, but at least they are straight forward with addressing real issues. My favourite one is the original New Kind of Strong Ad:

http://www.ndp.ca/page/6731

If the elections were based solely on TV ads, the NPD would definitely win, but watch the Debate tonight to see the real issues.

The conservatives have cut $45 million from funding to the arts. Do you think this is good or bad? Here are my ideas on the subject.

Reasons to Cut Funding
- Art is not a necessity. No matter how much you like art, it is not an essential part of society. We would still exist without an art culture, though it would not be very pretty.
- $45 million can be used to support another area. That is a large sum of money that can help many other groups possibly more that it can help our art culture.
- Arts are supported by the upper class who may be willing to keep the arts a thriving business in Canada.
- CTV ran a call-in poll that said about 75% of the people in the GTA do not support increased funding to the arts. It does make sense for the government to be doing what the people want even if it is not in the best interest of our culture.

Reasons to Give Funding:
- Government funding supports up and coming artists that may not get support from the elitist art culture.
- The arts include funding for arts services for children.
- Canada has developed a certain reputation for artistic culture, which may be diminished when other countries see that the government is taking funding away.

Personally I am undecided on the issue, but I feel it is still a bad decision for the conservatives to remove a large amount of funding from any group right before the election. Do you agree with my ideas? What is your position on the subject?

Apparently Facebook’s philosophy is “If it’s slightly broke, cluster-bomb it.” Facebook has forced everyone to use the new facebook. I would say that it looks good and it made things simpler, but it hasn’t and do not let anyone tell you differently. Now I will explain how much sucks.

The Wall
The wall has been a facebook staple from the beginning. The wall is quick, easy and can be hilariously embarrassing. The wall posts have always been together, because that made sense. Then they went and broke it. They merged the wall with your personal mini-feed so that everything about you is in one “convenient” section. So what is so bad about that? Well I know what’s in my mini-feed, I did it, I don’t need to be reminded, I just want to see who talked to me. The mini-feeds purpose is to show other people what I did and the wall is to show me who talked to me. That’s why they need to be separate.

My Apps
It was controversial when facebook apps were added. Everyone has hated some app at some point after their friends tried to super-poke them or convert them to be a pirate and battle ninjas. When used in moderation apps can be fun: get your friends to play Tetris, see where in the world your friend has gone, see a classic quote from a favourite show. Then they broke it, by putting the apps in the “boxes” tab. Most apps are main page material. It’s supposed to be a social site with social apps. They should bring them back up front.

Commenting
Why can you comment on everything? You can now comment on people’s status and on people’s new friendships. Why would I want to comment on people’s friendships and statuses? They have a wall, I can write on it. Why isn’t that enough? (Obviously picture comments are awesome, keep them)

So all facebook has to do to fix the problem is separate the wall and the mini-feed, put apps back to the front and stop the crazy amount of comments. They should also increase the default font size, because size 9 is too small. I’m not saying everything about the new facebook is wrong, just almost everything.

Here are some pictures comparing the old facebook with the new facebook courtesy of ijustine (hopefully she doesn’t mind since it is public on her flickr account)

Old Facebook

New Facebook

Old Facebook

New Facebook

Here are some links to official blog posts about the new facebook. I thought they were funny because the facebook people are wrong about everything

Announcing the New Facebook

Frequently Asks Questions

Cancer is not one disease, but many diseases with many causes. Some types can be prevented, while others are linked to genetic predispositions. I am not saying that finding cures and bringing awareness to the many cancers is not a worthy cause, but there are other diseases that already have cures and solutions. I feel cancer awareness is very important, but a massive celebrity endorsement could be put towards a more prevalent concern.

Wikipedia offers a worldwide list of death rates from the World Health Organisation (WHO) ranked by cause. The number one cause by far is cardiovascular disease at around 29%. That is more than double the cancer rate of 12.5%. Cardiovascular disease is treatable, but it is also preventable.

Another epidemic, Obesity has become a major problem in North America. It may be a result of fast food, lack of exercise or sloppy parenting, but it is here and causing numerous health problems. Obesity is linked to with diabetes, cardiovascular disease, respiratory disease and cancer. The last three are the top causes of death. Having a body mass index over 32 has shown to double your risk of death. WHO shows the 2005 obesity rates of many countries around the world. The number statistics can be shown at the bottom and the United States is at 36.5% for males and 41.8% for females. Over 1 in 3 Americans are obese. Another interesting website from the CDC shows the obesity trends in the US from 1985 to 2007. It is appalling to see how obesity has grown over the last 20 years. Canada has an obesity rate around 23.5%. It is lower, but is still a concern.

WHO provides more interesting statistics comparing the top 10 causes of death for developing and developed countries. It is depressing to look at.  Lung cancer, car accidents and suicides should not be in the top ten for developed countries. Take the time to stop smoking, drive safely and reach out to someone. In developed countries it is sad to see that diarrhea and measles are in the top ten.  It is almost unheard of in North America for someone to die of those causes. I am not trying to say that cancer is an unworthy cause, but consider all of the other ways to save a life before mindlessly giving money to celebrity endorsements.

Thank you.

Post Scriptum: This past weekend parliament was dissolved, meaning Canada is having a federal election two and a half years after the last one.  I think it this is a waste of tax payers’ money, but it is still better than the drawn out process the US is currently going through.

That being said, I think Google is monopolizing the online general-use software and marketing industry to an unprecedented extent. Is this good? Is it bad? What does it mean for the future?

Monopolization of the Internet

Google has monopolized online searches. Google does roughly 60% of all online searches compared to Yahoo!’s 20%. Google essentially has the power to change what people find (and don’t find) online. As far as I know Google is not selective about its search results except in one area: Sponsored Links. That’s where the money is.

Google is our New Big Brother

Google doesn’t even have to try to be big brother. People search the internet for everything, even things they would never tell other people. Google knows and keeps track. Ads on many websites come from Google’s Adsense and are based on where you live and what you’re looking at. I’m not saying Google is evil of course, it’s just smart marketing. However when talking about Google’s censorship in China, CEO Eric Schmidt said, “We actually did an evil scale and decided not to serve at all was worse evil.” Who knows where the evil scale might tip in the future.

A Chrome Coloured World

So why is Chrome so important? It’s just a slimmed down open source free web browser, but it gives Google the potential for so much more. Pre-boot environments already exist that can launch web browsers without an operating system. Since most of Google’s applications and storage are online, they can easily take advantage of a minimalist computing environment. Google has already been easing people into a browser based world, why not take it a step further and eliminate unnecessary operating systems for the casual portable computer.

So can we stop them from taking over our virtual world? Do we want to? Who would have thought that the price of freedom would be a free download.