Hamilton Ontario

A coworker who just relocated here from the US has had her housing options fall through, she intends to buy a house ASAP but has to find somewhere to stay for now, and the rental company for the apartment she was going to take is not answering her. They are a professional couple with one cat, both of the houses they tried to buy ended up failing inspection so now she's in a bit of a bind. Can anyone give advice?

cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/61582484

A crucial first step

On June 4th, Hamilton's Committee of Adjustment voted to deny a land severance application (pdf) by Slate Asset Management which, if approved, would have accelerated Slate's plans to build a hyperscale data centre by the waterfront.

The denial was in no small part due to the overwhelming response from Hamiltonians; the Committee member who moved to deny the application even cited the collective effort as the reason for the denial. Residents showed up in large numbers - thousands signed petitions, nearly 1800 sent written submissions to the Committee, and dozens spoke at the meeting itself, for nearly 8 hours in total.1

Perhaps most importantly, around 1000 people showed up physically outside City Hall at 8:30am on a Thursday - on just a few days' notice - making it absolutely clear that we will not allow those with money and power to unilaterally impose these data centres on our city.

But despite this win, the fight is far from over.

"And the Steelport site is indeed zoned to allow data centres, seemingly of any size; the M5 zoning allows for a "Research and Development Establishment" use case, which, according to its definition, allows for a "Computer, Electronic and Data Processing Establishment" - a definition last updated in 2010, surely never meant to include the massive hyperscale data centres of today."

Hey Hamilton,

Posted on /r/Hamilton 2 years ago looking for tech folks - www.reddit.com/r/Hamilton/comments/143d9jr/just_landed_in_hamilton_looking_for_cyber/ . Got a swell reaction!

The world's changed since then - we've all watched what happens when communication infrastructure gets cut, when platforms get censored, when "the cloud" becomes someone else's political weapon.

TL;DR, I am a real guy, who has no sell ... I simply love technology and believe it's being used to control us.

I'd like to change that dynamic.

Let's sit down and have a real cup of coffee. That's it. Talk tech, what we got going on.

Today, while posting this below ( and subsequently arguing with the admin of /r/Hamilton got me perma-banned... techs aren't allowed to set up "meetups". Can't even reoccurring Coffee Shop invite... That's unfair when I'm trying to give away services, knowledge and time for free.

What I've been building: Self-hosted communication (Matrix servers) Local AI that doesn't send your data to Silicon Valley (chatbots, RAG, recursion) Backup systems that work when the internet doesn't (immich/photoprism, Plex/Jellyfin, OS level, metastatic) Digital infrastructure you actually own

Not trying to sell anything or start some grand movement. Just a 31-year-old guy whose wife is tired of hearing about server configurations and thinks I should find some actual humans who get why this stuff matters. I'm offering my time to sit down; let's just chat about our projects, sustainability, and potentially leverage some of our resources together.

I have some of my own - yet unreleased products I'd like to have a few sample... https://backup.wiuf.net/ an example (this page while live isn't broadcasted beyond this post, we're in alpha testing with private developers - but this is a taste of the architecture we want to see). A "Gift-Economy" model for trading storage spaces with your peers - your own friends, on your own decentralized server. Just one example of a few.

The reality: When systems fail - whether it's Rogers going down for a day or something more serious - having your own infrastructure isn't just a hobby anymore. It's insurance.

If you're working on similar projects, dealing with the same "how do I actually own my data" questions, or just want to talk tech over coffee without the startup pitch energy, drop me a DM.

Not looking to organize anything huge. Just quiet conversations about building resilient systems in an increasingly fragile world. Lessons and sharing of resources as we're able or desire... ultimately, the ability for us to create circles where locally we can get together to gab.

That's all...

Casey Tunturi https://www.caseytunturi.com/briefings/overview

I found this and shared it bc I wanted to tell a true story:
I have 3 kids, born in '85, 87, & '89, and throughout the early nineties, I would relive my childhood and hop a bus w/them on a random Saturday to go to the downtown Farmers' Market.
Every so often we would traipse over to the Art Gallery, and hang out for a bit, appreciating...(they're great kids, immaculately behaved, thank god...)

It was only on about our 15th visit that I discovered there was an admission fee! We'd always just wandered in, even greeted the staff!
And never been challenged?
I've always found it odd that no one ever said anything.

American ruling, reported by a UK paper, nevertheless food for thought as Hamilton (and everywhere) grapples with these issues.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/40997702

Not Hammer but Simcoe.
Make no mistake - this was 100% targeted and racial.

Google Maps says 'temporarily closed'.

I realize the encampments are problematic for lots of reasons and the solutions aren't easy but leave these poor people alone.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19504574