Or at least they were: Today, TomTom has lopped $30 clean off their original app's high (and increasingly high-seeming) price, bringing the price for the combined North American app down to $70. So actually no congratulations, Canada! Your TomTom still costs more than ours, and your maps are worth less. At least, until the end of the holiday season, when the prices of both apps should buoy back up to where they were before. This per-country pricing scheme is fascinating. [TomTom]

Joining the ranks of SCTV, Vancouver's lax pot laws and universal health care in the short list of things Canucks can brag about, this new bundle comes with a 360 Elite, two controllers, Halo 3 and Halo 3: ODST. This will set you back CAD$400, or $380 in USA dollars. It's for sale now, but much like the popularity of hockey, this deal won't last for long, so hop on it if you're going to. [Kotaku]

Canada Has Its Very Own Version of the AT&T vs. Verizon Ad Lawsuit

Telus and Rogers are sworn enemies in the Canadian wireless carrier arena, sort of like AT&T and Verizon but on a much more quaint, socialist and cold scale. And like our own two big dogs, Telus and Rogers have been at each others' throats recently about advertisements—Rogers has ads claiming it's "Canada's most reliable network" and that its speeds are twice as fast as any other network. Telus hit back, claiming it's not true (Telus did after all just launch a 21Mbps HSPA network) and Canadian courts actually forced Rogers to pull the offending ads, an interesting twist on the lawsuit pattern we Americans pioneered. Anyway, I know we're going to be crushed in the comments with high-larious anti-Canadian jabs, so let me pre-empt:

Igloo, cold, eh, hockey, The Arcade Fire, Bob and Dave MacKenzie, Pamela Anderson, who cares. [Boy Genius Report]

CollegeHumor Tackles Modern Warfare 2 (With Bonus Giz Appearance)

CollegeHumor just posted a video in which comedy nerds play (and are subsequently killed during) Modern Warfare 2, with a bonus appearance by our own Adam Frucci. I can exclusively report that Adam Frucci is a very old man who is several years removed from college, but the video's pretty funny despite this factual error. Discussed within: MW2's similarity to Crash Bandicoot, Dick Cheney quotes, a tax-funded sequel to Psychonauts, and why the glamorization of war is awesome. [CollegeHumor]

LG BL4 Gets Christmas Edition

You know, in America, Christmas editions are usually red and green, but in South Korea, it looks like they hang black tinsel on gold trees, because the LG BL40 Christmas edition is decked out in those colors. It's a small upgrade from the original BL40, with an 8MP camera (up from 5MP, though who knows if it's any better), a fancy case and entry into a contest with lots of prizes. It's in Remainders because only those black-and-gold-loving South Koreans can get their hands on it so far. [Engadget]

VUDU Adds Wikipedia, Possibly the World's Most Boring Update

VUDU is a pretty nice media service, built into set-top boxes and TVs and offering nice 1080p streaming, and adds to its repertoire Wikipedia integration. It's previously added Rotten Tomatoes, which is a little more obvious (and dare we say useful), and I personally might prefer IMDB rather than scrolling through prose paragraphs on my TV in Wikipedia, but it's good that Vudu is constantly updating its product. If you have to ask why it's in remainders, you probably haven't read this far: Vudu, Wikipedia, snore. [Engadget]

Tokyo company HiBot is developing a robot to transfer the dangerous duties of high-voltage wire inspection from meat-based humans metal-based robots, in a move intended not just to decrease the likelihood of flash-frying technicians, but to make the inspection process—vital, now that many countries' electrical infrastructures have components approaching 100 years old—more efficient.

The HiBot Exliner, pictured above and set to deploy in Japan, is the second such robot, and the most ambitious: while the LineScout, pictured at top and currently in trials in Canada, only inspects one line at a time, the Expliner will cover four. And unlike their human counterparts, Exliner and LineScout don't even care if the lines are left active while they're doing their respective things, because they ain't got nothin' to lose, y'know? Also: because they're properly insulated.

UPDATE: For anyone wondering why these robots are necessary (or depending on how you look at it, why they aren't) watch this video, starting at around 2:00. —Thanks, winshape![IEEE via Make]

It's a lighthearted dig for those with a sense of humor. But comes after Bell seemingly ripped off Apple's iPhone ads last week. So friendly neighbors to the north, what gives, eh? [Thanks Denis!]

First, the above chart: it clearly indicates the existence of an 8GB 3GS—look at that checkmark!—which seems to lend credence to an earlier, shakier report from BGR that the carrier would launch an 8GB version of the handset. But then, this:

That's from the same site, on the front page. If there was an 8GB version of the 3GS, it's safe to assume it'd be cheaper, and just as safe to assume that Rogers would want to advertise this fact. Rogers spokespeople were unavailable for comment this morning, but we can confirm their salespeople know nothing of the device, telling us that the only 8GB iPhone available is the 8GB 3G. Of course, the chart could reflect leaked info about some future announcement, unseen by Rogers sales minions, but I'm leaning toward some intern screwing up a complex chart over a bizarre, irrational shakeup to Apple's—and by proxy, Rogers, AT&T, 02 and others'—product line.

UPDATE: A Rogers spokeperson returned our email, confirming our suspicions:

You're right, there is no 8GB 3G s iPhone. There is a formatting error on our website. It is being corrected asap

FWIW, they were a little less emphatic when talking with Electronista, but at least for now, this looks like a no-go. [MacRumors via BGR]

Frozen in the "bottom layer" of ice (Christ, how many layers do you think there are?) since, he estimates, early winter, the iPod was frozen solid and not in the best of shape. But after a few minutes of charging, the iPod booted right up and even displayed the correct date, proving once and for all that the iPod classic is to date the only Yukon-approved PMP on the market. [Robulack via TUAW]

The full handset list, as transcribed by BGR, is here:

* Blackberry 82XX Pearl Flip (3G version of 8220 Pearl Flip but with GPS, WiFi, and video calling)
* Blackberry 9520 Storm (North American 3G GSM bands and 802.11 b/g WiFi)
* HTC Touch 3G
* HTC Touch Pro
* HTC Touch Viva
* Motorola MOTOZINE ZN5
* Motorola Q11
* Motorola VE66
* Nokia N79
* Nokia N85
* Nokia N96
* Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
* Samsung M8800 Pixon
* Sony Ericsson Xperia X1a
* Sony Ericsson C905

Some prices are still sometime horrific, natch, but this handset selection—which includes the hitherto unheard of 3G, GPS, Wi-Fi Pearl Flip and Wi-Fi Storm handsets—provides some relief for the long, dark winter of the gadget soul that is life in Canada. [HowardForums via BGR]

The drone, which will fly from the Grand Forks Air Force Base in North Dakota, will begin its patrols in January. Ostensibly, it's on the lookout for terrorists who are trying to sneak into the States, but we all know who the real criminals are: Canadians who are sick of free healthcare and are looking to pay for hospital care in the US. We're on to you, you slimy Canucks! And we won't stand for it! [Breitbart]

The robot submarines are just the latest tool for the five "polar nations" currently jockeying for supremacy in the oil-rich Arctic Circle. Trouble is, there's no land mass up there, which is the traditional yard stick for territorial disputes, so the interested parties have taken to mapping the terrain underwater.

For Canada, this means determining where the Canadian continental shelf ends, and whether or not the subs can discern "geological links" between the country's northern coast, High Arctic Islands, and two underwater mountain ranges: the Alpha and Lomonosov ridges. The latter certainly sounds Russian, but who are we to get in the way of a little apocalyptic robot war, right? [Canada.com]

A letter from Apple lawyers said the VSBT logo, which depicts an apple and a mountain graphic from its sister company, northStudio.com, infringes on Apple's rights. The letter also alleges the logo is "falsely suggesting that Apple has authorized your [computer-software operation courses]." Some of those courses are conducted on Mac hardware.

If this tiny British Columbia school does not comply with Apple's request, legal proceedings could begin that would prohibit the school from using the logo. The VSBT could also be forced to repay legal costs and "damages."

The VSBT, for its part, is conducting a survey about the issue on its homepage. It doesn't take a genius to guess what the current survey results reveal.

Surprise! The school's president and CEO, Dieter Gerhard, is vehemently denying any infringement, saying the logo differs from the Apple logo in several ways:

• the acronym VSBT is part of the design.
• the logo incorporates a mountain graphic from its sister company, northStudio.com
• the school's apple has three bumps on top while Apple's design has two
• the logo is multi-colored while Apple's is not

Seems pretty cut and dry to us. Why all the sour grapes at Apple? [Vancouver Sun]

The quasi-three-dimensional electron crystals were discovered in a device scientists cooled at ultra-low temperatures – roughly 100 times colder than intergalactic space. They then exposed it to the most powerful magnetic fields possible on Earth, which made it “pop” from a 2D electron system to a semi-3D one. It could also help improve transistors, allowing for greater density on a single microchip. Looks like Gordon Moore can rest assure that his law won't be broken for another long while. [Science Blog]

(Note: That's not a picture of the new state of matter, by the way.)

Among the callers was John Hope, who keeps a trigger lock on the 9-mm Beretta stowed in his Bracebridge home. He says he's eager to give up the gun so it doesn't land in the wrong hands – a criminal or suicidal teenager, say. Since he can't trade it for a camera, he now plans to throw it into the middle of a lake.

"There's no way someone's going to go down 200 feet to get a gun he doesn't know is there," he said.

Smart thinking.

It's a really great promotion, even though most people who own a gun can probably already acquire a digital camera for free...[The Star via UberReview]

These gloves are made for wussy American winters. In a real winter, you can't be pulling out your fingers all willy-nilly to decide which Justin Timberlake track you want to bop along to. You make that decision before you leave the house, and goddammit, you stick with it. These gloves are an invitation to lose that iPhone-pointing finger to frostbite. Unless, of course, you live in the south, which I've now come to see as anything below Boston. You confederates will be just fine. [Freehands]

DOT MATRIX REVOLUTION* from superbrothers on Vimeo.[io9]

Calling all iPhone 3G fans!

Select Rogers Plus stores to open early coast-to-coast on July 11 Launch promotions to include limited time 6GB data offer

TORONTO, July 9 /CNW/ - In anticipation of iPhone 3G launch on July 11, Rogers Wireless today announced plans to open the doors of select Rogers Plus retail stores across Canada in advance of regular hours. Starting at 8:00 am July 11, Canadians will be able to purchase the new iPhone 3G at special launch day events to be held at six Rogers Plus stores across the country. Be among the first in Canada to get the next generation iPhone 3G and have the choice of a 6GB data plan through a limited time promotional price offer. "As Canada's leading wireless carrier, Rogers is excited to bring iPhone 3G to Canadians even sooner, allowing our customers to be amongst the first in the world to experience this amazing mobile innovation," says John Boynton, Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer, Rogers Wireless. "To celebrate its launch on Canada's fastest wireless network, we're rolling out the red carpet with special events at six Rogers Plus stores and a limited time price promotional data offer from coast-to-coast." iPhone 3G combines all the revolutionary features of iPhone with 3G networking that is twice as fast(*) as the first generation iPhone, built-in GPS for expanded location based mobile services, and iPhone 2.0 software which includes support for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync and runs the hundreds of third party applications already built with the recently released iPhone SDK.

Rogers Launch Promotions —-—-—-—-—-—-—-—- The following Rogers Plus stores in these cities will open their doors at 8:00 a.m. (all times local) on Friday, July 11 for advance purchases of the Apple iPhone 3G: Toronto: 112-10 Dundas Street East Montreal: 1015 rue St. Catherine Ouest Ottawa: 690 Bank Street Halifax: Unit 265, 7001 Mumford Road Calgary: 5244 Falsbridge Gate, NE Vancouver: 2097 West Broadway

Customers attending launch day events at these Rogers Plus stores will be treated to a free early bird breakfast and have a chance to win Rogers Wireless prizes. Effective July 11, and as a limited time promotional offer for customers who activate by August 31 on a three year contract, a data-only offering of 6GB of data for $30 per month is being made available that can be added to any in-market voice plan. For example, with 6GB of data, iPhone 3G users can visit 35,952 web pages, or send and receive 157,286 emails, or watch 6,292 minutes of YouTube videos each and every month.(xx) New Canadian iPhone 3G customers will also have the choice to select from Rogers Wireless' existing voice and smartphone data plans and/or additional features to best suit their needs, or from Rogers Wireless' value bundled plans specifically for iPhone 3G. Existing Rogers Wireless customers can keep their current voice service plan and select a separate data plan to meet their needs or choose from other plans after checking their individual upgrade eligibility. Starting July 11, iPhone 3G will be available at participating locations across Canada, including select Rogers Plus, Rogers Video, and Rogers Wireless retail locations and at the following specially selected authorized Rogers Wireless dealers: WirelessWave, TBooth and Wireless etc. iPhone 3G can also be purchased online at www.rogers.com and through Rogers' customer service at 1-888-764-3771. For a complete store listing, visit http://your.rogers.com/mq/mqlocator.asp. Due to anticipated high demand, there is a maximum purchase of two iPhone 3G per customer.

(*) Based on 3G and EDGE testing. Actual speeds may vary due to a variety of factors. (xx) Based on live trials of iPhone 3G on Rogers HSPA network, July 2008

Canada doesn't produce its own electronics. “But Dan,” some defensive, annoying nationalist might say, “what about all those semiconductor plants in Southeast Ontario?” Well, Antagonist I Just Created, you're a nitpicker and totally missed my point. Consumer electronics brands are almost exclusively imports from the States and various Asian countries. Update: RIM is obviously the one significant exception. What that means is that Canada imposes duties on pretty much everything, driving the retail prices up. I won't even go into the 15% 12.5% sales tax. (Yes, shut up about taxes, America, you're a bunch of whiners.) But even worse, Canada is currently cursed with a horribly strong dollar, leading to damnable economic benefits across the nation. Yet they have not adjusted to the temporary economic downturn (don't say recession, don't say recession) in the Greatest Country on Earth.

What does that mean to a young, naïve Pennsylvanian just trying to figure out how to make his Benjamins last? When I went looking for a new laptop, I found something fascinating: the same HP model, from Best Buy's online sites, costs $649 in the States, and a whopping $799 in Canada. Going by exchange rate, that computer should actually have cost $654 at Bestbuy.ca—that's $150 less I could spend on still deliriously expensive Canadian beer!

I'm a particular kind of gadget nerd. I don't go crazy over Linux or cell phones or overclocking or whatever. I'm a media nerd, and I have the debt and unhealthy pallor to prove it. Trust me, normal people don't stockpile PMPs or set up a Netflix account at a new apartment before introducing himself to his roommates.

Media is where Canada takes a big ungainly flop on its face. I lived in Montreal, a thriving artistic city with an unparalleled music scene and multiple international film festivals, a city that is very much in the here and now. Yet there is absolutely no legal way to watch Top Chef as it airs, forcing poor deprived Canadian children to wait for months to get their culinary-based reality competition fix. This year the show began June 24th in Canada, after the whole season had already ended in the Land of the Free.

Besides delays, Canada's version of the FCC, the CRTC, has very strict rules about the percentage of “cancon,” or Canadian content, that must be played. A whopping 60% of television programming between the hours of 6 AM and midnight has to be homegrown. Now, that's mostly taken up by filler like daytime talk shows and local news, but an awful lot of solid entertainment falls to the wayside to make room. There's a very long and boring debate about consumer freedom vs. preservation of Canadian culture, but the discussion's been going on for decades and Top Chef doesn't wait for parliamentary consensus.

On the same note, any Canadians who have ever tried to stream US television episodes legally over the web will be familiar with that ever-present message of rejection: “This video is not available in your region or location.” The CRTC refuses to allow the lovely Padma Lakshmi to appear on my computer, even in a low-res, three-inch popup window. So forget about Hulu or any other legit way to watch those shows; Canadians are forced into less savo(u)ry Internet back alleys like BitTorrent as a matter of course.

This epic struggle doesn't only apply to television, but gadgets as well. Canada has been without the JesusPhone for so long that they've reverted to a culture of hunter-gatherers. Even when it finally arrives later this month, it won't be readily available to all: The cost of the phone and its monthly plan is so high that the Canadians who do opt for it will have to forswear store-bought food and live off the land to save money. Even TiVo only landed in Canada in late 2007, although seriously guys, you don't need to record Corner Gas and all that other cancon. It's really not very good.

Selection of consumer electronics in Canadian brick-and-mortar stores is depressingly limited, with few non-mainstream products and long delays on others. The hilariously-named Best-Buy-equivalent “Future Shop” seems to be staffed with people chosen only for their ability to turn customers purple with rage. So you'd think Canadians would just turn to online shopping for their nerd needs, right? Well, Amazon only exists in Canada as a shadow of its true self, selling nothing but books, DVDs, music, and video games. Newegg? Forget about it. Woot for electronics? Not a chance. If you're lucky enough to find some misguided online retailer willing to ship you some gadgetry, you'll enjoy the lovable quirks of the Canadian postal service. Canadapost does deliver mail occasionally, but most of the time they indulge in their hobby of losing shit, charging more than my monthly rent in duties, and hoarding packages for weeks just for fun.

I like making fun of Canada, like any other red-blooded, God-fearing American citizen. For a gadget nerd, it's frustrating. The cost of our favo(u)rite toys is upsettingly high, the selection far too meager. Shipping is expensive, unreliable, and slow, and there's not even much good TV to watch while you wait for your imported gadget to arrive. On the other hand, if you're a functioning member of society who prefers sensible politics and beneficent social values to slightly more convenient electronics purchasing, Canada's pretty great. Just get ready to pay up for the ridiculous Canadian iPhone plans when you flee northward to avoid the next war. Happy Canada Day—or Bonne Fete du Canada—everybody!

Dan, our summer NYC area intern, just graduated from McGill in early June. Feel free to say hi to him. And in case you were wondering, he HAS already been hazed a bit. As he himself admits, he's the one with the beard.

The letter, which can be found on ruinediphone.com asks Apple's head honcho to “take a look at all these disappointed people” and do something! It also includes a petition, which has garnered over 10,600 signatures at last count. Do our friends to the North a favor and sign the fracking thing, eh?

Rogers has argued that its top data plan, 2GB a month for $115, is more than enough for most users and that an unlimited plan would “end up costing customers more for what they don't use.” Hmmm, sounds suspiciously like they're taking a page from the book of the cable industry over here. [Fortune]

Obviously, this report is not the last word on the subject and we will surely see more studies in the years to come. And my guess is most of these studies will be in conflict with one another. Hell, we have already seen one incident where a Taser may have helped someone with a heart condition. What's next? A study that finds Canadian criminals are more sensitive to electrocution than American criminals? [CBC News via Digg]

Mounties corporal Scott Wilson defended his colleague's grandad-bashing actions. "Whether the person is 80 or 20, we are dealing with a person who had a deadly weapon in their hand. We could not deploy our ... pepper spray, because we could potentially contaminate the entire hospital."

Lasser, a former prison guard, reckons they overdid it, claiming that, with three Mounties in the room, they could have overpowered him without using a Taser. Lasser said there were three RCMP officers in his hospital room and believes they could have easily handled him without the use of a Taser. "I was laying on the bed by then and the corporal came in, or the sergeant, and said to the guys, 'OK, get him because we got more important work to do on the street tonight,'" he said.

"And then, bang, bang, bang, three times with the laser, and I tell you, I never want that again." That'll teach him to bring a knife to hospital, then. [CBC News via Dvorak]

I guess we are coming to the end of the early iPhone era. But Coupland, the author of Microserfs and Generation X, moves onto another, more disturbing theory: that gadgets make morons of us all.

I remember in the 80s when cellphones first started to pop. I remember how, if you saw someone using a cellphone on a street, you immediately thought they were an asshole: gee, my phone call is so important I have to make it right here and right now! Twenty years later, we're all assholes. We're assholes at the supermarket's meat counter at 5:30pm, phoning home to ask if we need prosciutto; we're assholes driving in traffic; and we're assholes wandering down the streets. And with cellphones and handhelds, we collapse time and space and our perception of distance and intimacy.

The father-and-son team of George and Peter Bubenik used an artificial moose ear that had been created by TV special effects team, and mounted a pair of antlers on top of it. A microphone and sound meter were placed in the ear canal, and a speaker set up 30 feet from the ear, which was rotated into different positions.

When a sound was played through the speaker (something by The Rasmus springs to mind) the sound meter recorded 59.5 decibels when the ear was facing the source of the sound, and 57.5 decibels when it was facing backwards. But when it was moved into a sideways position, and where the antlers worked as an amp, the level came out at 61 decibels. [Daily Mail]

The emergency services were alerted by a professor and his eight students, who all reported they had seen a suspicious man carrying a "long, tubular object." Following a campus lockdown and a thorough two-hour search, nothing was found. Information incoming across the weekend has indicated a photographer with a tripod was the reason for the disturbance, though he has yet to be located and spanked for all the fuss he caused. Let this be a lesson to you camouflage-cargo pants-wearing weirdos; don't wear camouflage cargo pants. You're not in the army, you suck. Talking of things that suck, according to a satirical joke we are about to make, the NRA was said to be very disappointed about there being one less gun on the streets. We don't doubt it. [Globe and Mail via blogTO]

Bill appears and after a brief state-of-the-industry intro, notes that this is his final CES appearance. He'll look back on some of his previous experiences, noting how far we've progressed since he declared the "Digital Decade" in 2001 for three reasons:
1. The promulgation of lower-cost HD displays and soon interactive surfaces.
2. Mobile intelligence - cellular and GPS enabled products that help us get through the day
3. Interaction with technology increasingly mirroring the way we interact with people

First announcement: NBC Universal is making MSN the exclusive home for NBC's coverage of the 2008 Summer Olympics in China. It's the first "long tail" Olympics: there will be thousands of hours of content available at nbcolympics.com, ranging from the most popular sports to the most obscure—from basketball to badminton. The video will be both live and on demand, with over 30 simultaneous live broadcasts; 2,200 hours of live broacasting and 3,000 hours of on-demand content. All of the video will be shared in Silverlight format in "near HD" quality.

Hands-on: Never-before-seen demo of the Surface table. In this demo, Bill designs a snowboard for himself—yes, a snowboard—using multitouch technology to try out different designs, then save them to his Windows Mobile phone and share with his friends. I only wonder what his insurance company thinks about his snowboarding plans.

Robbie Bach, Microsoft's President of Entertainment & Devices Division, will take the stage to cover the bulk of the presentation, talking about:

• Xbox's banner year - 17.7 million Xbox 360 units sold; 7 titles surpassing 1 million sales mark; U.S. users spent more on Xbox 360 in 2007 than more on any other game console ever

• TV show deal with ABC Television and Disney Channel for Xbox Live programming, available for direct download to Xbox 360. It includes 500 hours of content, in standard and high def, available at the end of the month, with shows such as Desperate Housewives, Lost, Grey's Anatomy, plus Disney shows including Hannah Montana.

• Movie deal with MGM - Xbox will offer MGM films in standard def and high def including the entire Rocky series, Terminator, Dances With Wolves, Silence of the Lambs, Legally Blond, Barber Shop and the Bond franchise.

• New application for Microsoft's Media Room IPTV, distributed by AT&T U-Verse: On TNT, NASCAR fans can choose a view of the race from the camera inside their favorite driver's car via their set-top box; Showtime boxing will let you choose camera angle and audio feeds from the trainer, ref, or the commentators; in CNN's coverage of US presidential campaign, viewers can vote on issues, gauging voter opinion in realtime.

• Media Center Extender support is growing in the consumer-electronics industry, led by Samsung, which will be working on a connected TV with MCE capability.

• Zune 2 off to a good start, with 1.5 million people starting Zune social fan pages since the service began in November. Bach will announce the availability of the Zune in Canada, the first distribution outside the US.

When Bill takes the stage again, he will demonstrate a "device of the future," something that won't necessarily become a product sold by Microsoft, but still a good glimpse of things to come. The device will ostensibly store and catalog all of Bill's memories so that he can pull up a reel of all his past CES keynotes. At one point, he will snap a picture of the Venetian auditorium and the gadget will recognize the venue, proposing various recreational activities he might enjoy after the keynote.

This is a rough sketch of the proceedings, one that's bound to change considerably. I'm told there will be some surprises—maybe a celebrity guest or some farewell treat. Who knows? That's why we plan to catch the whole event, and fill in any gaps that may be missing from this otherwise thorough digest. (You're welcome.) [Microsoft at CES]

Previous messages beamed into deep space via radio-telescope by scientists have tried to demonstrate our intelligence by sending coded math problems, a bit of chemistry, physics and biology, some data on what we look like and even where we've come from. This may not, however, be good enough for their superior brains. Dutil and Dumas argue that if any alien does decode a message containing essentially trivial data, "after reading it, they will be none the wiser about us humans and our achievements."

The really difficult bit is, of course, trying to work out what would be interesting to an extraterrestrial. Dumas and Dutil suggest that we should try things that will be new and different to an alien, like Britney's last album Paris Hilton's sex tape "social features of our society," or economics or sociology problems. These can still be described mathematically, which neatly gets around the problem of which language to use.

Who knows, aliens may even be interested in our political issues, and so the starry-eyed Canadians have even begun trying to explain our electoral procedure in code: "We can explain our methods, and ask 'what do you use on your planet?'" You've got to hope that the answer is better than hanging chads.

As Dutil also points out, it might be handy to have a clever and interesting message to hand just in case an alien race ever tries to contact us "just to say 'we'll get back to you'"—followed presumably by "leave some math after the beep, and promise not to use your death-rays on us." – Kit Eaton
[New Scientist]

Bell Mobility has reduced the charges to $3,243 as gesture of goodwill, but they claim that Staniaszek should have known that using a cellphone as a modem fell outside the realm of normal usage. They also noted that the software he used for this purpose warned him that additional charges would apply. Still, Staniaszek plans of fighting the bill citing that Bell Mobility's policies were unclear. You would think that this would be pretty open and shut, but in a world where you can be rewarded a settlement for spilling hot coffee in your lap at McDonalds, I'm not so sure. [The Register]

Apple Announces Hit Television Programming Now Available on the iTunes Store in Canada

Programs from Canada's Top Networks, US Favorites & NHL Now Available on iTunes

CUPERTINO, California—December 12, 2007—Apple® today announced that hit television programming from Canada's top networks, US broadcasters and the National Hockey League (NHL) is now available for CAN$1.99 per episode from the iTunes® Store in Canada (www.itunes.ca). iTunes customers can choose from Canadian-produced favorites such as the top-rated, award-winning "Corner Gas" from CTV, smash hit comedy "Little Mosque on the Prairie" from CBC, Emmy and Peabody Award-winning "South Park" from Comedy Central and the NHL Games of the Year.

"We're thrilled to bring television programming to the iTunes Store in Canada in time for the holiday season," said Eddy Cue, Apple's vice president of iTunes. "We're off to a great start with hit shows from CBC, CTV, Comedy Central and MTV Networks, along with the best of classic and current NHL action."

Television shows purchased and downloaded from the iTunes Store can be viewed on a PC or Mac®, iPod® nano with video, fifth generation iPod, iPod classic or on a widescreen TV with Apple TV™. Television programming on the iTunes Store in Canada includes:

• CBC's comedy programs "Little Mosque on the Prairie" and "The Rick Mercer Report," reality programming "No Opportunity Wasted" and "Dragon's Den;" • CTV's smash hit comedy "Corner Gas," dramas "Instant Star," "Degrassi: The Next Generation" and "Robson Arms;" • Comedy Central's "Drawn Together," "The Sarah Silverman Program" and Emmy and Peabody Award-winning "South Park;" • MTV Networks programs "Avatar: The Last Airbender" and "The Hills;" and • NHL Games of the Year, including top NHL games in their entirety for the 2007-2008 season, as well as Stanley Cup Classics, a five-game bundle of great Stanley Cup Final games.

With Apple's legendary ease of use, pioneering features such as integrated podcasting support, iMix playlist sharing, seamless integration with iPod and the ability to turn previously purchased songs into completed albums at a reduced price, the iTunes Store is the best way for PC and Mac users to legally discover, purchase and download music and video online.

Pricing & Availability
iTunes 7 for Mac and Windows includes the iTunes Store and is available as a free download from (www.itunes.ca). Purchase and download of songs and videos from the iTunes Store requires a valid credit card from a financial institution in the country of purchase. Television shows are available in the US, UK and Canada only, and video availability varies by country. Television shows are CAN$1.99 per episode in Canada. TV shows from the iTunes Store are downloaded in near-DVD quality at a resolution of 640x480 (up to 480, depending on the aspect ratio) and can be viewed on a PC or Mac, iPod nano with video, fifth generation iPod, iPod classic or on a widescreen TV with Apple TV.