So word comes today that the jerkasses at Hasbro Inc have dropped their copyright infringement lawsuit against brothers Jayant and Rajat Agarwalla, two enterprising brothers from Calcutta, India.

When the clever boys created the wildly popular Scrabulous (as both a Facebook application and a website) word game, they ran afoul of the corporate bully which owns the North American rights to Scrabble.

Shortly after Hasbro filed suit, along came a second bully company, this time Mattel, which owns the rights to Scrabble outside of North America to file another lawsuit claiming violations of intellectual property. No word yet on the status of that suit, but expect it to be settled too.

Both Hasbro and Mattel earned themselves a load of super bad publicity. Talk about a public relations nightmare in their heavy-handedness. Sure they need to defend their trademarks, but what they should have done was made a deal with these two as their version was better than anything the two companies had come up with.

At first Facebook declined to remove Scrabulous, but eventually they did. Not to be detered, Jayant and Rajat went ahead relaunched it as Wordscrapper. It can be found on Facebook, and online at Lexulous.com.

One of the things I dislike the most is people who drink and drive, and not just the ones who have 'accidents', but the ones who haven't had one yet. As far as I am concerned, no one should take or anything that impairs their driving in any way. That includes drinking, drugging, taking legal prescriptions or over-the-counter medicines that affect their physical and mental abilties, talking/texting on mobile phones, getting behind the wheel while tired and prone to falling asleep, etc. You're driving people, PAY ATTENTION. These are not accidents, they are incidents, and if you cause one, you need to go to jail - and if you kill someone, you need to go to jail for a long time - including for a first offense.

MONTREAL–The loved ones of a Quebecer killed by a suspected drunk driver say there is cruel irony in her death because she made her living making sure inebriated partygoers got home alive.

Cécile Descôteaux, who ran a chauffeuring service in Drummondville, was killed on the job early Sunday when a SUV veered into her lane and slammed head-on into her car.

Descôteaux's neighbour, Tammy-Lee Giroux, said yesterday the 60-year-old often spoke to her about the perils of impaired driving.

"She was completely against people who drove drunk," said Giroux, who lives near Descôteaux's home, northeast of Montreal.

"She used to tell me about her work. She loved it. She really didn't ask for much. If you only had two bucks then you gave what you could. I was really sad when I heard it was she who had died – and all because of goddamn booze."

Descôteaux was driving a man and a woman home around 2:30 a.m. when her car collided with the SUV.

Provincial police suspect the 48-year-old man behind the wheel had consumed at least one too many. But police spokesperson Pierre Rivard said it could take weeks before officers receive the results of the blood-alcohol test.

Rivard said the driver of the SUV and Descôteaux's male passenger both sustained minor injuries. He said Descôteaux's female passenger suffered serious injuries that were not considered life-threatening.

Descôteaux was the owner of the 9-year-old business Securimax. Giroux said she was on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to ferry tipsy partiers home after a night out.

The Canadian Press

(Ottawa) Canada's age of sexual consent has been bumped up two years to 16 beginning today.

The change means adults who have sex with boys or girls aged 14 and 15 years old could face criminal charges.

Canada's age of consent has been 14 since 1892.

The legislation was brought in by the Conservative government in part to deal with older internet predators who troll the web looking for younger victims.

Canada's age of consent will now be in line with other countries, such as Britain and Australia, and most American states.

The intent of the new law is not to criminalize teenage sex, but to crackdown on adults who prey on youth, former justice minister Vic Toews said when the bill making the change was introduced.

The law includes a "close-in-age" provision of five years, which means it would be legal for a 15-year-old to have relations with a 19-year-old provided the relationship is not exploitive and the older party is not in a position of authority or trust.

But while all political parties backed the legislation and law officials welcomed it with open arms, several gay rights groups are not satisfied and have said the law ignores gay men.

It is currently illegal for Canadians under 18 to have anal sex, meaning two gay or bisexual 17-year-olds who engage in the act could end up in jail something the new law does not address.

Other groups, such as Justice for Youth and Children, said the new law, if misunderstood, could end up driving teenage sexual activity underground.

"Because its highly technical and quite complicated I think that we need an awful lot of public education to make sure young people, fearing they are doing something illegal, don't hide and fail to seek the medical help they need and fail to get appropriate treatments and appropriate counseling," said Martha Mackinnon, the group's executive director.