Canada is a great country, one of the hopes of the world. We can be a better one – a country of greater equality, justice, and opportunity. We can build a prosperous economy and a society that shares its benefits more fairly. We can look after our seniors. We can offer better futures for our children. We can do our part to save the world’s environment. We can restore our good name in the world.

…

My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic.

Jack Layton
July 18, 1950 – August 22, 2011

So how do I spend so much of my day online? Well, for one, my job entails that I be connected all day. Many of the tools required for my job are cloud-based services, such as Google Apps for email, calendar and shared documents. We use Go Plan for project management. I use Mockingbird to mock up projects. We use Gtalk to chat with each other, which is handy with our desks being physically separated across a large, shared office space, and 1 member of the company working remotely from Toronto. Our phones use VoIP. Sometimes I might open up local software such as Word, but the rest are still running in my browser in the background.

At home, my BlackBerry connects to my wireless network; I don’t get cell phone service in my apartment, so the wifi connection allows me to still receive data on my phone. To make phone calls from home, I use Skype Out. Both of those also help me from going over my expensive cell phone minutes or data plan.

I don’t subscribe to cable or satellite for television (that’s another rant for another day), so I “watch TV” by streaming shows from the websites of Global, CTV and CBC. Or from Netflix. (Yes, my TV is connected to a media PC). All of which are legal methods of consuming television content, and which are actually promoted by the networks themselves. However, streaming is extremely bandwidth intensive. Occasionally, I’ll download a movie or TV show that isn’t available via streaming in Canada. Downloading content like that is much less data-intensive, but also slightly less than legal. And my ISP throttles that traffic, making it extremely slow and time-consuming.

Sure, I’m ahead of the curve on this, but in time most people will be living this way too. Of course, not if the CRTC let’s Bell get it’s way.

Because the biggest problem with my connected lifestyle? I don’t buy any of Bell’s or Roger’s bread and butter – home telephone or cable/satellite television. Me and the people who live like me are eating away at “old business”‘s primary source of revenue, opting for alternative forms of entertainment and communication.

So they make me pay for it, literally, with usage based billing. Yes, that term has been thrown around a lot lately, but it’s been in place on most residential Internet connections for years. I get charged when I use “too much”. And I have gone over my cap and used too much; the bill that comes in is expensive. The rate I get charged — $1-4/GB depending on where you live — is marked up anywhere between 3,333.3% and nearly 13,333.3% more than what it costs the ISP to deliver that data to me. Can you imagine if your business could mark up your product or service that much?

They claim it’s because I should pay more if I use more, as if I was using up some precious resource. But that’s not how the Internet works. Internet usage is more accurately likened to how long you watch TV for, than how much gas you use in your car. The Canadian Business magazine simplifies it:

…imagine if your bill were to go up commensurately depending on how long you had your TV on for. Your neighbour, who watches only an hour or so a day, would see his bill stay at $54. But you like to regularly watch sports, the news and American Idol, so your bill climbs to $80. You’d probably be pretty steamed, right?

For years, I thought I had to just put up with it. I wasn’t aware of some of the resellers and wholesalers offering unlimited bandwidth plans, until the CRTC decided to take it away. The fight against usage based billing in this case has made me realize how unfair the whole billing practice is unfair, uncompetitive, and will lead to stifling innovation in the homes and businesses in Canada.

I’m supporting Open Media and other groups and individuals in the fight against usage based billing in Canada because the CRTC needs to realize that bending to the will of Bell is NOT what the people of this country want, in terms of competition or billing models.

For now, I’m waiting out my contract with my ISP (only 4 months left!), and then I’m planning to switch to Teksavvy. Even if the CRTC goes through with the usage based billing changes and I can’t get unlimited bandwidth, I think it’s important to support the little guy and support competition in telecommunications in Canada. Actions speak louder than words, but money yells. Maybe if enough money starts yelling and screaming, the big telcos will notice.

You can sign the Stop the Meter petition below or at stopthemeter.ca. So far, fewer people have signed it than currently live in the city of Brampton, so, you know… get on it.

Um, what? What’s with all the US sites there? The result I actually wanted was quite far down the page.

Some notes: This search was done on Google.com, via a search bookmark. While normally all Google.com searches punt me back to Google.ca, somehow when I search like this it stays on Google.com. However, it usually recognizes me as being in Canada and gives me those SERPs or some mashup of .com and .ca SERPs. But I was logged in, so they should know I’m Canadian/click on Canadian sites/whatever (although I was previously searching for hotels in Burlington VT, so maybe I confused them). I suspect this query might also have triggered QDF due to all the chatter about the lawsuit at the moment — and thus the inclusion of News — however, to be sure I’ll have to remember to do this search again when things are quieter.

For comparison, here is the SERPs I expected, which I got through actually searching on Google.ca:

When I first checked out 7books, I thought “It would be great if I could embed these lists on my site.” The site I had in mind, of course, was Book Brothel, cuz it’s also about books. But 7books didn’t have that feature at the time. I can’t remember whether I mentioned it to Tom on twitter, or just thought it, but here we are and 7books now features the ability to embed lists.

Of course, I haven’t gotten around to setting up author pages on Book Brothel yet, so there’s no appropriate place to embed such a list on that site. Hence, this post.

Any way, to cut to the chase, here’s the list I created this morning of the books I read in 2010:

Books I Read in 2010

Booklist created by saffyre9

Outliers: The Story of Success
by Malcolm Gladwell

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium Trilogy Book 1)
by Stieg Larsson

The Girl Who Played with Fire (Millennium Trilogy Book 2)
by Stieg Larsson

The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals
by Michael Pollan

Playlists for bookworms: www.7bks.com

Search & Social Woot!

Search and Social Woot was the initial reason I went to Hawaii. I won a pass to this intimate, little conference. The topics ranged from beginner to advanced internet marketing and attendees ranged from some of the founders of SEO to newcomers to internet marketing, and from small independent shops to companies like Microsoft.

Seasport Divers

A group of us went diving with Seasport Divers out of Poipu. We were given full gear rental and shallow water lessons before setting out on two boat dives. The first boat dive was more about getting used to the water, but it was beautiful. Lots of fish species I couldn’t identify, and coral. The second dive took place at Sheraton Caverns, home to many sea turtles. Getting to not only see, but swim with, such magnificent creatures was unbelievable.

We also got to see a pod of spinner dolphins, who played in the boat’s wake. Simply amazing.

Waimea Canyon

On the last day, we took a drive to the western side of the island to check out Waimea Canyon. It’s the second largest canyon in North America, second only to the Grand Canyon. It’s unbelievable to think that such a large landform exists on such a small island.

Garden Island Inn & Banyan Harbor Condos

The Garden Island Inn and Banyan Harbor Condos were my home-away-from-home for the week. It’s an adorable little place across the street from Kalapaki Beach. Staff were wonderful and welcoming, views were gorgeous, and the condos were cute. We had a two bedroom condo with 1.5 baths – essential for three girls. The decor was totally kitschy, but it was so appropriate for a vacation rental.

Comments can be left on the Environmental Registry until tomorrow.  There’s also a petition against it on the Green Party of Ontario website.

As a resident of the Province of Ontario, I am concerned about the Peaker Plant project that is under way in the Township of King. In short, this plant is not suitable for the location that has been selected, and the process by which the project is taking place should be considered illegal. This is not NIMBYism – this is simply a flawed process and a bad idea.

I am not denying  the need of power in this region; having grown up in neighbouring Newmarket and Holland Landing in the 1980s and 1990s, I’ve seen the population of the area grow exponentially. I know the northern part of York Region is a desirable community to live in, and towns such as East Gwillimbury and Georgina have not yet reached their peak capacity.

WRONG LOCATION

The only part of the chosen location of the Peaker Plant in the Holland Marsh that makes any sense is the proximity to the Holland Marsh Junction and existing infrastructure.

The chosen property, while technically not within the boundaries of the Holland Marsh, is literally only 500m outside of the Marsh. Despite being outside of the boundary, according to the Ontario Soil Survey this location is still sitting upon some of the best agricultural soil in Canada – soil that is rapidly disappearing, along with our country’s food-producing lands, to urban development.

The chosen location is also within the boundaries of the Greenbelt, and area that the Ministry of Municipal Affairs & Housing claims to want to protect and grow:

“Ontario will continue to support efforts to curb urban sprawl by protecting our valuable farm land, countryside, water resources and wetlands.” – Hon. Jim Bradley

It is also barely outside the boundaries of the Oak Ridges Moraine, another ecologically sensitive area that the government has promised to protect.

The effects of emissions from peaker plants such as this is not well enough known. This project is risking damage to the local crops (the Marsh produces half of Canada’s carrots and onions alone), the soils, as well as ground and surface water.

It is also in a flood plain, which is just stupid planning altogether.

Additionally, it not where the users are. As this land is protected under both the Oak Ridges Moraine Act and the Greenbelt Act, urban development will not occur here. Therefore, the people who will be requiring the use of the Peaker Plant are not going to be located here. You are forcing not only the residents of King Township to pay for the power requirements of the residents of East Gwillimbury and Georgina, but the rest of vegetable-eating Canadians as well.

DANGEROUS LEGAL & POLICY PRECEDENT

By allowing this project to go through, the Ontario Government is blatantly disregarding it’s own regulations, namely the Planning Act, the Greenbelt Act, and the Oak Ridges Moraine Act. It is also clearly circumventing the Environmental Site Assessment process.

This is simply nothing more than abuse of power and process by the Ontario government. If the province cannot abide by its own rules and regulations, why institute them in the first place? This sets a dangerous precedent moving forward, that the government can be allowed to break rules for the benefit of a single company when and if it suits. If the municipalities of Ontario must abide by the rulings set forth in the Greenbelt and Oak Ridges Moraine acts, then so must the government of Ontario.

Therefore, I strongly urge the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing to withdraw this regulation immediately.

I then sent a copy of the letter on to the following:

• Bill Fisch – Regional Chair, York Region
• Paul Calandra – MP, Oak Ridges – Markham
• Peter Van Loan – MP, York – Simcoe
• Helena Jaczek – MPP, Oak Ridges – Markham
• Jack Rupke – Councillor, King Township & Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Authority Board of Directors
• Margaret Black – Mayor, King Township
• Frank Klees – MPP Newmarket-Aurora
• Carol Mitchell – Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs for Ontario
• Lois Browm – MP Newmarket- Aurora
• Brad Duguid – Minister of Energy and Infrastructure for Ontario
• Julia Munro – MPP, York – Simcoe
• Globe & Mail Letters to the Editor
• Toronto Star Letters to the Editor

Update – 18/09/2010:

The Environmental Commissioner, Gord Miller, will be presenting a report to Ontario legislature next week, and in it includes his concerns about the process (or lack of) that has allowed the peaker plant to be approved. See Holland Marsh power plant under fire for more information.

Last week I attended Search Engine Strategies in Toronto. It was my first time actually attending an SES show, and they graciously invited me to speak (or, well.. do a site clinic). Overall, the conference was done quite well. Great bunch of speakers, awesome networking events, and a nice location.

But… (you knew there was going to be a but). I question the decision to include some of the exhibitors. Or, just one of them, really. TOPSEOs had a booth set up, front and centre as you walked through the doors of the expo hall. This wasn’t their first time exhibiting at a Canadian search conference, as I’d also spotted them at SMX Toronto back in March.

If you haven’t heard, TOPSEOs is a scam rating service, meant to elicit money from search firms wishing to be included in their listings. Among things like stealing copyrighted material, they claim to be the “independent authority” on rating search and internet marketing firms. The search industry is pretty much up in arms about this practice. For a review of the goings on, Edward Lewis has tracked all the articles and complaints about TOPSEOs going back to 2007.

So why is this an issue? Most intelligent search marketers should know to stay the hell away at this point, right? Right. But the crappy ones, the snake-oil salesmen our industry has become known for, they might just jump on the chance to be seen as a reputable organization. And what about the innocent business person, new to internet marketing, looking to hire a decent search agency? They aren’t likely going to know the difference. They know they need help, and here is a company claiming to represent the search industry.

By having them front and centre in the expo hall – and even encouraging attendees to visit the booth, through the “Booth Bingo” game – SES is essentially duping newbies into falling for TOPSEOs crap.

Now, I’ll admit, I don’t know the inner workings of running a conference. Are exhibitors screened? Is SES really promoting the so-called service that TOPSEOs provides? I don’t know. Likely, they were in need of companies to exhibit in order to cover the cost of putting the conference on. But there is the perception that SES is promoting the services of the vendors in the expo hall.

On a funnier note, I did have the wonderful experience of meeting a couple of snake-oil salesmen in person. At one of the networking events, they tried to claim to me and several others (including Canadian search industry veterans), that they were able to out-rank Canada’s 3 major telecoms for “extremely competitive” (read: long-tail) keyphrases, using their network of link farms. It was all I could do to contain my laughter, but others were visibly amused.

I’m posting this here mostly so I can remember how I did it. If you happen to find this useful yourself, then great

One of the problems I commonly have with WordPress is customizing archive-type pages. I usually want to put some piece of content above the archives — and need that content to be editable by the client, so it can’t be hard-coded. And I don’t want just a list of archives, I want titles, meta info, excepts. Yeah, I want a lot of things.

After much hair-pulling (cuz my PHP skillz are basic, at best), I came up with this solution that I used on my best friend’s wedding site.

1. Create a new template

Create a new file, call it say blog.php, and put the following at the top:

<?php
/**
Template Name: Blog
 */
get_header(); ?>

2. Add in the page’s content

Within the Loop, put the following:

 <h1><?php the_title(); ?></h1>
<div class="entry">
        <?php the_content(); ?>
</div>

3. Add in the list of archives

After the page’s content, and before the end of the Loop, stick this in there:

 <?php
 $postslist = get_posts('numberposts=-1&orderby=date');
 foreach ($postslist as $post) : 
    setup_postdata($post);
 ?>
      <div>
        <h2 id="post-<?php the_ID(); ?>"><a href="<?php the_permalink() ?>" rel="bookmark"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h2>
        <p class="postmetadata">By <?php the_author(); ?> on <?php the_time('l, F jS, Y') ?> in <?php the_category(', ') ?> | <?php edit_post_link('Edit', '', ' | '); ?> <?php comments_popup_link('No Comments', '1 Comment', '% Comments'); ?></p>
        <div class="entry">
          <?php the_excerpt() ?>
        </div>
      </div>
<?php endforeach; ?>

(This is the list of parameters that get_posts() can have).

4. Create the Page

Now go into your WP admin, create a new page, and select Blog from the template list.

And that’s it. We’re done. The end.

EAVB_DTRPWQAUFX

But come April, that all changes; they are letting me out of the office to come see ya’ll! Here’s where you can find me:

SMX Toronto – April 8-9

This is the second year for SMX to visit Toronto, in conjunction with eMetrics Summit. I’ll be heading to the big city and representing Outspoken Media there this year.

You can catch me speaking in the Link Building Strategies and Ranking Tactics session on Thursday, along with Gillian Muessig, Shalom Issenberg, and Christina Keffer.

Update: I got some great coverage of my session at SMX Toronto. Check out the video and links below!

• Link Building session summary from NVI
• Link Building review by Gil Reich

Pubcon South – April 13-15

Rae, Lisa (hi Lisa!) and I will be heading down to Dallas for Pubcon South the week after. Lisa will be providing her usual live-blogging genius for those of you who can’t make it.

On the 15th, I’ll be speaking in the HTML, CSS and Hosting panel, with Benj Arriola, Mike Maughan, and Ryan Smith.

Rae and Lisa are also going to try to drag me to a country bar. That might be fun for you to watch. I mostly want to eat some good barbeque while I’m there – don’t disappoint me Texas!

So now you know where you can find me this April. And that my house will be empty (please don’t rob me!). If you’re heading to any of these shows, make sure to stop me and say hi!

Update: If you’re thinking about making it out to Pubcon Dallas but haven’t registered yet, use coupon code rc-8536420 for 20% off!!