Posts with the student tag

Barris Beat

Deal with the vaccine deserts

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
Vaccine rollouts are missing the so-called vaccine deserts for the other less populated hot spots. healthing.ca

Earlier this week, a delivery van pulled up at my neighbour’s house. The driver hopped out of his vehicle. He was fully masked and went to the door, kept his distance, and ensured that the package was delivered into the right hands. He then photographed the street address of his delivery and was walking back to his van when we exchanged greetings.

“Pardon me for asking, but have you received a COVID-19 vaccination yet?”

“I don’t mind,” he said, “but no, not yet.”

“I’ll bet you do dozens of deliveries a day and run the risk of either being infected or infecting others,” I suggested. “Don’t you think you should’ve had a shot by now?”

“Of course, but the company hasn’t made it a priority.” (more…)

Barris Beat

Copyright gone wrong

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment

copyrightTEDOne day last winter at the college where I teach, I stood waiting for a copier/printer to complete a job so that I could photocopy a letter. Initially, I paid little attention to the pages landing in the printer discharge slot.

Then I noticed the material was repeating itself. Every third page was identical to the one printed three pages earlier. The photocopied pages, I noticed, came from a book. The printer kept spitting out the sequence until nearly 50 versions of the same three pages had piled up. Somebody somewhere in the building was copying the book excerpt and planning, I guessed, to circulate copies among students. The person didn’t realize the copying was happening at this printer in my corner of the college, because he never came to pick up the copies.

“Who would waste all this paper?” I thought.

Then, I got even more ticked off that the person doing the mass printing was simply ripping off the author – copying all those pages and giving away the content for nothing. Lawyers call it a breach of copyright.

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