I am not sure I’m comfortable with its linkage to the Super Bowl. Fox was actually running ads suggesting that people watch their coverage of both football and the election, like they were related. Much as I delighted in seeing the Patriots lose the big one (and special thanks to the Giants for not talking …
Author Archives: Jonathan Sterne
5-à-7s and Vegetarianism: Two Montreal Stories
Two responses to the last post merit a post of their own: 1. David asks “What’s a 5-à-7?” The simple answer: a cocktail party that occurs between the hours of 5 and 7pm. Except people seem to mostly drink wine at these things. Spelled cinq-à-sept and pronounced by anglos everywhere as something closer to “Sanka …
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Snowed in Stroganoff
Last night Carrie had excellent Friday night plans. We were going to a 5-à-7 and then to catch dinner and movie downtown. Well, the weather pretty much killed that ideas and the 5-à-7 was cancelled, so we decided we’d cook something nice and stay in and watch stuff on TV. All evening we could hear …
Why I Hate Mercury
No, not the planet. It’s cool. Mercury is the name for McGill’s online student course evaluation system. For most of my career as a teacher, there has been a day at the end of the term when students have filled out course evaluation forms, commenting on the instruction, their impressions of the course, and other …
Quote of the Day (for yesterday)
Didier Delmas, from the preamble to his PhD comprehensive exam defence: The demands of everyday life conspire to hide the relevance of advanced knowledge.
Some Suggested Directions for Canadian Copyright Law
Israel recently reformed its copyright code, and given that it shares many of the same intellectual property issues as Canada, its path is instructive. Although there is much talk that Canada must adopt DMCA-like anti-circumvention measures (a provision that even authors of the DMCA now disown), it appears that small countries with big knowledge economies …
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Quebec Alternative
Last night, I attended the vernissage for Quebec Alternative. The exhibit shows off some of the materials in Marc Raboy’s collection of alternative publications, which he dutifully stockpiled — eventually renting a storage locker until he was able to donate them to the McGill Library. For last night’s event, many key figures in Quebec’s alternative …