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From the "Bottom Rung" Department ::

Labour Shortage Puzzling to Skilled Immigrants

This is one area of the country's operation that needs some serious thought and a complete overhaul. The way it works right now is just plain wrong! On the one hand we have government sponsored campaigns to attract skilled immigrants then that hand gets washed of any further responsibility. Then the other hand gets involved and the whole reason for being degrades into a typical boondoggle.

Personally, I think this is no better than any other cruel crime against humanity. We skim off the most talented individuals from countries that can ill afford to have them leave and then, if they survive the insane Immigration Canada selection process, we put them behind the wheel of a taxi-cab if they can drive or a mop bucket if they can't.

If we really need taxi-cab drivers that bad then we should be landing "real" taxi-cab drivers. The guys that make a living transporting people in their home countries. My experience abroad has been that these guys are, without doubt, professionals in the strictest sense.

Then there's the shortage of skilled exotic dancers who somehow still get fast-tracked through Immigration Canada's tangle. Steven Harper needs to put an end to that in a real hurry. The "skin business" has been historically linked to the underworld which makes their arrangement with Immigration Canada all that more difficult to digest.

I guess that about does it for today's rant. I've been busy on many other projects and this project has suffered a bit from lack of attention. Keep coming back though..., interesting things are on the way.

From the "I'll Be Darned" Department ::

Prime Minister Harper Wants Immigrants Credentials Recognized

It's about time some bold thinking happened at Immigration Canada. In fact it's twenty years or more overdue. It's going to be interesting to see how long before some real action takes place. I'm betting it won't be long just because it has to happen. It's funny that this headline trailed my initial post by about six hours. I didn't think anybody ever read any of this - I sure don't get many comments.

Check back regularly, no telling what little nugget of gnarled knowledge or whimsical wisdom you're going to unearth here but it could be a 'Breaking News Nugget' - and you can say you saw it here first. Others will just have to wait for the rest to catch up.

Note:: These headlines rotated, updated & barbecued throughout the day. Enjoy!

Hasta La L8r Señor Headline Hunter

Clean Up Dodge

Well..., it's Tuesday and the sky in Alberta is a "Conservative Blue". I don't think there was ever a doubt in any Albertan's mind. Maybe Landslide Annie had some doubts but that's all history now - to be shot down by a fighter pilot is nothing to be ashamed of though.

Steven Harper has his work cut out for him but his first priority should be to clean up "Dodge". I think Steven Harper has the brains and the will to do so and I firmly believe that he is poised to show a lot of doubters what he's made of and what he's capable of. He's young, he's smart, he's figured out Quebec and I think he deserves our support.

Give Steven Harper a chance to show what he can do for Canada and for Canadians (and that includes disgruntled Quebecois and Albertans too).

Frankly..., I'm relieved we have somebody with fibre heading up the country. It's a pleasant change to the arrogant, lying, thieving, back stabbing bunch we've put up for the better part of a decade and a half

Hasta Luego Mr. and Mississauga (OK..., so I stole it - get over it! It's not like the planet is going to quit spinning and we're all going to get flung off or something weird like that.)

Vote for Your Life

Stay tuned to your election results. This could be interesting and likely the dawn of a new age in Canadian politics. Will the paper shredders be running to capacity throughout the night? Midnight bank transfers to offshore accounts maybe? How about shadowy 'courier' type guys brown bagging currency or any number of conspiracy theories or accusations. But really, things like "Auditor General" reports can sure get the imagination working.

Remember..., if you don't vote you forfeit all complaining privledges.

It's going to be interesting to see if Steven "Hockey Historian" Harper can put one past Paul "Mother Pucker" Martin to win the "Parliamentary Cup". I sure hope there' s no overtime. The last "Minority Government" is enough overtime already.

Hasta La Luego Mr. and Mississauga (Like I said, "I stole this from some journalist that likely stole it from someone else. I like it so I'm going to use it.

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This was just way too ironic to pass up. I receive an interesting newsletter from Marilyn Jones of Mediamag e-Zine, a well done site out of Edmonton geared towards media interests in and around the Capital City.

It's quite a lengthy newsletter and as I was scanning the various headings I ran across this one:

OCTOBER 19 TO 21
NETSPEED CONFERENCE for librarians, technicians and knowledge workers. Presentations on SuperNet, digital production, copyright, privacy and more. Sponsored by the Alberta library. To be held at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, Edmonton. For more info see the "Conference Website".

The mere mention of "librarians" and "privacy" in the same paragraph immediately grabbed my full and undivided attention. Should you be interested in finding out exactly why this would have been so noteworthy to me, check out this site I put together regarding my involvement in the unfortunate keystroke logging incident at Parkland Regional Library.

While checking out the link to the "Conference Website" I noticed that one of the plenary speakers was Dr. Michael Geist from the University of Ottawa - Faculty of Law. A quick scan of the Adobe Acrobat PDF linked from the Alberta Library website indicated, on page four, that Dr. Geist would be speaking on a touchy subject considering Parkland Regional Library is a member of the Board of Directors at the Alberta Library consortium. From the conference program I provide the following:

Dr. Michael Geist   Room: SALON A
Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law University of Ottawa

Michael Geist will identify the challenges that lie ahead for Canadian privacy law in light of emerging new technologies. A pending Parliamentary review of Canada’s national privacy legislation in 2006, combined with a growing number of existing provincial privacy laws, have created a challenging national privacy patchwork. New technologies such as radio frequency identification tags, web cam video surveillance, keystroke logging, and Internet telephony are stretching the boundaries of current privacy legislation. Michael will focus on how policy makers can adjust to emerging technologies and how organizations can anticipate the future shifts of the Canadian privacy law landscape so that they can be ready for future privacy compliance requirements.

I sat back for a moment to absorb some of the irony this provided and that's when I noticed that the "contact for more information person" was Mary Jane Bilsland, whom I worked with at Parkland Regional Library and who was also the sister of Parkland Regional Library's legal counsel, John Bilsland. Throw some more irony on the irony blaze why don't ya! I just about flipped my chair over backwards when I leaned back laughing.

Anyhow..., I would have loved to have been there in some shape or form. For one thing, I respect Dr. Michael Geist for his tireless pursuit of privacy rights for the individual but from the personal entertainment angle, being there would have been priceless.

Check back regularly, no telling what little nugget of gnarled knowledge or whimsical wisdom you're going to unearth here but it could be a 'Foul Smelling Nugget' - and the odour appears to be coming from behind some library bookshelf.

Hasta La L8r Señor Gordo Low-life Scumbag

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Privacy ::
The "E-Commerce Times" Commentary

Decent commentary from a Toronto E-Lawyer who also does the Laws of Dot Com site.

Privacy ::
"Lacombe Globe" Story on the Keystroke Logging Incident

It's a sad day when libraries decide to spy on their employees!

Privacy ::
"Red Deer Advocate" Coverage on the Parkland Regional Library Keystroke Logging Fiasco

Ladies and gentleman, your tax dollars at work!

Privacy ::
Another Take On the Use of Keystroke Loggers in the Workplace

I just can't help but agree with this guy!

Privacy ::
A Primer on Keystroke Loggers

Do you sleep well at night?

A couple of weeks ago the Privacy Commissioner for the Province of Alberta published his ruling on the use of keystroke logging software for employee performance monitoring.(PDF) His decision clearly indicated that keystroke logging software was excessive, intrusive, invasive, and indiscriminate in the information it gathers. Curiously, Parkland Regional Library's flawed logic attempts to defend keystroke logging as an objective measure of employee performance. For anybody interested on why this is flawed logic I would suggest a scan of the comments on Slashdot concerning this matter.

Anyhow..., the Privacy Commissioner for the Province of Alberta ruled that the information collected by way of the STARR keystroke logger was stored in a secure manner. Unfortunately, a wee bit of research into this matter would have clearly shown that the information gathered was, in fact, stored as "clear text" html files easily viewed by anyone with a web browser contrary to what's been reported. That would be just about anyone with a computer hooked to the Internet these days. As far as this genre of software is concerned I would have to say that the IOPUS STARR product is amateurish at best and if nothing else, sleazy.

The deployment of the STARR software on the Parkland Regional Library network was poorly implemented and completely unnecessary. Curiously, software I provided for Parkland Regional Library network in the form of the Request Tracker trouble ticketing software provided PRL with everything they needed to monitor employee productivity and much more. Unfortunately, inept management completely missed the opportunity to exploit Request Tracker for 'Human Resource' purposes. This is clearly an example where IT staff have no business whatsoever dabbling in 'human resources' matters.

Check back regularly, no telling what little nugget of gnarled knowledge or whimsical wisdom you're going to unearth here but it could be a 'Breaking News Nugget' - and you can say you saw it here first. Others will just have to wait for the rest to catch up.

Note:: These headlines rotated, updated & barbecued throughout the day. Enjoy!

Hasta La L8r Señor Headline Hunter

Yikes! My Internet connection has been down for 24 hours and it's caused me all sorts of grief. First on the list is the fact that my phone is a VoIP phone so not only was I without Internet service I was without a phone. Sure, the failover worked fine transferring the calls to my cell phone when it detected there was no Internet connection but my cell phone rates are considerably higher than my VoIP phone rates so it was a bit of a hassle.

The other big hassle was the fact that my webserver and mailserver where tied to the dynamic address so when I finally came back up I ended up with a different IP address. That's going to mean a bunch of DNS changes before everything is back to normal. The fact that my ISP, Shaw Cable, caches their DNS records means that the exercise will likely spread over the next few hours. I make a change and have to wait to see if the problem is fixed. Bummer!

Anyhow..., I'm moving before too long and I'm going to seriously look at static IPs. No more of this monkeying around with dynamic IPs. They're nothing but a pain in the posterior.

Check back regularly, no telling what little nugget of gnarled knowledge or whimsical wisdom you're going to unearth here but it could be a 'Real Nugget' - making you rich and famous in the end.

Hasta La L8r Señor Patron of Hand Picked Headline News