3. Timothy’s Letters | Timothy Comeau

A. Letter to Google News
From: news-feedback@google.com
To: Timothy Comeau
Subject: Re: Google Arts News [#930186]
Date: Thursday 26 September 2002 2:46 PM

Dear Timothy,
Thanks for your helpful email about Google News. We’re considering a number of improvements based on feedback from our users, and we will certainly pass your comments on to our engineers. Given that we’re still fine-tuning this service, it’s too early for us to know which of the many great ideas we’ve received will be implemented. Thanks again for taking the time to write us and please visit Google News in the coming weeks to see our additions and improvements.

For the latest on Google News and other Google innovations, you may want to sign up for our Google Friends newsletter at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/google-friends/

Regards, The Google Team

—–Original Message—–
From: Timothy Comeau
Subject: Google Arts News
Date: Thu, 26 Sep 2002 02:41:43 -0400
I really like the Google news so far, but think you definitely need an arts page. I don’t give a shit about sports so your algorithms are wasting processing power on that one when it comes to people like me – and you know there are a lot of us out there! The lack of arts coverage in the media in general is depressing. With Google News which is new and hot, why shouldn’t you add to your hipness by making sure arts gets covered just as thoroughly as sports?

Thanks,

Timothy Comeau
Toronto

B. Letter to CBC Newsworld Program CounterSpin
From: “counterSpin”
To: “Timothy Comeau”
Subject: Re: not that pleased
Date: Friday 18 October 2002 10:25 AM
Timothy:

Thanks for your comments. CounterSpin is an independent co-production and all decisions regarding scheduling, broadcast frequency and commercials are made by the CBC management. I encourage you to forward your comments directly to the CBC through cbcinput@toronto.cbc.ca, or by contacting CBC President Robert Rabinovitch.

Brent Preston
Senior Producer
At 01:11 AM 10/18/02 -0400, you wrote:
>Eeeewwww….
>
>….it seems that whenever the higherups take a great show and make it
>once a week, than it’s on its way to being cancelled….
>
>Counterspin is such a great and important show (though you too often have
>the same right-wing windbags on -Jonathan Kay from the National Post and
>Jason Kenny from the Alliance Party / please find more intelligent people
>to articulate the views of the right -who with them as their spokespersons-
>often seem like the Wrong Wing, which can’t be true given that they’re so
>popular out west….) that I would hate to see it made irrelevant by being
>on only once a week. Please say that it’ll be on for at least an hour and
>half, or failing that, commercial free. Last season you were lucky to have
>any conversations at all, since you kept going to commercials (which is
>actually quite insulting to the demographic who is watching the show,
>young people like myself who are concerned about contemporary
>politics/state of the world, and not McCain’s french fries).
>
>Regardless, I’m looking forward to the new season.
>
>yrs,
>
>Timothy Comeau
>
>ps. I’d nominate Mark Kingwell from U of T to be the new host (if his
>schedule permits of course. I also realized it’s far fetched, but hey,
>wouldn’t that he great?) or Daniel Richler (god Big Life was a great show)

C. Letter to his MP
From: Timothy Comeau
To: McTeague.D@parl.gc.ca
Cc: email@danmcteague.net
Subject: Please support the Kyoto Accord
Date: Monday 21 October 2002 8:11 PM
—————————————————————————–
To: Right Honorable Dan McTeague
Member of Parliment for Pickering, Ajax & Uxbridge
Room 302 Justice Building
House of Commons
Ottawa, Ontario
Canada
K1A 0A6
Mon. 21 October 2002

I simply want to express my support for the Kyoto Accord, and hope that you will be voting in favour of it when it comes up later this year.

I am a young person (27) who is very concerned about the world I am in the process of inheriting. While I understand that Kyoto will have economic consequences, I believe that scaremongering on this basis is both irresponsible and representative of a narrow minded parochial view. It would seem to me that those so heavily invested in a fossil-fuel based economy are refusing to see the economic benefits (and I would think, great opportunities) of a Green based one. The jobs that will be lost are – like an “executioner”- jobs that probably shouldn’t exist in the first place, since they are detrimental to the long-term survival of the biosphere.

You are from a generation older than mine. You have experienced and enjoyed an ecosystem that will probably not exist for my children or grandchildren. This is something new for us as human beings and as citizens of Canada; the rural generations of a century ago did not imagine their descendants not enjoying clean rivers and clean air. Why should we make the future pay for our selfishness? Kyoto may be considered a small and almost insignificant step, but we have to start somewhere.

Please vote in favor of Kyoto. You can count on my vote in the next election if you do.

Sincerely,
Timothy Comeau
tim@instantcoffee.org