The Herald, Frog Blog and others are all talking about the following video of an English Member of the European Parliament criticising Greenpeace.
We currently have the USA and the UK fighting a war on state sponsored terror and here we have a MEP encouraging it!
What the French did was completely wrong and defied international law and is something that no member of Greenpeace or New Zealander will ever forget.
Over at No Right Turn Idiot/Savant is calling the police “blue-uniformed thugs who decide for themselves what is and isn’t acceptable” in response to the arrest of an individual for protesting against tennis player Shahar Peer just because of her nationality.
This is nonsense on two counts. Lets first deal with the issue of the arrest of the protestor. The individual in question was using a loudhailer to voice his opinion. That message that he was being broadcast so loudly that it was being heard right across into the tennis game while the match was in question. The protestor was allowed to continue for 45 minutes before he was made to stop. That is more than enough time to make your point and if you want to continue do so – but without breaching the peace of others through the use of a loudhailer. I believe that the police did the right thing in arresting the individual for breaching the peace and did not violate his human rights unlike what NRT would want us to believe.
The second point is since when was it ever acceptable to make racist comments about an individual as a means of protest? The herald reports that the protestors were chanting: “blood, blood on your hands”, “freedom for Palestine”, “go home, Shahar”. Lets look at these slogans a little more closely because it appears that the protestors need a history lesson:
And what bugs me most about this? I blogged on exactly the same incident twice last year.
I have been watching the whole climategate saga for a few weeks now. So far I have not blogged on it because I was hoping that it would either be shown to be such the stupid smokescreen that it really is, or that there would be some truth to it and there would be some form of outcome. However, as it stands at the moment both sides are claiming victory over a situation that has become very messy.
If you are not already up to play on the situation Wikipedia (as always) provides a good overview of the mess: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatic_Research_Unit_e-mail_hacking_incident
In a nutshell: sometime in November (or earlier) the computers are the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia were hacked and a large amount of emails and other data were then selective leaked onto the internet. The right wingers/nutcases/conspiracy theorist/deniers claim that this stolen data shows collusion amongst climate researchers in deliberately trying to prove climate change is man made when the data shows a decline in global temperatures. Of course this is complete and utter nonsense, the content of the emails that have been leaked are damaging to the reputation of a few scientists. However, they completely fail to prove any worldwide conspiracy.
There are two great articles that have been produced dismissing the points that have attempted to be made by climategate. The first is from New Scientist:
We can be 100 per cent sure the world is getting warmer
Forget about the temperature records compiled by researchers such as those whose emails were hacked. Next spring, go out into your garden or the nearby countryside and note when the leaves unfold, when flowers bloom, when migrating birds arrive and so on. Compare your findings with historical records, where available, and you’ll probably find spring is coming days, even weeks earlier than a few decades ago.
You can’t fake spring coming earlier, or trees growing higher up on mountains, or glaciers retreating for kilometres up valleys, or shrinking ice cover in the Arctic, or birds changing their migration times, or permafrost melting in Alaska, or the tropics expanding, or ice shelves on the Antarctic peninsula breaking up, or peak river flow occurring earlier in summer because of earlier snowmelt, or sea level rising faster and faster, or any of the thousands of similar examples.
Is it possible that tens of thousands of scientists have got it wrong? It is incredibly unlikely. The evidence that CO2 levels are rising is irrefutable, and the idea that rising levels lead to warming has withstood more than a century of genuine scientific scepticism.
The second is from the academic journal Nature:
The e-mail archives stolen last month from the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia (UEA), UK, have been greeted by the climate-change-denialist fringe as a propaganda windfall (see page 551). To these denialists, the scientists’ scathing remarks about certain controversial palaeoclimate reconstructions qualify as the proverbial ’smoking gun’: proof that mainstream climate researchers have systematically conspired to suppress evidence contradicting their doctrine that humans are warming the globe.
This paranoid interpretation would be laughable were it not for the fact that obstructionist politicians in the US Senate will probably use it next year as an excuse to stiffen their opposition to the country’s much needed climate bill. Nothing in the e-mails undermines the scientific case that global warming is real — or that human activities are almost certainly the cause. That case is supported by multiple, robust lines of evidence, including several that are completely independent of the climate reconstructions debated in the e-mails.
Back in New Zealand we have had our own little mini conspiracy theory with Ian Wishart among others trying to claim that NIWA have deliberately altered their data to artificially create a warming trend. The truth is they have deliberately altered their data but only to adjust changes in the physical locations of weather stations. NIWA has close to a 100 years of data and over time both the way in which you collect data and the instruments use change as a result the data collected by one method has to be adjusted to match up with the data collected through a different method. This is standard scientific practice. In fact if you didn’t do this any analysis done over time would be wrong! But because the scientists at NIWA have done the right thing the crazy climate change deniers are claiming a conspiracy.
So here we have NIWA with this plot of adjusted data:
and the deniers with this plot of unadjusted data:
The most interesting thing about both of these plots is in the end of both of them I can see an overall rise trending!
A few days ago NIWA responded to the nutcases who are claiming conspiracy everywhere by producing a plot of only the 11 weather stations that have not been moved or adjusted (see below) note that the rise is 1C and the P-Value (extremely small this an absolutely confirmed rise there is no arguing with it). Now the conspiracy crazies are claiming the graph should include all weather stations and thus a circle begins.
For more on the stupidity of Climategate there are some good blogs on Open Parachute:
Finally I will leave the last word with Jon Stewart’s take on the whole saga:
I was stunned to read the following opinion piece in Computerworld this afternoon, it is full of inaccuracies and Microsoft loving:
Opinion: Why Chrome OS will fail — big time
Fatal flaw No. 1: The Linux foundation
First, there’s the core architecture. A derivative of Linux, the Chrome OS builds on Linus Torvald’s popular open source foundation to create a lightweight, web-oriented desktop environment. However, it also inherits that platform’s many warts, including spotty hardware compatibility.From power management to display support, Linux has long been a minefield of buggy code and half-baked device driver implementations. Google recognises this fact and, in a page out of the Apple Macintosh playbook, has taken the draconian measure of allowing the Chrome OS to be distributed exclusively on a series of as-yet-undisclosed netbook-like devices.
It’s a move born of desperation. Google knows it can’t possibly establish a viable hardware ecosystem and still meet its self-imposed release deadline of “mid-2010″. So rather than do the hard work of courting device vendors and building certification processes, Google is taking the easy way out by micromanaging which systems will be allowed to ship with the Chrome OS and then dumping responsibility for the rest of the ecosystem onto the open source community.
This first point is complete and utter nonsense. Linux hardly has any so called warts, it is more stable than windows and is much more secure too. When was the last time you heard of a virus on Linux? How does that compare to windows?
Spotty hardware compatibility? Again hardly. In the past linux had issues with device driver support however this is more as a result of hardware manufacturers not providing information about the hardware to build the drivers, it is not a fault of the linux programmers themselves.
Google is also not allowing the OS to be distributed exclusively on a series of as-yet-undisclosed netbook-like devices. The code is open source anyone can compile and run it for any device. However in order to keep the OS small Google have said they will only be officially supporting a small number of devices. This is the same as windows not running on an ARM CPU. The difference here is with Chrome being open source people can build support into branches of it.
Google can establish a viable hardware ecosystem by mid 2010 it is easy use the existing linux device drivers. The difference is they don’t want to because they want to keep things simple and small, who can blame them for that? They are trying to be the opposite of Microsoft.
Fatal flaw No. 2: The web user interface
Then there’s the user interface. Google looks at the world through the prism of a web page. So it comes as no surprise that the primary interface to the Chrome OS is … Chrome, as in the Google browser.Unlike a traditional OS, there’s no desktop. The “applications” running under the Chrome OS are really just interactive web pages, with the Chrome browser’s tabs serving to separate and organise them visually on the screen. Basic configuration tasks, like defining wi-fi settings, are handled via Chrome OS-hosted pop-up windows, while a simple status bar-like strip at the top of the display informs you about battery life, connectivity status, and so on.
Sadly, none of the above UI constructs is particularly original or compelling. The tabbed interface and “dockable” favourites are clearly derivative of Mac OS X and/or Windows (depending on whom you ask), as are the status icons and pull-down applications menu.
In fact, nothing about the Chrome OS UI jumps out as innovative. Rather, it simply replaces one set of metaphors (Start menu, taskbar/Dock, system tray) with a bunch of webified equivalents. And though I can certainly appreciate the advantages of doing away with those heavy legacy OS windowing layers — web content is lighterweight and easier to isolate from a security standpoint — it also serves to limit the environment’s overall utility.
The world won’t buy an inflexible OS
And that’s where I believe the Chrome OS ultimately fails. In its effort to pare the traditional OS model down to the bone, Google has thrown out the one characteristic that made Windows and, to a lesser extent, Mac OS X and full-blown Linux successful: flexibility.Simply put, the Chrome OS is too narrow. It assumes that the world is ready to give up the traditional personal computing paradigm and live full time in the cloud. In reality, most users prefer a hybrid existence, with some of their data and applications stored locally, and others — typically the freebies, like Gmail — hosted online.
Perhaps the easiest way to put the Chrome OS into context is by comparing it to the OS it’s designed to supplant: Microsoft Windows. Like the Chrome OS, Windows lets you boot your system, surf the web, and manage your data. Unlike the Chrome OS, Windows also lets you run rich, local applications and services — and do so on the hardware of your choosing.
Don’t forget that Google’s plans for acceptable hardware to run the Chrome OS is very limiting. No hard drives or even DVD drives; only solid state drives. That may reduce power usage and speed up boot time (as if that was really an issue), but it also means you can’t run your own apps, or store and access data, when you don’t have a live internet connection. Plus, the supported laptops are only netbook-size laptops, with low-power CPUs that won’t be all that capable. Sure, Google says you can use a PC or Mac for that stuff, and Google is right: You will. Why you would want a web-only appliance as well is not so easy to answer.
Again this is all nonsense. The current build of Chrome only stores everything on the cloud. Future builds will include the ability to store content from gmail and other apps offline on the SSD – just look in the Google apps labs for these features, they are just not finished yet. Secondly, why support HDD? HDD is old technology storage is going the way of SSD and if Chrome the OS of the future then they need to support the future, not the past.
The bottom line is that while there is virtually nothing that you’ll be able to do with the Chrome OS that you won’t be able to do equally well with Windows, there are literally millions of things that you can do with Windows today that you’ll likely never be able to do with the Chrome OS.
So don’t be surprised when you start hearing about early Chrome OS adopters trying to reformat their systems with Windows 7 Starter Edition. After all, people are easily distracted, and the Chrome OS already bores me to death.
Of course you can do the same things in Windows as you can do with Chrome. That is why there is a Chrome Browser for Windows. However the key difference is the focus of the operating systems. Windows is designed to be big heavy and bulky. Chrome is designed to focus on the cloud. And of course there will be things you can do on windows that you can’t do on chrome. Google have made this clear already, Chrome is not meant to replace Windows it is designed as an alternative to Windows. And I doubt many people buying a chrome netbook would reformat to Windows. If you were going to do that you would buy a Windows netbook.
The Herald is reporting this morning of the expensive helicopter rescue of a missing tramper last night:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10601958
What fails to surprise me is just how unprepared this personal was:
A lost tramper was rescued from Tongariro National Park early today.
The Wellington-based Westpac rescue helicopter found the man just south of Waikune, 30km northeast of Raetihi, about 2am.
“This was one of the trickiest searches I have been involved in,” said helicopter crewman Colin Larsen.
“We had intermittent contact with the lost man via his cellphone and he was extremely difficult to locate due to the terrain, his dark clothing and his location stuck amongst 80 foot trees.”
Conditions in the area were cold but there was very little wind.
The helicopter crew said they understood the man was a visiting Swiss National in his early 20s. He was uninjured other than being quite cold and a bit battered and bruised.
He is really lucky to be alive.
You really cannot get much more silly than that.
LandSAR do a fantastic job in NZ and there are plenty of people who genuinely need them even when they have taken all precautions into account.
But going solo into an alpine environment with dark clothing is essentially a death wish.
Seriously LandSAR need to implement a policy whereby if you have not adequately prepared for a trip and you need rescuing then you should foot the bill for it.
Pretty much you never ever go tramping alone, let alone with dark clothing. That is why they make the alpine based clothing bright colors, they are shades of yellow for a reason. Tramping is a survival adventure not a fashion show, how many more people need to die before the vast majority of the population realises that?
The photo (taken by me) below shows how shitty the weather can get during the day in the Tongariro National Park so how much worse would it have been in pitch black darkness?
Police are annoyed at having to rescue a tramper for the second time from a snow-covered ridge in the Ruahine Ranges as dusk fell last night.
The 59-year-old Hastings man had been rescued from the same spot less than a month ago.
But police say the man had been warned not to attempt the trip in alpine conditions, Hawke’s Bay Today reported.
Police said then he was not carrying the right equipment, had not planned his trip well and didn’t have the fitness level to complete the trip.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10590581
It is one thing to be rescued once. We all make mistakes and go into places with the wrong equipment. But to do it twice. When you have been warned not to. That is nuts and stupid.
The NZ Herald is reporting that some fans are annoyed because they managed to buy 3 times the tickets they needed for the AC/DC Concert.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=10587417
AC/DC fan Tamar McKewen was not impressed to discover her credit card had been maxed out with three times as many tickets bought than she was after, after a blip in Ticketek’s online booking system for the band’s Wellington concert.
A number of ticket buyers have complained about the overloaded system that either had buyers unwittingly purchasing too many tickets – or not able to buy any at all.
Tickets for the ageing Aussie rockers’ January concert went on sale at 9am yesterday, but the massive volume of customers left many frustrated with faults on Ticketek’s website.
However, Ticketek general manager Brendan Bainbridge said the day was a “success” and although he did not know the figures, only a small number of people were probably affected.
Ms McKewen said she logged successfully onto the website before 9am.
However, after she entered her credit card details and was waiting for confirmation from the site, the webpage timed out.
Ms McKewen was trying to buy three $160 tickets to the show.
She repeated the process two or three more times before a note appeared advising her to call Ticketek before attempting to buy any more tickets.
So at the start it appears that Ticketek had a problem. But they didn’t. It just appears that the customer does not know the basic rule of online shopping. Once you have pressed purchase only ever press it once, do not press it again because it is going sow, or reload it. This is clearly the customers fault not the fault of Ticketek. So why the media beat up?
The company would refund the cost of the extra six tickets.
That’s nice of them, again so why the beat up?
“As much as I’ll never use the Ticketek website again because of the hassle, I know it was all worth it to see AC/DC.”
May I suggest you learn to use a computer before going and having a cry.
I guess it is a slow news day.
Okay being offline for the last two days has been a pain as there has been some good news. And this probably the best and funniest piece of news out. However, because of the delay now lots of other blogs are covering this story so I will keep my blog on this short and let the links do the talking. In summary the head of the National Business Review (NBR) has decided to change their news site to a pay per view model rather than free with ads supporting the costs. So far big deal, who cares, I can get my news from other sites.
What has annoyed me and many others though is in announcing the decision he had this to say about bloggers:
And to add to the madness it has been the aggregators that have profited the most from the supply of that free news copy. Worse still the model has spawned a huge band of amateur, untrained, unqualified bloggers who have swarmed over the internet pouring out columns of unsubstantiated “facts” and hysterical opinion.
Most of these “citizen journalists” don’t have access to decision makers and are infamous for their biased and inaccurate reporting on almost any subject under the sun (while invariably criticising professional news coverage whose original material they depend on to base their diatribes).
Say what? David Farrar at Kiwiblog has the best to say about this:
Of course there are many many blogs that are rubbish. But they accordingly have littler readership and little influence.
And that is exactly the point.
This blog has been running for four years and in terms of its global reach it is very small. And I would actually agree that most of the stuff I post on here is probably rubbish, and has little influence. But that is no reason for me to stop posting it. This is my soap box not yours.
And as far as being upset about people linking back and commenting on stories, well that is interesting because by linking back and commenting you are in fact increasing readership not decreasing it. I actually believe that the move to pay is to keep profits up not keep the bloggers out. Anyway rant over, here are some more good comments (interesting enough all from blog sites, at least two of which are more popular than the NBR website):
A Dargaville man has been charged with driving a ride-on lawnmower while drunk.The 52-year-old was seen by police driving through the Northland town at 9.30pm yesterday.He was stopped and asked to get the mower off the road. The police officer then discovered the man was a disqualified driver who had been drinking.
Northland police communications officer Sarah Kennett said the man recorded a breath test of more than twice the legal limit.
The lawnmower was impounded for 28 days and the man is to appear in Dargaville District Court this week facing charges of careless driving, driving while disqualified and driving with excess breath alcohol.
You have to love our police force. Impounding a lawn mower. In no way to I condone Drink Driving but charging someone for driving a lawn mower is pretty funny. Who is he going to mow down? The grass?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10486979
I don’t know how exactly to describe this, nuts? Cool? Insane? Lucky?
