May 3, 1999

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Business

THE BEER PLAYOFFS

For a dozen years, every Thursday night during hockey season, Kelly Taillon and about 18 other guys in the Vancouver area ranging in age from their late 20s to early 50s have gotten together to do the same thing. In a scene in which life imitates art—or, at least, countless beer commercials—they gather at the University of British Columbia arena, don hockey equipment, divide into two teams and take to the ice.

The Mail

In some sort of ritual of atonement to the creators of technologies past, every sector of society is throwing money at the evil precursor of the end of modern civilization, known as the millennium bug (“Guide to Y2K,” Cover, April 19). The problem is not governments and corporations; they do what they have to do.

Columns

Nutty ideas worth billions

As this magazine went to press, hundreds of angry Canadians were bombarding the Prime Minister’s Office with e-mail messages demanding that the government keep its greedy, good-for-nothing, cotton-pickin’ hands off the Internet. By Ross Laver4 min

Opening NOTES

Richard Ouellet, the mayor of the tiny Quebec village of St-Simon-de-Rimouski, moves in exalted circles—and has the photos to prove it. The 65-year-old Ouellet has had his picture taken with hundreds of well-known figures, including seven Nobel Peace Prize winners—among them Nelson Mandela and the late Mother Teresa. By TANYA DAVIES4 min

April 261999