From Hard News.... for those unfamiliar the Maxim Institute is a loony tune bigoted, 'family' centric, bible thumping, conservative right wing think tank outfit....

Tim Michie pointed that the Maxim Institute is running a tertiary student essay competition - six lucky winners will get to work for Maxim in the holidays. Six? These people have money. The suggested text for the essay topic is C.S. Lewis's The Abolition of Man, one of the sacred tomes of the whole hell-in-a-handbasket movement. (You can crib and buy an essay on that.) It's fairly obvious that an essay which does not accord with the Maxim worldview will not be a winning one, but if anyone wants to enter such an essay I'll be happy to consider it for publication here after the contest has closed. We might even be able to manage a prize of our own

I've got $50 towards a competitive prize and challenge all of those liberal (in the classical sense of the word) readers among my throng to do the same.

Pledges in the coments please.

http://www.microsoft.com/nz/teched/tracks/smartclient.aspx

- First Look at the Australian Microsoft MapPoint Location Server (MLS)

Please repeat after me.... OH HELL YES!

BTW...

9th June - ASP.net Architecture.ppt (1020.5 KB) 

http://blogs.tonygoodhew.com/tonyg/archive/2004/06/04/326.aspx

So if someone can be a hard core democrat (ie left wing) but not be a communist/marxist then can't a right winger not be a religious nutter?

*nods*... It's called being a libertarian *G*...

I personally prefer the compass dial approach to political orientation rather than *wings*.

After you take the test look at the analysis too.
http://www.digitalronin.f2s.com/politicalcompass/analysis.html

Can you spot the area that is sorely lacking!?!

Specialize in quickly becoming a specialist.

Bill and Casey are having a bit of a blogversation here, here and here about the trouble with being a specialist. Particularly when it comes to MS exams.

It's interesting to watch because I've yet to do these exams (have been meaning to for a while) and the same sorts of things concern me- Remoting (bleh!... an API just waiting to be deprecated), Printing  (urm XML->PDF or SQL Reporting Services for me please) and so forth...

But at a more fundamental level these guys have got me thinking. To some degree I am now an employer (of contractors) and when the guys ask me what sort of skill are important a specialist skill is the last thing that I would say. Instead, I think that the most fundamentally important skill in the IT industry is being able to quickly upskill yourself into any given specialty. When I look for potential contractors I'm generally going to look more for self starters who can quickly bring themselves up to speed on a piece of technology. Maybe this is a symptom of being in New Zealand where our limited labour pool makes this sort of JIT learning a necessity. But, I think it's a pretty good approach to take. If I wanted to be a deep level subject matter expert I would have been an academic.... can you say BORING!

Now there is some irony in this. Because, in the case of Casey at least*, the guy seems to have the most profound ability to upskill himself to a pretty detailed level of knowledge over a short period of time Just look at his articles- it's like 'oh.. this week I'm gonna learn Neural Nets' and then he plugs into the matrix and out comes an article...

What we really need is some metric/test/whatever that indicates a persons potential to be 'switched on'... maybe like an IQ and EQ test put together. I actually think being a Jack of All Trades is pretty important provided you can become an expert at light speed when necessary...

*I shall reserve judgement on Bill until after he has purchased me an Imported New Zealand Lager @ MVP Summit 2005.....

What the paper can't comprehend is Richard has also endorsed Ken, Muriel and Stephen and the Herald clearly thinks ACT should pick its leaders in secret. Such leaders have no mandate. Helen Clark struggled and Bill English failed. ACT's new leader will have the mandate that comes from a nationwide democratic vote.

From 'The Letter'... the weekly ACT party mailout. Tuesday 08/06/04
I'm just posting this for posterity in case the party decide to do something wholly stupid........

This looks pretty cool....

Weedshare is a file sharing system with a paid component that benefits both artists and the people who shared the file.... and REAL money too. 50% for the artists and also money for the sharers up three levels.

Looks VERY cool...uses windows media for the DRM.

I'm gonna start by taking a look at this guy....
http://www.weedtunes.com/index.php/a/av/artist/59

Now this is a cool idea.

Using RSS to dish up Hansard (the official Parliamentary proceedings for you non Westminsterites).

You can subscribe to specific MPs and see what they've been saying in the house.

From Gizmodo

And Gizmodo also has other droolworth stuff...... I might look for one of these in Singapore later in the month.

http://www.gizmodo.com/archives/philips-key019-shipping-with-016-inch-lcd-015686.php

Here is the slide deck for tonights session.

01_languageprimer.ppt (152.5 KB)

and

Audio

Not one of the really expensive Masticating Juicers but quite a nice Breville Centrifugal Juicer. Works pretty well and with 85 cent per KG Apples available makes VERY nice apple juice.

Will be sure to blog more on my juicing experience.

Save for Ronny and Barbs 'War on Drugs', the Regan years were pretty good. Pretty early in my lifetime though too

Rodney points @ Jim Peron (who must be about the worlds most prolific writer) on the matter.-Goodbye Ronnie.

OK.... so it's probably pretty common knowledge by now that Rodney Hide leads the pack when it comes to being a techno-politician..... His website has gone mad over the past month with the comments and the general level of interactivity.

But it's really cool to see others getting in on the swing of things. For example his recent post on Archbigot Vercoe's little outburst gets a comment from National Member of Parliament (with a bright future) Katherine Rich... is blogging going to be the great leveler in politics? Where the people and the politicians can interact freely on the same plane. I think it is fantastic to see two politicians, from different parties, having free and frank conversational type communications in the blog space. This is the sort of conversational blogging that would make Scoble have kittens!

Here

Bill is a Christian so he has some interesting things to say on the banter that we've been kicking around....

He wades in on the 'whole Gay thing' with some good argument, does Porn, mentions the Darwinian fish....

These Bible beaters are making Christianity a laughingstock and doing more to destroy it than all the strip clubs, bars, and gay people combined.  Their obsession with trashing people different from them is sickening.  And do you really think they don't take money from Adulterers?  Or Drunks?  Or just about any other politically correct sinner category.  There's wayyyy too much house cleaning needing done to be pointing fingers about trivial nonsense like this.  No one is sin free, the bible says so.  So why focus on other's sins instead of your own?  That's why I can laugh at all the mockery, b/c I agree with it.  It's not mocking Jesus, it's mocking the clowns that have coopted Christianity, and THEY DESERVE TO BE MOCKED!   They're the blasphemers.

All good.

[UPDATE] Casey has these on his car...

Casey points to some cool bumper sticker type things... I reckon they would look great on my gas guzzling Subaru......

Any other kiwis want some? We can split shipping.... post in the comments....

P.S. TS in 'What Would Jesus Do Thong' shots please....

I'm kicking through the comments on that post from Rory now... thought I ought to create a new category and post some of the funny shit I'm finding.... like this

The Internet was created by the United States of America - a Christian nation [ref. 1, 2, 3] - and should not be used to spread anti-Christian, secular, or non-Christian propaganda and hatespeech. This is our Internet, and we should exercise our position as its owners and as the guardians of civilization to stop its misuse.

*note to DARPA* Nuclear Weapons are the least of your worries... please rebuild the internet to be resistent to Religious Attack.....

Another great pisstake site- http://www.landoverbaptist.org/ - home to the

From the comments by Jeremy Brayton ........

You cannot correctly guage a religion until you, yourself, have tried it.

From this I conclude that Religion is most different from sticking a fork in a light socket- something I sure as hell can guage without trying it...

I've had this notion to try to explain the Bible and existence in terms programmers can understand. I've started the post here: http://geekswithblogs.net/jbrayton/archive/2004/05/26/5405.aspx

Scientists experimented and proved the Bible correct. The Bible itself isn't a scientific journal, but it spoke of things that were later proven true.

Hmmm....... 'if you stick a fork in a live light socket it will hurt'... now is that a revelation of scientific or biblical proportions?

I'm kicking through the comments on that post from Rory now... thought I ought to create a new category and post some of the funny shit I'm finding.... like this

The Internet was created by the United States of America - a Christian nation [ref. 1, 2, 3] - and should not be used to spread anti-Christian, secular, or non-Christian propaganda and hatespeech. This is our Internet, and we should exercise our position as its owners and as the guardians of civilization to stop its misuse.

*note to DARPA* Nuclear Weapons are the least of your worries... please rebuild the internet to be resistent to Religious Attack.....

Another great pisstake site- http://www.landoverbaptist.org/ - home to the

From the comments by Jeremy Brayton ........

You cannot correctly guage a religion until you, yourself, have tried it.

From this I conclude that Religion is most different from sticking a fork in a light socket- something I sure as hell can guage without trying it...

I've had this notion to try to explain the Bible and existence in terms programmers can understand. I've started the post here: http://geekswithblogs.net/jbrayton/archive/2004/05/26/5405.aspx

Scientists experimented and proved the Bible correct. The Bible itself isn't a scientific journal, but it spoke of things that were later proven true.

Hmmm....... 'if you stick a fork in a live light socket it will hurt'... now is that a revelation of scientific or biblical proportions?

Casey points to Rory offending the god botherers..... love it.... I'm gonna have to take some time to giggle through the comments too....

We were running out of space in the old office.... So we shifted to a new one. We reckon this is the coolest office in Dunedin.

Features include:

• A good PA class stereao system 
• Full DJ rig including Pioneer CDJs, Technics Turntables and a Pioneer Mixer 
• Xbox 
• Best views in Dunedin 
• Heat pump downstairs 
• Lava Lamp!

It ROCKS! See photos and video shot on Smartphone.

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IMAGE_00044.jpg

IMAGE_00043.jpg

IMAGE_00042.jpg

Download: VIDEO_00001.avi

A few quick aggregates from the political scene tonight.....

There is a bit of a bun fight going on over on the Whigs blog centered around the ACT Primary. Things seem to be getting nasty towwards the end- yet they started out so well in Dunedin....

Note to the Whig... where is your... if it ain't syndicated it ain't read in this household :-(

The Whig also points to a great spoof site....

http://www.densitychurch.org/ Happy Clapping for Jesus.

You've kinda got to be a Kiwi to get a lot of this (Destiny Church is a Happy Clappy NZ Church)... but it makes for sme good light reading.

You can even buy some great T Shirts......

Planned Parenthood's San Francisco-based challenge the Partial Birth Abortion Act of 2003 has succeeded at the trial court level. Check out the Court's order here. Check out a press release here.

There are two similar challenges also proceeding in New York and Philadelphia. Neither of those courts has ruled yet on the issue.

via [LawGeek]

Rodney is blogging some calculations that show that there is potential for a 117% effective marginal tax rate under this new budget.... Earn $100 lose $117 i.e. $17 worse off for earning another $100!

See the details here.

Somehow I found myself reading Julia Lermans Blog (subscribed! as Scoble would say) and she had linked to Steve Smith of ASP Alliance fame with his new Army blog... seems he's off to Iraq called up from the Army reserves. Makes for interesting reading.

Steve is talking asbout taking his Laptop away... He needs a Toughbook Tablet PC! http://www.toughbook.com!

Berend has posted some replies to my recent rant and I actually think that we probably agree on what the end result should be....

I essentially agree with Chris point of view. But again, this isn't an integrated package. It doesn't remove state paid child care for example.

*nods*... If only it were an integrated package! I think that we could actually quite easily agree on what the end result should/could be... we are just divided on how to get there....

Labour wants to change the law. Do we really believe a Labour law will give more freedom to the people? It doesn't. It will have huge impact on who you can employ as a business or who you can appoint as teacher at your school.

To be completely honest I think the horse has unfortunatly already bolted on these. I think that the Human Rights Act already makes it nearly impossible to discriminate in the hiring process. I don't think that the Civil Unions Bill will have a great effect on the hiring/firing thing.

It affirms that the government has something to say about marriage and can define what it is. I thought real Libertarians denied the government could do this. So how can it be a step in the good direction?

But the crucial point is that it DOESNT try and say anything about marriage. The bill says that the goverment will recognise the legal union of two people of the same sex and that this recognition is categoricaly NOT marriage as the current statutory definition defines it. It's the christian brigade who say that that is something akin to marriage. I do deny that the government should be involved in marriage- get them the hell out. Let the churches have the concept of marriage back to offer as the icing on the relationship cake to those who abide by their beliefs.

The quote that ACT has steadfastly opposed each of the anti-family Bills that it has introduced came from a column of Muriel Newman.

Of all the ACT MPs she is probably the one that would look least out of place in United Future so it is an unsurprising comment. But, let's quickly flick through those bills- I'm going off the cuff here so I may totally stuff up and make some invalid assumptions about the contents of these bills but here goes...

Property (Relationships) Amendment Bill.
I would hope that the problem that most (Muriel obviously excepted) ACT MPs had with this bill was that it forced unchosen obligations onto people who, in many cases, had made a deliberate choice not to enter into a statutory relationship.

Families Commission Bill
Can't really remember enough about the Bill to comment- always seemed to be a let's create a social construct so that we can throw money at it Bill to me anyway. Bills that contain the workding 'for the good of Families' scare me almost as much as bills with the wording 'for the good of Society'....

Care of Children Bill
Muriel complains about it making it easier for gay partners to become guardians of children. I personally think that we should set a far higher standard than we currently do before awarding guardianship... but, I don't have a problem with gay people caring for children. I'm inclined to agree that the lack of a shared parening clause is unfortunate.

DPB....
I would hope that my statements on the 'family friendly' budget give some indication as to my feelings for have a child earn another buck govt. funding programs.

Civil Union Bill...
Already discussed in the last article. Neuman rolls out the usual 'bad for marriage' stuff... It's not marriage nor does it pretend to be marriage. it is something quite distinct. Hell, if it were available it might make a good option for those of us heterosexual people who aren't really into the whole Christian concept of marriage. It's sure as hell a better idea that the stupid 'deemed civil union' shit that came through in the  Property (Relationships) Amendment Bill.

So hopefully there are some areas in which Berend on the conservative side and myself on the liberal side can agree on. Here are a couple of questions for him and others...*puts on his utopian crystal ball gazer hat*

1. In the ideal world the government would not have anything to do with marriage except for enforcing marriage contracts in the same way as they might enforce any other contract.
2. In the ideal world the government would not be dishing out any favours or 'rights' on the basis of relation status, be that attached or unattached.