Oz Bound!

This Blog Has Moved

2009-01-09T11:57:00.003+10:00

I've finally got round to moving my blog to my own domain and hosting. You can now find my blog at www.darylhaines.com. Please update your bookmarks. You will also be able to subscribe via RSS or e-mail.

Santa Ahoy!

2008-12-16T10:48:00.003+10:00

Rachelle's Mum and Dad arrived safely on Friday to join us for Xmas and new year. I think Mandy in particular was a little shocked about the heat and humidity. We did warn them about coming to Brisbane in Summer!

On Sunday we all went to Rach's boat club for Sunday lunch and the kids Xmas party with George, Julie and Reyce. In typical aussie style the xmas party was a little different, with Santa arriving by boat...

It really was a dismal attempt at a Santa. Lauren was not convinced, or impressed.

Most of the kids dressed up in fancy dress, and so did some of the adults...

By this time I'd already had about 4 beers and half a bottle of wine, so things were getting a little surreal.

After the party we all went back to ours where we sat out and watched the sunset over a few drinks.

The sky looked amazing...

Today, Mandy and Steve have took Lauren up to Noosa for a couple of days with Cath and Bonny. This is the first time that Lauren has been away without us since we arrived in Australia. Last Friday she finished Year 2 so she's now into her 6 week summer holiday. It's Rach's last day today and I finish up for xmas on Thursday. We're both back to work on the 5th Jan so we've got a nice 2 week break to look forward to!

More photo's on Flickr.

Sheraton Gold Coast

2008-12-16T10:35:00.003+10:00

A couple of weeks ago we spent a night away in luxury at the 5 start Sheraton Mirage Resort and Spa Hotel on the Gold Coast, courtesy of a hotel voucher from Rach's boss in thanks for Rach selling one of the Marina berths. Rach has already blogged about this on her own blog so I won't repeat it here. Suffice to say that we had a great time, right up until the point where I got burnt to a crisp.

It's 2 weeks later and my legs are still sore. A little tip for any blokes (and women) with hairy legs like me: if you use the spray-on sunscreen, make sure you rub it in thoroughly!

Quantum of Solace

2008-12-03T20:41:00.003+10:00

Being a rather geeky James Bond fan I was very much looking forward to the Quantum of Solace.

After the re-incarnation of James Bond in Casino Royale, which kept pretty much authentic to the original plot and character in Ian Fleming's novel, I had high hopes for QoS.

What a disappointment.

Unlike the edgy, exhilarating and well-shot action scenes in Casino Royale, the action scenes in QoS were a bit far fetched at best, and for most parts, completely unwatchable at worst. Unfortunately, it seems the Director and Editor had taken the comparison with the Jason Bourne films to heart and decided to follow this latest ridiculous trend of shooting scenes with a shaky hand-held camera and over-editing the scenes so much that the angle of shot changes with nearly every frame. The result is you can't make out what's going on.

I can imagine that in 10 years time we'll look back at this period in film-making and think 'what was that all about? Who on earth thought it was a good idea to shoot big blockbuster action scenes with a hand-held camera and switch between cameras angles so fast that it gives the viewer motion sickness?'. I think Paul Greengrass is a good British directory, and both the last 2 Bourne films which he directed and United 93 are great films, but they'd be even better if we could actually make out what's going on in the action scenes! Please, please, stop it. There's a time and a place. For instance, it kind of works in films like Cloverfield. In Cloverfield there's a reason it's shot with a hand-held camera. It's part of the plot, and, it does add something to the reality of the scenes.

Besides the bad editing, QoS also suffers from a rather thin plot. The film is based on a short story written by Fleming, and fleshing a short story out into a feature movie was always going to be difficult. But this just feels like treading water. Bond travels from one exotic location to another with very little rationale for why he's going there, except to chase down baddies. It was as if the producers picked a few nice locations they wanted to visit in advance of making the film, and then wrote the script to fit around the locations.

One of the best things for me in Casino Royale was the quick and witty dialogue, especially between Bond and the love interest - Vesper Lynd. There's hardly any of that in QoS. The non-stop action leaves very little time for character building. There's not much of a love interest either - not a classic one for bond girls! Bond does get his end away with one civil servant, who incidentally meets a sticky end covered in oil, reminiscent of that famous scene in Goldfinger. Her death is obviously a reference to Goldfinger where the character 'Jill Masterson' is killed and covered in gold paint. The bond franchise seems to be trying to send a message - the currency of power in the early Bonds was gold and diamonds, whereas in 2008 the currency of power is oil. QoS is that un-memorable that I can't even remember if he kisses the bond girl who survives to the end.

Don't get me wrong. It's not a complete disaster. QoS is still better than the average action film. Daniel Craig makes a great James Bond and Judie Dench continues to do a good job as 'M'. The action scenes where the camera stays still for a few seconds are really good. It's certainly better than the later Pierce Brosnan bond films where some of the action got preposterously far-fetched. Mind you, surviving a fall out of an airplane where his parachute only opened 10 metres off the ground, and running through a building engulfed in flames without getting even his eyebrows singed, was pushing it a little in QoS.

In summary, watchable, but not a classic.

Brisbane Storms

2008-12-03T20:11:00.003+10:00

It's tropical storm season here at the moment and this year it has been particularly bad. Tonight we've been treated to yet another fantastic lightning storm after a very hot day, but it was rather mild compared to what happened on Sunday 16th November when we had the worst storms for 30 years.

Luckily we escaped the worst of it where we live on the south side of the Brisbane river. No such luck for those in the northern suburbs, especially The Gap where my boss lives.

This YouTube video shows how bad it got in The Gap. In particular watch what happens from 1 minute and 30 seconds in:

My boss's house was without power for 4 days after this.

On Thursday the 20th November we had another big storm, and this time I got caught in it. I was working in the city at a client site and left a little early to go to my office for the first of our 2 Xmas parties - this one being the one where clients were invited. In the office, we had the weather radar up on one of the Plasma screens so we could watch the storm coming in. When we realised it was heading straight for us many of us decided to leave to try and get home before the worst of it reached us, particularly after what had happened the previous Sunday. So I set off walking to the train station (as my usual bus didn't run that late) and got half way there when the heavens opened, and as is typical, I'd happened to have left my umbrella at the client site.

The rain was coming down so ferociously that I decided to take shelter in a shop entrance and wait until the worst of it was over, thinking that it would only be a short one. Twenty minutes later it was still horizontal rain so I thought bugger it and set off again on a brisk walk.

Near the train station there is an area where I need to cross two major roads with a traffic island in the middle. I crossed the first road and just as I got to the traffic island the hailstones started. I couldn't believe it. Whilst waiting for the traffic lights to change, in a very short period of time the hailstones started coming down faster and in increased size. I was watching them fall all around me - the size of golf balls. The thing is, for that short period of time I had absolutely nowhere to hide. I was stuck, and the hailstones were coming down that hard I thought to myself if one of these hits me smack on the head I'm going to be in trouble. Yet, the unbelievable part is that none of them hit me. They were falling all around my feet yet I managed to stand through it for a good 2 minutes before the traffic lights change, and then run across the road to shelter without a single one hitting me.

Talk about lucky!

The End of Darkness?

2008-11-04T20:01:00.004+10:00

In just a few hours time, after what's been the longest, most expensive, and perhaps most exciting presidential election ever, we'll know who is going to be the 44th President of the United States.

Being a political news junkie, I've been following the race fairly closely for the last 18 months, and, like pretty much the rest of the world outside of America, I'm praying (figuratively speaking given I'm an atheist) that Barack Obama wins.

The world can't handle another 4 years of a Republican administration in the White House.

A while back I read Bill Clinton's autobiography - 'My Life', and he stated that although history will ultimately judge his presidency, his own view was based on a simple mental list he kept:- jobs created, increased access to healthcare, increased funding for childcare, number of people lifted out of poverty, etc.

Now lets apply that principle to George W. Bush. Here's my mental list:

Over 4,500 coalition troop deaths in the Iraq War and hundreds of thousands civilian casualties resulting from a war, lest we forget, which was sold to us based on the threat of weapons of mass destruction which never materialised;
The trampling of human rights and civil liberties via the Patriot Act, Extraordinary Rendition, Water Boarding torture, Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, and other such terms we had all never heard of before 2001;
The failure to sign the Kyoto Treaty, and furthermore, the continual effort to block and hamper the fight against climate change;
The abysmal failure to act or show any leadership in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina's devastation of New Orleans;
The complete wipeout of the federal budget surplus and creation of America's biggest ever budget deficit;
etc, etc.

Maybe I'm being a bit unfair. On the plus side he did give records amount of financial relief to AIDS riddled countries in Africa, and was the first US president to acknowledge that a two-state solution was the only way to resolve the Israeli-Palestine issue.

However, on the first, the amount of money given to the fight against AIDS ($30bn if I remember correctly) now seems a pittance in comparison to the $1 trillion spent on the Iraq War to date and the $700 bail-out of the banks (a figure which looks like it could double). And on the second, what progress has been made? We seem no closer to a solution now than 8 years ago. At least 8 years ago there was no wall built around the West Bank. Given what many people believe are the root-causes of 9/11, you'd think that pushing the middle-east peace process would be right up there with catching Osama Bin Laden. Yet both seem to have took a back seat to what I believe is Bush's number one priority - 'Energy Security'.

I remember a few years ago visiting the White House website to see what his administration had to say about climate change. If you go there now there is a section titled Environment but a few years ago no such section existed. Yet there was a section titled Energy Security.

Some cynics may say that Energy Security was the entire basis for the invasion of Iraq. After all, we all know that the Bush family's links to the oil companies are long and well documented.

The last 8 years have been a disaster and George W. Bush will probably be remembered as one of the worst and most unpopular American presidents ever.

So, will we see an end to this darkness?

I'm not naive enough to think that America will completely change its foreign policy and stance on climate change overnight if Barack Obama wins.

Lets just hope it is a new direction and an Obama win will go some way to reverse the damage inflicted by 8 years of the Neo-Cons in charge.

As for John McCain, I had a lot of respect for him before this process began. I've read about his 6 years imprisonment and torture during the Vietnam war, and his refusal to be released ahead of his compatriots. He truly is a war hero. But the way he has fought this campaign has surely undone a lot of the goodwill many people had for him.

Some political analysts say that he has simply learnt from his 2000 campaign to become the Republican presidential nominee against George Bush. In that campaign he mainly refused to go negative and resort to nasty tactics. Bush on the other hand had no such qualms and many Americans, bombarded with adverts and push-poll phone calls, fell hook, line and sinker for the Bush campaign's smear tactics.

McCain has clearly taken some political campaigning lessons from Karl Rove and thrown his morals out of the window. At every step he has attempted to dumb the campaign issues down to the lowest common denominator; painting complex issues as black and white, and virtually labeling Obama as everything from a terrorist to a socialist.

The soundbites coming out of the McCain team over the last few weeks since the economic meltdown really has represented a low-point in intellectual debate. How many times did McCain quote Obama as using the words 'share the wealth', insinuating that Obama is somewhere to the left of Karl Marx with his policy of reducing income tax on the middle tax, as opposed to McCain's policy of cutting corporation tax for big business. It amazes me how that word 'socialist' is used in american politics. It's as if no american has ever visited Western Europe and seen the balance between economic growth and state welfare that has given a high standard of living with free(ish) health care for all.

Obviously I'm making grand generalisations here. It's mainly commentators on the right side of politics in America (right as in opposite to left, not right as in opposite to wrong), such as the state news channel that is Fox News that have done the most to brainwash some Americans into believing that all the issues are black and white; free-markets - good, regulation - bad; religion - good, atheism - bad; etc.

I sometimes play a little game. I put on the Bill O'Reilly show on Fox News and see how long it is until I want to throw a brick at the TV or start laughing uncontrollably in an effort to hide the tears of frustration at the ridiculousness that is the pompous, egotistical Bill O'Reilly. It's been particular amazing to hear his rants lately against the democratic bias of the MS-NBC news channel. Talk about 'pot this is kettle'.

Anyway, speaking of black and white, some commentators are looking out for the purported Bradley Effect to see if the polls are wrong and McCain can clutch victory from the claws of defeat. The Bradley Effect is a theory that many voters tend to lie in polls when asked if they voted for the black candidate because they don't want the pollster to think that they are racist. I guess we'll find out in a few hours time whether there are truths to this theory.

I've been watching the Emmy award-winning drama John Adams over the last few weeks which is currently showing over here. I wonder what Adams, Washington, Franklin, et all would make of the circus that now exists as a result of Article 2 of the United States Constitution? Whatever happens, these are certainly interesting times we are living through.

Playing the Tour Guide

2008-11-04T18:56:00.004+10:00

Our latest set of visitors arrived safely on Friday - Frances and Rob - so we had a busy weekend playing tour guide.

Friday evening we took them to the Manly Harbour Village Halloween Street Party. Loads of people dressed up (kids and adults) and joined in with the 'spooky street parade' at dusk. There were kids rides, live entertainment, dancers, street performers, and all in all it was a great atmosphere.

We'd booked a table at the Boats restaurant which overlooks Manly parade so we had a great view of proceedings as we were waiting for our meal to arrive.

We later went to Rach's work (boat club) for a drink before proceeding home, and we came out of the club just in time to see the closing fireworks. A pretty good welcome to Australia for Frances and Rob I reckon.

On Saturday, which turned out to be one of the hottest days so far this Spring, we took them down to South Bank and spent some time on the city beach and in the lagoons. We later returned home and went in the pool, before finishing the evening off with a customary barbie and a few beers.

On Sunday I managed to get some work done while Rach and Lauren took them to SeaWorld.

Frances and Rob have now gone up north to the Great Barrier Reef for a few days. If they think it's hot in Brisbane they're in for a shock up there!

Stevie Wonder

2008-10-27T14:08:00.003+10:00

On Saturday night we went to see Stevie Wonder in concert at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre.

Being one of my all-time favourite artists, this was a rare treat, and he didn't disappoint. Both Stevie and his band were magnificent.

There were a couple of small let downs. First, while he got through most of his hits, he didn't do some of my favourite songs, such as 'Do I Do' and 'Blowin' in the Wind' (yes, I know that last one was a Bob Dylan cover), instead choosing to sing some more obscure songs which I, and everyone else judging by the lack of reaction, didn't know. They were still good though. Second, he let some 14 year old competition winner go up and sing 'I Just Called to Say I Love You', and she killed it (not in the good way).

He did a few jazz numbers, which is always fine by me, making use of the wide range of instruments in his band. He even started off with a Miles Davis number, showing off his skills on the harmonica.

All in all it was a really good night - 2 and a half hours of great music.

Maybe, Just Maybe

2008-10-27T13:52:00.002+10:00

As the Chelsea v Liverpool game was on at midnight our time last night I recorded it and watched it before work this morning.

With Chelsea being unbeaten in the league at Stamford Bridge for 86 games, I was expecting yet another goalless or 1-1 draw between the two sides.

Incidentally, the last team to beat Chelsea at home, 4 and a half years ago, was Arsenal, and they went on to win the title.

You never know, you just never know.

I've Got Brain Ache

2008-10-17T15:42:00.005+10:00

I'm very busy on the work front at the moment, both in my day job and with the internet business.

In my day job I'm involved in a major, very complex, government PKI project. PKI stands for Public Key Infrastructure and is basically a set of systems that can be used for issuing and signing digital certificates that can be used for encryption, authentication and other security type things. The thing about PKI is it's all about trust. If you're going to use a digital certificate to encrypt your communications, or use it for authentication (such as to gain access to a website, or even to a building by putting the certificate on a building access card) both you, and the owner of the systems, need to have confidence that the certificate hasn't been compromised in any way.

What this means is that every aspect of how the certificate is created, issued, renewed, revoked, used, and stored has to be managed in a way that covers all the potential security risks.

My job is to create a framework of rules around the entire PKI, covering everything from the physical security of the buildings and servers which will host the PKI, the security procedures for the operation of the PKI, the HR procedures to ensure the people operating the PKI can be trusted, to the technical security controls of the particular systems.

The framework has to be specific enough so it covers all the risks, but generic enough so that the PKI can be future-proof and used for multiple different purposes.

I've also got to write the audit procedures so that they can get an outside auditor to come in and carry out annual audits of every Certificate Authority that wants to operate under the PKI (of which there may be many covering multiple government agencies) in accordance with the procedures I've written.

To say it's making my head hurt is an understatement. There's particular international standards that I need to make sure it complies with, as well as fitting in with government standards around authentication and identity management.

My little brain is struggling to cope!

As for our internet business. IPChitChat is doing pretty well. We've had some good feedback on the new site, and most importantly, revenue was up for last month considerably from Sept 2007. We're still some way from making a full-time living out of it but it's growing, slowly but surely.

We've also launched EzeeQuit, which is more of an experiment than anything else. Probably won't be a long term venture but it demonstrated we can now react to new opportunities and get an e-commerce site up relatively quickly.

We've also changed the name of our company. We originally registered the company as Autonomy Business Solutions Ltd when we had the idea of creating an IT Managed Service for medium to small businesses. Our business model has changed considerably since then and we're now concentrating on building internet-based brands.

We're really interested in the whole new phenomenon of cloud computing, the whole idea of applications moving away from the desktop to being purely web-based. With that in mind we've now changed our business name to NetCloud Ltd, which we believe better reflects the ethos of the business. We couldn't get netcloud.co.uk so our domain name for NetCloud Ltd is www.netcloudgroup.co.uk. This is ok as NetCloud will effectively be a group of companies under the netcloud banner. There's not much on that website yet but it will grow as our underlying businesses grow.

So our existing websites are keeping us busy, there's day-to-day management of the site, marketing and development of more features, as well as troubleshooting the odd issue that comes up here and there. I'm currently putting together the next newsletter for IPChitChat which you can sign up for on our site.

And of course there's the development of our next sites. The social networking site I've mentioned previously has been completed (to some degree) by the developers we hired in India, and I'm now working on developing features and content. Not sure when we'll get this one off the ground as it's a major project but it's certainly an exciting prospect.

We also have a couple more ideas for e-commerce sites that we're investigating.

All in all life is busy on all fronts.

Who's Got My Go Card?

2008-10-17T15:15:00.002+10:00

Yesterday when I went to get on the bus to work I realised I'd forgotten my Go card, which is basically an electronic card you can use with the Brisbane transport system - I can top the balance up online and simply touch on and off buses and trains, and it automatically gets deducted (it's basically an RFID card like the Oyster system in London).

Anyway I had a look round for it this morning and couldn't find it, so I went online to check the last transaction. It seems some cheeky twat has been using it for the last 2 days. I can see that he/she got on a bus this morning on my route and got off in the city, obviously using my card to get to work and back.

I've rang up and cancelled it but of course, it's not as simple as cancelling the card and sending me a new one. I have to order a new one (which will cost $10), and then complete and post a form for them to transfer the balance of the account from the old card to the new one. All of which will probably take weeks knowing how council departments work.

I'm not sure whether I lost it or someone pick-pocketed me. I've realised it must have been Wednesday evening. I remember Wednesday evening because we had a monsoon. I got off the bus to walk the remaining distance home and got caught up in absolutely amazing freak weather conditions. Apparently during that brief storm, which lasted about an hour, we had over 3000 lightning strikes.

I've never seen anything like it. Only muggins here was stupid enough to be outside walking the streets in it. I remember having this gut feeling that I was going to be struck by lightning any second, as everyone else was inside or in their car (apparently your car is the safest place to be during lightning). Also, living in sunny climes I didn't have a jacket or umbrella with me so I was absolutely drenched by the time I got home. At least it was warm rain.

According to this Brisbane Times story it dumped down nearly 60mm of rain in that 1 hour and 32,000 homes lost power.

Introducing EzeeQuit.co.uk

2008-10-08T22:24:00.003+10:00

I am pleased to announce the launch of our latest website - www.EzeeQuit.co.uk

You may have heard news stories, such as featured on the front page of bbc.co.uk/news today, about the revolutionary Electronic Cigarette. This product is win-win for smokers and non-smokers alike as it allows smokers to beat the smoking ban in pubs, whilst it offers no risks from passive-smoking as it doesn't emit smoke, like a traditional cigarette.

We have Electronic Cigarette Starter Kits in stock now and depending upon the interest we'll be looking at adding other related products.

Bribie Island

2008-09-23T21:47:00.004+10:00

Continuing our quest to discover Brisbane and the surrounding areas, on Sunday we spent the day at Bribie Island. Bribie Island is approx an hour's drive north of Brisbane and the only Island close to Brisbane that is connected by a bridge.

We started out at Bongaree which is on the South East of the Island. Being on the sheltered side of Bribie this is a lovely little village that is ideal for young kids, as there's virtually no surf. There's a small beach with a pier, which is surrounded by parklands with plenty of BBQ areas and children's play areas.

From Bongaree you can get a view of the bridge back to the mainland. Also, you'll have to take my word for it because I forgot to take a photo but to the left of this image there would be a view of the Glasshouse Mountains in the background..

After having lunch at Bongaree, we then drove 7km straight across to the west side of the Island to Woorim. Whereas Bongaree is ideal for the small kids, Woorim is great for the big kids (me), as there is plenty of surf to play in but nothing too scary..

Although Lauren is like a fish in the pool she's still wary of the ocean...

More of our photo's on Flickr

Strange Coincidence

2008-09-23T21:38:00.003+10:00

Back in Sydney again. Just a flying visit this time (24 hours). At the airport I heard the announcement "Darren Gough please proceed immediately to Gate 39". Of course I had a look round to see if, unlikely as it would be, it was THE Darren Gough. The strange coincidence is that when I got to my hotel and turned on the tele, Sky News came up and scrolling across the bottom in the news ticker were the words "Darren Gough retires from Cricket"!

Could Darren Gough be celebrating his retirement with an holiday down under?

By the way the Hotel I'm staying in now is the same one that the Australian Idol contestants stayed in. Not that I watch that drivel :-)

An Englishman Abroad

2008-09-09T20:04:00.002+10:00

Typical Englishman abroad. Steve McClaren has only been in Holland 6 weeks and he's already doing the pigeon English thing. They should put this stuff in a Rough Guides guidebook. If you are an Englishman on holiday in a non-English speaking country, simply speak slower and louder at Johnny Foreigner. Failing that, try speaking in the accent of your host, that's bound to work, the non-English speaker will understand you perfectly!

Father's Day at Icon

2008-09-08T19:36:00.003+10:00

Yesterday it was Father's Day here in Australia, and so for a treat we went for Lunch with George, Julie and Reyce to Icon at Raby Bay.

We'll definitely be returning to Icon again. The food was fantastic, especially given it was a buffet. Usually at buffets you end up getting the cheap cuts of meat, but not so at Icon. It was only $30 per head for adults and $15 for kids and the quality of steaks, salmon, prawns, etc was superb. After sharing a bottle of wine and a few beers we made our way home to continue drinking in the garden. Back to business as usual for Sundays then!

Some pics...

More pics on Flickr

Manly Harbour Festival

2008-09-07T09:34:00.003+10:00

Yesterday, Rach said she wanted to get some spring cleaning done so I took Lauren down to the Manly Harbour Festival. Here's a few pics:

A little something for the adults...

And a little something for the kids...

This is a view of the rear of Rachelle's work. You can see two cranes - one is dredging and the other is pulling out piles - making ready for the new extension to the marina...

We also had a drive round the corner to Wynumm so Lauren could have a swim in the Wading Pool. This is the first time we've been there since it has been refurbished. I didn't realise how huge it is...

Lauren was the only one brave enough to take a swim. It's still too cold for the Aussies (and me)...

I'm really jealous of Rach getting to work here (certainly beats my view of office blocks)...

I couldn't believe how quiet it was. It was a bit windy but was still a beautiful day - we definitely needed the sun tan cream.

More photo's on flickr

Brisbane RiverFestival Weekend

2008-09-05T14:28:00.004+10:00

A few of our pictures from last weekend...

On Saturday we had planned to go on board HMB Endeavour - the replica of Captain Cook's ship which visiting Brisbane for a few days, but we got there a little late as Lauren attended a friend's birthday party in the afternoon. Plus, we couldn't be arsed to queue for an hour so instead we spent some time on Portside Wharf where HMB Endeavour was berthed.

On Saturday night Rach went out with the girls whilst myself and George babysat for the girls, and watched the RiverFire fireworks on telly. Seemed very different watching it on telly after being there last year.

We were both feeling a little rough on Sunday morning, but nevertheless we got up and went down to South Bank for the free breakfast BBQ that was being held on Goodwill Bridge.

Afterwards, we walked across into the CBD and checked out Brisbane Library. Very funky indeed. There's more computers and Plasma screens than books!

We then walked over Victoria Bridge back to South Bank and went to the Brisbane International Boat Show being held at the convention centre.

Afterwards, we went for a late lunch at a greek restaurant in South Bank.

More photo's on flickr

The Aussie Immigraton Map

2008-09-03T11:55:00.003+10:00

Gettingdownunder.com has a handy immigration map for anyone wishing to emigrate to Australia...

Google Chrome

2008-09-03T10:49:00.002+10:00

Google has finally entered the Internet Browser market with the release of Google Chrome. Only time will tell to see if it can compete with Internet Explorer in terms of market share. For me, Firefox is the best browser out there but it still only has a 20% share of the market - even IE6 which is ancient in Internet years has a bigger share of the market than Firefox.

Will Google be able to leverage its search engine dominance to make Chrome bigger than IE?

I've downloaded and tested Chrome. My first thoughts were I like the clean look and feel. Secondly, it's clearly faster than both Firefox and IE, which is a major bonus. I also like the fact that each tab acts as its own 'sandbox', so that if a website causes the browser to crash, which happens a lot in IE and Firefox, it will only cause that tab to crash and not the entire browser.

So does that mean that I'll ditch Firefox and start using Chrome? Not likely yet. The biggest draw for me with Firefox is the plugins. There are currently no plugins or extensions for Chrome. That means no easy del.icio.us bookmarking, no stumbleupon toolbar, no Better Gmail, no GTDInbox for gmail, and no Firebug, to name but a few of the plugins I rely on. As Chrome is open-source I'm sure it will only be a matter of time before the plugins start appearing.

Also Chrome is only currently available for Windows, although a Mac version is in the works.

Hopefully by the time the Mac version is released they'll also have some decent plugins, in which case Google Chrome it will be.

A Games to Remember

2008-08-25T15:22:00.005+10:00

It was only 4 years ago, yet I can remember very little about the 2004 Athens Olympics. Some of the sporting achievements stick out, such as Kelly Holmes winning 2 Gold Medals, the Men's 4x100 team winning Gold, and the discovery of Amir Khan. However, I can hardly remember a thing about the 2004 opening and closing ceremonies.

I'm sure I won't be saying the same about the Beijing Olympics 4 years from now.

China certainly pulled all the stops out to make this probably the most enjoyable Olympics ever. Of course, it's not so hard to pull off an amazing show when you can throw unlimited money at it; the cost of the Beijing Olympics was over twice the budget for the London Olympics. I guess it's easier to raise the funds when you've got a single-party political system.

I've certainly never been as engrossed in the Olympics as I was this time round. There were so many amazing moments. It helps of course that Team GB did outstandingly well, and I also had the bonus of being able to support the Australian athletes.

It will be good to get an early night tonight after staying up most nights after midnight following the coverage. I'm glad I did though. It wouldn't have been the same watching Usain Bolt break both the 100m and 200m world records in a replay the day after.

Last night's closing ceremony certainly lived up to expectations after the amazing opening ceremony. I'm not too sure about the 8 minute London contribution though. They were never going to be able to compete with the grand majesty of what Beijing were offering, nor should they. But to say that 8 minute segment alone cost £2.5 million, I was expecting a little more. Perhaps I was expecting David Beckham to kick the ball 200ft into the air only for it to explode with a thousand Union Jack parachutes descending into the stadium? Seriously though it wasn't so much what they did, it was the general theme that I found a little disappointing. Please, give it a rest with the stereotypical stuff (it doesn't always rain in London (thanks to global warming), and not everyone goes to work on a red London bus). Also, give it a rest pushing London's cultural diversity down our throats. Yes, we know London is a conglomerate of lots of different ethnic communities, but so is Sydney, and New York, and Paris, and most other major capitals around the globe these days.

I really hope that in 2012 they try to be less funky and concentrate more on celebrating British history and culture. Britain's got an amazing story to tell - think Shakespeare, Newton, Darwin, Raleigh, Drake, The Battle of Britain, The Beatles, the countless inventions and discoveries, and not forgetting the sports that Britain gave to the world - football, cricket, tennis, golf, rugby, even Table Tennis, to name but a few.

Don't get me wrong, I did enjoy the London handover bit even though it was a little cringeworthy. I thought 'Whole Lotta Love' went down pretty well, and although it's getting a bit tired dragging Beckham out each time for these events, it probably was appropriate given his involvement in the bid as well as the fact that he is bigger than Jesus in Asia. Not just Asia, he draws a crowd everywhere. LA Galaxy are playing in Brisbane later on this year and you can bet that the stadium will be completely sold out.

Roll on 2012. I tell you though, if the opening ceremony of 2012 involves a thousand mixed-race kids wearing bowler hats and singing in cockney accents I'll happily surrender my British passport for good!

Aussie 'Sour Grapes'

2008-08-20T21:48:00.003+10:00

I've just been watching this video on the BBC website about supposed Aussie sour grapes over the success of team GB. If you get any Aussies throwing out the same line that 'it's not England, you can only beat us if you combine your countries', just point out to them that most of Australia's golds have come from Queenslanders. In fact, my home town of Brisbane is doing pretty well. Brisbane's Stephanie Rice is bringing home 3 gold medals. We're all very proud!

Actually, the Aussie sour grapes aren't as bad as the UK media makes out. The news reporters over here have expressed surprise at how well team GB as done, but I have found when I've watched the games that if Australia isn't represented in a particular event they do get behind the Brits. I've even heard the words 'the Brits are awesome this year' come out of the TV.

It's all to do with the Commonwealth you see. I think I've heard the word 'Commonwealth' mentioned more times in the 15 months I've lived in Australia than the entire 32 years I lived in the UK. I thought the 'Commonwealth' was pretty much a dead term only to be brought out for the Commonwealth games, until I arrived here. Not so, the antipodeans love it. Australian federal law is even known as Australian Commonwealth Law, which is passed in the Australian Commonwealth Parliament.

I wonder if the Commonwealth would be more important to Britain if GB wasn't part of the EU?

I'm happy to support both GB and Australia in the Olympics, which, as the time of writing, puts my personal Gold tally at 27 - more than the US!

UK National Risk Register

2008-08-20T16:53:00.004+10:00

The UK Cabinet Office has now made public information from the previously classified UK National Risk Register. This is available at http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/reports/national_risk_register.aspx.

This seems to backup what many scientists have been saying. The greatest risk to the UK is not terrorism, or even global warming. It's an Influenza Pandemic.

US Media 'Spins' Olympics Medal Table

2008-08-18T16:11:00.002+10:00

I find it pretty cynical that whilst the rest of the world's media is following the IOC official Medal Table, i.e. ranking countries by Gold, then Silver, then Bronze, which currently puts China at the top, the big US media companies are instead ranking countries by total medals won, which of course puts the US in the #1 position.

Come on American, face up to it, the world order is changing. The 20th Century may be known as America's Century but things are quickly changing, and I'm not just talking about sport. The Olympics medal table as always been a good indicator for the general world order - and all the indicators point in the direction of the US heading south. Just look at the decline of the US dollar.

Now I'm not a proponent of the European Union forming an EU olympics team, but just imaging if they did, I can't be bothered to count up the total medals of the 25 EU nations but a quick glance at the medals table tells you that a EU team would have more than twice the amount of medals as the US. Now there's an idea, albeit not a good one.

With most of the Athletics events still to come there's a good chance that the US will still finish at the top of the table, using both methods of ranking, given that China's medal hopes come mainly from non-Track and Field events. It would be nice though if China did end up with more Golds and more total medals than the US. How would ESPN, NBC, CNN/SI, etc manipulate the tables to put the US top then?

IPChitChat is now LIVE!!!

2008-08-13T19:55:00.004+10:00

I am pleased to announce that after months of development, our new website - www.ipchitchat.co.uk - is now live!

We originally hired a web developer to build this site but it didn't work out too well. His work turned out to be really shoddy. It's our own fault, we should have done better due diligence when choosing the developer.

After getting rid of the web developer there was so much work to do to try and get the site looking the way we wanted that we decided it would be quicker to start again. I'd learnt so much trying to fix the work he had done that I had confidence that I could do a better job myself. I'm not sure I'd do it again. You wouldn't believe the amount of hours work it takes to create a site such as this, particularly when it's all open-source (using free software) to save money. If we'd have spent a fortune on a top e-commerce system then I'm sure it would have only took half the time.

Anyway, it has taken a lot longer than planned to get this site up and running, and there may still be the odd bug or two that we need to iron out, but I'm happy with the results.

So how does this differ to our old site - ipchichat.com, you might ask? Well, it's like comparing a Mac to a ZX Spectrum. The old site was completely built by hand using html. None of the site is database driven and we had to use a third-party to provide our shopping cart and checkout.

In the new site, the whole site is run using a proper content management system. Everything is database driven, making it much easier to manage and make changes to the site on the fly. We've integrated a proper shopping cart system, and now have our own SSL certificate so users can checkout within the site. We've got a blog, a download area - where users can download user guides, firmware, etc. Users can properly manage their account information on the site, and see their order history. We've got different account types for regular shoppers, corporate accounts, and resellers; meaning that users will automatically get discounts on products depending on their account type. We've got an help-desk system where users can submit support requests, and they will receive a support ticket, which is managed through our Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system. The list goes on. We've also greatly extended the range of products we offer.

Over the coming months we've also got plans to introduce even more features.

Check it out at www.ipchitchat.co.uk - you can even sign up to our e-mail newsletter.