BC Children’s Hospital, which has been running a home lottery for several years, has recently surpassed the 60% point in their ticket sales. But that’s not the fresh bit. What is fresh is the huge 10th-floor condominium in Concord Pacific’s Cooper’s Lookout. The ENTIRE 10th floor! Way cool. The views are phenomenal. Check out their details at the BC Children’s Hospital Lottery web site.
We’ve also found some basic information about the BC Children’s Hospital Lottery here as well.
Fresh Bit
If you’re searching for a charity lottery to spend a $100 or so in, look first to Dream Lottery Canada. I was looking for the new Variety Club lottery and found this interesting directory. It looks like they’ve listed pretty much every big charity lottery in Canada, and give some basic information about each one - number of tickets, prices, prizes, etc.
Very handy.
btw - here’s the page about the newest Variety Club lotto.
Fresh Bit
Recently in the news there have been stories about how a Staples Business Depot in Ottawa sold a returned hard drive containing hundreds of personal files on it. See the original article here, and here.
No doubt Staples should have some procedure in place to ensure that returned equipment is in “like new” condition when it’s resold. And in this case - meaning free of any data.
But I fail to see why Staples is being singled out here. Everyone - including individuals and companies - is responsible for protecting personal information under Canadian privacy legislation. And that includes Professor Jill Vickers and her son. The law doesn’t differentiate between companies and regular people. Prof. Vickers and her son had a responsibility to ensure that the data was wiped clean - completely clean - from the hard disk prior to returning it to Staples. That’s the law. Simply deleting the files is not sufficient. And that’s assuming they were in fact deleted.
Here’s how most responsible companies deal with hard drives: They’re destroyed. Not returned to the manufacturer. Simply destroyed. Taken apart by IT staff and the platters smashed. At the very least, the drive is completely wiped clean with specialized software.
It’s not rocket science, people. I own a data processing company, and we’ve had our share of flaky hard drives. Never once have we returned one. Under warranty or not, if they’re pulled from service, they’re physically destroyed. It’s the cost of doing business when you deal with confidential information.
Fresh Bit
A couple of friends of ours joined Weight Watchers recently and have been really pleased. They’re not really trying to lose a whole bunch of weight, just a little, and also trying to focus on just eating in moderation.
Anyways, I created a little points calculator for them. Enter the calories, and the grams of fat & fiber, and it will do the quick math for you. Bon Appetit!
Fresh Bit
“Mega” lotteries and raffles in Canada are an important tool used by hospital foundations and other charitable organizations to raise large amounts of money to support their causes. All of them have web sites, and in some markets, the competition to sell tickets is fierce. After all, only so many people out there are willing to support their local hospitals by purchasing a lottery ticket.
One site we’ve always used is Dream Lottery Canada, which purports to list all the active charitable lotteries in Canada. I cannot say for sure whether the claim is true, but it certainly lists most of them. I noticed recently that they changed the format of their site, and I have to say I think it looks pretty good.
In this economy, helping to support charitable causes and health care is an important thing to do. And Dream Lottery Canada seems to fulfill that goal admirably.
Now that’s a Fresh Bit.
Fresh Bit
Yesterday I received a call from a Telus rep asking if I had a moment to review the calling plans I was subscribed to. “Sure”, I said. Well, basically, I wound up removing a feature I’ve never used, and getting a better rate on my long distance as well. And I save $8 a month.
Ok, I know this isn’t a new idea, and that Telus has been doing for years, but I always appreciate the gesture from them.
It seems to me that good customer service has been in decline lately, and so Telus continues to get my vote and my business.
Now that’s a Fresh Bit.
Fresh Bit
I’ll start off this blog with something near and dear to me…
I like to support health care, and I do donate to several hospital foundations in the Vancouver area. But I also like the home lotteries that a few of them put on each year, and this year, I am really impressed with the home that the Millionaire Lottery is offering as the grand prize. I like it so much I’m going to go back with my camera and ask to take a few shots for this blog. It’s a big house, like the lotteries used to give away back in the day, and the furniture and decorating is simply beautiful. Definitely a home that makes me again think “Wow!”.
Too bad the old Surrey Memorial lottery isn’t running any longer; I enjoy a little competition, and this Millionaire prize home would really have been a great one to compare to the Surrey lottery.
Love it. Love it. Love it.
Now that’s a Fresh Bit.
Fresh Bit
Health Care, Millionaire Lottery, VGH