Posted by Leefe on 24 February 2010 – 10:25 pm
As part of a new system implemented by the Federal Government, all school students will be bar coded. Students will be required to scan themselves when they site for tests to improve data tracking. And, as an added benefit, it will allow students to swipe to logon to computers, setting the correct Internet Filter setting automatically.
“Better record keeping, and keeping you children safe on the Internet, all in one!” the education spokesperson announced.
While this may be a little fanciful, I worry about information systems that this government wants to setup. The new “unique student identifier” looks like a Trojan Australia Card.
If the government starts tracking all your school results you will get stuck with them for life. I can see the USI being rolled over into your Taxfile number or some such thing when you get older.
When applying for a job in a government department, do you really want them quizzing you about why you failed maths in year 3?
Maybe this is a little extreme, but it is something you need to think about. Will those those indiscretions as a child catch you up (or at least your children) later in life?
Posted by Leefe on 4 February 2010 – 11:31 pm
This morning the twitterverse was abuzz with the news that iiNet had won the cast AFACT brought against them. It was found that ISPs are not responsible for what users use them for.
Nice to see you can’t punish ISPs for hearsay copyright infringement notices.
Now, can the same be applied to what users view? ie. why should ISPs be responsible for filtering Internet content?
A collection of interesting articles about the AFACT vs iiNet case.
- Sanity prevails: iiNet did not authorise its users’ infringements (Nic, EFA, 4 Feb 2010)
- iiNet wins video piracy trial (Renai LeMay, Delimiter, 4 Feb 2010)
- AFACT v iiNet: Statement in full from the losing party (NewTechnica, 4 Feb 2010)
A humorous interpretation of events after the ruling was announced.
- Document: Judge’s summary of iiNet trial (Ben Grubb, ZDNet.com.au, 4 Feb 2010)
- Pirate Party Australia Welcomes Decision In IiNet Trial (Pirate Party, 4 Feb 2010)
- iiTrial: Telstra welcomes “legal clarity” (Renai LeMay, Delimiter, 4 Feb 2010)
- Mixed reaction to iiNet ruling (SBS, 4 Feb 2010)
- iiNet outcome an “application of common sense”: EFF (Tim Lohman, Computerworld, 4 Feb 2010)
- An attempt to cast a pall over internet usage (Robert Corr, 4 Feb 2010)
A summary of points the author thought were important in the 200 page judgement.
- Piracy case to shake up global fight (Bronwyn Herbert and Tim Leslie, ABC News, 2 Feb 2010)
At the start sounds like it assumes that all users are pirates, but has some useful comments further down.
Posted by Leefe on 30 January 2010 – 11:36 pm
Filed under News, SciFi
Tagged as Anime, car, Ferrari, Manga
I don’t normally write about cars here, so consider this post to be about Anime.
I recently cam across images Ferrari 458 Italia. And it looked to me like something out of Japanese Anime. Perhaps Ghost in the Shell. or Bubblegum Crisis ?
I like the smooth organic styling. It looks almost alive.
Posted by Leefe on 24 January 2010 – 11:56 pm
In today’s Sun Herald Julia Gillard reviles that schools will now be rated by Lleyton Hewitt.
Upon hearing the news at his court in Melbourne Mr Hewitt raised his fist and screamed in joy. The familiar ‘Common’ could be heard a block away.
Teachers are expected to object to this appointment, but the government sees it as the best way to deal with all but the most belligerent opponent.
“Common! That comment was out.” a Department spokesman was heard declaring.
Posted by Leefe on 20 January 2010 – 10:56 pm
Cadbury, my favourite brand of chocolate, is being devoured by Kraft.
For a deal worth £11.5 billion ($20.28 billion), or 860 pence a share, most of the articles I have seen talk about the worry of having to make ‘making significant cost savings’, ie job losses. And while I sampathise with the people that may loose their jobs, I worry about the state of my favourite chocolate.
When Kraft takeover Cadbury wil they change the mix of the chocolate? Cadbury is an iconic brand of chocolate would you mess with the recipe?
No being a fan of Kraft cheese. And noticing the recent Vegemite iSnack 2.0 debarcle. I am a little worried.
Althought I see they also own Toblerone. So, maybe they can still make decent chocolate. I wil have to wait and see.
More worrying is the rumors mentioned of a counter offer by Hershey. If that maker of crap compount chocolate takes over Cadbury, I can really see the quality going down the tubes,
Posted by Leefe on 5 January 2010 – 11:58 pm
So it appears that the Y2K bug has turned up a little late. Maybe the big had budget and scope problems, and is running behind schedule?
The Bank of Queensland EFTPOS machines have had problems since the 1st. And now it appears Bank West EFTPOS terminals are having the same problem. All deciding it is really 2016 and rejecting cards as expired. [1]
Then there is a the Window mobile SMS messages being future dated.[2]
Best explanation I have seen for this is a ‘10′ in decimal being read as ‘10′ in hexadecimal, which become ‘16′ in decimal. Hence jumping from 9 to 16.[3]
Or there was an atempt to avoid the year 2012 on the Mayan calendar.
- Welcome to 2016: Eftpos glitch spreads (Chris Zappone, SMH, 5 Jan 2010)
- 2016 bug hits Windows phones (John Oats, The Registry, 5 Jan 2010)
- The 2016 hit-list is getting longer (David Heath, iTWire, 5 Jan 2010)
Posted by Leefe on 30 December 2009 – 3:07 pm
Filed under Baby, News
Tagged as bank, Japan, News, procreate
Japan’s largest banking group says ‘Go home and procreate’.
Taking the government directive to boost the population seriously, management at Mitsubishi UFJ sent staff an email telling them to go home at 5:10pm rather than the usual 7pm. The idea being this would leave them with more energy at the end of the day, and more time to pursue extra circular activities at home.
It is worth noting though that bank branches close to the public at 3pm. What do all the staff do for the next 4 hours?
Posted by Leefe on 17 December 2009 – 7:07 pm
Filed under News, Social, Tech, Web sites
Tagged as Australia, censorship, filter, Internet, manditory, nocleanfeed, politics, Stephen Conroy
Stephen Conroy has delivered his Christmas present early, ISP level Internet filter. Tuesday afternoon the government announced that was giving the green light to its controversial censorship plan. And Conroy stated that we can look forward to legislation being introduced next year, ahead of the election.
Yesterday news sites, blogs and twitter erupted in a furore over the plans. Below are some articles on the subject I though were interesting:
- Internet censorship plan gets the green light (Asher Moses, SMH, 15 Dec 2009)
- Scott talks to ABC PM about net filtering (Scott Ludlam, The Greens, 16 Dec 2009)
- Internet filter to protect her children from porn and other horrors gives mother some peace of mind (Mahesh Sharma, The Australian, 16 Dec 2009)
The tale of computer-illiterate mother who is deluded, and thinks that te filter will protect her children.
- Australian Internet Screwed (Jeff Engert, 15 Dec 2009)
- SMH poll on the Internet Censorship
Over 21000 votes, 96% NO.
- ZDNet Australia poll – Do you support a mandatory internet filter?
Over 1100 votes, 96.4% NO.
- ISP blocking – our evaluation report (Telstra, 15 Dex 2009)
Telstra’s report on why they think the filtering they tested works. And people’s comments about this.
- Our views on Mandatory ISP Filtering (Iarla Flynn, Google Australia, 16 Dec 2009)
How Google thinks the proposal is extreme and uncalled for.
- Net censorship move a smokescreen: expert (Asher Moses, SMH, 16 Dec 2009)
How the filter test was designed to succeed, so wasn’t really a fair trial.
- Conroy’s Clean Feed Won’t Block Child P*rn (Mark Newton, NewMatilda, 16 Dec 2009)
- Net censorship trial report brings more questions than answers (EFA, 15 Dec 2009)
- At what point does internet filtering become censorship? (Gordon Farrer, SMH, 16 Dec 2009)
- Abbott drawn into filter debate (Suzanne Tindal, ZDNet Australia, 16 Dec 2009)
- Child groups slam Conroy’s ISP filtering plans (Kathryn Edwards, Computerworld, 16 Dec 2009)
- Net filters ‘thin end of the wedge’: Kirby (Asher Moses, SMH, 17 Dec 2009)
Kirby’s view on the filter, and a rehash of what everyone else has said of the last day.
Read More »
Posted by Leefe on 13 December 2009 – 1:03 pm
I was thinking about Tony Abbott’s recent appointment as leader of the Liberal party. Apart from his dislike of the ETS (we just need dykes like the Netherlands), and the fact Abbott doesn’t know what peak oil is, his policies include a strong desire to make abortion harder.
Without delving into the reasons this could be a bad thing, I wondered what the next step a right wing Catholic PM would take.There must be too many divorces at the moment, for that side of politics. Lets remove no-fault divorce.
Doesn’t no fault divorce just make it easier to split up families?
But looking back I see that this was July’s policy. Abbott talked of moving to an opt in fault divorce [2]. Reversing the no fault divorce legislation passed by the Whitlam government in 1975. An idea that even the private investigation industry though was a stupid.
So, it looks like de-legalising abortion, or at least making it much harder to access, has been chosen as the easier right wing agenda item to push.
But, expect that if this goes through, a modification to the no fault divorce law will be surely follow.
Posted by Leefe on 19 October 2009 – 11:45 pm
Now that the Australian Dollar is doing well, about US$0.92 to the AU$, it seems like the perfect time to buy all the stuff I wanted overseas. The only problem is, what did I really need? And all the recent upheaval in world finances had made me thing: Do I really need it?
The dilemma of the strong Australian dollar: buy now or wait for it to get stronger? As the current predictions are that it will go over US$1.00 in the beginning of next year.
So, are you going to buy all you Christmas presents from online retailers rather than local stores this year?
