Forget OCZ, they might look like the best performers on paper but they have woeful reliabilitiy rates. Even the non-intel competitors such as Crucial, Corsair, GSkill etc. are much better than OCZ in reliability stakes.
Yeah the x25 is a great drive, no doubt about it. It was just so expensive compared to the alternatives back then... I could have bought three competing drives for the same cost. I keep backups so drive failures aren't a huge problem (though still annoying).
Luckily though I haven't had issues with my SSD at all. A Corsair Force drive well over a year old now and still performing great. I'd heard the stories about how most SSDs seem to die quickly so I was paranoid at first, but maybe I just got one out of the good batch or something;)
I'm Australian and I get the random pat down sometimes for international fights, especially international flights to the US. I'd say you're being overly paranoid and acting on too small a sample size (I've made probably 100s of international flights in and out of AU).
Keep in mind that these scanners are only being deployed for international flights from Australia. So you can come to Australia without being scanned (unless you're leaving from the US or UK...). You can even fly around Australia domestically without being scanned. It's only when you leave again that you'll have to be scanned. So, just don't leave:)
Yes, when only 10 years ago, the AUD was around 50 US cents. And even then, things were slightly more expensive in Australia than the US. Now that the AUD is worth more than the US (and domestic prices haven't halved, you know)...
Basically an American in Australia is paying 2x - 3x as much as they would for the same thing at home these days. Doesn't affect the Aussies since they are earning AUD, and doesn't affect those from places using currencies that have also appreciated a lot against the USD in the last few years, but for Americans, AU would be close to the most expensive place on earth right now.
Australia has flights to the US. I suspect that is one of the primary reasons.
Previously, if you were on a flight to the US, you had to go through regular airport security, and then, there was an additional security check at your gate (for US flights only). This was because Australia's standard airport security procedure was not 'up to the standards' of the Americans.
So you had to do the whole liquids in plastic sandwich bags, shoes off, bags searched crap at your actual gate, after you had already been through one layer of security.
Then, several years ago, Australia brought in the liquids restrictions that the US has (international flights only). So we no longer had to have quite as extensive 'extra' security for US flights. But there is still an extra check, usually consisting of a baggage search.
So my guess is that introducing these scanners is a further step to that end. Perhaps now US fights will be treated like all other flights and we won't need to go through security twice anymore?
The other saving grace of this situation is that it's only for international flights. Domestic flights are still fine: basic metal detector, no nudie scans and you can take liquids etc. on board just as you've always been able to. But don't think that Australia would have introduced this kinda stuff if the US hadn't... a big party of it is the restrictions placed upon airlines if they want to continue to fly to the US with regards to security (and airports recognising that US-bound travellers going through security twice was a very inefficient way of doing things).
What? There have been >$1000 unlocked phones as long as I can remember. Hell, I remember the Nokia 8 and 9 series phones cost over a thousand bucks way back in 1997 or so...
Heh ok. Yes I suspect it's a regional thing. The few Americans I know say "parking ramp" but they are from the upper Midwest (WI, MN), which is an area known for a few language differences here and there.
One quite vivid way of doing this is looking at the moon from different hemispheres too. Most people have looked at the moon and seen the mares on it, darker grey areas contrasting with the 'white' areas (yes I know they aren't actually white and in fact still quite dark, the moon has a very low albedo etc.)
I'm Australian, but when I first went to the northern hemisphere, I got this vague impression that something looked 'wrong' with the moon, but I couldn't quite figure out what. I eventually realised that it's because it was "upside down" from how it normally looks (since in the northern hemisphere the moon will be in the southern sky, and vice versa, you're going to be looking at it from a different angle unless you like bending your neck back over your head greater than 90 degrees...)
I'm not American so apologies if I'm wrong, but I was led to believe that a "parking lot" = a flat, open area where you park cars, whereas a "parking ramp" = a multi-level (or sometimes underground) enclosed building in which cars are parked.
We have a similar, but not quite as sophisticated (no map) system in many (if not most) malls in Australia. Before you even enter the carpark (American: 'parking ramp'), an electronic sign out the front says how many spots are available. If it's none, then off you go to the next area where parking is available.
Once you enter the carpark, green arrows will guide you to the areas where spots are still available (i.e. you might pass by three rows with a red cross and 0 spots available, then come to the fourth row, where a green arrow will now point down that row, next to the number of spots left in that row). Turning into that row you will see that every spot has either a green or red light above it, indicating whether it's occupied (so you can see at a glance how far down you have to drive, and won't miss spots hiding behind large vehicles etc.)
Best thing since sliced bread IMO, almost completely eliminates the hassle of finding spots on a busy shopping day.
This San Francisco system is even more advanced, because it covers a wider area (not just a single mall or whatever), and has the whole smartphone integration thing going on. Also it operates using magnetics in the pavement, rather than the system in Australia that uses some kind of IR laser or sonar or something that beams down from the space above the parking spot to detect whether something's there (you can confuse it by just standing there if you stand in exactly the right spot).
Who modded this informative? She is most definitely the Queen of Australia (and Head of State): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_of_Australia (same argument applies to most of the other countries you mention too).
She's head of the Commonwealth too, as you point out. But that's a separate role to her role as Queen.
Actually, the Queen of Australia is on our money. The fact that the same physical person also happens to be the Queen of England is irrelevant. One person, multiple hats.
When the Queen is in Australia, she's not there as the Queen of England (or any other Commonwealth realm). All the standards, flags, titles associated with her role as Queen of England are nowhere to be seen - the Australian equivalents are used instead. For instance this flag will be on her vehicle.
One might argue that it's all a subtle technicality. But we don't put the Queen of England on our money, any more than the UK puts the Queen of Australia on theirs.
Er...? Only the US, UK and a smattering of other small nations (mostly Carribean islands with strong links to the US, one or two African countries and Burma) use miles for measurement (e.g. of road distances). That's far from a majority of the world's landmass.
Hell you could take just Russia alone and it would be bigger than all the 'miles-using' countries.
Yeah, my home router is dualband 2.4 Ghz and 5 Ghz. The laptops can all see both APs, as can the tablet (iPad 2 FWIW... I'm pretty sure the iPad 1 only does 2.4 Ghz).
Everything else (phones, game consoles etc.) are stuck on the 2.4 Ghz though unfortunately. It sucks, since the 2.4 Ghz spectrum in my place is very congested. I can see a dozen other networks, all operating on one of the three standard channels (1, 6, 11). I live in Australia so channel 13 is also available for use, BUT unfortunately we bought some of our devices in the US, and so their firmware simply doesn't see channel 13. So we're stuck on channel 1 still. Remind me not to buy WiFi devices in the US again... that channel 13 is a godsend since 99% of people never both to change their channel (and nothing is on channel 13 by default).
That's different though. "Guinea pig" is the actual name of the animal. "Koala bear" is not - for some reasons some people add the 'bear' when they say it though (you won't find anyone in Australia saying that though... not sure if it's a purely American thing or more widespread).
Yeah, and I thought Australia was dry... but even it has more green in a sat image than visible in this image.
To be fair, it's winter and most of the US has been cleared of native vegetation and replaced with farmland. Crops have all been harvested so there ain't much there except dead grass (dead because a lot of the continent freezes in winter). Plus it's been a dry winter (not much snow in the north nor rain in the south).
Oh and retail overheads are huge in Australia. Even compared to Europe. Minimum wage is ~$16/hr, but almost noone actually gets paid that. Most retail jobs are paying $19/hr at minimum - more for casual staff. I was getting $22/hr stacking shelves 10 hours a week at my local supermarket throughout my university years, for instance. And that doesn't include the compulsory retirement (superannuation) payments that the employer also has to make on your behalf (so add another 9%, at minimum)...
Nope it ain't taxes, it's simply "pricing at the levels the market will bear", plus the fact that pricing hasn't been adjusted to account for currency fluctuations.
Ten years ago, the AUD was worth half of what the USD was. Back then, our game prices were double (in raw numbers) US prices (e.g. a game that was $50 in the USD was $100 here, or so). No issues there - that is roughly the same amount after you converted the currencies.
However, now, the AUD is worth slightly ~more~ than the USD. So it's more than doubled in value in the last decade. But game prices haven't changed (much). They are still 50-80% higher than US prices (in raw numbers). Thing is, that's what people always bought games at. So companies, to an extent, get away with it because the actual numbers on the price tag haven't really changed (or in fact, they've decreased, but nowhere near as much as would account for the change in currency value).
Some are blissfully unaware of how much cheaper games overseas are (or simply don't pay much attention to the news and realise just how strong our dollar is now compared to what it used to be). Some are aware, but simply don't care because they have enough disposable income not to worry about it (the average Aussie has more disposable income than, say, the average American, and is used to paying higher prices for almost everything - food, clothes, cars etc.) Others, like myself, say "screw that" and simply purchase over the Internet from the US (or use a US-based Steam account or something), and save themselves a healthy chunk of change. More and more people are doing this and it's starting to become a mainstream issue (not just games but all kinds of things - retailers here are complaining about everyone importing stuff and arguing that sales tax/GST should apply to imported goods etc.)
The other factor is that, Australians are still buying at those high prices. If people simply refused to pay, well, prices would come down. But retailers aren't gonna do that without good reason... they're looking to turn maximum profit after all.
The final thing is that the AUD, although strong now, is an incredibly volatile currency. It may be 0.80 EUR and 1.05 USD now, but in any economic crisis (such as the one that could easily unfold in the Eurozone this year), it will collapse as investors rush back to safehaven currencies like USD and JPY (which is stupid, really, as the AU economy is far stronger than the US or JP economy... but currency traders don't really care about that). So if they reduced prices to US levels, and suddenly our dollar lost 40% of its value in a few weeks (which has happened before, and indeed, has happened within the last few years), then what? They'd have to raise prices back up, and THAT would create a huge controversy (far more so than failing to simply reduce prices in the first place).
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Forget OCZ, they might look like the best performers on paper but they have woeful reliabilitiy rates. Even the non-intel competitors such as Crucial, Corsair, GSkill etc. are much better than OCZ in reliability stakes.
Yeah the x25 is a great drive, no doubt about it. It was just so expensive compared to the alternatives back then... I could have bought three competing drives for the same cost. I keep backups so drive failures aren't a huge problem (though still annoying).
Luckily though I haven't had issues with my SSD at all. A Corsair Force drive well over a year old now and still performing great. I'd heard the stories about how most SSDs seem to die quickly so I was paranoid at first, but maybe I just got one out of the good batch or something ;)
I'm Australian and I get the random pat down sometimes for international fights, especially international flights to the US. I'd say you're being overly paranoid and acting on too small a sample size (I've made probably 100s of international flights in and out of AU).
Keep in mind that these scanners are only being deployed for international flights from Australia. So you can come to Australia without being scanned (unless you're leaving from the US or UK...). You can even fly around Australia domestically without being scanned. It's only when you leave again that you'll have to be scanned. So, just don't leave :)
Yes, when only 10 years ago, the AUD was around 50 US cents. And even then, things were slightly more expensive in Australia than the US. Now that the AUD is worth more than the US (and domestic prices haven't halved, you know)...
Basically an American in Australia is paying 2x - 3x as much as they would for the same thing at home these days. Doesn't affect the Aussies since they are earning AUD, and doesn't affect those from places using currencies that have also appreciated a lot against the USD in the last few years, but for Americans, AU would be close to the most expensive place on earth right now.
And it's still the same. The scanners (and for that matter those stupid US liquids restrictions) are ONLY for international flights.
Domestic flights are as they have always been and hopefully will continue to always be.
Australia has flights to the US. I suspect that is one of the primary reasons.
Previously, if you were on a flight to the US, you had to go through regular airport security, and then, there was an additional security check at your gate (for US flights only). This was because Australia's standard airport security procedure was not 'up to the standards' of the Americans.
So you had to do the whole liquids in plastic sandwich bags, shoes off, bags searched crap at your actual gate, after you had already been through one layer of security.
Then, several years ago, Australia brought in the liquids restrictions that the US has (international flights only). So we no longer had to have quite as extensive 'extra' security for US flights. But there is still an extra check, usually consisting of a baggage search.
So my guess is that introducing these scanners is a further step to that end. Perhaps now US fights will be treated like all other flights and we won't need to go through security twice anymore?
The other saving grace of this situation is that it's only for international flights. Domestic flights are still fine: basic metal detector, no nudie scans and you can take liquids etc. on board just as you've always been able to. But don't think that Australia would have introduced this kinda stuff if the US hadn't ... a big party of it is the restrictions placed upon airlines if they want to continue to fly to the US with regards to security (and airports recognising that US-bound travellers going through security twice was a very inefficient way of doing things).
What? There have been >$1000 unlocked phones as long as I can remember. Hell, I remember the Nokia 8 and 9 series phones cost over a thousand bucks way back in 1997 or so...
Heh ok. Yes I suspect it's a regional thing. The few Americans I know say "parking ramp" but they are from the upper Midwest (WI, MN), which is an area known for a few language differences here and there.
One quite vivid way of doing this is looking at the moon from different hemispheres too. Most people have looked at the moon and seen the mares on it, darker grey areas contrasting with the 'white' areas (yes I know they aren't actually white and in fact still quite dark, the moon has a very low albedo etc.)
I'm Australian, but when I first went to the northern hemisphere, I got this vague impression that something looked 'wrong' with the moon, but I couldn't quite figure out what. I eventually realised that it's because it was "upside down" from how it normally looks (since in the northern hemisphere the moon will be in the southern sky, and vice versa, you're going to be looking at it from a different angle unless you like bending your neck back over your head greater than 90 degrees...)
I'm not American so apologies if I'm wrong, but I was led to believe that a "parking lot" = a flat, open area where you park cars, whereas a "parking ramp" = a multi-level (or sometimes underground) enclosed building in which cars are parked.
I'm talking about the latter in this case.
We have a similar, but not quite as sophisticated (no map) system in many (if not most) malls in Australia. Before you even enter the carpark (American: 'parking ramp'), an electronic sign out the front says how many spots are available. If it's none, then off you go to the next area where parking is available.
Once you enter the carpark, green arrows will guide you to the areas where spots are still available (i.e. you might pass by three rows with a red cross and 0 spots available, then come to the fourth row, where a green arrow will now point down that row, next to the number of spots left in that row). Turning into that row you will see that every spot has either a green or red light above it, indicating whether it's occupied (so you can see at a glance how far down you have to drive, and won't miss spots hiding behind large vehicles etc.)
Best thing since sliced bread IMO, almost completely eliminates the hassle of finding spots on a busy shopping day.
This San Francisco system is even more advanced, because it covers a wider area (not just a single mall or whatever), and has the whole smartphone integration thing going on. Also it operates using magnetics in the pavement, rather than the system in Australia that uses some kind of IR laser or sonar or something that beams down from the space above the parking spot to detect whether something's there (you can confuse it by just standing there if you stand in exactly the right spot).
Who modded this informative? She is most definitely the Queen of Australia (and Head of State): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_of_Australia (same argument applies to most of the other countries you mention too).
She's head of the Commonwealth too, as you point out. But that's a separate role to her role as Queen.
Actually, the Queen of Australia is on our money. The fact that the same physical person also happens to be the Queen of England is irrelevant. One person, multiple hats.
When the Queen is in Australia, she's not there as the Queen of England (or any other Commonwealth realm). All the standards, flags, titles associated with her role as Queen of England are nowhere to be seen - the Australian equivalents are used instead. For instance this flag will be on her vehicle.
One might argue that it's all a subtle technicality. But we don't put the Queen of England on our money, any more than the UK puts the Queen of Australia on theirs.
Er...? Only the US, UK and a smattering of other small nations (mostly Carribean islands with strong links to the US, one or two African countries and Burma) use miles for measurement (e.g. of road distances). That's far from a majority of the world's landmass.
Hell you could take just Russia alone and it would be bigger than all the 'miles-using' countries.
It could be one very small country :) Like, I dunno, Vatican City.
Yeah, my home router is dualband 2.4 Ghz and 5 Ghz. The laptops can all see both APs, as can the tablet (iPad 2 FWIW... I'm pretty sure the iPad 1 only does 2.4 Ghz).
Everything else (phones, game consoles etc.) are stuck on the 2.4 Ghz though unfortunately. It sucks, since the 2.4 Ghz spectrum in my place is very congested. I can see a dozen other networks, all operating on one of the three standard channels (1, 6, 11). I live in Australia so channel 13 is also available for use, BUT unfortunately we bought some of our devices in the US, and so their firmware simply doesn't see channel 13. So we're stuck on channel 1 still. Remind me not to buy WiFi devices in the US again ... that channel 13 is a godsend since 99% of people never both to change their channel (and nothing is on channel 13 by default).
That's different though. "Guinea pig" is the actual name of the animal. "Koala bear" is not - for some reasons some people add the 'bear' when they say it though (you won't find anyone in Australia saying that though ... not sure if it's a purely American thing or more widespread).
Pedant mode on: koalas are not bears. It's just a koala, not a koala bear.
Yeah, and I thought Australia was dry ... but even it has more green in a sat image than visible in this image.
To be fair, it's winter and most of the US has been cleared of native vegetation and replaced with farmland. Crops have all been harvested so there ain't much there except dead grass (dead because a lot of the continent freezes in winter). Plus it's been a dry winter (not much snow in the north nor rain in the south).
Wow ... didn't know that. (I'm not American so I have a bit of an excuse though). That's kinda ridiculous.
Also, it's "intents and purposes"...
Not according to:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_uranium_reserves
Sort the table by "World Share". Australia is on top, by a huge margin, and has four times as much reserves as Canada.
Oh and retail overheads are huge in Australia. Even compared to Europe. Minimum wage is ~$16/hr, but almost noone actually gets paid that. Most retail jobs are paying $19/hr at minimum - more for casual staff. I was getting $22/hr stacking shelves 10 hours a week at my local supermarket throughout my university years, for instance. And that doesn't include the compulsory retirement (superannuation) payments that the employer also has to make on your behalf (so add another 9%, at minimum)...
Nope it ain't taxes, it's simply "pricing at the levels the market will bear", plus the fact that pricing hasn't been adjusted to account for currency fluctuations.
Ten years ago, the AUD was worth half of what the USD was. Back then, our game prices were double (in raw numbers) US prices (e.g. a game that was $50 in the USD was $100 here, or so). No issues there - that is roughly the same amount after you converted the currencies.
However, now, the AUD is worth slightly ~more~ than the USD. So it's more than doubled in value in the last decade. But game prices haven't changed (much). They are still 50-80% higher than US prices (in raw numbers). Thing is, that's what people always bought games at. So companies, to an extent, get away with it because the actual numbers on the price tag haven't really changed (or in fact, they've decreased, but nowhere near as much as would account for the change in currency value).
Some are blissfully unaware of how much cheaper games overseas are (or simply don't pay much attention to the news and realise just how strong our dollar is now compared to what it used to be). Some are aware, but simply don't care because they have enough disposable income not to worry about it (the average Aussie has more disposable income than, say, the average American, and is used to paying higher prices for almost everything - food, clothes, cars etc.) Others, like myself, say "screw that" and simply purchase over the Internet from the US (or use a US-based Steam account or something), and save themselves a healthy chunk of change. More and more people are doing this and it's starting to become a mainstream issue (not just games but all kinds of things - retailers here are complaining about everyone importing stuff and arguing that sales tax/GST should apply to imported goods etc.)
The other factor is that, Australians are still buying at those high prices. If people simply refused to pay, well, prices would come down. But retailers aren't gonna do that without good reason ... they're looking to turn maximum profit after all.
The final thing is that the AUD, although strong now, is an incredibly volatile currency. It may be 0.80 EUR and 1.05 USD now, but in any economic crisis (such as the one that could easily unfold in the Eurozone this year), it will collapse as investors rush back to safehaven currencies like USD and JPY (which is stupid, really, as the AU economy is far stronger than the US or JP economy ... but currency traders don't really care about that). So if they reduced prices to US levels, and suddenly our dollar lost 40% of its value in a few weeks (which has happened before, and indeed, has happened within the last few years), then what? They'd have to raise prices back up, and THAT would create a huge controversy (far more so than failing to simply reduce prices in the first place).