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Canadian Telcos Agree on WiFi Hotspot Standard
Jucius Maximus writes "As reported by Globetechnology, Canada's cellphone providers have agreed to create a common standard for their subscribers to connect to the Internet via public "hot-spots." The agreement became necessary because Canada's cellphone providers offer four different and incompatible connection technologies. The carriers will continue to vigorously compete with each other, both for customers and Wi-Fi hotspot locations, the CWTA said in a statement."
"Hot spot" -- a place where the radiation level is high. Oh I know, nothing has been proved, but then, smoking was harmless for decades, too.
Does everything include nothing?
I believe one of the pre-requisites to living in Canada is being able to spell Canada.
Does anybody remember a T.V. show called "Space: Above and Beyond"? It was pretty derivative and was cancelled after one season, but it did have one thing going for it... All the evil government conspiracies back home were tied to an evil megacorp named Telus... Telus just happens to be the dominant Telco in my province, and yes, they are EVIL.
You should see my bill. Enron should have taken lessons from Telus's billing department when it comes to creative accounting. I pay twice what I agreed to pay in the five-year cellphone contract I unwittingly signed in suspicious smelling red ink. I have no clue why, and they aren't about to tell me.
My cellphone inexplicably dies in my basement while other cellphones on other providers get crystal clear reception. I regularily receive phonecalls at 3AM from people who say things like "What the @#$%!! Stop calling this number you @#$#tard!" or "Hello? Hello? STOP CALLING ME YOU PERVERT!" Of course, the number displayed from these calls is my own, which makes it somewhat difficult to know who I should stop being woken up by calls from at 3am. Is there an evil prankster at work, or are Telus' phone-lines possessed by a minion of the Dark one who relishes the creation minor annoyances? Perhaps it's the same minion who came up with Britney Spears and reality TV...
The current model for emigration to Canada for people with your qualifications is this:
1. Apply for refugee status.
2. Get rejected.
3. Marry a Canadian.
4. Get a Visa, head on over, and apply for landed immigrant status.
5. Hire an Immigration Lawyer. Start filling out forms.
6. Six months later you will still not have a work permit. This will begin to worry you because you will be almost done filling out forms and the staff at the local government offices now know to run and hide as soon as you enter sight.
7. Bribe, threaten, or blackmail your immigration lawyer into submitting the lynchpin form he was supposed to submit the day you started paying him. He will not want to do this because it will mean allowing you to pass out of his power. Read some Anne Rice novels to more fully understand his or her motivations.
8. Congratulations! Work permit! Your can now use your PHD in physics to find employment in our nation's fine eating establishments, convenience stores, and, if you take night-school, perhaps a mechanic shop. Of course, you will be competing with Canadian PHD holders for many of these positions, so don't expect an easy go at it. (This is one of the downsides to being a member of the most over-educated population on the planet) If you feel discouraged, visit the local pizza hut and laugh at the waitresses holding PHD's in 18th century Russian Poetry who are even more hooped than you!
9. Employment. Now that you're making money it's time to pay 60% of what you earn in taxes. Being from a Scandinavian country you should be used to this.
10. After a few years you will be able to apply for Canadian citizenship. After this point you will be fully qualified to criticize americans and be completely ignored instead of being bombed back into the stone age. By this point in time you should also feel the beginning of a massive inferiority complex setting in and should also be experiencing uncontrollable urges to hold doors open for people while constantly apologizing for everything.