Jason Friesen {dot} ca

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In another collaboration with JB Beaulieu, we concentrate our efforts on demonstrating that DHTs can be made mobile, relational, and ubiquitous.

http://labs.oldman.ca/eree/

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§702 · August 21, 2009 · Personal, Professional · Comments Off · Tags: amusing, Protocols, raid

¶ Simulating DHCP and Spreadsheets with ACANTH

Simulating DHCP and Spreadsheet with ACANTH

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¶ Protect Canadians Against Copyright Profiteering

Canada is soliciting input from Canadians regarding changing copyright laws. Big Media’s voice is being heard. Is yours?

My family creates copyrightable material: stories, poetry, songs and recordings thereof. With liberal copyright options (such as Creative Commons — http://creativecommons.ca/) our creations can be consumed widely whilst appropriately attributing the works to us. That’s much more useful than “all-or-nothing” laws.

We also have many friends and associates in formal arts and entertainment industries. The various attempts by Canada to deal with modern realities have only benefitted corporations and lobbyists, not artists. We have an opportunity to do something truly different, and liberalise Canada’s copyright laws. We could defy the powerful corporate slaveowners that offer chains masquerading as contracts.

We cannot stop piracy; it would be a ~~neverending~~ war that will never end. The only benefit is to keep citizens in fear, artists broke and bureaucrats employed. It is absolutely not worth it.

What follows is a letter written and sponsored by the Canadian Coalition for Electronic Rights. That’s the letter that you’d be encouraged to send by clicking the banner above.

(more…)

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§688 · August 13, 2009 · Personal · Comments Off · Tags: Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, arts, Bill C-61, Canada, Copyright, Creative Commons, Digital rights management, law, politics, Public domain

¶ Jerk Factories

In his article “The Bait and Switch of Contemporary Christianity”, Richard Beck hyperbolises the problems inherent in turning Christianity into a religion of tasks rather than the total transformation that it really is.

One can fill a life full of spiritual activities without ever, actually, trying to become a more decent human being. In fact, much of this activity can distract one from becoming a more decent human being… Many churches are jerk factories.

Take, for example, how Christians tip and behave in restaurants. If you have ever worked in the restaurant industry you know the reputation of the Sunday morning lunch crowd. Millions of Christians go to lunch after church on Sundays and their behavior is abysmal. The single most damaging phenomenon to the witness of Christianity in America today is the collective behavior of the Sunday morning lunch crowd. Never has a more well-dressed, entitled, dismissive, haughty or cheap collection of Christians been seen on the face of the earth.

Performing spiritual/religious activities does not inherently make you a better person. Really becoming a better person is something that can only be done by Jesus.

We know very well that we are not set right with God by rule-keeping but only through personal faith in Jesus Christ. How do we know? We [Jews] tried it—and we had the best system of rules the world has ever seen! Convinced that no human being can please God by self-improvement, we believed in Jesus as the Messiah so that we might be set right before God by trusting in the Messiah, not by trying to be good. …I tried keeping rules and working my head off to please God, and it didn’t work. So I quit being a “law man” so that I could be God’s man.
Galatians 2:15-16,19 MSG

Beck is clear: there is nothing wrong, and much that is right about private devotions, bible study, prayer, fasting, et cetera. It just can’t be a substitute for being a decent human being. We need both. What we don’t need is our churches perceived as being “Jerk Factories”.