General Motors announced today that they will phase out Pontiac from their product offering. By the end of 2010, one of the iconic makes of the American automobile industry will be no more. To pay homage to Pontiac, let’s look back at some of the great, or at least, memorable, cars of Pontiac’s past. Continue reading
News
New Zealand Has Identity Crisis
New Zealand didn’t fight the law but the law won anyway. It turns out that the names of New Zealand’s two main islands were never legally registered with the country’s Geographic Board. Now the government is asking the people of New Zealand what they would name the islands. Continue reading
The Pirate Bay Founders Found Guilty
In a verdict that will send shockwaves throughout the interweb, the four founders of The Pirate Bay website were found guilty of violating Swedish copyright laws. They were sentences to a year in prison and ordered to pay 30 million Swedish kronor ($3.5 million US) in damages. Continue reading
Mercedes S-Class: The Future Today
The Mercedes S-Class is the top of the line car in the whole world. The gadgets that you find on the S-Class are here long before they make it any other car on the market. It’s a showcase of what can be done and what everyone else will be doing soon. If you want to know what options you can have on your car in five or ten years time, you check out what Mercedes-Benz is offering on the S-Class. This was the first car to have anti-lock brakes, passenger-side airbags, seatbelt pretensioners, traction control, radar-assisted braking, and infrared night vision. Of course, this year’s new technologies are pretty cool too. Continue reading
UWO Salary List Released
The University of Western Ontario released its list of employees who made over $100,000 in salary and taxable benefits. There’s lots of familiar names on there for me because Ivey appears to have a minimum starting salary of well over $100,000. At least I know where my tuition went now and now you can find out where your’s goes.
Some noteable names from the list:
Paul Davenport (UWO President) – $405,512
Carol Stephenson (Ivey Dean) – $395,755
Greg Marshall (Mustangs Football Coach) – $128,613
Joyce Garnett (University Librarian) – $163,933
Stephen Alb (Book Store Director) – $112,750
Looking for names you recognize? Click here for the complete list.
This Guy Says What We Can’t
I know we portray Lowdown radio and the blog as no holds barred radio. Well, at least for radio, that’s not quite true. We speak the truth as much as possible but we’ve “crossed the line” a few times on radio and been formally reprimanded, threatened with suspension and the like.
That means, while I’m very limited in what I can say about what I think about CHRW’s owners / broadcasting licence holders, the University Students’ Council, I can still talk about other people talking about them.
Take this article from the blog wriseup.com. Continue reading
UWO Saves The Bus Pass
Earlier this week, I posted about the referendum at the U of WO which would decide the fate of the school’s undergraduate bus pass. Good news: Common sense prevailed. By a margin of 94% to 6%, the students voted to renew the bus pass deal with London Transit.
More interestingly, the voter turnout for what I described as a poorly timed and even more poorly advertised referendum was about 60%. The funny thing about that is the UWO Students’ Council elections last month, which are far more publicized and hyped, had about a 34% turnout. Either students are really into saving money or they couldn’t care less about which of the very similar candidates becomes the figurehead leader of the student government.
Save the Bus Pass, Save the World
In case you haven’t been paying microscopically close attention to the news at the U of WO, there’s a referendum that will decide the future of the undergraduate bus pass. I say “microscopic” attention because the USC has let this slip under the radar.
Long story short, vote YES to keep the bus pass (at the rate of $135 per year) or vote no and go it alone. The USC will consider it a decision of “no” if less than 5500 votes are cast in total or “no” gets more votes than YES.
I’ve done some maths on this and the new bus pass rate will pay for itself after 50 rides (at the LTC adult rate of $2.75 per ride). Fifty should be easy to cover for anyone that doesn’t live within a 5-minute walk of campus. Basically, voting YES is the only real sensible way to go.
But what if you wanted more reasons? Suppose you want to live within five minutes of campus but haven’t signed a lease yet so you wouldn’t need a bus pass. (I guess that means you don’t plan on going downtown or to Masonville.) I would put pen to paper soon because those places close to campus will be in much higher demand. I would imagine a smart landlord would be able to pull in more than $135 over twelve months more than he is now. You’ll buy a bus pass from the LTC, you say? At $70 per month it’s only $560 plus tax. Maybe you have a car and will drive to campus everyday. Good news, you can get a parking permit (with no guarantee that you’ll get a spot you like) for only $638.
So vote YES. Save some cash. Be environmentally friendly. Don’t freeze to death in winter. Pick whatever reason you need, just vote YES.
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