KiwiCoromandel

the case of the missing link eh? :bigsmile:

here you are.....for some reason it doesn`t seem to be working today..... :rolleyes: http://www.citynews.co.nz/webcams/mtbeach/ check this out....the link below fills in a little more very interesting backround on the issue....... http://www.xtra.co.nz/broadband/0,,10979-4071640-300,00.html

yep..the link`s there http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=5&ObjectID=10010529

Peering webcams bring need for responsibility 11.02.05 It's always interesting when technology hits the mainstream and leaves a wave of paranoia and unease in its wake. Last week it was a webcam positioned in a spot above Mt Maunganui beach. The Mount Wave Cam camera was labelled a "perverts' playground" where sunbathers could be watched. The internet company providing the service, Enternet Online, was targeted with a death threat. Mount Wave Cam is still operating and you're likely to see good-quality pictures of surfers heading for the water or sunbathers lounging on the sand. The issue was blown out of all proportion. After all, if you're out in public you have to assume the world is watching you and act and dress accordingly. And what's to stop a voyeur sitting well back from any beach in the country with a high-powered camera lens?........ Read more........... http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=5&ObjectID=10010529

Microsoft buying anti-virus software maker 09.02.05 1.00pm NEW YORK - Microsoft on Tuesday said it would buy anti-virus software maker Sybari Software Inc. in a direct challenge to Symantec and McAfee Inc., which currently dominate that market. If Microsoft, the world's largest software maker, bundles anti-virus features into its Windows operating system, security software makers could feel the pressure, analysts said........ Read more....... http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=5&ObjectID=10010181

Music site set to turn up volume 11.02.05 By Owen Hembry Digirama, New Zealand's only legal music download website, is aiming for a five-fold increase in the size of its music catalogue, while confronting new legislation that may steal its customers. Record labels such as Warner Music have enabled the company, launched in November, to provide 50,000 online tracks. This week's signing of American indie label The Orchard, which includes acts such as Coldplay, will raise the total to 60,000 songs. Co-founder Shaun Davis said that within three months he aimed to have 250,000 tracks available to download. "We really want to be the digital media superstore for New Zealand. You don't have to go to a shop, just download it." ..... Read more......... http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=5&ObjectID=10010530

Q: How do you know you've been kidnapped by a redneck? A: He's asking 2 million dollars ransom in unmarked million dollar bills.

another successful black person and black community leader in the spotlight....ya gotta wonder...???

typical aussies...even their bloody chooks are dumb..everyone knows how difficult it is to fly when you`ve just been " plucked "......... Q: why did the chicken cross the road?...... A:"The Republicans made the chicken cross the road." "Today the Republicans rounded up all the chickens in the nation, marched them across the road, forced them to pray and then shot them with unregistered assault weapons. Neglecting the cries of the needy of this country, the Republicans then slaughtered the chickens, roasted them over an open fire, thereby contributing dangerous CO2 emissions which are causing catastrophic global warming, and ate all of the birds, which are listed as an endangered species. The Republicans then sat around smoking cigarettes, making racist jokes and conspiring to take away social security from our nation's senior citizens."...

if you`ve got a weight problem try this....... :bigsmile: Low Fat Broadband Capped and slow, but less expensive With early adopters already wired for speed, the hunt is on for ways to migrate dial-up users to high-speed connections. In the States, providers are hoping to do that with cheaper, slower introductory tiers; something British Telecom has started offering across the pond (though with a 1 gig cap). The provider has announced (BBC) a £19.99 (around $37) 512kbps DSL tier. The only catch is that the tier features a gig per month cap, something many of our users would burn through before finishing their breakfast cereal. "This is plenty for half of all broadband users," says one British Telecom representative in the BBC article. "It is pretty generous and makes quite a significant difference to our economies." In addition to the cap, the report claims the DSL tier "does not support home networking". How exactly BT would hope to enforce that restriction isn't made clear. UK provider Tiscali recently unveiled a similar tier overseas. Users now able to get a 150Kbps connection for £15.99 ($26.50) a month, though whether or not that can even be considered "broadband" is highly debatable. UK cable providers have likewise joined the low-fat broadband race, cable company Telewest offering their own £17.99 a month discounted product in the hopes of countering BT's move. The telcos in the States have been toying with similar plans; BellSouth being one of the first to offer a "Lite" 256kbps (128kbps up) tier for roughly $40 a month last year (less if you bundled). Since then, SBC has shaken things up with their price reductions, and many competing providers are offering 1.5Mbps or more for that price - making the "low-fat" push here in the States less relevant for the time being. It would seem the ideal "dial-up killer" tier would offer 512kbps or slower for less than $20. The slow adopters and "Aunt Bethels" (cost conscious dial-up users who primarily surf and use e-mail) are now the targets of the industry. They've found themselves stuck between the marketing pitches for dial-up accelerated products (some of which until recently were charging as much as $28 a month for the honor) and low-fat broadband. Several cable providers here in the States are expected to offer their own, sub 1Mbps discount tiers before the end of the year.

You There, at the Computer: Pay Attention Matt Dunn for The New York Times FOCUS - Ben Bederson builds interfaces that create a minimum of distraction for the user. FIRST, a confession. Since starting to write this article two hours ago, I have left my chair only once. But I have not been entirely present, either. Each time I have encountered a thorny sentence construction or a tough transition, I have heard the siren call of distraction. Shouldn't I fiddle with my Netflix queue, perhaps, or click on the weekend weather forecast? And there must be a friend having a birthday who would love to receive an e-card right now. I have checked two e-mail accounts at least a dozen times each, and read eight messages. Only two were relevant to my task, but I responded right away to all of them. My sole act of self-discipline: both instant messaging accounts are turned off. For now. This sorry litany is made only slightly less depressing when I remind myself that I have plenty of company. Humans specialize in distraction, especially when the task at hand requires intellectual heavy lifting. All the usual "Is it lunchtime yet?" inner voices, and external interruptions like incoming phone calls, are alive and well. But in the era of e-mail, instant messaging, Googling, e-commerce and iTunes, potential distractions while seated at a computer are not only ever-present but very enticing. Distracting oneself used to consist of sharpening a half-dozen pencils or lighting a cigarette. Today, there is a universe of diversions to buy, hear, watch and forward, which makes focusing on a task all the more challenging. "It's so hard, because of the incredible possibilities we have that we've never had before, such as the Internet," said John Ratey, an associate professor at Harvard Medical School who specializes in attention problems. Dr. Ratey said that in deference to those who live with clinically diagnosed attention deficit disorder, he calls this phenomenon pseudo-A.D.D. A growing number of computer scientists and psychologists are studying the problem of diminished attention. And some are beginning to work on solutions. Ben Bederson, who builds computer interfaces at the University of Maryland, said his design goal is to generate a minimum of distraction for the user. "We're trying to come up with simple ideas of how computer interfaces get in the way of being able to concentrate," said Dr. Bederson, director of the Human-Computer Interaction Lab at the university. When scrolling up and down a document on a computer screen, for instance, he said, some software causes the page to jump. It's an invitation to distraction, in that it requires the eye to reacquaint itself with the document in order to continue reading. To help people understand the importance of avoiding these kinds of jumpy interactions, Dr. Bederson showed that smooth scrolling was not only easier on the eye, but reduced the number of mistakes people make when, say, reading a document aloud. But some distractions don't need much of an invitation. Take e-mail, for instance. "It's in human nature to wonder whether you've got new mail," said Alon Halevy, a professor of computer science at the University of Washington who specializes in data management systems and artificial intelligence. "I don't think anything else is as compelling to divert attention." Dr. Halevy and others talk about making e-mail intelligent so that it knows when to interrupt the user. "Suppose you trusted your e-mail system enough that you're alerted to an e-mail only if it's really pertinent right now," Dr. Halevy said. "If I knew the right thing was happening with my e-mail, it wouldn't be such a distraction." Dr. Halevy said this is a very difficult problem because it requires sophisticated natural language comprehension on the part of the software. "Completely solving the natural language problem is still decades away," he said, but "extracting useful information out of e-mail is a simpler instance that could make much faster progress." Dr. Halevy is working on what he calls semantic e-mail, which provides some structure to the originating e-mail to make it easier for the software on the recipient's side to understand it and assign a priority. Many people, even the experts, have devised their own stopgap solutions to the attention-span problem.

Wal-Mart to close unionised Canada store 10 February 2005 TORONTO: Wal-Mart Canada will close one of its two Quebec stores that won union certification last year after failing to reach a labour agreement, the retailer says. The Canadian arm of US retailing giant Wal-Mart Stores said today its store in Jonquiere, Quebec, will close after becoming the first unionised Wal-Mart in North America about six months ago. Wal-Mart Canada said it advised the union last year when the bargaining process began that the store's financial situation was precarious....... Read more........ http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3183801a12,00.html

while that may be true..the very thought of any sort of incident involving nuclear material a la 3 mile island is to much for many nzers to contemplate ...so any practical criticism in that respect (windpower) is not being heard at the moment..polls put kiwis at between 65 - 75 % against nuclear or coal - fired power generation and pro renewable energy resources at any given time.....most of our power is hydro generated but any more development of our river system for power generation is being blocked by a very strong environmental lobby in this country...hence the focus on wind at the moment.....

nice little number dude....um, is it, um, suppertime yet?? :good job:

and that`s bloody fast mate.....

so does he......

do not let it get you down..you know in your heart of hearts that you did the right thing..it now remains to be seen who did the wrong thing..time will tell and you will be vindicated........ ;) :bigsmile:

every man and his dog has a mobile in our family......my eldest daughter has one of those picphones and even my youngest (7) is demanding her own cell phone.. i hate them and i especially hate text calls..they make you too damn accessible when you don`t want to be contacted for some reason......

Possum Kingdom The Toadies Make up your mind Decide to walk with me Around the lake tonight Around the lake tonight By my side By my side I'm not gonna lie I'll not be a gentleman Behind the boathouse I'll show you my dark secret I'm not gonna lie I want you for mine My blushing bride My lover, be my lover, yeah... Don't be afraid I didn't mean to scare you So help me, Jesus I can promise you You'll stay as beautiful With dark hair And soft skin...forever Forever Make up your mind Make up your mind And I'll promise you I will treat you well My sweet angel So help me, Jesus Give it up to me Give it up to me Do you wanna be My angel? So help me! Be my angel Be my angel Do you wanna die? I promise you I will treat you well My sweet angel So help me, Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus... Believe In Angels...

like a flash sg...always ready to help a damsel in distress....... :yup: :yup:

very good find dude...very cool.....some good stuff there.... :good job:

dokken... " breaking the chains " from the 1983 album " breaking the chains"....... Breaking the Chains (Lynch, Dokken) Sit there thinkin' In your room You feel the pressure You're goin' crazy too The walls around you Closin' in You need a change Claustophobic Feelin' scared You need somebody But no one seems to care A one way ticket A change of pace You've had enough Can't take no more (Chorus 1) Breaking the chains around you Nobody else can bind you Take a good look around you Now you're breaking the chains Got this letter Came today From my baby Who left me yesterday Said she loves She'll come back She wants to try I won't let her She'll be upset I know it's better Than somethin' I'll regret She's been dishonest And insincere I lost my mind Twenty times a year (Chorus 2) Breaking the chains around me Nobody else can bind me Take a good look around me Now I'm breaking the chains (Solo) Woke up today I'm alone I look around But baby you were gone But I don't mind And I don't worry I will survive I'm alone Now that you're gone Don't need nobody To hold or tie me down I broke the chains So let me be I've gotta be free (Repeat Chorus 2) (Repeat Chorus 2)

Calling Dr Gonzo......an interview with an atavistic hunter .s. thompson ......... by Pete Cobus A can of Schlitz is on the counter, next to the fridge. A puddle of condensation forms at its base in the balmy Washington night, a kind of reflecting pool before an aluminum monolith that sanctifies endless weeknights of low-octane, underpaid alcoholism. I have been trying to reach the doctor for several weeks now, usually leaving messages with sweet Anita, his sober, rational better half and sidekick on the compound in Woody Creek, Colorado. "Usually what will happen when you call Hunter S. Thompson for an interview - and this is a trend that I've noticed over the past decade or so - is that you call at the appointed time, and the machine will pick up. But leave a message and if he's in the room, he'll pick up when he hears your voice," Anita warned me. "Then he'll tell you call back in a half hour." It didn't happen that way. Outfitted with a good book, plenty of Schlitz and a resolve to wait the old man out if it took all night, when I called at the appointed time, Anita picked up again. "Hunter's on the other phone with Sandy Berger," former Clinton Administration Security Adviser, she said. "Call back in an hour." It was almost midnight, the beer not getting any cooler. "Okay," I said. An hour passes. I dial Hunter again. The machine clicks on and culminates in another, iniquitous beep: Programmed, mechanized greeting: No on is here to take your message right now. Please leave your name and number -- BEEP . PC: Hey Hunter, it's Pete again, hello... Static screeching, phone wrenched from the cradle.... HST: Ho. What's that? PC: Hi. HST: Wait a minute. Yeah, wait. Hold on a minute. Who is this? PC: Pete. While You Were Sleeping magazine. HST: Yeah, oh good. Can you call back in ten minutes? PC: Sorry? HST: I'm talking about your subject right here. I'm telling you I'm talking about it right now, man. I said call me back in ten minutes. PC: I'll call back in ten minutes. 20 Minutes Later. Call Number Three. Beer Number Four. Mechanized greeting. A loud beep followed by a staticky, vacuous silence. A weird click and screeching, phone wrenched from the cradle.... HST: Ho. Look, hello. I was just setting up a...uhh...a kind of a trip. With me. I'm going to go down to Little Rock to meet the General. But I just got a bright idea. The woman I was talking to there, the woman is deeply into politics and sort of a personal friend and staff member of Wesley Clark. PC: So do you need to get back to that? HST: I interrupted that so I could talk to you. I'm getting pretty excited. I just proposed that I might be in New York for the Paris Review, a celebration of the magazine's 50th. PC: Yes. HST: Yeah. Anyway, it's a big deal in New York. You'll have a lot of big press. Big-time press. PC: Do you need to get back to wrapping that thing up, man? HST: No. No, I'm bringing Wesley Clark with me and introducing him to the literary crowd. PC: Wesley Clark was in DC the other day. Do you think he's dynamic enough to beat Bush? HST: Well.... (thoughtful, impregnated pause) PC: I mean, he's got NATO command under his belt, so he can take him to task on the war and everything, but the guy's got no political experience. HST: Well, uh...yeah, that's right. I recognize that, but given the doomsday situation we face, and the American politics here, this shit is just not working. Every state in the union is broke, and these fuckers just keep borrowing money from the taxpayers. This a bloody disastrous experiment, a robbery right in front of our eyes. Including the national treasury. Shit, they've busted too many people. They've been too greedy. So somebody's got to beat the bastard this year. I didn't believe that before, and I'm trying to figure who it's going to be. I always like to know about the presidential campaigns. So that's what I'm doing now. I apologize for putting you off, but this is too important for me not to follow through. I guess I got a plane to Little Rock and New York, maybe maybe maybe.... So now...is Wes Clark qualified to be president? Anybody from "W" to Woody Creek, to Little Rock, to New York, unless the general can attend the Paris Review party - which is one of my great dreams - he's a qualified person.... if he's qualified: Oooo!!! who knows?! But if he has staff people who can do that... If the people on his staff can do that, you see I know all those guys from the Clinton era. PC: Right. What about Dean? HST: Yeah, definitely. PC: Okay, so the guy is liberal, but in terms of fiscal discipline, he'll give new conservatives a run for their money. HST: All these terms! You know, all of this 20th century terminology is not really applicable. It's like after the Civil War, the Whigs were no longer applicable. They were a big power before, but there's going to be a shift in definitions. I think it's going to depend now on if the people in who are in power have any will to attack the problems, including any personally vested interest, and that I think Clark does have. Clark strikes me as the one person in this election who really can't afford to lose. PC: Because his ego's too sensitive, as the rumors stipulate? HST: No. Because he has no power base to fall back on. Uh, Kerry is still a fuckin' senator. He will be if he loses. PC: Speaking of which, Kerry hasn't said much for himself. He clings to middle ground. He's not an individual. HST: I've found out a lot of things about Kerry. Do me a favor. Call me back on xxx-xxxx. PC: xxx-xxxx. HST: And then I can reach across my desk here. So if you call me back on my right-hand phone, I'll talk to you in a second. PC: Take care. HST: Same thing. Right. Prolonged silence followed by dialing. Elderly black woman: Hello. PC: Hello. Anita? Elderly black woman: Hi. Who is this? PC: This is Pete. Elderly black woman: Pete, I think you have the wrong phone number. PC: Thank you. Elderly black woman: MmHmm. Prolonged silence followed by dialing. Machine picks up, prolonged grating screech, phone wrenched from the cradle... HST: (Rhythmically snapping his fingers) PC: Hello?......The reason I called you in the first place is because I wanted to get somebody to do this sort of meditation on the Patriot Act as the new McCarthyism, or the new Hitlerism....Hello? HST: Yeah, yeah, yeah... PC: Whew, shit....thought I lost you. HST: Yeah, I'm right here with you. I'm just thinking. PC: I feel that this sucks. I typed up these questions that I wanted to hit you with, and I hate to stop conversation to recite a question. HST: Well, shoot, so do I. PC: Do you mind if do it, though? fast building-block kind of conversations here recently - you know, just in the last hour or so. I'm kind of used to a pretty fast pace. But, I'm trying to make a judgement myself between Dean and Clark. Because, I do more than predict; I know elections are a lot more than that, but that's a big part of it. So I've kind of had good experience with people I've endorsed as a gambler. PC: And is there a gain for you, personally? Good prescience? HST: I just like to be right. And, I'm looking back over this book of columns that's going to be published later this year for ESPN - sports columns - and, Jesus Christ, just looking through them, into the politics in it, it's inappropriate, they say, for a sports magazine. But I've done it anyway, and it's very accurate. Yeah, it's important for me to be right. 'Cause that's my tradition, that's what I do. PC: Listen, you were talking about the impending 'big darkness' in "Hey Rube," but I need to ask you this question. I was born in 1975. If you were to take yourself back to the Vietnam era, back to the Cold War, what's scarier to you about the current state of world affairs? The fact that Bush II and the new GOP represent a refined, well-organized brand of fascism? Or the fact that they wield these policies of unilateral military action, eradication of civil rights, etc...before a nation that doesn't appear to give a shit? HST: Well, we have a problem there. Yeah. You know, the Bush doctrine you were talking about, and the Patriot Act, they're really one and the same. It's martial law. You know, that's where you get your military tribunals, that's where you get your wartime translations of the Patriot Act. You know, legally, in terms of war and peace, the Patriot Act defines a worldwide policy. But, in terms of law - of who can be held and who can't - the Patriot Act is the civilian implementation of the... PC: The what implementation? HST: "Civilian." Yeah, I'm a military man. Imperialists run the Pentagon. We have a [unintelligible phrase] Rumsfeld and Cheney and those swine. But this is contrary to all constitutional principles, contrary to all case law, in terms of civil liberties or legal process. The Patriot Act overrides the due process aspects of the American constitution and the legal process. You can't just grab people off of the streets and hold 'em for as long as it takes. Which is part of the Patriot Act, too. That's an exact reality. PC: Is it safe to call it social regression? HST: Yeah, that's a good phrase for it. What I've always called these things is an "atavistic endeavor." PC: Atavistic endeavor, hm? HST: E-n-d-e-a-v-o-r. PC: Hahh! Ha! HST: Yeah. An atavistic endeavor, you familiar with that? PC: Well, not really. HST: Well, atavism is an.... PC: I know atavism. But what do you mean "atavistic endeavor" as a term politically? HST: Well, this is going back to the Stone Age for the concepts of law. This goes back to Gengus Khan. That was the way he handled legal accusations and the process of guilty or innocent. And just thinking here.... In the Stone Age - I'm just playing with this thinking as I'm talking to you - atavistic endeavor is an attempt to go back to the past. You know, the processes of the past. Back to the good-old primitive days, when men were men and things were simple. So, these Jesus freaks, these primitive hillbillies - really, worse than hillbillies: hellboys - they don't know anything, really. They're ignorant. And they don't know that what they're trying has been tried many times before. Yeah, it's called fascism. It's called state socialism or - fuck, I hate to say this – but, theocracy. The separation of church and state has been the centerpiece of the American nation for 200 years. So we just try to brush aside 200 years of not just American but, shit, the whole world history. And you simply can't, anymore, get away with it....you know, it's not like a monarch, you can't just tax the peasants until they believe. They can't force them to work for nothing, confiscate their crops. You know, "all lands are royal lands," that worked back in Robin Hood's day in the Sherwood Forest. But it's not going to work when a bunch of cowboys with greasy oil hands reach out to seize nations that go back to, shit, 5,000 years before this alleged Jesus Christ. Shit, I don't mean to offend you. PC: No. I'm agnostic. And people do talk about Iraq as the ancient land of Mesopotamia, and the people there fighting for a land and not a leader. HST: Yeah, they still have the burning bush there. They have the oil that burns on the surface of the ground. You can take pictures of it: lake of fire. It's right above or somewhere around Tikrit. Or a little more northwest. A friend of mine went over and took pictures of it. PC: Have you discussed any of this with Pat Buchanan? HST: Godamnit, you know I haven't, and I should. I will. I must. PC: Has he been laying low? HST: Well, Patrick is too honest for this administration. He's too, uh...he really does love this country. He hasn't used it to bleed money off of other people and to get rich at other people's expense. Patrick is a Democrat in a way. I mean, a little "d." I've always liked him a lot and respected him a lot. I'm a friend to him and should talk to him. I will. p>PC: Well, look, which brings me to a question. I know Kerouac considered himself a patriot. Do you consider yourself a patriot? I know Kerouac's brand of patriotism expanded the concept for a lot of people who didn't understand it well. HST: Kerouac was a drunken asshole. And it's unfortunate, but he got that way in his - not old age - but, he went back to live with his mother in Florida. He turned into a dunce. He went and supported Goldwater. Nah, he was one of these uninformed Nazis. PC: You're someone who's hard to pigeonhole politically. HST: Oh good.......

i`ll take that one today...

how about this for mail crimes and invasion of privacy...... Public fury halts posties snooping 10 February 2005 By RICHARD TROW New Zealand Post has caved in to intense public pressure and ended its short-lived experiment wiring up posties to "snoop" on the public. The publicly owned mail company was trialling a new way of gathering data for its business customers by getting posties to record through lapel microphones whether houses on their routes needed repainting. The information was to be used in a marketing campaign. The practice, reported in The Dominion Post yesterday, prompted fury among members of the public unhappy at their trusted postie being used as a spy. Yesterday's revelations are also understood to have resulted in a "please explain" call from State Owned Enterprises Minister Paul Swain to New Zealand Post chairman Jim Bolger. Mr Swain made it clear in Parliament yesterday he was unimpressed with the initiative. He confirmed that the trial had been discontinued "due to public feedback". The company decided to pull the plug yesterday afternoon. Chief executive John Allen said the company had thought the concept, used in the United States, was appropriate for New Zealand. "Clearly though, in light of the feedback we have had through the day from lots of New Zealanders, we are not going to be progressing it." The company had not foreseen the backlash, he said. "I suppose what it has done is reinforced for us the very high trust with which the community views the postie and it's a fairly clear signal to us that we have got to be careful how we deploy our postie workforce in the community. "I think the image of the postie will remain strong in the minds of New Zealanders and I hope they also understand that this is a business that needs to continue to try new things, try new ways to deliver service." However, a union boss said posties on their rounds yesterday took some flak from householders. The information collected by the four posties used in the five-day trial would be passed on to Resene Paints as required under their agreement, Mr Allen said. Resene would not pay a fee for the service......