Canada Moms Blog

You Are a What? What's a Blog?

I had a post about telephones ready to go, but then Twitter went all 'OH NO SHE DIDN'T' all over an article in The NY Times with the snarky title 'Honey, Don't Bother Mommy.  I'm Too Busy Building My Brand," and I had to stop and read all the furor and posts in response and so on.

I am not going to respond to the NY post, far better writers have done that...read Mom 101's response to the article or Kelby Carr's piece where she sums up nicely why the main stream media treats bloggers who happen to be mothers this way:

"We get marginalized for a few reasons, including:

• We are women who are, perhaps for one of the first times, far better at something than men in many cases and far better in an industry that is making a major impact. I should explain that I know many, many men who are talented, brilliant bloggers, but that isn’t surprising. For women to stand out in an industry that major corporations are clamoring to get involved with just sits wrong with some people.
• We are excelling in the media landscape, which doesn’t sit well with traditional media.
• We are turning our backs on the mold that has been created for us.
• We are threatening to traditional publishers, mostly old white men who couldn’t write a blog or use Twitter if you put a gun to their heads.
• Newspaper circulation keeps declining, while blog readership and authorship keeps growing.
• Writing snarky articles about mom bloggers encourages mom bloggers to share links and drive readers to the newspaper’s web site. (Here’s a hint, New York Times… we would share positive coverage just as much, if not more).

We are trying to make a living by creating content, and for that we get demeaned, criticized, talked down to, made fun of, and stereotyped as unethical money and swag grabbing whores.

I know of a few other organizations that make their money creating content. Namely, mainstream media."

Canada vs. Facebook

I'm thrilled to read that the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada is pressing Facebook to fix their stupid privacy policy. Have you ever noticed that when you allow an app, say Scrabble or Word Twist, that it lets you know that you're giving the app developer access to your information... all your information, including photos? This factoid is why I install few apps. It creeps me out. Why do the makers of Bowling Buddies need to know my email address or, worse, my blog address? Why do they need access to photos of my kids? And that private boudoir photo album that I uploaded for ONE professional photographer friend to see... did all these app developers see that, too?

I comfort myself by telling myself I'm one of millions of users. Isn't that how we comfort ourselves about most bad stuff? Ah, what are the chances my kids will get into a car accident, the one time they're not in a booster seat? What are the chances lightening will strike me? What are the chances my sexy photos will find their way onto the internet?

The chances are small but the principle is big. 

No cat-dogs, no green toilet flower arrangements, and no celebrities on Twitter.

You know how Quebec reserves the right to stop you from naming your kid something really stupid/cruel, like Lucifer, Spatula, or a French word that means "whore"?

Well, recently Gwyneth Paltrow, getting into the spirit of dictatorship, is considering a rule that all members of her $4500-sign-up-fee gym need to adhere to a dress code so that her gym will be a pleasurable visual experience as well as a pleasurable(?) physical experience. [Source was offline, couldn't find online source.]

Personally, I think this makes perfect sense.

While American Libertarians would choke to death on indignation over this, I believe in even greater suppression of free will for the betterment of... well, my life. Why stop at baby names?  A name is relatively harmless, proved by Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt in Freakonomics. Also, it certainly doesn't affect me much if your name is Spatula. Why stop at dress codes? Dress codes should be the starting point.

What bugs me are people who gesture for me to turn left at a four-way stop, when they are making the same turn, only as a right-hand turn. I want to scream out, "Guess what? We'll both start going at the same time and you'll STILL beat me around the corner and then NEITHER of us has to wait or play the go-no-you-go-no-YOU-go game."  I believe there should be a $1000 fine for this.  POLITENESS CAN GO TOO FAR. 

Your cellphone sounds like a mosquito to me

Canadian teens are betting on teachers' and parents' aging ears to allow them to send and receive text messages and phone calls by using high-frequency tones that are inaudible to most people over thirty. Called 'mosquito' tones, these were originally marketed in South Wales to deter teenagers from loitering around stores.

The high-pitched buzzing grows uncomfortable to young people after ten minutes or so. Most people over thirty aren't aware of it at all. We all have old people disease, you see. Even those of us that don't feel particularly old.