Canada's Telecom Oligopoly

Recently, if you were one of over eleven million Canadians who depends on Rogers for telephone communications, internet, or a myriad of other digital services, you were left without access to service. Many Canadians woke up on Friday and realized they could not text, make phone calls, access their banking information, internet, or streaming services. Worse, phones could not even call 911 in an emergency. This is despite the fact that, by law, Canadian telecom providers are supposed to enable their devices to reach 911 at all times.

How did a third of the Canadian population suddenly find themselves without service? Well, no one actually knows yet.

While the exact problem which brought down over a third of the telecommunications industry is currently not known, why this is such a problem is not a mystery. 

In Canada, over 90% of the telecoms market is owned by the Big Three providers, Rogers Wireless, Bell Mobility and Telus Mobility, with these big three controlling nearly twenty-nine million subscribers. The only other network that comes close is Freedom Mobile with another two million subscribers. The smaller networks are not national, and none even come close to providing the coverage that would be reliable or desirable outside large cities, which makes them untenable for Canadians who live in rural areas. Furthermore, this will be Rogers second major outage in the last few years. Not a good look for Canada's largest telecoms provider.

This oligopoly, essentially, sets prices for Canadians on a whim. The government did, in the last few years, force the major telecoms companies to reduce prices by 25%. However, with recent inflation and the attempted merger of Rogers and Shaw, this is not quite the boon we had hoped for. And in truth, there is nothing stopping the Big Three from raising prices in the future to 'cover costs' as they see fit. Canadians already pay some of the highest costs in the world for communications, and we're very much aware of this.

While I can't give you an easy answer on the outage, I can give you an easy answer on how to fix bad service and high prices.

Most would argue that the best way to fix the telecoms problem is the regular capitalistic slogan of 'increase competition' which would, probably, lower prices initially as the market was flooded by foreign competition. However, that would not last forever and might end up seeing much of Canada dominated by the US's own version of the Big Three in corporate mergers we're unable to stop.

However, we already have a home grown solution to this. Crown Corporations provided much of the regional and provincial communications for nearly a century across much of Canada. In fact Sasktel in Saskatchewan still does for that province. It used to be the same in Alberta and Manitoba until those were privatized or bought out with regulator permission. The only private communications distributor who still can compete on a regional level with the Big Three is Québecor which provides much of the French language services and entertainment. For further reading on the power and innovation of Crown Corporations, I'd heartily recommend The Sport and Prey of Capitalists by Linda McQuaig.

These regional exceptions and crown corporations are important because they show that the Big Three are not remotely necessary to provide us with communications. In a supreme irony the Big Three also cease to apply 'exchange rates' in regions where regional operators supply real competition and require pricing adjustments to keep people with their services. The ability of Canada to create a national telecommunications Crown Corporation is not seriously in doubt, and it could be run quite easily off government revenues, if Canadians paid even a fraction of their annual phone bills in tax revenues to run a national telecoms service we could have some of the cheapest telecommunications in the world. The average Canadian spends over 2,000$ on phone bills a year, almost 10% of what the median income earner pays in taxes!

While I can see the objections to a national telecoms provider, I would point out that treating telecommunications like a basic service such as road maintenance, sewage maintenance, and healthcare, can only benefit Canadians. All attempts to privatize the former mentioned services anywhere in the world have only led to suffering, higher costs, and lower standards of care. Should we treat something as necessary to 21st century living as cell phones and the internet any different? This outage has shown just how much of a disaster allowing a third of any industry to be dominated by an ultimately unaccountable corporation can be; putting it back in the hands of the public is only right.

Walkaway

In the not so distant future, the world is falling into shambles amid climate change as encroaching privatization leaves many without work, without insurance and without hope. Though technology is plentiful and scarcity could be a thing of the past, the grinding desire of capitalism to own and consume leaves no room for that. It has led many people to simply up and walkaway from the default world and trust altruism and omnipresent technology to help them get by. They're talked about in hushed tones by others. They're terrorists, radical anarchists, Mad Max style hooligans, and much worse. But for some, the crushing horror of the default world is too much and they take their chances with the walkaways.

Enter Natalie Redwater, scion of a zotta (ultra-rich) family and her new friends after a crazy night at a "communist party" where they flip on old printers and just give everything away. After a run in with the law, she and her new friends Hubert-nineteen middle names-Espinoza (otherwise known as Etcetera) and Seth decide they've had enough and decide to give it all up and go walkaway. Enter Limpopo, a veteran walkway and sort-or proprietor of the B&B, a walkaway community where you can stop and get adjusted. She shows them the ropes and helps them decide if they want to stay.

In the background however, the world is changing with technologies that could change the meaning of life itself, and Natalie's ultra rich father, Jacob, has power and reach. Will he let his daughter get out from under his thumb or will he leave her to the changing world of the late 21st century?

Walkaway is a sort-of piece of utopian fiction where a new world is struggling to be born. This is author Cory Doctorow's bailiwick, with the common themes he talks about in both fiction and non-fiction. Omnipresent surveillance, creeping capitalist domination, and the possibility of a post scarcity society just at our fingertips. In this novel he presents a radical ideology of pacifism, technological sustainability, and gift economy which exists outside the norms of capitalist society.

Doctorow does a wonderful job elaborating on these ideas throughout the novel, his characters having real motivations for what they do, and complex and all to humanly flawed personalities which clash with their own ideologies more often than not. Though the throws a lot of slang and terminology at you, he does a good job explaining most of it and fleshing out how his world works, why the walkaway society is great, but by no means perfect. With the power of efficient recycling and 3D printing, the society is one which seems enticing, if weird and alien to the world of default sensibilities. Ideas of owning nothing, and carrying little more than what you have on your back are not only rational, but with the power of printing, viable.

Though the story starts from Etcetera's perspective, it is largely that of Natalie's and her work in adapting to the walkaway lifestyle and the world. The other driving characters are Etcetera and Limpopo who all shape the story to one degree or another alongside others introduced later on.

Walkaway spans multiple years, but this is never clearly indicated between chapter breaks. I found myself getting lost in the plot a few times as suddenly we were years down the line and I had no indication of what had happened which jarred me from the story more than once. The slang and jargon often goes unexplained with you having to pick it up as you go along, which does work in most cases but was a bit confusing at times.

There is also very little preamble into the state of the world leading up to when people just walkaway and despite some mentions of wastelands or abandoned properties I found myself wondering how so much land simply got abandoned. With looks at climate change and mentions of bankruptcy and social disorder, I had some inkling, but much of the world was a little vague for my taste.

That said, I do have a certain thrill that 99% of the book takes place in Canada. Doctorow is a Canadian by birth, and the setting early on in and around Toronto and Niagara was a huge tug at my heartstrings. It made for a nicely familiar setting to me, with talk about some differences between Canada and the US, but also some delightful time shock as it examined the breakdown and atomization of society to this future norm where I scarcely would have recognized Canada of the later 21st century!

Doctorow also does wonders with the aspects of passive and non-violent resistance. Not that walkaways won't defend themselves, but they almost exclusively use non-lethal means, except against drones and that doesn't count. That is part of the walkaway ethos where people can't take something from you if it wasn't yours to begin with. The action in the book primarily revolves around this kind of retreat and technical battling against aggressive electronic warfare by the state. It made for many amazing action scenes in which, on many occasions, no one actually dies! A very different form of action from what I'm used to.

Like any good utopian fiction, it grapples with the flaws and pitfalls of the society it creates. Selfish people still exist and they can drag the whole thing down - no one really solves the free rider problem. There's also the benefits, and they do seem legion. The science fiction aspect of course also plays a role with the technology, with some very interesting ideas being bandied about.

Walkaway is a radical utopia with warts and all. Despite some difficulty jumping in, I did enjoy the story and the trajectory for these characters. It's a fascinating world with radical ideas and some beautiful character growth. Give this one some love.

Red Mars

In 1992 Kim Stanley Robinson published the first book in his phenomenal trilogy about the colonization of Mars. Taking a look at the information we had on Mars at the time, how it might effect people living there, and telling a very deep story about community, Robinson paints a fascinating picture of life on the Red Planet, and how humans end up changing the environment of Red Mars.

From goodreads

Come the year 2020, the first humans set foot on Mars. John Boone is the first man out of the lander, and in one small step becomes the most famous man in the Solar system since Yuri Gagarin orbited Earth or Neil Armstrong. Returning to Earth, he puts his heart and soul into creating a mission to settle Mars. Wrapped up in the heady wines of fame, discovery, and international popularity, Russia and the United States begin constructing everything they need to settle the Red Planet.

With a reasonably vigorous testing system, a faux Martian settlement in Antarctica, and lots and lots of psychoanalysis, the United States, Russia, and various others from numerous nations representing one hundred in number, set off to colonize Mars on the ship Ares in 2026. Led by John Boone, his American counterpart Frank Chalmers, the excitable Russian Arkady Bogdanov, and the other Russian leader Maya Toitovna, the First Hundred head to Mars.

From there we have an exciting series of landings, struggles against nature, and exploration. From the landing of the First Hundred on Mars, the exploration of the Martial North Pole, and the struggles of building in low gravity, the initial backdrop for the colonization of Mars is vividly realized. There's many poignant and breathtaking explorations of Martian vistas, the world around them, and the different skies people see.

Much like all of Robinsons work, the story is also very ideological. There are those who want to terraform Mars as fast as possible, known as Greens, while there are those who want to be slow and methodical, keeping Mars pristine, known as Reds. Then others want to simply learn how to live in coexistence with this environment, for as long as possible. This ideological debate informs much of the early story, and it seems there are those willing to go to any lengths to see their views come out on top.

There is also no agreement on how Mars should be governed, or even developed. Initially the UN supports the slow approach, but pressure from a world that is overpopulated, resource hungry transnational corporations, and other factors, push them along the quick path. Then comes the question of who exactly governs Mars. Who sets the laws, who polices people, and who profits from all the work being done? That is an extremely messy question with no easy answer.

I found that, from the trip on Ares on, the story hooked me. Personally, I enjoyed the more confined element of the ship over from a story telling view, but it worked very well introducing us to all the various characters. It established personalities, ideologies, and competing interests very effectively for the eventual struggles which would culminate in the final acts of the novel. None of the characters ever felt like a cardboard cutout, and many had interesting depths. Some were better than others, but they generally didn't interact enough outside the First Hundred to really flesh the world beyond them out, so one might say the story is told almost exclusively from their view of it.

Some elements were told simply for plot. The idea of a stowaway on something as sensitive as a colonization mission to Mars is a bit extreme. Then a few of the ideological and cultural patterns did stretch belief (no idea who the Big Man of Mars is supposed to be represented by) but nothing really pulled me out of the story or ruined it. Reading this story with all we know now in the 2020s - and without a First Man on Mars - is interesting, as we see what people thought of Mars in the 90s. It's definitely going to be interesting how many speculations from the novel end up being correct from looking at the Martian environment.

Red Mars is an amazing piece of the classic science fiction canon, and a strong opening in this trilogy. Definitely worth checking out!

The Waking Fire

This month has been a month of high fantasy for me. However, I have indulged myself by not just limiting myself to the regular fare of swords and sorcerer's, but have gone into the world of magic and flintlocks as well. However, recently I was able to read a book which has been catching my eye for some time now, and I took my first step into steampunk fantasy!

That book of course, was The Waking Fire, by Anthony Ryan.

From Amazon

Welcome to a world of rifles, steam power, electricity, and dragons. The Ironship Trading Syndicate, the largest and most successful company of the Corporate world, runs on drake blood. Controlling the largest sphere of influence on the foreboding continent of Arradsia, they hunt and capture drakes to fuel their society. From ships to long range communications the blood of drakes is a necessity for keeping the world going.

It also gives the Corporate world an advantage over their one great rival, the powerful but fading Corvantine Empire, which seeks to control this precious resource for itself.

Enter Lizzane Lethridge, granddaughter and daughter of famous inventors, and an extremely effective spy and assassin. She is being sent to Arradsia by the Syndicate to take matters in hand as war looms between the Empire and her company. All in pursuit of a mysterious device which may turn the tide.

Then you have Claydon Torcreek, a petty thief who dreams of nothing more than getting out of the slums of the great colony city of Carvenport. He just wants to make enough money to flee his past and bring his friends to safety far away from the ferocious continent of drakes and the grim tribes of Spoiled who inhabit the Interior. Little does he know that destiny has greater plans for him.

Finally, we have Second Lieutenant Corrick Hilemore of the Ironship Protectorate Vessel Viable Opportunity which patrols the worlds oceans to make them safe for commerce. Sent to hunt down pirates, he finds himself caught up in a conspiracy well beyond his pay grade.

Honestly, this book was awesome. It mixes the best parts of Brandon Sanderson and the Mistborn series, with all the things David Weber does right in his many series, and notably Safehold. But, for those slim similarities, it holds its own with a unique style, magic system, and unquestionably epic action and adventure. From high seas hijinks, spy vs. spy action worthy of James Bond, to amazing adventures in the Interior worthy of Indiana Jones or Crocodile Dundee. Honestly, its a blend of never let up action which will keep you engaged and subject to a new series of awesome adventures in each chapter.

The world is, quite frankly, one of the most unique in terms of world building I have come across since Brandon Sanderson. Forget the true and rightful king, it's one nation under copyright. The world our main characters hail from is one which knows no democracy, little true political freedom, and is one where contracts are as binding as oaths. Corporations run and own everything, but the most powerful of course has the most say. Shareholder is a rank of privilege, and the managerial class are as close to nobility as you get. Everyone else is a worker whose trying to scrape their way up the corporate ladder.

Then of course you have the Empire. Backwards, corrupt and decadent, but for all that still the most powerful and potent force not in the Corporate sphere.

With this little cold war going on, the magic system plays a big role. Though yes the powers are color coded for your convenience, you find it nice and simple to keep track of. Each user is not limited to one color of drake blood, and may use all of them. However, many become adept at one or the other, few can master all of them easily. It causes some fascinating action scenes as blood users square off against one another.

Of course, the author doesn't skimp on guns and ships either. The knowledge of weapons and warships reads well, and you can really believe that the people know their stuff, with rifles and pistols being the order of the day, while on the cannons blaze away at armored ships which run off blood burning power, giving them incredible speed. These are all thought out logically and given true advantages and weaknesses, which keeps things constant and quite exciting as you try and figure out who can win in what situations.

In this world though, you do get an idea that things really are shrinking. Though the Interior is vast and dangerous, you get the sense you are seeing the end of an era. Drakes are becoming harder to find and harvest in numbers, and are virtually extinct near the coast. One is brought to mind of the death of the buffalo on the Great Plains as they were hunted to extinction.

For the plot, I really can't say much for risking spoilers. It honestly goes at such a break neck pace with revelation after revelation that you'll be on the edge of your seat as the story progresses. As it goes on you realize nothing is as it seems, and many of the things our characters discover are downright unsettling. Heck, many of the finds later on seem like something straight out of H.P. Lovecraft!

None of the characters gets a short shift in these stories. Each has a good arc which they run with. Lizzane with her secret mission infiltrating Corvantine territory and Clayton with his run into the desolate and dangerous Interior with a crew of Contractors out for the ultimate prize. Perhaps only Corrick doesn't get as fleshed out as he deserves to be, but that's what we have sequels for of course!

If I had to say anything bad, maybe some of the revelations lacked proper foreshadowing, and one or two events were unceremoniously dumped on us, but with nary a slow scene and constant action paving the way forward, how can I complain?

A solid start to what promises to be an overall solid series. It shouldn't be missed!

Remakes in Moderation Please

Well I have to say that I have recently come across some mildly disturbing news thanks to Cracked. That is their lovely article here detailing how we have a slew of remakes to look forward to in the near future.

For those not willing to read the article, a short summary; here we have no less than three Peter Pan remakes coming out in the near future, four series that could only under a generous stretch of the imagination be called Wizard of Oz spin offs (of some sort), two new sets of Tarzan movies, and two films about Hercules, one staring the Rock no less.

And some other kid

Now let me get something off my chest, I'm not against remakes, not at all. I actually like many reboots or re imaginings of old shows. For instance I loved Tin Man's re imagining of The Wizard of Oz universe in a slightly darker and more adult version of the old Oz franchise, I am a huge fan of Peter Jackson's 2005 King Kong reboot, Death Race in 2008, The Godzilla remake in 1998, and I sincerely enjoyed the reboot of The Thing in 2011 (ok not technically a reboot or remake but still something cool finally done in the universe there). Hell until Disney acquired the rights to Star Wars I'd even been hoping to see some Star Wars remakes before I died.

However, there is a thing which makes reboots good, and what makes us want them, the fact that we haven't seen these things in a long time.

The upcoming Godzilla remake will have waited a respectable time (16 years) before putting a major Godzilla piece on the market again (and I say major in all seriousness, the Power Ranger esque Godzilla bits coming out in the 80s don't count) and that's what makes people look forward to it.

The TV series Once Upon a Time is fresh because no one has really done a grand new imagining of the old fairy tales in a long time, and not in such a fresh and fascinating way with a diverse cast of characters and an epic plot.

The upcoming sequel to 300 (300: Rise of an Empire) has waited a long time to reintroduce us to that crazy sword and sandals world we haven't seen in a while. I've been broadcasting all about it on my Facebook page for a while now and the trailers have been out on Youtube so if you don't know about it shame on you!

There's also the upcoming re imagining of the 47 Ronin which looks to be almost 300 in Japan, is a film to look forward to I would personally say with cautious optimism.

You know what separates these things from all the other remakes I've mentioned? They're years apart from each other, seem to be trying to breath new and innovative ideas into a creation, and they can act independently of each other. These remakes seem to not even care that they'll be competing with other remakes of the same story, as if the producers didn't stop and think "Hey we'll be flooding the market with a really similar product to the next guy!" making the potential interest evaporate as you see the same thing over and over again. Hell of all the items on the list the only one I would consider seeing is the one that puts a modern soldier in a post-apocalyptic Oz since that seems like an even darker version of Tin Man.

This is actually a problem I've been having with superhero movies recently. Yes their big flashy blockbuster productions what should I expect? Here's the thing though, we're being flooded with cheap (and sometimes tacky) remakes of films, for example, the Hulk films of the last decade are barely 5 years apart all so Hulk could be shoehorned into the Avengers (Don't get me wrong Avengers was great, but did they really need the remake? We know who Hulk is and he doesn't have anything original to contribute to the series like Iron Man, Thor or Captain America, but I digress). Now we're going to have to contend with yet another series of remakes for Super Man (whose films really can't do anything original to save their lives) and more Batman since it seems they intent on recreating the Justice League, meaning we will probably have to endure another Green Lantern movie (gack) and potentially Aquaman.

Now this version I would see

My issue with these is that they are basically just hashing out old ideas and trying to market them to a new audience. In some cases it works (for the Avengers especially) but for things like Batman and Superman, we're really just whipping the same dead horse and we'll probably be at it for the next decade.

Now although some of these remakes may not end up being awful (I'm willing to bet money they won't be great either) I'm not enthusiastic for their release.

To finish off I know that this blog would never get the ear of major producers, but is it seriously so much to ask of them to jump out of the cardboard box they've been in for the last decade and start trying to embrace some new ideas, writers, or scenarios? Hell would it be too much to ask that we could actually try and market a new superhero to people instead of just rehashing old ones?

If we're going to be dusting off old ideas, why not try some that really haven't been done before? Maybe some of H.P Lovecrafts numerous works in his mythos could be adapted (Aquaman optional)? Perhaps we could get a modern Dune series (yes we had the miniseries in 2000 but would a decent film with a good budget really be too much to ask for by 2020?). Or even say an adaption of the great novel Earth Abides? (Not starring Will Smith or Tom Cruise even).

What I suppose I'm trying to say if we have to dust off old ideas rather than attempt to embrace new ones, we could at least be dusting off old ideas that haven't been done before (or at least in a long time). Let's try fishing up some new fodder instead of digging up the same old corpse before it's body is even cold ok producers?

Until next time readers.

The Wealth Gap and redefining Monopoly

The Video Shown Here which I reccomend people who read this short blurb watch, really illustrates the staggering wealth gap in American society, and I shudder to think how this would be applied in my own country on the same graph. Though for anyone interested a page here shows the distribution in Canada and a direct comparison to the US. Now for someone like me who has researched this issue it is not what I would call a huge surprise. However, what shocks me is the difference between how people seem to percieve the weatlh gap (which is still pretty unequal by our own collective admission apparently) to how different it actually is!

For those of you having seen the video it truly is staggering just how wrong the common perception seems to be.

Though what shocked me though is something that I suppose in hindsight ought not to have shocked me was this little nugget.

Yes according to this chart the top 1% of the nation owns fifty percent of stocks, bonds and mutual funds.

The idea of them owning more of the nations wealth than the other 80% is not surprising, even the idea of the top 1% owning 40% of the nations wealth didn't really shock me to learn. However, the knowledge that they own 50% (I'll say roughly for fairness sake) of the stock, bonds, and mutual funds is simply a staggering thing to learn. Think about that for a second, that means that only 1% of the country has a virtual monopoly on the stock market and control over its resources.

How that speaks to the way the market works, its faults, and where investment goes and how this invisible wealth is generated and spent I'll leave the reader to speculate on.

The fact remains however, that this gap in wealth, control of the market and industry, and depressingly, who gets their voice known in government (money speaks) shows just how much power, real tangible power, one group in society controls.

It is worth noting this and I would urge readers to really think about what this means for our economic and political system across the world.

Spots the Space Marine

Well readers it seems a large company have once again embarrased themselves over a ridiculous issue. I can't even begin to comprehend why they would have chosen this issue to embarass themselves over! What am I talking about you ask? Why the Games Workshop Space Marine controversy!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21380003

Now for those of you who haven't heard about the controversy (or didn't want to read the article) it boils down to this. Spots the Space Marine is an Amazon Novella written by author M.C.A Hogarth. The story is set in the future where humanity has allied with an alien race engaged in a brutal war with another expansionist race of aliens. The titular character is a space marine who is taking part in the fight against these aliens.

As an aside I've now purchased the novella and I have to say it's written in an interesting format which flows very well and since it's already in partial script format it would transfer easily to television or film. I highly reccomend readers look it up.

http://www.amazon.com/Spots-Space-Marine-Defense-ebook/dp/B006MGJYOE

In line with the rest of the article however, it gets weird. UK based Games Workshop sent a legal application for the book to be taken off Amazon because 'the book infringed on their trademark'. Now Amazon of course took the book down, but this understandbly upset the author, who posted about it and from there the story spread.

It garnered attention from other bloggers, authors, and members of the science fiction community who rightly called it 'absurd' and demanded the legal action be called off. In turn this prompted massive backlash from many of Games Workshops's own supporters and Warhammer players who launched a campaign of their own speaking out against the ridiculous action.

In response Games Workshop released a statement (which due to events I do not have a copy of, more on that in a second however) and have said:

"The law requires us to protect our trademarks in certain ways – and if we do not – we might lose them. As you can imagine, we do not want to lose our trademarks as we would no longer be able to create the great miniatures and tabletop hobby wargames that we pride ourselves on!"

Now let me just say something here, the idea of trademarking the term 'space marine' which has been around since 1932 is ridiculous. It would be like trademarking the word 'drone' or the name 'Enterprise' for a ship. However, Games Workshop has claimed that the loss of being able enforce a tradmark on the term would somehow cause a loss in their revenues or sales to their tabletop games. One of their biggest reasons for cracking down on the term was because of their recent forays into paperback publishing with Warhammer 40k fiction which can be found in the Black Library and much of that fiction has of course featured the ever popular space marine chapters of the Warhammer 40k universe.

Or video game series with the 40k logo

 However, the thought that someone else using the term space marine in an independent setting will somehow detract from the international sales of these books is absurd. In fact many of Games Workshop's own fans saw through this thinly veiled bully attempt and called them out on it, which lead to the Facebook page for Games Workshop on Facebook being taken down, as mentioned earlier.

Now when you upset your own fans that much you know you have made a mistake. As of time of writing no further legal action has been taken against Hogarth and Spots the Space Marine is back up for sale on Amazon. How Games Workshop will deal with the fallout among their consumer base and supporters remains to be seen, but hopefully they can manage it with grace and dignity.

As a final aside I would normally defend an author or companies intellectual copyright or trademarks, in this case however (just as with the case of DC and Marvel owning the word 'superhero') I do not support it. The idea that you can own a common phrase or word in the English language just because it ties into your franchise is absurd, it would be like Tolkien claiming he owned the term hobbit or halfing, or J.K. Rowling saying she owned the word 'muggle'. This is a case of legal overstretch and murkey copyright laws as they attempt to gain dominance over a subject, but thus far from lack of support and outspoken disagreement they have not been able obtain it.

I would encourage readers to use space marine as much as they please in their own stories or events and to always remember that free press and expression is important, and we can't let people pick and choose what words they want to trademark.

Space Marines forever readers!

The Monsanto Menace

While usually I don't have much to say about companies and corporations I recently found a video from an unlikely source. Alt-Market.com is a website that revolves around the establishing of alternate market opportunities in preparation for an economic downturn or collapse. It is also a part of the so-called liberty movement and makes its political views very clear. While it does have some decent articles from time to time it spends an unhealthy ammount of time peddling various conspiracy theories and decrying the American system. So it should be understandable that the author and I rarely see eye-to-eye on anything.

So imagine my surprise when the authour posted this artcile. It features a link to youtube video featuring the documentary 'David vs. Monsanto' which revolves around a Canadian farmer who is doing his best to fight back against the insidious influence of Monsanto and their attempts to enforce their ridiculous patent of GMO foods. For those unfamiliar a brief bit of background; Monsanto is a major player in the agribusiness of genetically modified organisms. As such they have put a patent on the particular content of their food and if that genetic pattern or seed shows up on another person's property Monsanto will sue you, sieze your product and milk you for every dollar you are worth.



Sueing people for impractical reasons is their trademark

Now I believe that Monsanto is probably one of the most evil corporations since the United Fruit Company and they have a number of unethical and immoral business practices which they like to use. As such I would encourage people to boycott their product and vote with your dollars by shopping at alternative food stores and buying from local vendors and deprive the mega-corps of their greens.

That however, is a topic for another time. I encourage people to watch this documentary and see just what it is all about and I want to raise awareness of what this company is doing and how it can effect all of us, even if you own just a small backyard garden plot.

So please watch and enjoy!