Aaah, America…

In the land where “Bigger is better” and “everything’s big”, it’s interesting to see what MSNBC has to say on tuition costs in the US.

Frankly, I was expecting to see a very definate pattern: US Schools are all bloody expensive, therefore Canadian schools are cheaper by comparison.  And indeed, that’s how the article seems to open up - talking about the most expnsive school in the US (George Washington University, at almost $38,000 in tuition alone, if you’re curious) and then getting into how tution has increased massively in almost every school over the past 10 years.

What’s so interesting is what happnes later on in the article; they start talking about the state-sponsored schools.  Some of those schools charge as little as $1000 for a year’s tuition.  This seems oddly reminiscent of another social structure - that of wages and social class.

Canada, in general, has a small upper class, a small lower class, and a big fat middle class.  Additionally, the classes aren’t all that far apart (relatively speaking…) thanks largely to minimum wage laws, social support networks, and fun things like socialized healthcare.   In the US, what’s seen more often is a much larger upper class, and a large lower class, but not many people in the middle.

The same phenomina seems to be present with schools - There’re a lot of private schools charging princely sums, but there’re also quite a number of state-run institutions that charge their in-state residences amounts that are comperable to (or, in a select few cases, signifcantly less than) their Canadian counterparts.

One question that still remains - are their state-run schools any good?  I’ve seen enough US TV with highschool students on the cusp of univeristy - if you don’t get into a good college, the tooth fairy rapes you or something, I donno, I wasn’t really paying attention… but something bad happens to you if you don’t get into a top-level school.

In Canada, you’re hard-pressed to find a bad school - I’d pe pretty happy to go to any institution in Ontario; they all seem to differ much more in their campus life than their academic abilities (fat middle again?).

So, I guess the big question is - Is it a bad thing that Canada doesn’t have any superstar schools?  Should we stratify upper education like in the US - some schools dirt cheap and probably pretty bad, and some schools awesome (assuming you have a kidney or a lung to spare to be able to afford to go there?)

Is mediocrity the best system?

I’m now running Wordpress 2.1.

Best feature?  Apparently it has autosave, so as not to lose posts anymore (Yay!)

Other than that, I don’t know.  I’m still trying to see if all my plugins are functioning as they should be (and make sure I iddn’t screw up the upgrade).

Let me know if you see something not working

As some of you might know, I have a shameful secret. Well, as some of you might know, I have several shameful secrets, but the shameful secret we’re talking about now is that I own a pair of obscenely priced headphones. Bose Triports, to be exact.

The sound quality on them is phenomenal (and, for around $200, it damn well better be…); I’ve greatly enjoyed them over the past year and a half. They’re the most comfortable headphones I’ve ever put on, anywhere, and they’re quite isolating (so, even if it’s a bit noisy about, my music doesn’t have to be blasting for me to hear it).

The trouble is that these god-like and crazy-expensive headphones are not indestructible. This fact was demonstrated to me very graphically when the right ear piece broke off from the headband. It seems as though the small bits of plastic that attach the adjustable part of the headband to the non-adjustable part decided that today would be a great time to flex and break off.

So, besides getting smacked in the side of the head with a piece of metal from the headband, I also had managed to completely destroy my $200 pair of headphones. The best headphones I’ve ever had. The headphones that I decided to amortize over 10 years to finally get the price into the zone of “reasonable”. Those headphones.

The warranty on the headphones was only a one year warranty, if memory serves. I remember moving into MKV with them, so they’re at LEAST a year and a half old; now that I think about it, they might be two and a half years old; since I think I bought them when I was working at Formet. So, 2+ year old headphones. Besides their being off warranty, just TRY proving that the break was caused by a manufacturing defect, and not wear and tear.

But, these were $200 Bose Triports, the best headphones I’ve ever owned, I wasn’t about to give up without a fight. And I would bring the fight to Bose; work my way up the product support chain. Get to the highest employee I could get to and state my case, beg my case, plead my case, scream my case at the top of my lungs. “I WANT MY HEADPHONES REPAIRED!” I would shout, again and again for all those with ears.

I steadied my nerves, and I called their tech support number. A technician answered immediately (I wasn’t even put on hold). He would rue the day he was efficient… I explained to him that just as I was innocently placing my headphones on my head, the right earpiece broke off. He asked me if I had an account with them; I gave him my name and postal code; he said that they didn’t seem to, so he took down my street address, phone number, and email address (he got the city and province from the postal code, why doesn’t every company do that??). I also gave him the serial number off of the headphones. Now was when the fight would begin. He fired his opening volley, “Well, sir, from the sounds of it those headphones aren’t in a usable condition. When you’re ready, I’ll give you the address that you should send them to and we’ll send you out a brand new pair as a replacement”. I fired back with… wait… what? My mind was racing, I didn’t have to shout, I didn’t have to fight or threaten, he just offered to send me a brand new pair of Bose Triports. In exchange I would send him my broken, 2 year old Bose Triports.

I have never in my life had such a positive experience with tech support. It was amazing! It was like someone had decided, “let’s do something nice for consumers; let’s not make their lives hellish. Let’s be nice to them and see what happens”. I mean, MY GOD! I’ve probably spent, literally, DAYS of my life speaking to tech support; and this was over and done with inside of 20 minutes. I didn’t even have to come up with a receipt to prove when I’d bought the things; it was just, “pack as much as you have that came with the headphones originally, and send it back to us”.

So, for the price of a box and a few bucks shipping (They have a depot in Richmond Hill, so I don’t even have to send it outside of the province!!) I’m going to get sent a new pair of Bose Triport headphones; the best headphones I’ve ever had the pleasure of using.

I just love it when a company stands behind their products. It’s such a bizarre and amazing feeling.

I just witnessed a lesson at the Dana Porter library at UW.

So far as I can tell, the new staffer got a rundown on how to open doors, and how to use a light switch.

If only I had a camera!!!

Hey, just thought I’d let everyone know that the long-anticipated next post from Brendon is now live.  It’s a rather thorough look at the Mac UI.

I’m quite looking forward to his posts in the future - I’m going to be in the market for a new computer sooner or later (I’m hoping later… lol) but, when I do make that decision, I would like to be able to seriously consider a Mac.  The trouble is that about all I ever seem to hear about in regards to Mac features are, “It’s awesome” and “it’s not Windows”.  Granted, that’s an impressive feature set already, but, when dropping a few thousand dollars on a system, I like to have more details to go on (and some more objective details to go on as well)

So, head on over and check it out.

Jordan, I must tell you, I feel as though you’re quite possibly being presumptuous in your most recent stance.

BURN!!!!!!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!  I SO got you!  BAM!  Take that shit!

What?  Seems a little extreme for a comment like that?

Check this out then, under the headline from an NBC affiliate, ”US Slams Canada in alleged torture case”

The first paragraph?

The U-S Ambassador to Canada says the Canadian government is being a “little presumptuous” in a case involving a Syrian-born Canadian who said he was tortured after the U-S sent him to Syria.

Damn… I feel so shamed… We’ve sooo been “slammed”.  Let’s put poo in a bag in front of the US’s door and light it on fire to get back at them!

Seriously, what is this, grade school?  We’ve been “Slammed” by the US… because they said no to something we asked for?  I thought that was how politics were supposed to work… Group A proposes resolution X, Group B says no, eventually they find a proposal that is mutually acceptable.

OR, if no solution is found, you draw attention to the issue and try and make the other group look like a jackass.  I think that’s what’s happening here - Canada’s said, “I’m sorry, we made a mistake, you’re not a terrorist.  US, our trusted ally, please take this man off your ‘likely terrorist’ list, the info we gave you was wrong” and then the US said, “No”.  Now, the US is in the unenviable position of having to justify why this guy is a terrorist; they can’t just pass the buck back to Canada and say, “Those crafty Canadians said so, and we believed them”.