IF YOU PRICK THEM, DO THEY NOT BREED?

Paul Madsen's ConnectID takes me to task in a piece called “If you prick us, do we not breed?” 

It seems Microsoft does not believe we Canadians have children.

Perhaps this is part of ‘the plan’, discourage non-Americans from population growth by turning off for us all software features that facilitate family-based identity management? Brilliant!

For myself, simply knowing that I'd be on my own in the raising of additional offspring makes me feel less inclined to do my “bit” for Canada.

Or maybe this is directly at Kim‘s instigation? Some long festering grudge against his homeland? Was he forced to go to the States for some two-tier medical procedure and carries his resentment to this day?

Some might have dismissed this complaint as a being merely specious, but out of completeness I did a search and found this shocking statistic:

Canada's birth rate fell two years ago to its lowest level since 1921, when the agency began keeping records, according to Statistics Canada.  The federal agency said on Monday that Canada's “crude birth rate,” which measures the number of live births per thousand Canadians, fell to 10.5 in 2002.

The rate declined by slightly more than a quarter in the decade between 1992 and 2002, according to the report.

In 2002 Canadian women gave birth to 328,802 babies, down 1.5 per cent from the year before. It was also the eleventh decline in 12 years.

Canadians, I am confident that it was not the conscious intent of my colleagues in Windows Live to further erode the Canadian birthrate.  And remember that the statistics cited date from before the NHL strike, which left the nation – rather, nations – with nothing to do on Saturday nights, meaning the situation may well be on the mend – even without my intervention.  None the less, I'll check into this and get back to you.  Personally I take it as a good sign that there is some differentiation between what is served up in the various markets.

Speaking of Windows Live ID, a lot of thinking and refinement has been going on there recently with respect to identity.  My colleagues have written a white paper which I'll share with you over the next few days.

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Kim Cameron

Work on identity.