iMatt :: The Blog of Matt Clare

The Canadian Auto Show is always interesting, lots of cars to see and a few interesting displays. The show is huge, spanning both builds of the Toronto conference centre and the SkyDome’s floor, but the show rarely hosts any new announcements or new concepts. This year GM had it’s new Camero concept and Honda showed off the “Fit” – the European Civic hatchback which is a great car, but I can see how it would weaken what Canadians see as the Civic brand.

GM did a good job with integrating their Olympic sponsorship into their setup and I watched (with my sister) the women’s short track final: America got the gold and Canada the silver.

The display that impressed me the most was the Canadian Military’s. On display was a pair of LAV III’s and a G-Wagon. One LAV III had its surveillance mast up and there was a large LCD display showing what it could see. The G-Wagon also looked impressive and should make a good addition to Canada’s light armored vehicles. The best aspect of the display was the positive feeling the display projected. Canada’s military has been so neglected over the years (both its equipment and soldiers) and it was great to see a force Canadians could be proud of.

The Ferrari Enzo, a Million dollar homage to Enzo Ferrari the founder of the company, was limited in production to 400 cars. One went to the Pope John Paul II (who auctioned it off for charity) and one went to this guy, Stefan Erikssen, a 44 year old former executive of Gizmondo. After a drunken race against a Mercedes SLR in Malibu this is all that was left of his Enzo. You’ll notice that 1/2 the Ferrari is missing and so is “Dietrich” the German Stefan says was driving at the time. WreckedExotics.com has excellent coverage of the whole event.

The next best thing next to having a highspeed internet connection and Google in your pocket is having all of Wikipedia! Encyclopodia is Wikipedia has been ported to iPod Linux! The nice part about putting Linux on your iPod is that should you want to experiment you can destroy the software on your iPod trying to install Linux and just use Apple’s iPod firmware updater to reset your iPod and sync it back-up with iTunes. More about iPod Linux can be found at ipodlinux.org.

Formally named DTV and formally only on the Mac, the new version of “Democracy” is ready for both Windows and Mac users. Democracy is a an open source attempt at an internet television. It subscribes to RSS feeds and downloads the enclosed files, stores them and allows you to view them. Unlike iTunes, this tool is an excellent way to view video and it supports torrent files for fast downloads and a reduced impact on the provider.

The program was created by The Participatory Culture Organization and is largely a tool to watch Democracy Now’s (a political radio show) video feed. The Participatory Culture Organization also makes The Broadcast Machine which takes care of a lot of the work of hosting and producing video podcasts/vidcasts/feed.

I’ve been using this application for a while and blogged about it last year. It’s a great way to find entertainment and information and view it on your schedule.

Get your copy of Democracy at http://www.getdemocracy.com/downloads/.

I can’t say why, but I’m always concerned with what’s over my shoulder — and it’s not just because it’s bad feng shui to sit facing away from the door.

To address this concern I built a simple laptop rearview mirror that will mount on the top of almost all LCD screens. All you need are these two basic parts available from Canadian Tire and many other places. The best part is you’ll have one for each side of your laptop as both components come in pairs.

1. Toolholders (as pictured below, part 61-3936-0, SKU 3069917459)
2. Pair of convex mirrors (found in the automotive section – choose your size – the ones that pivot are the best option)

Remove the wax paper from back of one of the mirrors and stick it to the side of the Toolholder. You may want to also remove the screw from the Toolholder (save it for your collection 😉 ) The rearview mirror should now clip onto your screen. Feel free to make another one.