blog on May 29th, 2009

Channel 7 Australia, Sunrise programme. A little antidote for the recession. Four preppy youngsters, wearing scarves and beads, a little (but not too much) choreography. Reject the Recession – the dance that will turn the world around. Not.
What were they thinking? Oh dear. Four faux-gangstas, strutting their stuff to make us all feel better, [...]

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blog on May 28th, 2009

Dr Steven Chu, Nobel-prize winning scientist and US Secretary of Energy, says we need to paint our roofs and footpaths white, and ensure our cars are white or light (cool) colours.
Highly reflective (ie white or silver) roofs allow sunlight to be reflected back into the atmosphere at normal wavelengths, rather than becoming absorbed into dark [...]

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blog on May 27th, 2009

Fugitive William Stewart was caught this morning after more than 100 days spent evading police. 47-year-old Billy Stewart took to the Canterbury back-country in February after allegedly threatening a police officer with an iron bar. Today he faced charges including breach of bail, possession of cannabis and possession of utensils. The latter is obviously a [...]

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blog on May 26th, 2009

Beetle-browed, frumpy, dumpy, but what a voice. Susan Boyle is the talk of the town, after her appearance on the show Britain’s Got Talent, an opportunity for the ordinary Brit to show what they can do.
Boyle came to international attention in April when she earned the judges’ consternation as she first appeared, and then completely [...]

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blog on May 25th, 2009

A survey in NZ recently found that more than 50% of teenagers felt that didn’t really get enough time with their parents. This is significant, because having a close relationship with one parent is an important predictor of good health and well-being for young people, according to Simon Denny, of Auckland University.
The survey of almost [...]

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blog on May 22nd, 2009

The UK Government wants communications companies to record all internet contacts to help enforcement agencies catch terrorists, murderers and paedophiles. Presumably this will be useful to track criminals organising their activities via email and the like. Civil libertarians are concerned for privacy. Examples given were that the privacy of the partners of Government officials who [...]

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blog on May 22nd, 2009

In the last ten years there has been a change in the ways people work. Traditionally, people worked in silos with little cooperation between departments, or even between members of the same department with roles being very individually-focussed. Jobs tended to be routine, with much the same tasks repeated over time. Nowadays, much mundane, routine [...]

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blog on May 20th, 2009

The term ‘world water crisis’ refers to the world’s water supply in relation to the needs of the human population. While much of the world’s surface is covered in water, most of the world’s water is unusable for human needs. And of the usable water, much is inaccessible. Only around 0.007% only of the world’s [...]

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blog on May 20th, 2009

The recent upswing in the property market seems to be sustaining, to a certain extent, but the most definite thing that can be said about the market is that it is changing. So the people in that market need to change also.
Mortgage approvals continue to rise, but repossessions are also on the increase. Buy-to-let [...]

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blog on May 20th, 2009

Revealed at the New York Museum of Natural History, scientists have identified the fossil that may prove to be the “missing link” between humans and other mammals. In other words, the common ancestor of the two main branches of primates – one that contains monkey, apes and humans, and the other which contains lemurs. The [...]

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