Last week the Canadian Competition Bureau released the report Your Data, Your Control: How data portability can unlock competition and empower consumers. The surprisingly readable report centers around an experiment exploring data portability in the insurance sector, calculating that “introducing data portability could save Canadians “between $1.10 billion and $3.83 billion in both time and money on their annual costs.” I decided to read the report to understand how the Canadian federal government thinks about data portability in general, with an eye towards other digital spaces like social media, cloud, AI, and the types of stuff I am interested in.
Attended a talk by some g0v.tw and ocf.tw reps from Taiwan at Newspeak House. They covered the evolution of the #opensource community in Taiwan, the relation with the gov, and the “Bloody Truth” of OS economics :lolsob: We then had a wide-ranging conversation and 🍕💖
After having a massive fish & chips I stopped by a Sainsbury’s and picked up some Jaffa Cakes and Walker’s Salt & Vinegar before heading back to the hotel. 🇬🇧 Might have to put on some Doctor Who to round out the evening. 🙃
Also, Brick Lane is a dream for street photography. I will have my GRIV out tomorrow for a wander 📸
Checked out the Newspeak House venue to prep for #PfP✨London, ended up staying for the Open Rights Group meetup, then got a massive fish&chips and hung out with faculty and fellows and even met some visitors from the Taiwan open source community passing through from FOSDEM. 💖
After a 3 hour delay due to a water pump issue—which they couldn’t fix so just shut down the system resulting in no coffee, tea, or running water in the bathrooms for the 9hr flight—I finally took off to London 🇬🇧 Slept the whole way and checked into my hotel. Everything is so… British 😂
How boring people people are actually interesting (and how they can help you do crimes) — advice for a 14 year old from the inimitable Mike Monteiro 😊
Played my first game of MOTHERSHIP tonight. Lots of fun! 👽🚀 #ttrpg
Had a lovely compliment this morning in a meeting: “You are a Zipper, always bringing communities together!” 🥹
My wife remarked, “Are you sure he wasn’t just telling you to shut up?” 😏🤐 🤣
Stay grounded out there! 😘
Church bells in the evening in Vancouver ⛪️🔔
At The Permanent for a little Internet Archive Canada thing 🥂
Watched The Sound of Music with the kids tonight 🎶 🦌🌞🤳🏃♂️➡️🪡⬅️🫖
What a weekend. After seeing the sunset on the beach we had Indian-Chinese food for dinner, then the next day my wife baked roht at her Afghan cooking class, after which we popped over to the farmer’s market to shop for nuts at the Armenian dealer. Surrey is great!
What a talk from Ajahn Nisabho 🙏 🪷
The Buddha said “I praise the killing of one thing: anger.”
