Slight correction: Internet censorship has not been introduced in Australia (nor the UK for that matter). Proposals for doing so may be on the table in Parliament shortly, but it's far from a done deal. So your "as it has been in the UK and Australia" sentence isn't quite right. Yet, at least.
I think the problem is not necessarily the lack of a chip, but the fact that it's not compulsory to use that chip.
I'm not American (and don't live in America) so I'm not sure of the situation there. But in my country, although my debit card DOES have a chip, have a choice of magnetic swipe + sign, or using the chip and PIN number. When I use it in a store, they ask me "do you sign or PIN?" (even though all stores have the necessary equipment to use the chip/PIN).
Plus, whether the card is magnetic-only or has a chip is kinda irrelevant for online transactions. All you need is the number, expiry date and CVV number.
There is one reason to use a debit card, at least where I live.
Some credit cards incur interest immediately (there's no interest-free period at all... you start getting charged interest the moment the transaction occurs). Sure you could literally drive home and pay off the amount straight away, but there'd still be a cent of interest or something annoyingly hanging around at the end of the month.
In fact for most of the last decade my credit card has been that way - immediate interest incurred. Why would I choose such a card? Well, the credit cards that DO have interest free periods (usually 55 days) here also tend to have annual fees (which you incur whether you use the card or not). For the couple of times I needed to use a credit card per year, the little bit of interest I incurred (maybe $5 a year) was far far less than the annual fee would be (typically $25-100 depending on the card), assuming I paid purchases off immediately (which I always did, via internet banking).
I've now switched to a different bank that offers a card that has an interest free period AND no annual fee. But I only qualified for that card because I'm married and both of us have a good income. When I was a poor-ass student, things were different.
Hehe I noticed that as a foreigner visiting America.
Obviously I didn't want to use my debit card from my home bank for every transaction since I would incur a currency exchange fee every time. So I generally used cash (and this was mostly in large denominations like 50s and 100s, since thats what they give you when you get your money changed at the airport).
The first thing I noticed was the signs at various shops saying "we don't accept 100s". This was 'new' to me. At home, money is money, and has to be accepted for a payment (it's legal tender after all). I don't think the retailer has a right to refuse you paying with particular denominations (although I suppose they can refuse to trade with you altogether which has the same effect). Having said that, I suppose the reason for this might not be related to counterfeiting at all - it could simply be that they don't like to count out a large amount of change (slows down the line etc).
The second thing I noticed was the weird looks they gave you paying in 100s, or in some cases, even 50s. Wtf...
The third thing I noticed was all the weird little things they did to check for forgeries... running it between their fingers, the UV light, etc etc. Some places even had little machines to check the bills. At home (Australia FWIW), I've NEVER seen anyone check a bill for authenticity (not even in a cursory fashion)... hell they barely even glance at it. Probably mostly because Australian bills are considered among the most secure in the world (they are polymer rather than linen/paper, and virtually unforgeable).
I think it's just one of those cultural things though. At home people use $50s and $100s all the time and it's not considered unusual at all. Noone even raises an eyelid. 50s are especially common since Australian ATMs dish out both 50s and 20s (so you can make withdrawals of 20, 40, 50, 70, 80, 90, 100 etc).
Of course it's not as bad as in Europe. Last time I travelled there the currency changer gave me a 500 Euro note. I'm sure dishing out change for that annoyed whoever I ended up giving it to.
I do a sorta similar thing. I have two banks. One is my 'regular' bank that I keep most of my funds in, get my salary deposited into, withdraw from at ATMs etc. I have both a debit and credit card with this bank, but I tend not to use the debit card online.
My other bank has only a debit card linked to a single account that never has more than a few hundred dollars. This is the debit card I use for online transactions, and is also the account linked to my PayPal account (via EFT). So if my number gets stolen or I get phished via PayPal or whatever, the maximum money I am going to lose is the small amount in that account. If that account gets too low I just EFT a bit more over from my 'main' bank (takes 24 hours).
You can of course acheive the same effect with a single bank. Have a transaction account accessible via the debit card, and a linked savings account that is not directly card-accessible (i.e. that money has to be transferred back to the transaction account via online banking or in person at a branch before it can be used - as far as the debit card is concerned, that money doesn't exist). That is a fairly standard way of doing things here in Australia anyway, since most people prefer to keep their money in a savings account earning 4% or 5% interest, than in an everyday transaction account earning close to zero).
Oh wow... Google around for some documentaries on professional gamers in Korea and prepare to have your mind blown. These people are national celebrities and take home big fat paychecks.
That's a good point. Although, I wonder if the differences between games in a franchise are more or less significant an obstacle to changing game than it would be for a professional sportsperson changing to a related sport.
There's been quite a few high profile Rugby (League) players crossing over to Rugby (Union) in the past few years here in Australia, for example. The games are related and certainly share a similar skill-set, but the rules and strategies are reasonably different. Things like the relative importance of strength vs. speed vary etc. I think this is a fairly good analogy for changing between, say, Counter Strike 1.5 and 1.6 (the games 'feel' quite different, but share higher-level strategies).
Apologies for the 'local' analogy with Rugby, but I was hard-pressed to think of two American sports similar enough to each other to make the analogy work. Maybe baseball and softball or something? Showing my ignorance here...
I doubt they have an equivalent. Even in other ~Western~ countries there is often no equivalent of such a registry. It's one of those things I always found a bit odd about America actually.
Where I live, you either don't release a serious criminal who is going to have a tendency to re-offend, or tabs are kept on them in other ways (house confinement, surveillance, radio bracelets etc.). I mean sure, the people who live nearby to the to-be-released sex offender will be notified and have a right to object to/block the offender moving into that area. But that doesn't extend to the whole world being able to punch in a random address and see who's around.
I'm not American so I may have misinterpreted what the Registry actually does. If so I apologise. But my impression was that ~anyone~ can search for nearby offenders ~anywhere~, even if that location has nothing to do with them.
It's a similar principle as in the West, where you generally can't release the names of suspected offenders (or victims) who are minors (or at least that's how it is here in Australia... you often hear 'the offender's identity cannot be revealed because s/he was under 18 at the time of the crime). This applies to both those merely accused and awaiting trial, as well as those convicted (or for that matter, exonerated).
The Korean law just goes a step further and extends this protection to all people involved in criminal matters.
I kinda like the idea actually, although there are some obvious caveats. The general public certainly has no right to demonise someone accused of a crime before it's been proved. And even once they are convicted, it is not really the general public's business to know criminals' names, other than obviously those connected with the crime (victims/families etc). They will pay a penalty under the law (a fine, community service, jail time etc)... but once that debt is paid they have a right to move back into society without being discriminated against for the rest of their lives. And keeping their name out of the media is one way to do that.
The counter-argument is made that people have a right to know if they are living near/employing/otherwise engaging with people who have been found guilty of serious crime (particularly sex offenders or murderers). And it's a good counter-argument. Perhaps we can draw a line and say "people convicted of the most serious crimes or those with no hope of rehabilitation can have their identities revealed, but for minor to moderate crimes, the criminals should remain anonymous". Either that or we toughen up sentencing so that serious criminals don't GET reintroduced into society in the first place... then the whole argument becomes moot.
Do these people have the tabloids after them? Leaked sex tapes by spurned beaus? Drug rehab every other month? No? How are they A-list celebrities then???
In Korea? Yes.
(Except maybe for the drug rehab...)
Professional gaming in Korea is on a whole other plane than it is in the West. I mean, many of these guys ~live~ in dedicated training camps (i.e. they eat, sleep and game in a building with other gamers) in preparation for big competitions, with rigorous daily schedules. It's serious business. (And I say that completely non-sarcastically)
Er... although I certainly am opposed to any form of censorship on the Internet, I do feel obliged to point out that Mr. Evers is not Australian. His lawyer has simply informed him that because he has broken an Australian law (whether or not you agree with the appropriateness of that law, which in this case pertains to racially discriminatory language/hate speech... conveniently omitted from what you've quoted), setting foot in Australia in the future ~may~ result in his being detained.
The same would apply to an Australian who breaks a US law (and believe me, you have your fair share of wacky laws too, including some that are very similar to the law Mr. Evans is alleged to have breached) - if they attempt to visit the US in the future they are likely to be arrested at the border. Mr. Evans may have family in Australia (as referred to in what you have quoted above), but he himself is not Australian. So the whole "he cannot return to his homeland" thing doesn't really apply.
Having said that I agree with the main anti-censorship sentiment of your post:)
Although I can see why Slashdot might give you that impression, do remember that the reporting on here is usually quite sensationalist.
Australia doesn't yet have an internet filter (hell, the Bill hasn't even been introduced into the House yet, and even if it passed there would face near-certain death in the Senate), and it's been aggressively fought every step of the way. Contrast this with China, which obviously has a well-known filter (and one far, far more intrusive than the simple URL blacklist proposed in AU). Contrast this further with other countries have introduced an AU-like filter quietly and without much debate (most recently, New Zealand).
If anything, it shows that the democratic process is working well in Australia, the fact that you are hearing and seeing so many stories (read: so much opposition) to such proposals.
The other kooky story you are likely to have heard out of Australia in the last 12 months is the lack of an R rating for computer games. There's been quite a breakthrough on that front, with the one man primarily responsible for blocking the introduction of the R rating retiring as South Australian Attorney-General. His replacement has publicly stated they are in support of an R rating for games. So it appears we'll get our R rating within the not too distant future, bringing us into line with the classification systems in the US and EU.
Australia has problems like any country. But I don't think they are anywhere on the scale of China, or even on the scale of other Western countries like the UK (far more surveillance there than in AU). The US overall has a good record on such matters, but it too is not perfect (witness the whole warrantless logging/tapping of public phone conversations debacle etc.). The problems might be ~different~ in other countries but they are no less serious.
Being Australian, we use the British/Commonwealth English spelling 'kerb' for the noun (i.e. the concrete thing at edge of the road), and 'curb' for the verb you are referencing above.
See there is a reason for some of our 'old fashioned' spellings;)
(Actually, being married to an American, I've found quite a few cases where American English uses the same spellings for both the verb and a related noun, but standard English differentiates the verb from the noun via a spelling difference. The practice/practise, licence/license ones are well-known examples.)
You can't really conclude that. That'd be more to do with the fact that the site is less than 12 hours 'old', so not many users have written entries for it yet (and for that matter, there aren't many users yet).
The tech sector in Australia is no smaller or bigger than in any other similar sized country AFAIK. Most of it is dominated by the usual multinational suspects (MS, IBM, Oracle, HP, Novell etc.) but there are a few Australian companies that are fairly substantial in size (although these are primarily consulting firms rather than hardware/software development companies... most of those get to a certain size then get bought out by one of aforementioned large multinationals).
The telco/ISP area is interesting though. Companies like Internode, iiNet/Westnet, TPG etc. are Australian-grown and have become rather successful and large. Actually come to think of it, there aren't many foreign companies that have come here and done that well in that sector - Optus (Singtel) and foreign mobile operators like Vodafone and Virgin are about it.
Yeah I've noticed this in Australia as well. Makes sense though... it's more likely that someone in Australia would find more relevant information on a.au site, especially if the subject matter is something that varies between countries. E.g. if you looked up "tax law" or "drivers license" or something...
It didn't say they are only implementing this on the US site. They said searches in English from Google.com.
Most people in other English speaking countries (the UK/Australia/NZ/SA etc.) just search in their browser search bar rather than going to google.com manually (which would redirect them to.uk,.au,.nz as appropriate). And depending on how the browser's been set up, those searches generally get pushed to google.com (the main site). The result page may be redirected to the country-specific one, but if you look at the string the browser sends (i.e. the actual search), it's often the plain old.com.
I suppose an obvious question to ask then is: from where is Google measuring site speed? From a single particular server/location (presumably in the US)? From the 'nearest Google datacentre/server farm' to the site (and if so, how do they determine this)?
If they are measuring site speed from a single (US) location, that's gotta be hurting the page rankings for any sites hosted outside the US, as even if those pages are lightning fast locally, you're always going to have that ~100 ms latency to Europe / ~150 ms to Asia / ~200 ms to NZ & Australia etc, from the US.
Ditto here in Australia. Ford Australia makes some really nice cars. As does Holden (which is the Australian GM subsidiary). I've driven Fords int the US though and they feel a lot cheaper:(
The stuck accelerator issue didn't affect any Toyota's here (Australia). IIRC, the part at fault was made by some plant in Indiana, so US cars were affected (and any other country that imports the US-made Toyotas, I suppose). We did have a recall on late model Priuses here, but that was for a separate issue I believe.
I vaguely remember the issue affecting some Japanese market cars too, although I might be mistaken...
Agreed. And I'm not even American (nor live in the US). You get what you pay for with that cheap crap imported from China/Thailand/etc. Never lasts long at all and in the case of something with moving parts, almost inevitably breaks about the fifth time you use it.
OTOH, on the rare occasion you do see something 'made in USA' here (usually tools, DIY machinery and whitegoods), I see it as a mark of quality. Usually well made and tough.
Ah true. I was speaking more generally about whether XP's lack of window sizing 'mattered'. In relation to the comScore tests though you are right... doesn't matter at all.
I'm all for the US Government bringing the matter up with our government. It sounds like this was done respectfully and informally, which is the right way to go when you have one mature democracy dealing with another. They aren't making demands or threats or anything... just voicing some concern. An added pressure on Conroy to drop the idea, hopefully. Anti-Americanism is rampant in Australia these days but I hope people can still see that, for its flaws, the US still acts as a positive force in areas such as this.
Having said that, I still think that there's no way the filter will every make it to the realm of reality. It's so wildly unpopular that I think Conroy is likely to get a tap on the shoulder from others in the Cabinet and be told to quietly drop it. This is an election year after all. Perhaps it might resurface during Rudd's second term (which it seems inevitable he'll get).
Unpopularity aside, it's a completely useless system anyway. A basic blacklist of perhaps a few hundred URLs. HTTP only. Since when was HTTP the main method of distributing illegal content? (And even if it was... proxies, VPNs, blah blah). Again, I think the government will not be wanting to be seen to be wasting money on expensive, ineffectual programs in an election year.
And even if it does get formally introduced into Parliament I honestly can't see how the Government will get the numbers to get it through the Senate. The Greens and other minority parties will oppose it. The big unknown is the Liberals' official stance on it, but I reckon they will probably oppose it too, as it could be a bit of a vote-getter for them. Abbott, as a Christian, might ~personally~ support it, but that doesn't mean the whole Liberal Party will take that position... the Liberals in general are less unified than Labor and more willing to cross the floor for their ideals (see: Malcolm Turnbull et al.). Conroy clearly wants to push it through while Labor is comfortably ahead in the polls, but even now I think it might be too politically risky.
So as I have done for the last year since this filtering idea arose, I will bide my time and wait. Every time it's been "just about to happen"... it hasn't. There's still a lot of obstacles ahead for it. And the US' comments here are another useful addition to those obstacles.
Slashdot Mirror
Slight correction: Internet censorship has not been introduced in Australia (nor the UK for that matter). Proposals for doing so may be on the table in Parliament shortly, but it's far from a done deal. So your "as it has been in the UK and Australia" sentence isn't quite right. Yet, at least.
I think the problem is not necessarily the lack of a chip, but the fact that it's not compulsory to use that chip.
I'm not American (and don't live in America) so I'm not sure of the situation there. But in my country, although my debit card DOES have a chip, have a choice of magnetic swipe + sign, or using the chip and PIN number. When I use it in a store, they ask me "do you sign or PIN?" (even though all stores have the necessary equipment to use the chip/PIN).
Plus, whether the card is magnetic-only or has a chip is kinda irrelevant for online transactions. All you need is the number, expiry date and CVV number.
There is one reason to use a debit card, at least where I live.
Some credit cards incur interest immediately (there's no interest-free period at all ... you start getting charged interest the moment the transaction occurs). Sure you could literally drive home and pay off the amount straight away, but there'd still be a cent of interest or something annoyingly hanging around at the end of the month.
In fact for most of the last decade my credit card has been that way - immediate interest incurred. Why would I choose such a card? Well, the credit cards that DO have interest free periods (usually 55 days) here also tend to have annual fees (which you incur whether you use the card or not). For the couple of times I needed to use a credit card per year, the little bit of interest I incurred (maybe $5 a year) was far far less than the annual fee would be (typically $25-100 depending on the card), assuming I paid purchases off immediately (which I always did, via internet banking).
I've now switched to a different bank that offers a card that has an interest free period AND no annual fee. But I only qualified for that card because I'm married and both of us have a good income. When I was a poor-ass student, things were different.
Hehe I noticed that as a foreigner visiting America.
Obviously I didn't want to use my debit card from my home bank for every transaction since I would incur a currency exchange fee every time. So I generally used cash (and this was mostly in large denominations like 50s and 100s, since thats what they give you when you get your money changed at the airport).
The first thing I noticed was the signs at various shops saying "we don't accept 100s". This was 'new' to me. At home, money is money, and has to be accepted for a payment (it's legal tender after all). I don't think the retailer has a right to refuse you paying with particular denominations (although I suppose they can refuse to trade with you altogether which has the same effect). Having said that, I suppose the reason for this might not be related to counterfeiting at all - it could simply be that they don't like to count out a large amount of change (slows down the line etc).
The second thing I noticed was the weird looks they gave you paying in 100s, or in some cases, even 50s. Wtf...
The third thing I noticed was all the weird little things they did to check for forgeries ... running it between their fingers, the UV light, etc etc. Some places even had little machines to check the bills. At home (Australia FWIW), I've NEVER seen anyone check a bill for authenticity (not even in a cursory fashion) ... hell they barely even glance at it. Probably mostly because Australian bills are considered among the most secure in the world (they are polymer rather than linen/paper, and virtually unforgeable).
I think it's just one of those cultural things though. At home people use $50s and $100s all the time and it's not considered unusual at all. Noone even raises an eyelid. 50s are especially common since Australian ATMs dish out both 50s and 20s (so you can make withdrawals of 20, 40, 50, 70, 80, 90, 100 etc).
Of course it's not as bad as in Europe. Last time I travelled there the currency changer gave me a 500 Euro note. I'm sure dishing out change for that annoyed whoever I ended up giving it to.
Yep this is a good idea.
I do a sorta similar thing. I have two banks. One is my 'regular' bank that I keep most of my funds in, get my salary deposited into, withdraw from at ATMs etc. I have both a debit and credit card with this bank, but I tend not to use the debit card online.
My other bank has only a debit card linked to a single account that never has more than a few hundred dollars. This is the debit card I use for online transactions, and is also the account linked to my PayPal account (via EFT). So if my number gets stolen or I get phished via PayPal or whatever, the maximum money I am going to lose is the small amount in that account. If that account gets too low I just EFT a bit more over from my 'main' bank (takes 24 hours).
You can of course acheive the same effect with a single bank. Have a transaction account accessible via the debit card, and a linked savings account that is not directly card-accessible (i.e. that money has to be transferred back to the transaction account via online banking or in person at a branch before it can be used - as far as the debit card is concerned, that money doesn't exist). That is a fairly standard way of doing things here in Australia anyway, since most people prefer to keep their money in a savings account earning 4% or 5% interest, than in an everyday transaction account earning close to zero).
Huh? NK barely has electricity over most of the country, let alone computer games...
Every now and again on Slashdot, a headline catches your eye that just makes you go "wtf?!". This is one of those occasions.
It makes a bit more sense now that I've read the summary/article, but heh, that's one of the weirder headlines I've seen in a while!
Oh wow ... Google around for some documentaries on professional gamers in Korea and prepare to have your mind blown. These people are national celebrities and take home big fat paychecks.
That's a good point. Although, I wonder if the differences between games in a franchise are more or less significant an obstacle to changing game than it would be for a professional sportsperson changing to a related sport.
There's been quite a few high profile Rugby (League) players crossing over to Rugby (Union) in the past few years here in Australia, for example. The games are related and certainly share a similar skill-set, but the rules and strategies are reasonably different. Things like the relative importance of strength vs. speed vary etc. I think this is a fairly good analogy for changing between, say, Counter Strike 1.5 and 1.6 (the games 'feel' quite different, but share higher-level strategies).
Apologies for the 'local' analogy with Rugby, but I was hard-pressed to think of two American sports similar enough to each other to make the analogy work. Maybe baseball and softball or something? Showing my ignorance here...
I doubt they have an equivalent. Even in other ~Western~ countries there is often no equivalent of such a registry. It's one of those things I always found a bit odd about America actually.
Where I live, you either don't release a serious criminal who is going to have a tendency to re-offend, or tabs are kept on them in other ways (house confinement, surveillance, radio bracelets etc.). I mean sure, the people who live nearby to the to-be-released sex offender will be notified and have a right to object to/block the offender moving into that area. But that doesn't extend to the whole world being able to punch in a random address and see who's around.
I'm not American so I may have misinterpreted what the Registry actually does. If so I apologise. But my impression was that ~anyone~ can search for nearby offenders ~anywhere~, even if that location has nothing to do with them.
It's a similar principle as in the West, where you generally can't release the names of suspected offenders (or victims) who are minors (or at least that's how it is here in Australia ... you often hear 'the offender's identity cannot be revealed because s/he was under 18 at the time of the crime). This applies to both those merely accused and awaiting trial, as well as those convicted (or for that matter, exonerated).
The Korean law just goes a step further and extends this protection to all people involved in criminal matters.
I kinda like the idea actually, although there are some obvious caveats. The general public certainly has no right to demonise someone accused of a crime before it's been proved. And even once they are convicted, it is not really the general public's business to know criminals' names, other than obviously those connected with the crime (victims/families etc). They will pay a penalty under the law (a fine, community service, jail time etc) ... but once that debt is paid they have a right to move back into society without being discriminated against for the rest of their lives. And keeping their name out of the media is one way to do that.
The counter-argument is made that people have a right to know if they are living near/employing/otherwise engaging with people who have been found guilty of serious crime (particularly sex offenders or murderers). And it's a good counter-argument. Perhaps we can draw a line and say "people convicted of the most serious crimes or those with no hope of rehabilitation can have their identities revealed, but for minor to moderate crimes, the criminals should remain anonymous". Either that or we toughen up sentencing so that serious criminals don't GET reintroduced into society in the first place ... then the whole argument becomes moot.
Do these people have the tabloids after them? Leaked sex tapes by spurned beaus? Drug rehab every other month? No? How are they A-list celebrities then???
In Korea? Yes.
(Except maybe for the drug rehab...)
Professional gaming in Korea is on a whole other plane than it is in the West. I mean, many of these guys ~live~ in dedicated training camps (i.e. they eat, sleep and game in a building with other gamers) in preparation for big competitions, with rigorous daily schedules. It's serious business. (And I say that completely non-sarcastically)
Er ... although I certainly am opposed to any form of censorship on the Internet, I do feel obliged to point out that Mr. Evers is not Australian. His lawyer has simply informed him that because he has broken an Australian law (whether or not you agree with the appropriateness of that law, which in this case pertains to racially discriminatory language/hate speech ... conveniently omitted from what you've quoted), setting foot in Australia in the future ~may~ result in his being detained.
The same would apply to an Australian who breaks a US law (and believe me, you have your fair share of wacky laws too, including some that are very similar to the law Mr. Evans is alleged to have breached) - if they attempt to visit the US in the future they are likely to be arrested at the border. Mr. Evans may have family in Australia (as referred to in what you have quoted above), but he himself is not Australian. So the whole "he cannot return to his homeland" thing doesn't really apply.
Having said that I agree with the main anti-censorship sentiment of your post :)
Although I can see why Slashdot might give you that impression, do remember that the reporting on here is usually quite sensationalist.
Australia doesn't yet have an internet filter (hell, the Bill hasn't even been introduced into the House yet, and even if it passed there would face near-certain death in the Senate), and it's been aggressively fought every step of the way. Contrast this with China, which obviously has a well-known filter (and one far, far more intrusive than the simple URL blacklist proposed in AU). Contrast this further with other countries have introduced an AU-like filter quietly and without much debate (most recently, New Zealand).
If anything, it shows that the democratic process is working well in Australia, the fact that you are hearing and seeing so many stories (read: so much opposition) to such proposals.
The other kooky story you are likely to have heard out of Australia in the last 12 months is the lack of an R rating for computer games. There's been quite a breakthrough on that front, with the one man primarily responsible for blocking the introduction of the R rating retiring as South Australian Attorney-General. His replacement has publicly stated they are in support of an R rating for games. So it appears we'll get our R rating within the not too distant future, bringing us into line with the classification systems in the US and EU.
Australia has problems like any country. But I don't think they are anywhere on the scale of China, or even on the scale of other Western countries like the UK (far more surveillance there than in AU). The US overall has a good record on such matters, but it too is not perfect (witness the whole warrantless logging/tapping of public phone conversations debacle etc.). The problems might be ~different~ in other countries but they are no less serious.
Haha I never thought of that...
Being Australian, we use the British/Commonwealth English spelling 'kerb' for the noun (i.e. the concrete thing at edge of the road), and 'curb' for the verb you are referencing above.
See there is a reason for some of our 'old fashioned' spellings ;)
(Actually, being married to an American, I've found quite a few cases where American English uses the same spellings for both the verb and a related noun, but standard English differentiates the verb from the noun via a spelling difference. The practice/practise, licence/license ones are well-known examples.)
(Posting to undo mis-clicked moderation, oops. Meant to mod you Funny but clicked the wrong thing >)
You can't really conclude that. That'd be more to do with the fact that the site is less than 12 hours 'old', so not many users have written entries for it yet (and for that matter, there aren't many users yet).
The tech sector in Australia is no smaller or bigger than in any other similar sized country AFAIK. Most of it is dominated by the usual multinational suspects (MS, IBM, Oracle, HP, Novell etc.) but there are a few Australian companies that are fairly substantial in size (although these are primarily consulting firms rather than hardware/software development companies ... most of those get to a certain size then get bought out by one of aforementioned large multinationals).
The telco/ISP area is interesting though. Companies like Internode, iiNet/Westnet, TPG etc. are Australian-grown and have become rather successful and large. Actually come to think of it, there aren't many foreign companies that have come here and done that well in that sector - Optus (Singtel) and foreign mobile operators like Vodafone and Virgin are about it.
Yeah I've noticed this in Australia as well. Makes sense though ... it's more likely that someone in Australia would find more relevant information on a .au site, especially if the subject matter is something that varies between countries. E.g. if you looked up "tax law" or "drivers license" or something...
It didn't say they are only implementing this on the US site. They said searches in English from Google.com.
Most people in other English speaking countries (the UK/Australia/NZ/SA etc.) just search in their browser search bar rather than going to google.com manually (which would redirect them to .uk, .au, .nz as appropriate). And depending on how the browser's been set up, those searches generally get pushed to google.com (the main site). The result page may be redirected to the country-specific one, but if you look at the string the browser sends (i.e. the actual search), it's often the plain old .com.
I suppose an obvious question to ask then is: from where is Google measuring site speed? From a single particular server/location (presumably in the US)? From the 'nearest Google datacentre/server farm' to the site (and if so, how do they determine this)?
If they are measuring site speed from a single (US) location, that's gotta be hurting the page rankings for any sites hosted outside the US, as even if those pages are lightning fast locally, you're always going to have that ~100 ms latency to Europe / ~150 ms to Asia / ~200 ms to NZ & Australia etc, from the US.
Ditto here in Australia. Ford Australia makes some really nice cars. As does Holden (which is the Australian GM subsidiary). I've driven Fords int the US though and they feel a lot cheaper :(
The stuck accelerator issue didn't affect any Toyota's here (Australia). IIRC, the part at fault was made by some plant in Indiana, so US cars were affected (and any other country that imports the US-made Toyotas, I suppose). We did have a recall on late model Priuses here, but that was for a separate issue I believe.
I vaguely remember the issue affecting some Japanese market cars too, although I might be mistaken...
Agreed. And I'm not even American (nor live in the US). You get what you pay for with that cheap crap imported from China/Thailand/etc. Never lasts long at all and in the case of something with moving parts, almost inevitably breaks about the fifth time you use it.
OTOH, on the rare occasion you do see something 'made in USA' here (usually tools, DIY machinery and whitegoods), I see it as a mark of quality. Usually well made and tough.
Ah true. I was speaking more generally about whether XP's lack of window sizing 'mattered'. In relation to the comScore tests though you are right ... doesn't matter at all.
I'm all for the US Government bringing the matter up with our government. It sounds like this was done respectfully and informally, which is the right way to go when you have one mature democracy dealing with another. They aren't making demands or threats or anything ... just voicing some concern. An added pressure on Conroy to drop the idea, hopefully. Anti-Americanism is rampant in Australia these days but I hope people can still see that, for its flaws, the US still acts as a positive force in areas such as this.
Having said that, I still think that there's no way the filter will every make it to the realm of reality. It's so wildly unpopular that I think Conroy is likely to get a tap on the shoulder from others in the Cabinet and be told to quietly drop it. This is an election year after all. Perhaps it might resurface during Rudd's second term (which it seems inevitable he'll get).
Unpopularity aside, it's a completely useless system anyway. A basic blacklist of perhaps a few hundred URLs. HTTP only. Since when was HTTP the main method of distributing illegal content? (And even if it was ... proxies, VPNs, blah blah). Again, I think the government will not be wanting to be seen to be wasting money on expensive, ineffectual programs in an election year.
And even if it does get formally introduced into Parliament I honestly can't see how the Government will get the numbers to get it through the Senate. The Greens and other minority parties will oppose it. The big unknown is the Liberals' official stance on it, but I reckon they will probably oppose it too, as it could be a bit of a vote-getter for them. Abbott, as a Christian, might ~personally~ support it, but that doesn't mean the whole Liberal Party will take that position ... the Liberals in general are less unified than Labor and more willing to cross the floor for their ideals (see: Malcolm Turnbull et al.). Conroy clearly wants to push it through while Labor is comfortably ahead in the polls, but even now I think it might be too politically risky.
So as I have done for the last year since this filtering idea arose, I will bide my time and wait. Every time it's been "just about to happen" ... it hasn't. There's still a lot of obstacles ahead for it. And the US' comments here are another useful addition to those obstacles.