With Toronto, Paris, San Francisco, Philadelphia (who were the first to jump on board, way back in 2004), Chicago, Miami Beach, Fredericton (that’s the sleepy village in New Brunswick, by the way), and a host of other North American and European centres offering free, state-of-the-art broadband wireless networking citywide across their jurisdictions, the forward thinkers on Vancouver City Council have finally capitulated to the public’s will, and on Thursday announced a free, citywide wireless broadband network by 2010.
What does this mean for you? Well, for starters, by 2010 you’ll be online, free-of-charge with a state-of-the-art high speed Internet connection 24/7 anywhere (and I do mean anywhere) across the City of Vancouver. Chances are that your cell phone (at least the new Apple iPhone) will connect through a WiMax network, which will forever do away with land-based telephones. You’ll be able to surf the ‘Net and send e-mails wherever you are (in your car, in the park) at will, wherever and whenever you choose.
Free. (Although, to be perfectly honest, it’ll probably be ad-supported)
According to Bruce Clayman, a Simon Fraser University Physics Professor and a member of the SFU Centre for Policy Research and Technology establishing a wireless network in Vancouver could yield a wide range of opportunities, including …

• providing residential and business computers with unlimited Internet access for a one-time fee of under $50;
  • automating hydro, gas, water and parking meter reading;
  • equipping transit, commercial and private vehicles with global position system (GPS) devices, which could expedite retrieval of information on stolen vehicles and help drivers determine their locations and find addresses;
  • providing tourists with instant access to maps and travel information;
  • providing city staff in the field with access to building inspection schedules, parking ticket details and other information;
  • delivering maps, mugshots and other information to emergency response teams travelling to accident sites;
  • providing a “smart” transit system that can advise commuters about bus and other transit schedules; and
  • providing free Internet access to residents of the Downtown Eastside, those on low or fixed incomes

  Remember that Telus ad that ran a couple of years back, the ‘story’ of a young woman shopping for a birthday present for her mother? She held the phone up so her sister could see the present she was considering for purchase. There was about the ad an eerie ‘brave new world’ quality.
  Welcome to that future. And much, much more. It’s here now.

Click on the picture above for a complete guide to Windows Vista

Microsoft’s newest operating system, Windows Vista, has finally arrived.
From here on in, if you’re going to purchase a new PC computer, Windows Vista will be the operating system your computer will come loaded with. For those PC users who have are currently running Windows XP, lucky you — Microsoft has extended the life of Windows XP through til April 2009, with security updates available til April 2014.
So there’s no great need to rush out and by the latest iteration of the world’s most popular operating system (currently resident on more than 98% of the world’s computers).
Now, there are those who take take umbrage with Vista’s bloatware, and there are those who are so far outside the computer loop (i.e. those people who are still running Windows 95 / 98 / ME / 2000) that the issue of which operating system they are running is of little consequence.
For the rest of us, though, Window Vista portends the future of computing and democratic communication, wherein your computer becomes a hub that does everything from answering your phone and taking messages, to providing you with information on which food items you’re running short of in your refrigerator and your cupboards, and everything in between.
Computers as the broadcast engine for personal video and corporate broadcast television onto your HDTV, and high-end streaming audio into every audio device in your home. Computers as seamless integrated machines that are invested in every part of your home and in your life.
A quarter of century on, we’re still at the beginning of a communications revolution, a revolution that will give voice to the many, and a democratic future of involvement in the everyday decisions which impact on our lives.
Maybe not in this generation … but soon, very soon.

Even though, according to esteemed, but seemingly addled, U of Calgary Political Science professor Michael Keren “bloggers are lonely people who live in a make-believe world” (such shallow analysis of the role of independent voices in the blogosphere, one might think, designed to act as a disincentive to bloggers to continue our posting written and multimedia materials), VanRamblings has decided to begin posting daily — most likely, shorter articles than previously — for the next while. Take that, Dr. Keren (hey, you wanna pay for our therapy?).
First up today, we’ll point you to an article in the Vancouver Courier about Shallom Ly (pictured above), a Vancouver-based fashionista who publishes a weblog (or blog, if you will) called Stylefinds, a subjective, local (if you’re living in Vancouver) and quite readable shopping and lifestyle guide.
Next up, you’ll notice if you look down a bit, and to the right that there are two other new blogs in VanRamblings’ blogroll — local photographer Alex Waterhouse-Hayward’s “A Thousand Words”, gorgeously conceived and updated daily; and the Vancouver Housing Market Blog, which offers an anonymous and engaging take on the local real estate development scene (all the while causing much consternation among various government agencies, and all those involved in one way or another in the real estate development market).
Well, that’s it for today. Who knows what we’ll come up with for tomorrow?