Telemarketing Now Illegal

At the risk of pointing out the obvious, the domestic telemarketing industry is now dead . Essentially, by the end of the week, everybody in Canada will have registered his or her phone number on the Do Not Call List . The list is to be paid for by telemarketers subscribing to it. But since everybody will be on it, there won't be much point in subscribing.

Wouldn't it have been simpler, and cheaper, just to make telemarketing illegal? And why do companies that I no longer do business with have 18 months of legal pestering. Just so you know, If you leave our company, we will call you every day for the next year in a half... WTF!

If you are a telemarketer, simply set up shop in a border town. Your American division can call Canada and your Canadian division can call the USA. Granted, finding clients for this dubious activity might be harder than before. But if you were willing to dirty your brand with telemarketing before, I'm not sure why this list would stop you now. 

At least I don't have a house in Miami

I really took a beating on the stock market yesterday and I wasn't able to enjoy the upswing today because the stocks were sold for me by my broker to cover a margin call. Ah, the joys of leveraged investments (what the heck was I thinking!). My leverage was only 60% (i.e. I had the money for 40% of the value of my stock, the other 60% was borrowed). But you have to feel sorry for the folks in South Florida who did what many people do: borrowed money to buy a house. Even if they didn't borrow money, they lost an average of 28% last year. That is some serious change on a median house price of  $276,000!

And as anybody in New Brunswick can tell you, those prices leave plenty of room to fall (you can buy a sea-side house in New Brunswick, Canada, for less than half that.).

Check out this comment after this article in the Miami Herald :

fstasfq wrote on 09/30/2008 04:31:34 PM:

I went to a foreclosure auction on Sunday at the Miami Beach Convention Center and I was able to pick up a bank owned 1650 sq ft 3/2 two car garage home for $125K which was previously sold about a year ago for $302K. I was approved by Chase, the current owner, for financing in about 5 minutes after they ran my credit and reviewed my income and liabilities. My payment is going to be $1,300/month with escrow. I can easily rent it for $1,400. If you have good credit and money for a down payment there are great deals out there.

If you are making a "profit" of $100 a month on your investment (before taxes and maintenance) and house prices are going down an average of 28% per year, that is one lousy investment!

Google Chrome, With the Right Computer, it Rocks

Once I got over the disappointment over the fact that their wasn't actually any chrome colour in Google's new Browser, I was impressed with the speed of delivering web pages. However, I was not pleased with the speed of plug ins.

That was on my old computer. Since any money I save is surrendered to the stock market gods, I  broke down and bough a laptop computer. If you don't have one, get one. But I digress.

With a dual core computer and 3Gigs of RAM, Google Chromes preforms marvellously. Including with plug-ins (granted, downloading and installing them is a bit of a pain).

The core of Google Chrome is Webkit. That core is also used by Safari. That is why few notice any noticeable speed improvements with Chrome over Safari. But I use Internet Explorer at work, so using Google Chrome makes home just that much better (yes, I realise the point of a laptop is to use it outside of your home, but I use it to blog in bed).

So let's recap, IE6 at work (because I work for idiots), Safari on my iPhone (no choice), IE7 on my older desktop and Google Chrome on my brand new laptop. 

Aol Radio: new but not so improved

AOL Radio was too good to last. But instead of saying, "sorry, we are losing money on this, the end", they are pretending they have improved the product. Granted, they aren't pretending that hard (from the AOL web site ):

The old AOL Radio (version 3.6) had 170 custom stations in 16 music categories. All the stations were commercial free and streamed in CD quality stereo-sound (if you were connecting to the Internet with a high speed connection) and also optimized for a dial-up connection. Now AOL Radio brings you SHOUTcast which has the largest directory of links to streaming Radio on the Internet. 

Ah yes, 170 streaming CD quality commercial free stations replaced by a directory of commercial infested low sound quality on-line radio. Gee thanks.

Update (a few minutes later): um, yeah, mea-culpa. AOL Radio is still awesome, now more so. Turns out the directory of on-line radio is in addition to the AOL streaming CD quality commercial free radio. Get it, use it. Free music never sounded this good. 

 

The Urbane Prefer the NDP

NDP surge in cities as Liberals languish: Poll Toronto Star

War in Afghanistan: Conservative Party

Fight Against Global Warming: Liberal Party

For everything else, there is the NDP.  

Urbane According to Dictionary.com 

1   having the polish and suavity regarded as characteristic of sophisticated social life in major cities: an urbane manner.

2.	reflecting elegance, sophistication, etc., esp. in expression:He maintained an urbane tone in his letters.

Alternatives to the Trillion Dollar Bail Out

The President of the United States is about to give a speach to
convince Americans that spending 700 billion dollars to buy delinquent
mortgages is a good idea.

It isn't. Unlike in Canada, there are thousands of banks in the USA.
Even if thousands fail, there still will be thousands left.

Obviously, the risk is a recession. A recession is caused by rich
people sitting on their money. They refuse to lend or invest it, and
the economy suffers.

However, you could certainly argue that if the government spent 700
billion dollars in other ways, there would be no recession.

Top ten ways to spend 700 billion dollars ($2000 per American).

1. Buy everybody an iPhone and $1000 to spend on iTunes and the app
store.

2. Buy everybody an X-Box and 3 years of online gaming.

3. Extend the New York City subway to Washington DC.

4. Buy everybody an HD TV and a year of free cable/satellite TV.

5. Buy everybody $2000 worth of Amtrack tickets.

6. Invade Saudi Arabia.

7. Extend the Washington DC subway to New York City.

8. Buy Alberta.

9. Build a mega aiport outside Boston and force all European traffic
to transit there.

10. Everybody is going to Dysney World

Envoyé depuis mon iPhone / Sent from my iPhone.

Slacker Uprising is Boring

If you watch the entire "free" movie "Slacker Uprising", I'll give you
my underwear.

Slacker Uprising is a terrible movie. There are no visuals. It is like
Farengheit 911, the low budget version, now with 90% more Moor.

Why would Moor think anybody would want to watch this?

I guess he can't always score home runs like Bowling for Columbine and
Sicko. Put Slacker Uprising in with Canadian Bacon: registered error.

At least it is free. Google "Slacker Uprising" to watch it free. I
watched the MPEG 4 version on my iPhone. Not that there is anything
wrong the the with PC version.

Envoyé depuis mon iPhone / Sent from my iPhone.

New and Improved Georgia

South Ossetians have their own language and culture, and now they have
their own country.

Has the iPhone Camera Improved?

This is a live action picture of my TV taken using my iPhone (Reese
Witherspoon in Rendition, 2007). Call me crazy, but hasn't the picture
quality, exposure and autofocus, vastly improved since the 2.1 update
a week ago?

IPhone App Review: TV Forecast Does Not Work

I just paid $3 for the iPhone app "TV Forecast" and I know regret it.
As you can see in the screen caption, all the shows come up as To Be
Announced; even new episodes that play later today.

In conclusion, TV forecast sucks.

Top Ten Progressive Reasons to Vote Conservative

For most people, all the parties have pros and cons. But if you are a left leaning social democrat, aka bleeding heart Liberal, voting Conservative would seem rather odd.

However, this is a Federal election. And as such, there are some compelling reasons to vote Conservative after Thanksgiving Day.

Top Ten Progressive Reasons to Vote Conservative:

1. Lower federal taxes for the rich or businesses leaves more room for the provinces to tax the rich and businesses. Money is more likely to be spent on health care, education and welfare if taxed at the provincial level.

2. Less corporate welfare. The Conservatives aren't above it, but they do subsidize corporations a lot less than the Liberals. Corporate welfare is hugely expensive and adds major inefficiencies into the economy. Less corporate welfare makes us all richer and leaves more money for healthcare, education and human welfare.

3. War. The Conservatives certainly talk more about war and national defence, but it is left leaning parties that send us there the most. The Liberals of Jean Chretien sent troops to Somalia, the former Yugoslavia and Afghanistan, among other places. The Harper Conservatives haven't sent troops to any new country.

4. Free Trade. All 3 parties are officially pro WTO (or whatever it is called now). World trade makes things cheaper, and if you are Canadian and like fruit in January, it is rather important. But face it, what party is more likely to lower Canadian duty despite specific industry job losses?

5. Quebec. The NDP is extreemly unpopular in Quebec because they want to put the Federal Government's noze (ie Anglo-Protestants) into the affairs of French speaking Catholic'ish Quebec. Obviously, the rest of Canada is less anglo-Protestant then ever. But nobody would call Canada French Catholic'ish. And even today, that is what Quebec is. In my humble opinion, Quebec is less likely to separate with the Conservatives in power in Ottawa. As a progressive, keeping likeminded Quebeckers in the country is essential.

Well, I'm stuck at five. I'll write more if I come up with anything.

Fwd: Donation, Alaskan Independance Party

I hope this doesn't get me on any no fly list. :-)

Envoyé depuis mon iPhone / Sent from my iPhone.

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Lynette Clark, Chairman" <---------@akip.org>
Date: 18 septembre 2008 12:40:30 HAA
To: ------@gmail.com
Subject: Donation

Dear -----,

Thank you very much for your donation to the Alaskan Independence Party.  Your monetary support of this Party is much appreciated!  It is "$" that help get AIP's message out to Alaskan and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your donation.

Sincerely,
Lynette Clark, Chairman
Alaskan Independence Party

It Takes Money, not Blogs, to Win an Election

You have a blog and you are encouraging the Internet to vote for your party. Super. But it takes money to win an election. Your money.

You want to influence the political outcome of this federal election (beond your anonymous vote), then give the legal maximum!

A four hundred dollar donation will only cost you 100 bucks. You will get the 300 back this Spring with your income tax return.

If you live outside Quebec, giving to the Bloc Québécois may be the only legal way to financially encourage Quebeckers to leave the country. I'm just saying.

Most of you, I assume, will give most of your allowed $1100 ($508 after tax credit) to the NDP. As you should. Otherwise, 600 billion dollar banking bailouts could spread north and cost you way more...

18 Per Cent of Americans Are Speratists

That 18% of Americans are separatist may or may not come as a surprise to you, especially if you have ventured out of New England and Florida. The civil war wasn't that long ago, after all.

Sarah Palin addressed the Alaska Independence party in the Spring of... 2008! "Keep of the good work" she told the audience (see video)!





According to the Alaska Independance Party web site, Sarah Palin attended a convention and registered as a member.

Contrary to initial reports, Vice-President candidate Governor Sarah Palin
was never a member of our party. We stand corrected. We issued a press release
today. It is posted here to those members of the media who did not recieve it.
Todd Palin was registered as a member but never participated in any party
activities aside from attending a convention in Wasilla at one time.

By they way, in case you were wondering, the Alaska Independence Party does accept international credit card and Pay Pal donations. Give generously. ;-)

According to the Baltimor Sun, seperatist from accrross the United States (united seperatists?) met in 2007 to discuss the dissolution of the United States.

The dominant idea among the delegates was that the U.S. experiment had
failed; it had become impractical, tragically ridiculous, its leaders and
institutions bought off, whored out, unaccountable and unanswerable to the needs
of citizens. The United States would have to be reborn smaller - our loyalties
realigned to the needs of localities - if the American dream was to
survive.

And this was before the government gave out 600 billion dollars to the New York City based financial industry.

Wouldn't it be embarrassing to Quebeckers if Scotland and parts of the United States separated before Quebec?

-ALTAVISTAGOOGLE: Jane Jacobs: Separatism and Sovereignty
-Alaskan Independence Party ;
-Palin's secession flirtationLos Angeles Times, CA - 3 Sep 2008Just when you thought you had him figured out, McCain threw another curveball -- picking rookie Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, whom he barely knows, ...
-Ten things you didn't know about Sarah Palin a week agoNew Zealand Herald, New Zealand - 3 Sep 2008Sarah Palin with John McCain. Photo / AP 2. She likes to tell likes to tell audiences that her favourite meal is moose-meat stew, preferably eaten after a ...

If You Need the Governement to Buy a Home, You can't Afford it!

"Applicants are not required to have a downpayment" (Home Ownership Program, Government of New Brunswick).

To simplify the current financial crises, too many people who couldn't afford houses bought one. Buying a house is a risky endeavor. Prices go up, prices go down. Your ability to pay your mortgage will vary: cost of oil, salary vs. inflation, etc...

So why for the love of goodness are we subsidising the buying of houses. New Brunswick subsidises new home buying to families making less than $35,000. Should families making 35 grand or less be buying new homes? No.

The federal government allows people to dip in to their RRSP to buy a house, tax free.

Now the Conservatives are promising $700 to people buying their first home. Hopefully that is an empty promise, because it is bad public policy.

We should also get rid of the tax holiday given to the few people able to turn a profit on their homes. Even the Americans don't allow you to make a million bucks tax free on your house.

Canada is still subsidising houses on the front end. The United States is now subsidising houses on the back end. Dolling out 600 billion dollars this year ($2000 per every American) to bail out, and take over, the mortgage industry. $2000 is almost half my yearly rent!

Let's recap, Americans are subsidising house buying which is responsible for the average American's sky high oil consumption. The American dream should be a dream, because when everybody attains it, it quickly turns into a nightmare.

Why Do Newspapers Charge For Old Articles?

The vast majority of the visits to my blog are to posts that are over 5 days old. In other words, the vast majority of the advertising revenu generated from my blog is from older articles.

 

The New York times gets it. You can have up to date advertising on out of date articles. Sadly, many other online papers don't. They are missing out on serious add money.

I Like Sarah Palin. There, I said it.

I've just been reading thru Sarah Palin's private emails and just like after watching Madona's Truth or Dare film, I like her more now. I think of her less as a freak, and more as a human being. And frankly, a human being I would trust with the White House.

 

-I don't share her religious beliefs, but as long as I'm free to eat ham, you could believe that Dinosaurs roamed the earth last Tuesday for all I care. As a member of a small religious minority (Agnostic), I have empathy for politicians who don't share the majority's religious views.

 

-As a former civil servant, I often think the more ignorant the politiciann the better. As Sarte said, you need to unlearn. When the politician knows little to begin with, there is no need for that unlearning process. As long as the politician knows how to read, or listen, they can make the correct decision (see my recommendation in bold in the introduction of my report).

 

- She is flexible. A good politician listens to the people, to the mood of the day.

 

-She has a Bachelors Degree from the University of Idaho. In journalism no less. Many of the journalist criticising her for her ignorance have the exact same education! In addition to living in Idaho and Alaska, she spent her first semester at the University of Hawaii. As any Canadian can relate to, going to the university of Hawaii proves very good judgment (Miami and San Diego would have also qualified).

 

-I didn't know what the Bush doctrine was either. And I'm an international news junkie.

 

-Lacking in travel. Prior to her Germany-Kuwait National Guard troop visit in 2007, Palin had been to the important countries: Canada and Mexico. So what if she's never been to any European capital. There will be plenty of time for that later. And most Americans and Canadians have never been to Alaska or the Yukon (or Hawaii and Idaho). Bill Clinton didn't have much travel experience either (granted, if you lived in Serbia or Irak during his bombings, you would have perhaps whished he had).  

 

 

Google Chrome Browser Not So Good After All

I was an early Google Chrome fan, but I find myself using Internet Explorer more. The reason: Chrome doesn't play well with others. Few third party software work well with Chrome on my older computer. Perhaps on multi core processors the experience is better. But to have a pdf file (Acrobat) freeze up my browser, in 2008, is just plane unacceptable.

 

That said, Chrome is a quick download in very easy to install. So try it. More importantly, IE can become corrupt and unusable, so it is a good idea to have a backup browser anyway.

CNN Linked to My Blog!

The most trusted name in news had a link to my blog on their site. CNN ! As a result, someone in Madrid, Spain, read my post criticizing the Spanish prohibition of democratic Basque Independence activities.

 

I might have to put some pants on when I leave my Moncton basement appartment to collect my Nobel Peace Prise... :-)

 

Domain Name		rima-tde.net ? (Network)
IP Address		80.25.15.# (Telefonica de Espana)
ISP		Telefonica Data Espana
Location		Continent  :  Europe Country  :  Spain  (Facts) State/Region  :  Madrid City  :  Madrid Lat/Long  :  40.4, -3.6833 (Map)
Language		Spanish es
Operating System		Microsoft WinNT
Browser		Internet Explorer 7.0 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 6.0; WOW64; SLCC1; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.0.04506; Media Center PC 5.0)
Javascript		version 1.3
Monitor		Resolution  :  1440 x 900 Color Depth  :  32 bits
Time of Visit		Sep 16 2008 7:55:05 pm
Last Page View		Sep 16 2008 7:55:05 pm
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Referring URL		http://edition.cnn.c...in.basque/index.html
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Hey Green Party, Second Hand Marijuana Smoke Causes Cancer!

Experts believe that exposure to second-hand marijuana smoke is at least as harmful as second-hand tobacco smoke. (Canadian Cancer Society)

 

Earth to Green Party, making marijuana legal will increase environmental pollution for those of us who live close to our neighbors (you know, the non-urban sprawlers who aren't warming the planet).

 

Marijuana smoke is a major nuisance. It stinks! Worse, it causes cancer and other respiratory disease. The Green party should want the reduction of pollution, not the increase!

 

There is no way I'm voting for a party that will increase the risk of respiratory disease to me and my family, whether we smoke or not.

Spain is Setting Itself Up for More ETA Style Violence

Last week the Spanish supreme court banned a referendum on Basque
independence. This week it banned Basque nationalist parties.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

If angry Basque men don't have a democratic outlet, many will chose a
violent one.

Spain should use Canada as a model of tolerance of seperatist democracy.

Envoyé depuis mon iPhone / Sent from my iPhone.

Banning Voice On Planes is Silly

Airlines were more than happy to offer us cell phone service at $2.95 a minute but are now banning free voice over IP because it is anti social. Crazy.

1. Airplanes are loud. A person on a phone could disturb one or two people, maximum.

2. In flight entertainment. You can listen to music, watch movies... If you don't have ear phones on, expect to hear people. Heaven forbid you over hear one side of a conversation!

This craziness isn't brought on by technology, it is brought on by people use to being alone in their car. Now they are next to people... talking! 

Kiss and Tell: Comedy relief

Si vous votez Bloc, Conservateur ou Liberal, d'autres soldats Canadiens vont mourir

Pensez au nombre de soldats canadiens qui peuvent mourir d'ici 2011, date à laquelle Harper promet de quiter l'Afghanistan, qu'on aye gagné ou non. 2011 c'est moins pire que l'éternité. Mais c'est quand même 3 ans!

En 3 ans, plusieurs autres soldats Canadiens vont mourir. Pensez-y.

Et un vote pour le Bloc, c'est un vote pour maintenir le parti conservateur au pouvoir...

Les Libéraux promettent de quiter l'Afghanistan bientôt. Pas tout de suite. Bientôt.

Seul le NPD fera en sorte que les soldats Canadiens quittent immédiatement l'Afghanistan. Je suis en favour d'attraper Osama Ben Laden. Mais ce n'est pas la mission en Afghanistan.

Oui, le Canada fait parti de l'Otan. Mais aucun des terroristes qui on attaqué les États-Unis provenaient de l'Afghanistan. Aucun!

Si la mission est d'établir la démocratie. Est-ce qu'on pourrait commencer par des petits pays comme Monaco ou le Leicheinstein?

Is the NDP Anti American?

Call me paranoid, but isn't that a "subliminal" american flag in back of those New York City style buildings when the lady says "corporate tax cuts". Hat tip to Splato.

I'm voting NDP. They aren't perfect, but they are way better than the alternative. Still, I think the NDP's marketing department deserves some waterboarding. After all, Americans are (in many cases, literally) our neighboors.



The French version is much better in my opinion. No subliminal here. It is anti-Bush and anti-Harper. No American flags in this one.

Quebec TV Show Laghs at Jack Layton's French

Infoman, the French language equivalent to the Rick Mercer Report on Radio Canada, pointed out the obvious and made fun of Jack Layton's French Thursday. It is really bad. Seriously, practice man! It isn't just bad ad lib like Dion's English. It is bad when read!

 

Hopefully, this will be Layton's last election.

 

Infoman also made fun of Young Liberals in Ottawa who apparently don't understand a single word of French. The show laughed at the Bloc's much ado about a bus. The Green Party's Elizabeth May wasn't made fun of and was even allowed to ridicule Harper driving accross the street to the Governor General's office.

 

If the NDP has any hope in this election in French Canada, it has to hide Layton and advertise "end the war now" ad nauseum.

 

The Téléjournal on Radio-Canada presented Jack Layton promising to inject funds into manufacturing (ie, Ontario) and mentioned the NDP's million dollar Quebec advertising budget against the war. If I remember the quote "because of Mulclair, the NDP seem to think they can do well in Quebec, pause for laghter, and are spending ONE MILLION DOLLARS in advertising in Quebec."

 

In short, Thursday was a bad day for the NDP in Quebec. On the other hand, they were mentioned on two of the most watched shows that night...

Screw the Environment, Save Auto Industry Jobs

This makes me angry. The Liberals and Conservatives have been handing over my hard earned money to Ontario's auto industry. No surprise there, both parties are visionless panderers.

 

But now the NDP is joining them, promissing to spend 2 billion dollars a year on making new cars.

 

GLOBAL WARMING WAS NOT CAUSED BY PEOPLE TAKING THE BUS!!!!!

 

How can you pretend to be in favour of the environment and subsidize car and house construction? Per capita, Canadians are the number 4 carbon emitters in the world! We produce less carbon than Saudi Arabia. Thank goodness for that. Hummer driving Americans emit more carbon, which makes sense. Urban sprawl Australia has us beet to.

 

But we release 3 times more carbon than the average Sweed. 3 times! Twice the amount of Frenchmen. Oil crazy rich Norwegians emit significantly less then we do.

 

And if that wasn't bad enough, an other ranking ranks us ahead of Australia and Saudi Arabia, just behind the United States!

 

 

A+ For True Blod with Anna Paquin

Step one: get TMN
Step two: set your DVR for Sunday night after Entourage (or watch it
later in the week on TMN on demand).
Step Three: Watch True Blood, the best new series this year, perhaps
this century.

The 26 year old Canadian Anna Paquin is sublime in this vampire series
set in New Orleans.

The premier totally sucked me in and I felt I was a part of the humid
Louisiana diner where most of the first show is set.

Regardless of your blood type, try True Blood.

Entourage was also DVR worthy this Sunday, as was Weeds, on Showcase.
In fact, Weeds was so good I watched it "live", including commercials.

With all this good TV, I'm almost happy Summer is over!

Envoyé depuis mon iPhone / Sent from my iPhone

Canadian Ecstasy

A new study has found that Canada is one of the top suppliers of the drug ecstasy.

Police became suspicious when they noticed people excited to be in Canada.

- Conan O'Brien

Late Night Jokes by iPhunny
Powered by Giglish.com

Envoyé depuis mon iPhone / Sent from my iPhone

End Corporate Welfare, vote NDP

The Conservatives are spending my hard earned money on car plants! Car
plants!

Let businesses fail (and succeed). Support people. Vote NDP.

If people aren't buying Fords, they are buying Toyotas. And guess
where they are made. Yes, Ontario.

The car industry is a zero sum game. You can't expect Toyota to open
car plants and not have competitors close some.

Companies need to make business decisions, they don't need governments
encouraging them to make bad ones.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080903.wharperwindsor0903/BNStory/National/home

Envoyé depuis mon iPhone / Sent from my iPhone

Chrome is the Best New Browser Since Firefox

I just, just downloaded Chrome, the new Internet Browser by Google. So perhaps it is a bit premature to give a review.

However, here it is:

Cnn.com works. Streaming video works on CNN. Youtube works (Google owns it). Competitor Dailymotion works. Bookmarks are there and they can be managed (deleted, moved, create new folder, etc...).

Here is what works better in Chrome than in Internet Explorer 7:

-You can easily go incognito (although Chrome recommends you literally watch your back; sound advice!)

-Gmail

-Mobile Me

-Internet searching. The address bar is now also the search bar!

-DNS redirect. You hate Rogers' new advertising infested DNS redirect. Good, you should. And you will never see it again if you use Chrome!

-Blogger (owned by Google) definitely loads faster.

-The tabs are at the top (makes more sense).

-The status bar at the bottom auto appears when you scroll over a link. 

So far, I'm impressed. I can't say for sure that non-Google inc. pages load faster, but they definitely don't load any slower.

My only gripe so far is that to access your favourites/bookmarks, you have to have the bookmarks bar visible. This needlessly takes up screen real estate. Ironically, you can add bookmarks without the bar. On the plus side, you can type the fist few letters of the page you are trying to get to and if it is in your bookmarks, Chrome will offer the page as a suggestion. This is probably faster if you have your typing hands available. But if you have your keybord out of the way because you are eating lunch, the lack of a quick bookmark button is anoying. Although if you open a new tab, the bookmark bar will be there...