Multiculturalism on the Canadian Prairies

One does not typically look to Colby Cosh for insight into the new pluralism, but here is a great quote from his blog:

"When I was a boy, the Ukrainian Hour was probably the single most popular program on what was then the most popular radio station in Northern Alberta. And aside from a brief rundown of content at the outset, it wasn't a bilingual show either. Which, for some reason, didn't stop my father--and thousands of others who, like him, are no more Ukrainian than Boutros Boutros-Ghali--from listening religiously. That's sort of the way it works out here: you kind of grow up Ukrainian, whatever you actually are."

Tags: pluralism

Stego for your camera phone

Fujitsu has developed a technology that allows your camera phone to decode information from printed materials including reading barcodes, reading QR codes (sort of 2-D barcodes), or stegonographically hidden codes in a glossy magazine. This is a very interesting idea, but is it a useful one? (Fujitsu Labs announcement, newswireless.net blog post).

Tags: stego

Japanese library drops library cards for biometrics

A new public library opening in Naka, Japan will feature "touchless" palm scanners for borrowers according to asahi.com.

"A new city library opening here in October will replace library cards with state-of-the-art biometric technology. Borrowers will hold their palms over a device that identifies people by comparing the pattern of veins in their palms with prerecorded patterns."

Tags: libraries infosec

Copyright and your vote

Based on the now dead Bill C-60, the Liberals support a more American style copyright law in Canada, at least in terms of owners' rights (and a lack of users' rights). Michael Geist has been covering the copyright positions of various parties and candidates on his blog. Here is an excerpt:

"Not to be overlooked by the Bulte issue is the fact that the major parties have provided some feedback into their views on copyright (many individual candidates have as well - those are posted at Digital-Copyright.ca). The Canadian Teachers Federation obtained responses from all parties on the education issue and access to publicly available materials on the Internet.  The Liberals confirmed their decision to shift away from the Bulte report by again committing to a consultation on the issue. The Conservatives and NDP took stronger pro-education stands."

Tags: copyright

I got dugg!

While I do not think that I have a snowball's chance in hell of making the front page, it is exciting to see that my post on playing hacker's capture the flag got posted to digg as Cool Play by Play of Lan Hacking Competition. Go and add your own digg if you want to see me (or my cool goat icon) on the front page!

It looks like Mr. Cosh has also taken a break from election blogging to briefly mention this item.

Tags: infosec digg