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What I find disappointing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

What I find disappointing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

What I find disappointing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

What I find disappointing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

Allegedly...

Although it would make sense why you don't hear about Russian Wikileak stuff.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10781381

What I find disturbing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

What I find disturbing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

What I find disturbing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

What I find disturbing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

What I find disturbing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

What I find disturbing is the negative way the media in New Zealand is portraying Kim "Dotcom" Schmitz.

NZ police acted on US request for help
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780138

They raided him with freaking helicopters!! :

Police complete Dotcom search
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780142

Dotcom birthday party targeted
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780321

Dotcom's lavish life of parties and luxury
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780514

Dotcom 'extreme' flight risk - Crown
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10780553

Dotcom case 'not open and shut'
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10781113

Apple audits 5% of their suppliers: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/compute/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501832&objectid=10779344
What they are doing is a good thing, but 5% is 5%.

An undercover policeman was installing a covert GPS tracker on the car of a suspected criminal; the suspect saw him doing it and shot him dead.

The legal status of this is unclear here too, it hasn't either been ruled legal or illegal.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10669854

a language that less than .0002% of the people in the world would recognize does that mean a TM is invalidated?

By my rough calculation our 4 million people gives us 0.057% of the world's population recognising the phrase :-)

The basic fact is that this is an extremely arrogant move. A company is taking a "common word", which ironically means gift, and using it for commercial gain for open source software that was created in the very country they're applying their trademark in.

The Maori meaning of "koha" is more complex than Gift - and if you start to understand the moral obligation that underpins true "koha" - you really feel that these guys are a bunch of knob-ends.

That said, our intellectual property office recently let a large brewery trademark the term "Radler" - http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10738427 - so unfortunately they might be needing their legal fund to try and get Koha back out of corporate hands.

I'm not a fan of CCTV being over used but as it isn't normally available for access when used in a taxi the abuse potential is pretty small. We haven't had them long but they have already caught one scumbag http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10764246 on video. Used in this limited fashion I support their use.

Start class warfare??? The 1% have been waging a silent war against the 99% for decades.

After-tax income for the top 1 per cent of US households almost tripled, up 275 per cent, from 1979 to 2007, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found. For people in the middle of the economic scale, after-tax income grew by just 40 per cent. Those at the bottom experienced an 18 per cent increase.

I've consulted for a bank, and here's the dream : full offline money. If you have a TPM they will manage your account in your laptop (or phone, or ...) and have full offline payments. Because the TPM will only give their program access to the data, they can still prevent you from simply adding money in your own account, while allowing fully disconnected payments to occur which the bank will only find out about weeks after the fact (and so can you on other's computers of course).

That sounds like a pretty big incentive to find someone with an electron microscope, or if you're part of organized crime, getting your own. It's not like TPM hacks haven't been pulled off before.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10331826

Think about it: how many routine flyers, do you think, have forgotten to turn off their phone when they sit down, or just didn't bother? How many incidents have occurred as a result? It's zero, in case you are wondering....

"Think about it" all you want, that won't make your gut feeling a fact. Let's try some actual facts:

http://m.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.php?c_id=1&objectid=10701029

Why bother switching to ipv6? ipv4 only has to last until October 21st 2011.

The article only shows half the story.

Ms Lee said last night the compilation was made of songs that were legally downloaded and paid for. "I'm not a pirate. I have never downloaded anything illegally in my life." Earlier she had told the House she did not even know how file-sharing through peer-to-peer systems worked.

Source

Unless she paid for and downloaded the tunes herself isn't that still the same thing? By their rules that is.

The article only shows half the story.

Ms Lee said last night the compilation was made of songs that were legally downloaded and paid for. "I'm not a pirate. I have never downloaded anything illegally in my life." Earlier she had told the House she did not even know how file-sharing through peer-to-peer systems worked.

Source

In New Zealand, format shifting is legal.

People also seem to be excluding the fine that may accompany the legislation. But here are some other tid- bits. . All is not lost (yet).

I am amazed that this sort of thing will go through on an election year!

from:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10719201

While the ability for copyright holders to apply to have repeat offenders disconnected remains in the legislation, it will not come into effect unless after two years it is shown that other less severe sanctions are ineffective.

Those sanctions include warning notices from ISPs to their customers informing them they have infringed copyright, and an extension of the Copyright Tribunal's jurisdiction to provide a fast-track, low-cost process to hear illegal file sharing claims.

The tribunal will also be able to award penalties of up to $15,000 based on damages sustained by the copyright owner.

You are mistaken. The Hobbit will according to an article I read not be Fake3D but actually be substantially shot by side-by-side mounted cameras.
As for the actual result in terms of colour balance and effects, I've seen several 3D movies and I must say it depends highly on the cinema operator. Given good equipment and a bit of tuning, excellent image quality is attainable. 3D effects tend to be persuasive, even - surprisingly enough - in some Fake3D movies.
Although I do remember a shot where the director had made a rather unfortunate decision in re how far away the horizon should be in a scene involving the ocean. It didn't give me a headache or anything like that, but it definitely didn't look as if it was at infinity, more like 50 meters. Really odd, especially since the 3D in the rest of that movie was good enough (and *used* well enough) to largely compensate for the complete and utter lack of plot.

Approval ratings for country leaders usually skyrocket in times of crises, so this 90% information sounds complete bullshit.

In fact, the first thing I searched for in Google, told me that's true...
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10707663 ... the other links commented the same, in fact, some of the others were a little older and had him at around 70%, which is exceedingly high.

I live in South Australia, and I know New Zealand has a low incidence of crime/corruption, so in all likelihood his cabinet truly thinks that whatever they're doing is for the best. You may not agree, economists would likely be split 50/50. If the government ever wants to reverse anything, they can, with varying amounts of hassle, if its popular it can always be undone.

Lastly, while you may have seen a tax cut for the rich, there is economic theory/ideology to support it, regardless of whether you think its right or not. Additionally, that requirement could have been apart of other trade negotiations and similar.

I study this stuff, and while people may think its easy, and that "we just got to do this" the truth is often far from the matter, and no one can reasonably say they know the answer, or what to do.

I'm actually confused now - I've read two different articles with conflicting opinions on that specific point. TFA says Amazon is under the gun, while the article I read (on NZ Herald, syndicated from Bloomberg) seemed to indicate noone could get a solid answer.

They gave him a knighthood, his studio USD50 million odd of tax breaks and subsidies and changed employment law so everybody who works on films is a contractor.

Exactly how much friendlier did you want the government to be?

They gave him a knighthood, his studio USD50 million odd of tax breaks and subsidies and changed employment law so everybody who works on films is a contractor.

Exactly how much friendlier did you want the government to be?

...whether by use of page scripts or by data mining: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/technology/news/article.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10456534&pnum=0

If the link is right, then the CIA probably has direct access to the Facebook database.
If worked for the CIA and had direct access to the Facebook database, then I would prefer to mine the database, because page scripts can be found by users and can fail for a variety of reasons.

and Russian airpower is falling apart due to corruption and lack of maintenance and small serviceable numbers of aircraft).

We could say the same about another "super"power where people are being kicked out of their homes into the street, and where a useless "healthcare" bill has FINALLY been passed, declared "Kommunizt!" and resulted in a Right Wing Riot!

The fact is, the "other teams" hardware beat the crap out of "our boys", it must be admitted. Talk about "shock and awe", being impressive is the whole point of "top of the line fighter jets". I used the Australian airshow example because its close to NZ, where I live, and I remember it, again, too scared to even compete! Mother Russia there gave Uncle a spanking!

Really, the answer with all these Games of War is not to play in the first place.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WarGames

Its better to be loved than feared. Nobody wants to mess with little ol' New Zealand! Our "airforce" sits around rusting:

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10698184

There was somthing call 'pig sushi' that I heard about a while ago, that had pig Beta cells wrapped in an coating that stopped the immune system from getting at them.

I havn't heard any more on that, but it did tackle the problem head on.

The trials are continuing as we speak here in New Zealand. The company concerned is Living Cell Technologies

And there is an article describing it here

It's a very clever solution that solves the rejection issue. The main questions are on how much insulin can be produced and over what time period. The reality is that anything that introduces at least some reasonable level of insulin production - even if not enough to eliminate injections - should reduce the extreme blood sugar highs that cause the most long term damage to Type 1 diabetics.

It will be fantastic if this can succeed (like all of the other potential cures to this disease).

New Zealand did not have any bailouts through this crisis that US is experiencing. Just bugger off.

Fuck you, you pompous lying prick. Not only have you been spouting lies constantly, you attack those who work to inform you. You are uneducatuable and should have your license to lie your useless shit revoked. For anyone else reading, one click should fix that. But the lying idiot above is obviously so personally committed to his insane dogma that he refuses to listen to others.

I wish you'd stop lying to everyone, but you'll see this as some liberal attack or something, rather than someone informing you that your facts are wrong (and obviously all the lies you pile after them you call conclusions). Try reading up on world affairs before making an ass of yourself and lying like an idiot. Nah, too much to ask. It's all a liberal conspiracy to mod you down for being a troll, and not because you are a lying sack of shit and everyone recognizes it.

Here (in New Zealand), we've been getting a rash of phone callers telling people they're infected and asking for money. In fact me wife got just such a call last week. Fortunately she knows just enough to tell the caller to fsk off. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10686568 I don't know if that's common in other places. We might just be a gullible bunch.

because this "trusted" hardware will/can have a specialized chip that contains a non-tamperable key.

Its not easy - but TPM has been proven breakable.

http://hackaday.com/2010/02/09/tpm-crytography-cracked/

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/technology/news/article.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10625082

Yeah, or using their parliamentary credit card to purchase it. At least he didn't apologise for the porn, just for the misspending. One of the local body politicians got caught peeing on a bush, and since he didn't apologise for it, I'm considering voting for him purely on that basis :).

What I hate is when they turn on the waterworks etc.., it just highlights that they are manipulative worms, but of course we already knew that.

This happened over here (in NZ). Cops were attaching a GPS tracer to a suspect's car, and the suspect saw them do it. Chase into the street, copper was shot and later died. Details here http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10531643

quit yer whinin' until you have an actual *solution*.

Keep waiting for your Courier or Joojoo or whatever vapourware tablet actually comes out and sells in the DOUBLE DIGITS.

I love my iPad, I couldnt imagine NOT having a "tablet computer" now, its truly "magical" at many things, checking email, showing photos, video, the applications...it deserves its success.

I've quite enjoyed many of the current (read FREE) news apps, even little old New Zealand has some enjoyable newspaper apps. My biggest concern is the lack of utility built into these apps, they are excellent for quick reading, you launch the Herald app , it has a short car commercial (stored on the device itself, hence why the app is 40MB odd), then a broadsheet display of the stories under basic categories, you tap the story you like and can then scroll through it.

I would love to be able to change font sizes, or even have my device read the text, all things that are easy to do on my personal computer. Simple, OS wide things that are not included in the majority of these current apps.
br> The iPad is here, its doing very well, hard to find them in-stock, until something BETTER comes along, lets enjoy what we have now, eh? "these cars suck, I hate congestion, look at all the sky above, why dont we have flying cars yet, damn you Toyota, get your lazy asses back to work..."

Nor are plant patents. People have had those for years, and they occasionally have controversies. I don't think it unreasonable to allow people to make a profit off their work, be it writing a book or breeding a plant. It took 20 years for some guy to breed the Redlove apple, is the time and effort of horticulturalists so meaningless that they should not be allowed to have a patent, for a reasonable time, on their work? And GM tech is no different. Now, suing someone because they were cross pollinated, there needs to be a better way worked out (although in the most famous case of that there was more to the story).

This happened in New Zealand. The target found the GPS and tried to sell it on an online auction site. The cops pulled the auction. Story at The Register

The other risk of police installing trackers is sometimes the targets don't know they are police and get very angry. A policeman was killed in NZ after being shot with an airgun while installing a tracking device. The crims thought he was trying to steal the car! NZ Herald story

I'm not saying it's the public's job to troubleshoot their shoddy code and develop fixes.

I'm just saying I feel it IS the public's responsibility not to make potentially dangerous information available to people with malicious intent.

I have no love for MS. I just feel everyone is better off with "Hey you morons, look at the latest exploit" instead of "Hey, general public including innumerable black hats, look at the latest exploit"

That does kind of depend quite heavily on the researcher being the first to find the vulnerability, and the vendor allocating enough people to adequately deal with fixing it in a timely manner.

Can you say with any real supportable evidence that either statement is a safe assumption? Because I know I can't. And to be honest, I doubt any researcher worth their title can either. Including the guy who I imagine kicked this new policy off by disclosing one he discovered when Microsoft were palming him off with vague answers for a week.

If the "people with malicious intent" already know about a vulnerability, which is a much safer assumption to make, and Microsoft are dragging their feet, because hiring enough good security people is expensive, is it not the researcher's duty to inform the general public? Who can then take steps to protect themselves while waiting for Microsoft to get around to making the patch available the next Patch Tuesday? After all.. We are vulnerable every second of every day to a host of unknown unreported vulnerabilities that any "black hat" could discover by themselves, and exploit for fun and profit. We can't be wary about exploits we are not aware of.

If a vulnerability is discovered, which do you think is faster to react? A company who knows the finder is not going to tell anybody, so they can take their time, or even ignore them completely.. Or a company who knows they better get right on it, or have a pretty nasty PR mess to clean up?
  Who do you think has the bigger and more authoritative security team? One who has perhaps got the authority to say to marketing.. " No you bloody well will not do that. And I don't care how much easier it makes sharing your whole hard drive over the internet with aunty Gladys and her bridge team"!

As you sit there worrying about Microsoft possibly losing money, or having their reputation tarnished.. Or worst of all.. Having to increase the size of the security team.. Ask yourself this question..

"What would BP have done differently if the warnings they had earlier been given about the safety of the gulf rig were a matter of public record"?

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10652032 (first one I came across on Google, not the first one I have read)

Provable losses is hard. Lower (or negative) profits versus just what exactly? Expectations? You need to run a parallel Earth. But you may find this interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sione's_Wedding#Copyright_violation_case Here http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10444843 it is suggested the film made $4m with a budget of $3.8m to make. So $200,000 profit rather than the claimed/expected $700,000.

You've linked to an article that claims that suicide bombings are un-Islamic. Which is perfectly true - they are also un-Christian, but in both cases it's not because you kill someone; it's because you kill yourself. Suicide is a major sin in all Abrahamic religions.

Oh, and they are also against "terrorism". But this is a loaded term - you can mean anything you want by it. But, for example, executing offenders in a way prescribed by Shari'a is clearly not terrorism to a Muslim - it's merely implementing the divine law; same as executing a murderer in a Western society is not considered terrorism.

Meanwhile, if you want an actual example, how about this? The guy is by no means a radical; hell, he was the only Muslim MP in the parliament at that moment, and, effectively, representative of the entire NZ Muslim community. And he goes on record to say things like that. "Oh, no, it's totally not right here - but elsewhere [read: where Shari'a is already implemented], stoning people is perfectly fine".

I would love to see how pro-gun people would deal with New Zealand, where we have a law "against" Smacking children :) http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10431333 (link just for fun)

I find the idea of everyone being armed absolutely terrifying, friends who have been overseas (and not just to Australia like myself) mention seeing police with guns on every street...and the thought of even armed police gives me the creeps...

We are less violent, we live longer, we are healthier, more left wing... we focus on preventing the problem in the first place rather than keeping our Millitary Industrial Complex running at full capacity.

I would love to hear your thoughts on my society :)

Most Christians and most Muslism are better than this. Please don't equate extremist Islam to all of Islam. You don't hear people accusing all Christians of acting like the westboro baptist church now do you?

It's hard not to notice that acceptance of the local varieties of Westboro Baptist Church are much higher among Muslims than they are among Christians. With Muslims, while many don't directly participate in acts of terror, when you ask around whether they support or condone it (and I mean not just anecdotal, but various polls etc), a lot show quiet support.

Then there are people like this guy, who try to project the "progressive Muslim" image to fit into their society, but, again, don't find anything wrong with various barbaric practices associated with Islam as such - only in the context of the (westernized, humanistic) culture they're stranded in.

Now, if you want to complain about how things went with our money and AIG (an insurance company) and the automakers, fine.

The automaker bailouts aren't as bad as people make out, either - the GM loan, at least, will be repaid by June.

Chrysler, on the other hand, won't pay back and should have been left to die. Their cars are ugly pieces of shit.

I do have a reference for an article about the consortium - probably the same one you've already read, but on the offchance anybody else is interested:

$900m plan to open NZ internet tap

No, the level of complexity isn't comparable. WoW for example could have several hundred characters on a screen, each with many characteristics and equipment. Map data, position, chat, rules about various areas, so on and so on.

In addition WoW was made to prevent people from getting access to the information. They have a customer base of millions and a large chunk of those are hackers. So wow obviously was obfuscated and encrypted to avoid getting hacked. And wow has a budget much larger than toyota's coders. So what makes you think toyota would spend a large large amount of money on securing the data which they don't even really have a duty to do so?

Crackers have done way harder cracks as well: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/technology/news/article.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10625082&pnum=0 for example. The level of difficulty likely 1000s of times harder. Probably another few orders of magnitude on top of that. Seriously, likely ALL game crackers out there currently putting out releases could defeat toyota's obfuscation in a few hours, days tops. Ask a group like Razor1911 or Skid-row to do it, give them a car and it'd be done.

FWIW, I'm embarrassed to be a New Zealander right today... They passed The Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Amendment Bill, so 3 strikes and we're out of pocket $15,000 and kicked offline.

About as trivial as rewiring a microchip. Unless you are this guy I don't think it is all that trivial.

When did peace activists (aka "useful idiots") ever protest in front of the Soviet Embassy?

And then there's this: Dietzel told Kliem he was a physicist working for an international research company committed to world peace.

I suspect you think that New Zealanders are "jealous of our freedom" too don't you.

The freedom to not have enough doctors and hospital beds?

Last year, NZ (which doesn't pay it's own doctors enough to stay in NZ) paid My Cousin The Newly-minted Doctor to work there for 6 months. It hardened her, a relative free spirit who lives in the New Orleans French Quarter, against socialized medicine.

And this: Women who get pregnant while in New Zealand on temporary residency permits are being told to leave the country to have their babies because of a shortage of maternity services.

I guess Nevada hates America too because they don't want Yucca Mountain.

Nah, that's just NIMBY.