I'm an Australian, based in the Washington, DC, area of the United States. I spend a lot of time there with Jasmine, Australia's best-known speedsolver of the Rubik's Cube. Prior to the US, Jasmine and I were based in London, UK. We have also lived previously in the United States and Australia.
I have worked for an Australian business rules and compliance company since 1999 in Australia, the US and the UK. I have also lectured in IT and Law related topics at King's College, London, and at The Australian National University.
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- February 2007
- January 2007
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These are a few of my favourite links:
- Jasmine's site
- Jasmine's blog
- Mikal
- Daveydweeb
- Beth
- Lyn
- Doug
- Marissa
- Lisaloha
- David (Greenomics)
- Paul's Ramblings (music)
Hits since 1 Sep 2004
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Site design by Jasmine
Mon, 02 Apr 2007 [Australian eastern time]
David had an interesting post on Friday about his participation in Sydney's Earth Hour. The Earth Hour idea is pretty interesting: Sydney households and businesses were urged to turn their lights out for an hour on Saturday night to demonstrate commitment to reducing greenhouse emissions. Although it saved power on the night, the event was probably more significant as a high profile way of promoting an environmental cause -- even to people who chose not to participate.
It's interesting that the event has received a huge amount of publicity around the world. This morning, Google News was showing more than 400 hits for "earth hour" from the world's media. Here's an example of the international coverage from CNN.
Technorati tags for this post: Australia Sydney environment Earth+Hour greenhouse
Sat, 06 Jan 2007 [Australian eastern time]The Age ran a particularly silly article today, under the headline, "At Heathrow it pays to be rich and organised". It describes the experience of an Australian who was turned around and sent home from Heathrow Airport in London. He had previously worked in the UK for two years, and on this occasion claimed to be going for a two month visit, with about £400 to fund the trip, and intending to stay with someone who could not independently confirm to UK Immigration that he was expecting a visitor.
The clear implication of the article is that UK Immigration is erratic and unreasonable, and that Australians may be summarily ejected from the UK for no good reason.
We can actually draw a simpler piece of advice from this tale. Any country can decide whom it will admit at its borders -- and Australia itself is stricter than most countries. Wise travellers can show that they can support themselves (£400 does not go far in London) and have strong ties to another place, so that they will leave the country without seeking work or using its health or welfare system.
Technorati tags for this post: Australia United Kingdom immigration
Tue, 02 Jan 2007 [Australian eastern time]Jasmine and I are visiting Australia again for a few weeks, after which we will be off to work with RuleBurst in Washington, DC.
Technorati tags for this post: Australia
Thu, 20 Jul 2006 [Australian eastern time]Back in April, I wrote about Cadbury's attempts to protect its distinctive purple colour using trademark law.
Michael has posted an update on this story on his site.
Technorati tags for this post: Australia Cadbury trademark
Sat, 27 May 2006 [Australian eastern time]
The Australian energy debate... and let's all drive nuclear-powered cars!
David has interesting posts on his site about the Australian debates over wind and nuclear power (you may need to scroll down a little). I had never realised until very recently how controversial wind power is!
Meanwhile, I read last weekend that Ford worked on a nuclear-powered concept car, the Nucleon, in the 1950s. Wikipedia has a photo of the mock-up vehicle, and it is good to see the passenger compartment separated from the reactor for safety reasons... but you would spill a lot more than oil on the road if you had a serious accident!
Technorati tags for this post: Australia wind+power nuclear+power nuclear Ford
Thu, 27 Apr 2006 [Australian eastern time]Chocolate manufacturer Cadbury doesn't own the colour purple, according to an Australian legal decision mentioned in a news.com.au article. According to the article:
The company, which uses a dark shade of purple in its global marketing effort, launched legal action in 2003 in a bid to sue Australian-based confectioner Darrell Lea over its use of similar colours.Cadbury had objected to Darrell Lea's use of various shades of purple in Darrell Lea's store signage, uniforms and product packaging.
This is not the only case of an Australian company attempting to restrict other businesses' use of particular colours. Another recent article (in The Australian) mentions the Cadbury litigation, and also a dispute between Woolworths and BP over use of the colour green to sell fuel.
Fri, 21 Apr 2006 [Australian eastern time]
Back in Australia for a brief visit
Jasmine and I arrived back in Australia a couple of days ago for a brief visit. The immediate reason for our visit is that everyone is getting married! We have an Australian wedding to attend on 22 April, and we were invited to one other wedding and an engagement party on the same day in other places in Australia. Jasmine also has another wedding to attend in May, when I will be back in London.
Sun, 02 Apr 2006 [Australian eastern time]
Hidden Braille Messages on the National Museum of Australia building
Miranda Devine has written a column in the Sydney Morning Herald which describes how the architect of the National Museum of Australia, which was opened in 2001, wanted to achieve a subversive "one in the eye for John Howard [Australia's Prime Minister]". To this end, the building had Braille writing built into the crazy modern design of its exterior.
The messages only remained for 10 days, and were then obscured or changed by management. Some examples quoted from the article:
"Forgive us our genocide" was one of the messages intended as a reproach to John Howard's Government for refusing to apologise for the mistreatment of Aborigines by previous generations.
"Sorry" was written in braille several times as well as "Resurrection city", a reference to a 1968 civil rights protest in Washington DC. Other messages were: "God knows", "She'll be right", "Mate", "Who is my neighbour?", "Time will tell", "Good as gold" and "Love is blind".
Unfortunately, the Sydney Morning Herald link may require a free registration.
Mon, 06 Feb 2006 [Australian eastern time]
Exciting (?) find: uranium in Australian water
David has an interesting post about uranium being identified in high concentrations in water in parts of Western Australia and the Northern Territory. He asks why people think this is so "exciting" given the likely link to health problems and the fact that it would be illegal to mine the uranium anyway.
Tue, 10 May 2005 [Australian eastern time]One of my old friends from The Australian National University has just started a blog called Bondurbia.
Current topics of discussion include Australian politics and, more importantly, Australian Idol and The X Factor.