On August 1, 2023, news links disappeared from Facebook and Instagram for people in Canada. No court issued a publication ban. No minister ordered a takedown. Parliament passed a law that would have forced Meta to pay Canadian publishers for making news available. Meta’s answer was to stop making news available. That distinction matters. Most…
A municipal bylaw in Canada becomes law when the local council follows the process set out in provincial legislation and in the municipality’s own procedure bylaw. In most provinces that means three separate readings at meetings open to the public, then signatures. Some bylaws also need advertised notice, a public hearing, or provincial approval before…
Rock salt does not heat the ice. It makes a brine that freezes colder than water, and that brine has a floor. On a real driveway or road, ordinary sodium chloride is already a poor bet around –9°C. The bag most people buy is sodium chloride. In a lab, a perfect mix of that salt…
In most Canadian provinces, a commissioner of oaths can administer oaths and witness affidavits or statutory declarations for use inside that province. A notary public can usually do that work plus certify true copies and authenticate signatures on documents meant for use outside the province or outside Canada. Quebec is the exception: a notaire is…
How much income you need to buy a house in Canada depends on the province. A typical home in New Brunswick and a typical home in British Columbia are not the same purchase, and the mortgage stress test treats them that way. This page uses July 2026 typical-home (benchmark) prices, then estimates the gross household…
The Black Death was the first and deadliest wave of the second plague pandemic. In the late 1340s and early 1350s it spread from central Eurasia through the Black Sea and the Mediterranean into large parts of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. It was caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis. That is no…
The water cycle, also called the hydrologic cycle, is the continuous movement of water on, above, and below the surface of Earth. The total amount of water on the planet has remained essentially constant for billions of years. What changes is its form and location. Water exists as liquid in oceans, rivers, lakes, and soil;…
A star spends its life in a contest between two forces. Gravity pulls its gas inward. Pressure pushes back—first from heat, then from nuclear fusion in the core. For most of the star’s life those forces stay in balance. Astronomers call that balance hydrostatic equilibrium. When the fuel runs out, the balance breaks. What happens…
A mini-split that suddenly blows cooler air, goes quiet outside, or sends up a cloud of “smoke” in January is usually doing its job. In heating mode the outdoor coil is the cold part of the system. It pulls heat from outdoor air. When that coil is colder than freezing and the air is damp,…
The National Basketball Association announced on September 2 that the Los Angeles Clippers violated salary-cap circumvention rules in the league’s collective bargaining agreement and imposed penalties on the franchise, owner Steve Ballmer, two team executives, and forward Kawhi Leonard. According to the NBA, a summary report prepared by the law firm Wachtell Lipton found that…