In a break with decades of past practice, Nova Scotia elections officials say they will withhold detailed results of the October 7 8 election for almost a month. In previous provincial elections, newspapers published poll-by-poll results a day or two after the vote. At a time when the internet has encouraged governments of all shapes and sizes to be more forthcoming with useful data, Elections Nova Scotia is moving in the opposite direction. Dana Phillip Doiron, director of policy and communications, declined to explain the policy change except to say the Chronicle-Herald "had no interest" in publishing this election's poll-by-poll results, and...

17 October, 2013

Many of you receive daily updates from Contrarian by email. These are sent out shortly after 3 am every day from Google's Feedburner service (to those who subscribed via the "once a day by email" link at right). This morning, for some reason, Feedburner sent out a trio of week-old posts for the second time. It's not clear why, but I wanted those who received it to know it was an error, not a deliberate reposting of these items. We are trying to sort out what happened, and why, if only to prevent it from happening again. Meanwhile, our apologies for adding to...

21 April, 2013

In response to yesterday's post about Merriam-Webster's vocabulary quiz, on which 60-year-olds leave younger word-users in their dust, Contrarian readers of various vintage have shared their scores. In alphabetical order: Andy Weissman (70+) 3420 Andrew Bourke (40-something) 3700 Anna Daniels (20-something): 3660 Blair MacKenzie (30-something): 3720 Charlie Phillips (50-something) 3660 Contrarian (sexagenarian): 3660 David Rodenhiser (5040-something) 3960* Elaine Fournier (40-something) 3700 Greg Lukeman (30-something) 3900** Jeffrey Shallit (50-something) 3900 John Denault (70+) 3720 Mike Targett (30-something) 3760 Peter Spurway (50-something): 3860 Shelley Porter (40-something): 3140*** Stan Jones (70+) 3800 Steve Manley (30-something): 3480 Suzanne MacNeil (20-somthing): 3400**** * Current raw score leader, verified by screenshot. ** Current leader on an age-adjusted basis. *** Ms. Porter has filed a protest...

17 March, 2013

Web fixer and community participation guru Mike Targett points out that Contrarian is about a week away from a quarter-million page views....

26 January, 2011

In response to this, someone called Peter Watts or perhaps Paul Buher, writes from a cryptic email account: You, sir, are a pig, and no different than Darrell Dexter. You hide under the guise of a political blog during the day, only to be writing for the NDP at night. A $15,000 pay cheque isn't too bad I suppose. Good for you. I have news for you. Anything you write on that virulent blog from this day forward is tainted with the stink of NDP orange, corruption, and self-serving interest. As I said, you sir, are a pig. I wonder how Mr. Whateverhisrealnameis...

21 May, 2010

In answer to concerned queries from readers: No, I do not personally get up at 3 a.m. to send out the daily Contrarian e-mail. Google's Feedburner service does that for me. At 3 a.m., Google automatically sends every item I have posted over the preceding 24 hours to everyone who has signed up for the daily Contrarian email (option 1 in the box at right)....

25 April, 2010

The Brain Repair Centre at the QEII Health Sciences Centre took a magnetic resonance image of Contrarian's brain today, as part of a study on memory loss in people with Alzheimer's disease. The researchers assured me I was there solely as a control! While the machine buzzed, clicked, and roared, the kindly technicians played CBC radio through my headphones. This is what Contrarian's brain looks like while listening to Costas Halavrezos....

12 April, 2010

Over the last two days, Contrarian readers in Halifax, Sydney, and England have reported that the website is loading slowly or not at all. HostPapa, my normally reliable hosting service, confirmed tonight that the server is responding slowly. The customer service rep has escalated the problem to the technicians who work on Hostpapa's servers. I hope they fix it soon. Apologies for the inconvenience. In most cases, apparently, if you are patient, the page will eventually load. The strange thing is, it works perfectly here at Kempt Head. (And yes, I appreciate the fecklessness of using a website people can't load...

05 April, 2010

Contrarian will be at the Inverary Inn's Thistledown Pub in Baddeck this evening to lead a discussion about blogging sponsored by the Cabot Trail Writers' Festival, the group that organized this event last fall. In addition to an annual fall festival, the group plans a series of satellite events, of which tonight's discussion is the first. I'll be talking about the writerly (journalistic, aesthetic, ethical) aspects of blogging; Mike Targett will be on hand to backstop me on those issues, and to add his technical smarts to the discussion. The pub serves supper from 5:30 to 8; The fireside blogging discussion,...

06 March, 2010