Virtual vehicles for the metaverse
News from the real world or the virtual.
Motion Picture Association president, Jack Valenti: “Piracy has become a malignant fungus on the face of our industry, and it’s becoming more virulent as we go along.”
Link: Canada.com: Big studios to appeal decision of judge who blocked ban on movie screeners
First the BC provincial government announced that all forests in BC — including old-growth rainforests — were “open for business”. More recently, the same government announced that they would begin logging in provincial parks to stop the pine beetle infestation — a move that was criticized for having little to no effect on the beetles.
Now, the BC government has announced plans to remove 1,000 hectares of land from Graham-Laurier provincial park for oil and gas exploration. According to an article on Canada.com, the government went ahead with this decision without consulting stakeholders in the area.
Okay, I wanted to just report this on my blog for everyone to read, but now I feel a good ol’ rant coming on. What is with these ignorant, short-sighted, money-grubbing bastards? Since they won the election, we’ve seen nothing but a stream of self-serving legislation that essentially screws over everyone for some immediate money-making scheme for private business.
Yes, Premier Campbell, you could rape the land for its resources and the province would be moderately more wealthy… for a couple of decades. Then what? Then we live in a polluted wasteland and the world will be without hundreds of species of animals and plants, and what precious little forest will be gone, and the world will be that much closer to cooking itself in a greenhouse of carbon dioxide.
Don’t try to tell us that the forests are being managed and replanted. In the terminology of the forest industry, “forest management” means systematically replacing old-growth, natural forests with artificially planted stands of trees. You can’t plant an ecosystem. Replanting trees just gives you a really big farm.
I’m simply stunned by the level of unabashed greed and inhumanity exhibited by this government as a whole. The only thing more disgusting to me than this travesty of a government is that British Columbians were stupid enough to elect them in the first place, and they’ll probably re-elect them next time around, because I live in a province of red-necks and greedy businessmen.
One of Canada’s new unmanned surveillance aircraft crashed on landing Friday, due to a failure of the parachute. The aircraft lands by deploying airbags and a parachute to slow its descent.
Typical of Canadian aircraft, it’s powered by a snowmobile engine.
No, seriously. It is.
Many thanks to the Canadian military for perpetuating a national stereotype. (heaves sigh)
Link: Canadian Forces’ new unmanned spy plane crashes in Afghanistan
I’m breaking my blog-silence to point out this appalling news: the premier of British Columbia, Gordon Campbell, has agreed to allowing forest companies to log BC Parks. The excuse, for now, is that it will stop the spread of pine beetles.
However, Barry Dobbin, the forests ministry’s assistant bark-beetle coordinator, admits that logging won’t help fight beetle infestations, and Joe Foy of the Western Canada Wilderness Committee feels that the premier actually wants large-scale logging operations in the parks.
This is about a year after the same government announced the “working forest” strategy, in which all forests in BC (except parks) would be “open for business”. Now, apparently, the parks — which include some of the last examples of untouched rainforest — are on the chopping block too. Or, more accurately, they’ll become chopping blocks and many other fine commercial products.
Here are the links. First, the pro-business perspective from Canada.com:
B.C. parks, forests ministry will combat bark beetles
And the independent media perspective:
Premier’s Agenda to Log BC Parks Shocks Environmental Community
An article on Canada.com reports that the Greater Vancouver regional district has only 42 days of water left. A hot summer with little rain has dried up the reservoirs, and water restrictions are in effect.
Oddly though, golf courses and car washes, among other businesses, are exempt from the restrictions. City council will analyze the weekend’s water usage sometime next week and decide whether having green golf courses is more important than having enough water to drink.
I think extreme restrictions should have been imposed on everyone early in the summer, as soon as the reservoir level dropped to fifty percent.
But I shouldn’t second-guess the wisdom of city council–they really know the business of running a city. And the mayor has a pretty good swing, I hear.