Black Friday Week In Canada ?
Yesterday I happen to go shopping at my local Real Canadian Superstore when I was handed a flyer saying they were having a Black Friday sale. So now I’m on the hunt to find other Canadian retailers that have decided to follow this American tradition, for some deals.
It appears that I’ve just missed an early Black Friday sale at Tiger Direct Canada but I’m guessing they will probably have a sale on the day itself, or perhaps a sale through-out the week.
Amazon.com
Sears Canada is currently running their own version of Black Friday week up to midnight Tuesday so they could be planning on having an official Black Friday sale.
Bestbuy and Future Shop are not having Black Friday week sales but keeping their best deals for next weekend. Details can be obtained by subscribing to their newsletter.
Newegg.ca are offering discounts on weekends through-out “Black November”. And though not officially calling their specials a Black Friday sale like their American counterpart, iNetVideo Canada appears to be offering similar deals on blu-rays and DVDs (Click Here to shop iNetVideo.ca Now!
).
Shop.ca and chapters.indigo.ca are only offering free shipping for now but they may do something on Friday.
In regards to holiday cards and calendars, Personalized Calendars are 50% off at Vistaprint until the 30th. It also appears that Zazzle Canada are also going to offer deals on their products this week.
Rexall Pharmaplus Coupon
A coupon for $5 off a $25 iTunes gift card can be found on some Rexall Pharmaplus flyers.
Valid from November 2nd to November 15th, this coupon is only redeemable from print flyers so check your mailbox or local store for a copy. Click here to locate your nearest store.
More Free Content Promised
iTunes has announced that they will be adding more free content to their catalog, including full length albums and television episodes, which can be streamed to computers and devices using their software and apps.
Full length album previews and television episodes had been available from legal sources for years but I am hoping this will fill in some of the gaps.
For example, we still don’t have services like Hulu here in Canada and some television episodes are inaccessible to us because of distribution rights issues.
The availability of full length album previews may also reduce previewing on peer to peer networks and questionable foreign web sites. And Walmart’s Vudu service will soon be introduced into Canada so consumers should soon be able to access more content.
One Step Forward, Two Steps Back
The Copyright Modernization Act passed through the legislative process and obtained royal assent in June of this year. And though I am critical of the technological protection measure provisions, the bill is still a step forward. But it appears that the lobbyists in the United States are attempting to reverse many of the provisions in this legislation through the Trans Pacific Partnership trade negotiations.
The International Intellectual Property Alliance want to circumvent our democratic processes in order to force our government to enact RIAA style prosecutions in Canada.
They are demanding new penalties for intellectual property violations, new processes in which internet providers are forced to police the internet on their behalf and the removal of the $5000 liability cap on non-commercial infringement.
But their demands don’t end there.
They want an extension of the copyright term up to the American standard and want our customs officers to search people for copyright violations upon entry, without a search warrant.
At the moment copyright is limited to life plus 50 years, meaning an author will own his works up to his death and his estate would retain copyright on these works for 50 years after the author’s death.
The Americans extended their copyright term to life plus 70 years and added additional provisions to their Copyright Act extending copyright on published works to 95 years from publication, which could be renewed resulting in a term of 120 years in some instances.
So, not only do they want to practically eliminate our public domain
but they also want us to be burdened with longer lines at our airports and border crossings so searches can be performed on laptop hard drives and media players.
These amendments were ineffective in the United States, having failed to prevent 96.68 million BitTorrent downloads in the first half of 2012 according to the Musicmetric Digital Music Index, so why would they work in Canada ?
He Said It, He Did It
Sam Sniderman, the founder of Sam The Record Man, has died at the age of 92.
The Sam The Record Man chain was founded in 1937 and had become Canada’s largest chain of record stores by 1982, which enabled the chain to be a major promoter of Canadian music.
In 1961, their flagship store at 347 Yonge Street in Toronto opened and had become a landmark due to its pair of rotating neon signs, which were prominently featured in film and television including Marvel’s “The Incredible Hulk” and one of my favorite music videos, Alphaville’s “Big In Japan”.
Unfortunately, the chain and flagship store closed by mid 2007 due to competition and advancements in music distribution technology. But Sam The Record Man will be remembered for his contributions to the Canadian music industry, including the independent scene, which flourished in the 80’s and 90’s because of his support.
Sam The Record Man RIP 1920-2012
E-Reader News For Canadians
It appears that Walmart will stop selling the Amazon Kindle e-reader line
On the other hand, the Kobo Mini eReader and Kobo Glo eReader
will be released in October. The full color Kobo Arc
will also be made available that month.
Unfortunately Barnes & Noble does not ship its Nook
line of eReaders and tablets to Canada.