Occupy Calgary (with thousands of zombies)

[allhatnocattle.livejournal.com]

I seen a lot of blood and scars at the Occupy Calgary rally today.

Let me just explain the politics of Alberta briefly. This is cowboy country. Extremely right winged, redneck part of Canada. We have had the same right wing party in government for 40yrs. Also this is an extremely wealthy city, supporting two Ferrari dealerships, Maserati, Rolls-Royce Bentley, etc, etc. So to run a left winged protest such as OCCUPY CALGARY is a rather daunting task. The City permitted Occupy to camp on St Patrick Island which is about as remote and away from traffic as possible, so as not to be a disturbance for anyone.

I have found this rather strange. The idea of occupy is to cause disturbance and disruption. To annoy he hell out of bankers, and other white collar pencil pushing suits so-called 1% (not to be confused with bikers) Did I tell you that the City permitted Occupy to camp on St Patrick Island which is about as remote and away from traffic as possible, so as not to be a disturbance for anyone, as long as they were not a bother to anyone. Organizers supplied the city and police with protest march route and times and had them OKed.
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Wired

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15320628

The European Commission is set to propose investing almost €9.2bn in a massive rollout of super-fast broadband infrastructure and services across the European Union.The plan is partly aimed at stimulating further investment in rural broadband. It is hoped the initiative will also help to create a single market for digital public services. The Commission has already set targets for improving the speed of home internet connections across the region.

It aims to get all European households on at least 30 megabits per second (Mbps) by 2020, with half the population enjoying more than 100Mbps, so as to make the continent more competitive and productive.


I think this is a fantastic idea. South Korea, where I currently live, is AFAIK the only country on the planet that has broadband nationwide. It's a move than seems to have paid off for Korean industry and I have to say that living in a very wired country is pretty handy at times. Of course, Korea has an area only about the size my home state of Indiana. So covering the whole country was a much easier thing to do than it would be in a fairly large nation like France or Germany.

Now I don't know enough about economics to really say how much of a boon such tech would be to rural economies. But I do think that a LACK of tech is poison to growth. If you've ever looked a map showing cell phone coverage in the US you'll see some "dead zones." Usually they're out in the Mojave dessert or some place like that. However, I have relatives who live in the Appalachian Mountains in a place where you can't get cell phone service. Until just a few years ago you couldn't get any internet that wasn't dial up and even then the connection was often rather bad.

Needless to say, it's a VERY poor area. Sure, there are a lot of other factors at play in that situation. But tell me a business that's going to want to open in an area where people can't even use a cell.

Anyway, while just how much this will help the EU economy remains to be seen. But I do think it WILL help and that it will also be a boost to the simple of quality of life for people living in rural Europe. I know there's been talk of a similar program in the US. Hopefully this will spur things on.