I filmed this a few weeks ago but forgot to upload it until now, it is a little random as I just let the computer decide what to chop together.

Seriously Awesome Short Film from Godzone

Hat Tips: @vodafonenz and Get Frank

From Darling Harbour on Sunday night, almost the entire show (missing first few seconds).

The video was automatically cut together by my movie making software so it is a little bit random in places.

After being in Sydney for around two and a half weeks I am still raving about the public transport system in particular the trains. In the last two and a bit weeks I have probably caught more trains in my entire previous life as well. The locals think I am nuts because apparently the system is meant to be bad.

I will let some photos do the talking.

Auckland trains:

Sydney trains:

The robot below built with Lego Mindstorms and using a Nokia N95 Cellphone with an ARM processor (same type of chip as in the iPhone and Google Phones) is able to solve a 4×4x4 rubiks cube puzzle.

While the application is quite trivial (as in the robot can only do one thing and it is a simple algorithm no real AI here) it is a cool example of what some basic robotics can do.

I hope to post some photos and/or video of some of the robots where I am studying in the next few days at the latest later in the month when we have a robot soccer match between ourselves and The University of Newcastle.

Hat Tip: WhaleOil

Stolen from the Herald

And on the matter of the flag debate I give it until Saturday for the issue to die off for another year.

I am a few days behind in blogging this as I have around 400 blog posts to work through as I get back up to speed after 4 days with no internet.

The video below shows the intersection of Wellington and Union streets in central Auckland when the power was out a little over a week ago. It is impressive just how much better the traffic flows with no traffic lights:

Hat tip: Auckland Trains

I find this video particularly interesting as it mirrors the results of my honours level research which showed the traffic lights performed poorly compared to Give Way intersections or Roundabouts unless traffic was extremely congested. It is nice to see the results of a simulation also play out in real life.

I wandered down to the Viaduct Basin at dusk to take another look at the new Superyachet Kokomo

There is more info on the yacht here: http://www.alloyyachts.com/our+fleet/Kokomo+AY39.html and http://www.southernspars.com/southern/index.cfm?fuseaction=app.buildpage&p=471

The second page lists the specs of a earlier version of the same class of yacht:
LOA 51.7m
Mast LOA 63.4m
Boom LOA 22m

Yup the older smaller version of the boat had a mast of 63.4m, I would love to know the height of this new one.

This boat was moored near Westhaven Marina this afternoon on my way home from work. The photos have been taken from my cellphone and struggle to show the size of the mast. From my own guess it was around 50m in height. It would be one of the biggest yachts I have ever seen.

I am a fan of Obama, however, this video is a very good piece of political satire.

This morning, despite the rain, I headed out with a friend to do the Okura Bush Walkway just north of Auckland. By the time that we started the 3 hour return walk the rain stopped and gave way to first an overcast, then sunny day. The walk was a little tougher than I was expecting and I was glad I took my tramping boots and not trail runners as the rain had made parts of the track slightly muddy. We had lunch on the beach at Dacre Cottage before walking back.

Crossing the ditch took on a different meaning today:

After the following photo was taken I did jump in to cries of “euu now your all wet”

I saw a post on a blog the other day that said the new TSA restrictions on travel were designed to make it appear that they were actually doing something when in reality every attempted terrorist attack since 9/11 has been stopped by other passengers on the plane and not by airport security.

BoingBoing have produced this great graphic summing up your chances of a terrorist attack (hat tip: Whaleoil).

It is also interesting to note how many people have been killed in the so call war on terror designed at stopping terrorism. The US has lost around 5,000 troops and there has been around 200,000 civilian deaths. That is a massive loss of life in the name of protecting 647 lives from terrorist attacks in ten years.

I just got home from church in time to see Santa get to Auckland.

Over the past week there has been quite a bit of fuss around a group of aethists raising $20k to put some advertising on busses saying “There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”

It didn’t take long for someone to create a image generator to create your own ad, here is my attempt:

You can make you own here: Bus Slogan Generator