City in brief, Nov. 1

Reggie’s patron arrested for packing non-existent heat
A man claiming to be armed was arrested at Reggie’s bar last Wednesday afternoon. According to university spokesperson Chris Mota, campus security called the police after the man claimed to be carrying a firearm. Police cleared the bar and arrested the man in question, who Mota said “is not a Concordia student.” The man later admitted that he had been joking.

Three MAs are coming back
Three arts and science programs are looking to relaunch their member associations within the Arts and Science Federation of Associations. ASFA’s VP internal Schubert Laforest confirmed on Sunday that students in Physics, German, and Journalism, who all lost their MAs over the past two years due to lack of interest, have been assigned CEOs to carry out elections over the next few weeks. Journalism student Aalia Adam, who contacted ASFA about relaunching the Journalism Student Association, said an MA “was extremely important for a department program because every student pays for ASFA and they should have a say in what goes on. Also they should have access to activities that cater to their program.’’

Avoiding traffic? There’s a (m)app for that
An online database of open licensed municipal information is now available to be read and used by Montreal residents. The city of Montreal launched Portail données ouvertes last week. The website owes its creation to Montréal Ouvert, a collective group made up of entrepreneurs and computer programmers, that has been campaigning for the city to make the data public for a year. According to The Gazette, the group hosted “hackathon” workshops to win the city over, using municipal data and statistics to create helpful online tools like ZoneCone.ca, a website powered by Google Maps that indicates every construction zone in the Montreal area with a little orange cone icon. When clicked, each icon describes why the road is closed and how long the construction is set to last.

BRB, suing BlackBerry
Montreal law firm Consumer Law Group Inc. has taken preliminary steps towards launching a class action lawsuit against Research in Motion, the Ontario-based telecommunications company which manufactures BlackBerry mobile devices. According to the CBC, the firm is unhappy with the free apps currently offered as compensation to users affected by the major service outages between Oct. 11 and 14, demanding that customers be refunded by their wireless service providers. Anyone whose BlackBerry service was affected is being asked to contact the firm.

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