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CBC
14 minutes ago
- CBC
'An incredibly sobering sight': Man snaps photos of bone-dry marsh in parched N.S.
Social Sharing Like many people who live in the Kentville, N.S., area, Ken Schwartz likes to hike around Miner's Marsh — normally a large, lush wetland and a favourite spot for birdwatchers. This week, instead of taking the 1.5-kilometre loop around the protected site, an astonished Schwartz walked on the bed of a dried-out pond as drought conditions persist in Nova Scotia, leading to water conservation measures and a provincewide burn ban. He shared photographs of the dry, cracked ground on social media, saying he'd never seen anything like it. Schwartz, who runs Two Planks and a Passion Theatre at the Ross Creek Centre for the Arts in Canning, spoke Wednesday with CBC Radio's Maritime Noon about Miner's Marsh and what steps his outdoor theatre company is taking to stay cool and safe during dry, hot weather. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. What does the photo show that you posted? What you see is essentially a very large plain where there was once water. And if you imagine photographs of a very dry desert with a spider web of crevices breaking up the dry earth, that's essentially what you see. It looks like the floor of a desert surrounded by reeds. What were people saying when you saw that site last night? There were some other people that were there for similar reasons to enjoy. It's an important park for people in Kentville. Many people jog around it. They come to watch birds and to see wildlife, and people are astonished. I mean, many of us were actually walking across the marsh and where there was once water, we were walking on the bed of the pond and just taking photographs and really marvelling at it because it's something none of us have ever seen. But also it's an incredibly sobering sight as well because it speaks to just how bad the drought is here. How deep would you say that marsh is, Ken? Well, it's not very deep because it's been engineered to be very flat and wide to provide the best possible area for waterfowl. But I think at a typical summer you would see at least a foot of water, maybe a foot and a half. And what are people in the area saying about this? I think there's a lot of sadness. I've heard from people I know in the Valley after I posted the photograph chiming in to say just how alarming and strange it is. Also, some people say that in other parts of Kentville, they're having problems with the low water levels in terms of community gardens and various other activities that typically happen this time of year that can't because of the low water levels. It has really impacted on the people who live in that area. You run an outdoor theatre. What are you noticing about the hot and the dry weather? We've noticed, as people who work outside, the changes that have been coming over the last number of years. So this is not new. We also have a Ducks Unlimited engineered wetland up here at the Ross Creek Centre [for the Arts]. And although it's not dry like the one that is in Miner's Marsh, it is very low. One of the two ponds is almost dry. One of our two performances every year is a fireside theatre where the audience and actors perform around fire. And … there is a fire ban right now because of the dry weather. So we've come up with an ingenious substitute to our fire, to our real fire, that we can use so that we can maintain the experience of the performances for audiences quite convincingly outdoors, even though we're not using a real fire. But that's just one of the many ways that we've had to adapt to the new reality. We heard today from CBC News Labs that summers in the Halifax area could end up feeling more like those in communities hundreds of kilometres south of us by the end of the century because of climate change. As a person who runs an outdoor business, what goes through your mind? Well, it's not surprising. I think about my neighbours who work on their farms in the Valley. Anybody who's been to the Valley knows it's a really important agricultural area. I think what it tells us and what it reminds us is that we need in our communities to start planning now and to start making adjustments now to how we do things. We're in the planning stages of creating an outdoor pavilion that will allow us to maintain our performances outdoors, but also protect the people who work for us and the audiences who come to see us. So it's not about abandoning what we do because of the change in climate, but having our eyes open and realizing that we have to start making changes.
CBC
44 minutes ago
- CBC
Expand your search for love in a new video game that features a voice actor from N.L.
'Date Everything' is a dating simulation game from developers Sassy Chap Games with over 100 characters, and they aren't all human. The CBC's Amy Feehan takes a look and catches up with a voice actor from St. John's, who was thrilled to be a part of the project.
CBC
an hour ago
- CBC
How an anti-porn lobby on payment processors censored thousands of video games
Social Sharing Video game developers are speaking out after two popular PC games stores made it harder — even impossible — to purchase thousands of games and other digital artworks, as a result of pressure exerted by an Australian anti-porn advocacy group. The takedown came after Collective Shout successfully lobbied payment networks and processors to stop facilitating financial transactions from storefronts Steam and until games with certain content were removed. But developers say the range of affected works goes well beyond games with explicit sex scenes. Also caught in the sweep are a teen-rated romantic comedy game, some LGBT-themed games by award-winning developer Robert Yang, and a 1920s alternate-history art book that has no sexual content. "This is incredibly worrying," said Adrienne Bazir, a Toronto-based game developer and artist who makes LGBT games. "Even just queer people holding hands is seen as not safe for work." CBC spoke to over a dozen Canadian games developers, creators and industry watchers who say the situation highlights the power held by international financial institutions in determining what kinds of art is deemed acceptable for others to consume, and frequently forces LGBT content and narrative into the darkness. What's happened so far? In July, Collective Shout published an open letter saying Steam and Itch hosted games with "rape, incest and child sexual abuse" content. About a week later, Steam removed hundreds of games with adult or sexual content from sale. Steam, the world's largest storefront and management platform for PC games with a reported 132 million active monthly users, said in a statement that "certain games on Steam may violate the rules and standards set forth by our payment processors and their related card networks and banks." It has the effect of shrinking the space available for diverse sexual expression. - Jean Ketterling, University of Saskatchewan Payment processors include credit card companies like Visa and MasterCard, and other companies that can facilitate purchases like PayPal and Stripe. Those games were removed from sale to ensure customers could purchase other titles and game content, the statement added. On July 28, Itch, a relatively smaller player, deindexed all games and other works on its site with the NSFW (not safe for work) tag. That means you can't find those works on the site unless you know the exact name of the creator or game. According to Game File reporter Nicole Carpenter, searching the NSFW tag on Itch before July 28 brought 7,167 results. Today, it surfaces five or fewer. Itch's creator Leaf Corcoran said the site's staff is "conducting a comprehensive audit of content to ensure we can meet the requirements of our payment processors." He later said Itch is seeking other payment processors that are willing to work with platforms hosting adult content. CBC reached out to several payment processors for comment. In a statement, Stripe said, "We do not support adult content," while PayPal replied that it will take action on anything "that violates the law, our policies, or the policies of our partner banks and card networks." Risky business? Collective Shout is an advocacy group that describes itself as a "movement against the objectification of women and the sexualization of girls." Its director, Melinda Tankard Reist, told CBC that her group reached out to payment processors after receiving no reply to about 3,000 emails sent to the Valve Corporation, which owns Steam. Tankard Reist said the group was not seeking to have Itch deindex all its NSFW gaming content. However, developers, artists and other supporters say the campaign has affected works with sexual content that don't cross the line into abusive or illegal behaviour. That statement doesn't ring true for Jean Ketterling, a University of Saskatchewan assistant professor who specializes in the study of sex and video games. "This is a tried-and-true playbook. It has the effect of shrinking the space available for diverse sexual expression," she said. Ketterling pointed to a long history of anti-porn or anti-sex work organizations campaigning against content they deem to be obscene, immoral or illegal. Similar recent cases involved lobbyists targeting payment processors for OnlyFans and Pornhub. WATCH | When pressure from banks almost led to OnlyFans banning sexual content: OnlyFans to soon ban sexually explicit content after pressure from bankers 4 years ago "We're seeing a lot of LGBTQ content come up. We're seeing a lot of stuff that's not even pornographic, but that is just exploring sexual violence or exploring the trans experience," she said. Val Webber, a postdoctoral researcher at the Sexual Health and Gender Research Lab (SHAG) at Halifax's Dalhousie University, says "high-risk" categories for payment processors typically include items with a potential for fraud or that contain potentially illegal content — such as adult content, firearms, gambling and some medications. But the processors' terms of service aren't always clear, leading to a wide interpretation of what kinds of content can be considered high-risk, she said. "They're effectively in charge of creating de facto obscenity law without ever naming specific sexual acts or fantasies or content that is, in fact, not allowed on the platforms," she said. Several Canadian developers and artists are frustrated that an Australian lobby group and U.S.-based payment processors have impacted their income. "What we have is a situation where American financial institutions are able to do de facto censorship on a global scale against content that isn't illegal," said Ash Krieder, an independent romance writer based in Kitchener-Waterloo, Ont., whose works were deindexed from Itch. "This is hampering freedom of speech in our country." Tankard Reist said location is irrelevant. "The internet has no borders. Women and girls everywhere are impacted by male violence against women and misogyny in general which we believed these games perpetuated." The counter-campaign Affected developers and their supporters have started phone campaigns and petitions to pressure payment processors to reverse their actions. One site lists several email addresses and phone numbers for people to lodge their complaints with Visa, MasterCard and other payment companies. with only 1,000 calls or emails," said Bazir.
