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Discussion (24 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews
I think it's more like "for some reason, monitors are called debuggers in later microcomputing."
[1] https://www.tpug.ca/tpug-media/tpugmag/TPUG_Issue_15_1985_Ju...
This is part of the issue; the GTA is solidly in the east (the centre of Canada is in Manitoba), but when someone says, "eastern Canada", one automatically thinks "Nova Scotia", but Toronto is a relatively short drive from New York City. That being said, I understand that in most cases, "central" is referring to population, industry, finance (not fashion - that's Montrėal).
Regarding the site, the exhibit's producer, Zbigniew Stachniak, wrote an excellent book [0] on the world's first truly portable computer: the MCM/70 - which ran APL (yay!).
[0] https://www.mqup.ca/Books/I/Inventing-the-PC2
And that shift of centrality from Montreal to Toronto was surprisingly recent too, very much post war.
Montreal, and Quebec, absolutely feel like a separate country from the rest.
It is really geographically "midwest" by US standards, not "east"
When I was in elementary school in Alberta in the 80s we called this "central Canada." And that's how I still think of it. But there's a growing trend especially in Alberta to call this "down east" which is in my mind a very political way of "othering" what is actually geographically quite central and economically and demographically as well.
As as Maritimer who moved to Toronto (but who came of age as an adult outside the Maritimes), your comment def wakes me up to the moral imperative of resisting the Toronto-centric framing in whatever ways I can
Then I moved to Toronto in 1996 in the .com boom. I had spent plenty of time in Vancouver but living in Toronto was night and day in terms of vibrancy, culture, activity, economy. Toronto was a real living city and even Vancouver didn't compare. TLDR there's a reason why the country is in part Toronto centric. There's just a lot going on there. A lot of people, a lot of money, and a lot of culture. In the 90s especially it really was "downtown Canada." That would have been even more so in the period this article is talking about. It has nothing to do with Toronto people thinking they're superior, it has to do with the fact that this is the 3rd or 4th (depending how you count it) largest city in North America and nothing else in Canada even comes close.
I have lived both sides and most of my family is still in Alberta. The persecution complex out there is 100% bullshit. Nobody in reality is treating Alberta badly. It actually gets a remarkably good deal in confederation -- selling oil and gas to the rest of the country. Hydrocarbons aren't the centre of existence. Even after all these years of neglect and downgrading the manufacturing economies of central Canada are still a massive part of the GDP of the country, and the industrial policies that apply for them are not necessarily the same as for energy or forestry exports and that needs to be recognized.
Not to mention that this part of the world is where the bulk of the population still is. Yet I hear people in Alberta routinely talk about how they're somehow holding the whole country up. It's not factually correct. Not even close, unless you play wilful distortion of how equalization works.
Also, we are some of the the biggest customers of Alberta, Line 9 runs right behind my farm. 90% of the oil used here in Ontario is purchased via that line from Alberta, pumped from Edmonton. I also fail to see recognition of this from many pundits in Alberta. Even Harper was spreading misinformation about "Saudi oil tankers coming up the St Lawrence" -- that's just bullshit. The only part of our country that uses middle eastern imports is Atlantic Canada, for obvious reasons.
I don't see it as colonial at all. I think certain people got very aggressive when necessary moves were made around climate regulation. As a person who lived half their live in Alberta, and half their life here... I just think those people are wrong. a) It's wrong for Alberta to be so dependent on hydrocarbons and it needs to diversify b) Climate change is real and Alberta's exports play a significant role in that.
There is a lot of ... motivated ... disinformation spread by various actors in Alberta. People should be skeptical.
Back when I worked in Toronto, people would always ask when I'd be moving there - because why would you want to live anywhere else?
I also remember, circa 2000, when the marketing people at the company I worked at were talking about advertising - they didn't see the point of spending on advertising outside of Toronto.
It's a very different mindset, that's for sure.