Dave Kordalewski

A homeless woman has pleaded guilty to two counts of murder in the fatal stabbings of a Canadian mother and daughter who were visiting Atlantic City.

The Electric Zoo event on Randalls Island was shut down hours before its third day after two concertgoers died and four others fell ill. The police said the deaths were consistent with drug use.

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The book, written under a pseudonym by the best-selling author J. K. Rowling, became a success only after her identity was revealed.

• York University will likely very soon file a statement of defence in the lawsuit by Access Copyright. This has already taken months longer than usual. York’s position and strategy will inevitably attract much scrutiny, since an adverse outcome for York could profoundly and negatively affect the entire Canadian educational community at all levels.
• The Federal Court could rule at any time in the Voltage Pictures effort to compel Teksavvy to hand over the identities of thousands of its customers. Teksavvy, it will be recalled, has spent a lot of money not to take a position on this issue and to buy time for a law school clinic to get involved as an intervener. Teksavvy’s counsel spoke briefly at the end of the hearing, which took place on June 25, 2013 but Teksavvy had not previously taken any position.
• The Copyright Board has just advised that “the Tariff of Levies to Be Collected by CPCC in 2012, 2013 and 2014 on the Sale, in Canada, of Blank Audio Recording Media is scheduled to be published in the Canada Gazette this Saturday, August 31, 2013. The links to the certified Tariffs, as well as the decision in respect of each Tariffs will be available on our web site under the heading “What’s New” on Friday, by the end of the business day.” The Board will also, at some point, rule on whether it intends to proceed with a hearing on whether there can be a levy on microSDs for the period of January 1 to November 6, 2012. The Government published a regulation on November 7, 2012 that stated that “Memory cards in microSD form factor, including microSD, microSDHC and microSDXC cards, are excluded from the definition “audio recording medium” in section 79 of the Copyright Act.”
• The Supreme Court of Canada could at any time now deliver its judgment in the case involving Cinar and Claude Robinson, et al which will presumably focus on the question of what is a “substantial part”.

• The hearing in the Federal Court of Appeal on the Warman v. Fournier case, which involves fair dealing, substantial copying, limitation periods, etc. and in which there are now some prominent interveners.
• A ruling by the Copyright Board in Access Copyright’s quest to get a tariff on copying by provincial civil service employees.
• A hearing next May by the SCC on the interplay between the Status of the Artist Act and the Copyright Act and whether the National Gallery must negotiate exhibition rights, etc. with respect to pre-existing art works under the aegis of the former act rather than the latter, under which the artists have apparently never even tried to get a tariff at the Board.
• A hearing by the Federal Court of Appeal on whether Catherine Leuthold gets the $22 million or so that she believes she is owed by CBC for the few apparently inadvertently unlicensed re-uses of a few of her still photos from 9/11 that the Federal Court said was worth less than $20,000 and what the cost consequences may be to her if she does not succeed.
• A hearing beginning February 11, 2014 by the Copyright Board of the Access Copyright proposed Post-Secondary Tariff, in which the AUCC has spent almost $2 million that we know about and withdrawn its objections, leaving its members without any representation in a hearing in which Access Copyright is seeking what it considers to be a “mandatory” tariff.
• A hearing by the Copyright Board beginning April 29, 2014 into Access Copyright’s proposed tariff for K-12 schools, which is taking place notwithstanding that the K-12 school boards have stopped paying anything to AC under the previous tariff.

• How will the educational community react to York’s defence of the Access Copyright litigation?
• Will Access Copyright sue one or more K-12 school boards?
• Whether the Government will look at growing calls to deal with certain issues involving the Copyright Board, some of which could be dealt with by regulation, rather than legislation.
• Whether Canada gives into expected American and/or European pressure to extend the copyright term to life + 70 years, etc. and other potentially controversial US and EU IP demands in the TPP and/or CETA negotiations.
• Whether the far reaching Bill C-56 dealing with anti-counterfeiting – but which goes far beyond what might be required even by ACTA – is reintroduced after the expected prorogation, whether changes will be made before it is re-introduced, and what will happen to it if it proceeds through the committee process.

“Shine” rolling papers are thin sheets of real gold you can use to smoke weed, if you have $60.

Mr. Heaney, a widely celebrated Irish poet who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1995, is recognized as one of the major poets of the 20th century.

Vegetable prices in India spiked 46.59% in July year over year, another ugly bullet point in the country’s persistent struggle with massive food inflation.

The longer story is here.

Last week an Indian truck was hijacked for its forty tons of onions.  Here are Brendan Greeley and Kartik Goyal on India’s onion price crisis.

By the way, the falling rupee is not helping India’s export performance.  The rupee is also creating planning horizon problems for Indian corporations.

Hairy bacon, Canadian French and leopard print: all words axed from the online vocabulary in China, according to a new book published by a University of Toronto researcher.

Josef Ackermann, the former chief of Deutsche Bank, resigned Thursday over the apparent suicide of the insurer’s chief financial officer.

There’s a hexagon of cloud at Saturn’s north pole. It surrounds the pole at 77 degrees north latitude, making it wider than two Earths. First discovered by Voyager in the early 1980s, it was still there in 2009, nearly 30 years later.

“The longevity of the hexagon makes this something special, given that weather on Earth lasts on the order of weeks,” said Caltech astronomer Kunio Sayanagi. “It’s a mystery on par with the strange weather conditions that give rise to the long-lived Great Red Spot of Jupiter.”

No one knows what causes the hexagon or how it has remained organized for so long. JPL atmospheric scientist Kevin Baines called it “one of the most bizarre things we’ve ever seen in the solar system.”

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A cyclist was taken to hospital with serious injuries after he was struck by a vehicle at Kennedy Road near Stratton Avenue.

The retired judge appointed by Toronto's police chief to head a review of police use-of-force policies has announced he is stepping aside because of a potential conflict of interest.

Putting together an eye-catching resume is an important part of landing a job. However, this is not how you do it… [via dorkly]

Have you visited Pleated Jeans today?

Australian meat pies are now available in Toronto courtesy of local bakers Megan Chan and Erynn Mayes and their new company Kanga Pies. Previously a hit at the Toronto Underground Market, the range of hand-made handheld pies will initially be sold exclusively at Sanagan's Meat Locker starting tomorrow with Hot Oven Bakery locations to follow in September.

After attending school together in Waterloo, the two founders spent a year together Down Under before relocating to Toronto where they spotted an unfulfilled niche in the Hogtown food scene for the traditional Aussie dining practice of having a pie in one hand, and a pint in the other.

Utilising Sanagan's locally sourced meat, they began working on mastering the style they remembered from Oz. Collaborating with their friend Monica on perfecting the crust, they ran through over 100 different recipes before finally settling on a 100% butter puff pastry.

'We were just three girls with a rolling pin', recalls Erynn. Finally launching in October of 2012, they took a test run of 500 pies to TUM, and sold out incredibly quickly. Repeating the feat again persuaded the pair to push their passion project forward, and the deal with Sanagan's soon followed.

The debut line-up features four different recipes. The Traditional Aussie pie is minced beef with a savoury tomato and vegemite gravy, whilst the Steak'n'Bacon is braised in Amsterdam's Nut Brown Ale. Also available are Butter Chicken and a Creamy Zucchini (roasted zucchini, in a garlic cheese sauce), all retailing for $6.

If you want to meet them, or live west of Downtown, they'll also be hosting launch events when their pies go on sale at Hot Oven Bakery's locations at both Kingsway (Friday 6th to Sunday 8th September for the Taste of The Kingsway Festival) and Roncesvalles (for the Polish Festival on September 14th and 15th), where you'll also be able to sample the pies with their delicious home-made ketchup.

Photos by Natta Summerky

Rob Ford, the embattled Toronto mayor accused of smoking crack cocaine, laughed as he told reporters that he has smoked "a lot" of marijuana.

In a case that raises questions about the accountability of those tied to Communist Party leaders, the son of celebrity singers is one of five defendants accused of raping and beating a woman.

WASHINGTON—According to a study released Wednesday by the Center for Media and Social Research, 25-foot-tall Asian women are still vastly underrepresented in the nation’s mainstream media.

An American man was fined $500 Saturday night after he swallowed a beloved human toe belonging to a Canadian bar.

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If you have ever headed to Bellwoods on your fixie to drool over plaid-clad dudes and their dogs, have I got a treat for you. The best thing ever has maybe just been invented: earlier today Reddit user brazilliandanny posted a Bellwoods-themed bingo card. Forget B-13, okay? If you've got a fedora, a beard, or something "vintage," you basically win here.

Sure, it might not be the real thing, but it is one accurate satire. What's more, is it provides something to do other than keep busy hiding one's tallboy. And, further, couldn't bingo be classified as ironic, now? (Alanis, where you at?).

Practicing drawing buildings