Most Australians will have their web access censored as of next month
news.com.au
news.com.au
You also know how hackers think. They believe things which evidence suggests are true. Regardless of what you say, if the government has failed to censor the web for 15 years, hackers won't believe it's going to happen. They'll vote for you based on other things.
You need to maximise votes. The winning strategy is obvious: loudly announce your intention to censor the web, but fail to do it. For bonus points, get some experts to tell the Christians it couldn't be done, so you can't be blamed for failing.
I just love Australian politics.
We also have Senators.
However the composition of the Senate will change on July 1st, with the Greens assuming the balance of power.
I personally suspect that internet filtering will be used as a bargaining chip in negotiations with the Greens over the details of a carbon tax / trading scheme.
There's no doubt that Fielding likes the plan too, but don't expect to disappear while it is in Conroy's portfolio.
I've never heard of the internet filtering being a carbon-tax bargaining chip before. Given that it was planned before Labor supported the carbon tax I'd be surprised if it planned that way.
(Also, note that this is technically voluntary filtering by these ISPs, so it probably wont' go away even if Conroy left)
In fact, the RU486 is a abortion-inducing pill effective in the first 2 months of pregnancy [1], while "morning after pill" is a common name for emergency contraception pills effective for the first few days after intercourse [2].
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mifepristone [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_contraception
I don't follow political opinion pieces though, so I can't say which are good.
"Greens leader Bob Brown has accused The Australian of trying to wreck the alliance between the Greens and Labor. We wear Senator Brown's criticism with pride. We believe he and his Green colleagues are hypocrites; that they are bad for the nation; and that they should be destroyed at the ballot box."
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/needed-a-policy...
And they attempted to sue a journalism professor for repeating comments by a former journalist at a conference that the Australian had an overt policy of suppressing stories that suggested that climate change was real. http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/11/26/the-torture-of-writing-a...
Beware the comments threads though, there be dragons, and rather cynical people.
Also worth checking out are:
http://grogsgamut.blogspot.com/
http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/
(Full disclosure: I work for the ABC)
Although the blog is focused on election analysis, which you may not want.
I've always thought Australia to have pretty darned good public transport, relatively speaking. That is to say that the US has (generally) fucking terrible public transport, outside of NYC and some small commuter services.
If it was cheaper I wouldn't mind, but $50 a week to stand in a non air-conditioned/non-heated dirty train isn't what I consider a good deal.
Sydney public transport sucks, it is very expensive, each ticket counts for only one trip. The trains are ok, the buses are very bad. The roads are awful in Sydney, and too much congestion. The state governments response to this is to build more roads, because they are too scared to make proper decisions.
Melbourne has the best public transport, but as with all Australian cities, it is too spread out (not as bad as Adelaide).
I live in Sydney, have a reasonable, but not high salary and live a pretty comfortable life. I don't own my home, but will do in 7 years or so. I drink reasonable wines and have whatever toys (phones etc...) I want. I have a dependent partner but no children as yet.
When all you have to complain about is that the houses and wine are expensive, you cant get a seat on the train/bus, imported goods cost more then local and digital content isn't as cheap as other markets your life really isn't that bad.
If you can't live in the second ranked city in the world, it may be time to look in the mirror and have a long talk with yourself.
Take it from a guy who moved to Sydney after 22 years in the states. There is nothing I've seen in the states[1] or even heard of which compares to the quality of life here. Not by a long shot.
[1]based on living in NYC, Miami, St. Louis, Chicago, San Fran and visiting countless points in between.
You don't understand his specific rationale or the social strata that he may be involved. Furthermore, how do rankings by old conservative institutions reflect on the preferred life balance of a hacker?
But why would that be worth posting?
I'm trying to argue the more general view of how amazing this country is and how _that_ is the consensus view and the OP is in the minority.
He could be a miserable sod for all I know. But again, that's not my problem or that interesting to anyone on HN.
The awesomeness of Oz on the other hand? There's a lot of supporting material for that position.
I was simply trying to balance the picture for other HNers who have never been to Oz.
Adelaide is boring and Canberra is a freezing public service ghetto; Sydney has them well beaten.
The quality of life you guys have is ridiculous. I don't know if a lot of Aussies get that.
(Grass is greener etc).
the climate: Just amazing. look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sydney#Climate and marvel. Tons of sunlight, moderate temperatures but you still get seasons (so no San Diego syndrome of 70-degrees year round).
the people: unbelievably friendly and easy going. take small-town midwest hospitality and invert the xenophobia. common decency, they wait in lines for the buses, but if someone cuts in line (doesn't know or is just being a dick) everyone kind of just mutters and shakes their heads. In Chicago, someone would have gotten stabbed. But who am I kidding, no one would line up in the first place and they would just mob the entrance. I almost took a guy's eye out surfing, his response? "no worries mate, my fault" (it wasn't).
scenery / the outdoors: Sydney is the most naturally beautiful I've ever seen. I take a ferry ride for 30 minutes every morning through the harbor. This week there were whales breaching in the background and a couple of little penguins [1] swimming around screaming their heads off looking for their mother. It's like living in a Disney movie. I wouldn't be surprised one morning to look out and see a Koala riding a dolphin and giving me the thumbs up. It's just unreal. On the way home? sun setting behind the harbor bridge and opera house.
miscellaneous things:
-a lot less religious extremism, it's very european in regard to the general secularism.
-the mainstream brands of beer are really really good. you don't have to rely on microbrews like you do in the states.
-the proto Sydney girl is tall, fit, blonde, blue-eyed and can probably drink you under the table.
-coffee - this was the big surprise, my god they're crazy about good coffee here. in the states you had to hunt for a decent espresso and then fail-over to starbucks. here you can walk into any cafe and get an amazing espresso. I've never seen anything like it outside of Milan.
In summation I'd say, imagine an english speaking country with a mediteranean climate, lots of european influences in food and drink and midwest levels of decency but in a +4 million person city with a major economy. And then put it in the most amazing natural setting you can imagine.
Rather off-topic, but do you or any other fellow HNers have suggestions for places to meet other hackers or like-minded people?
In Vienna there's Metalab [2], a very nice hackerspace populated by lots of creative people. I just found out about a place called Robodino [3] in Sydney. Are there any other meetups?
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World%27s_most_livable_cities
I'm in northern europe now and while the espresso bug has hit them, it's all only just a bit better than Starbucks at this point.
The 'huge tax on wine' is because you can get four litres of cask wine for $4 - or sometimes less. Oh, how onerous! I actually find it amusing that wine-lovers are screaming bloody murder because their preferential treatment over other alcohol types is coming to an end. Wine isn't being 'super-taxed', it's being equalised.
High prices for imported items? Traditionally it was because we had a weak dollar, and prices haven't caught up to the strong dollar - but that's okay, because we can order online with ease now. Our dollar hasn't been strong for very long at all, only a couple of years. General pricing moves slowly.
Ridiculous house prices I'll give you (and no politician will sign their own resignation by doing anyhting about it), but moving to another country merely to avoid those things you list? You're cutting off your nose to spite your face. If you like US culture (or wherever), then sure, move there. I know a guy that moved to Canada and won't stop raving about it.
But be familiar with the culture before you jump ship - you may be suffering from 'grass is greener' syndrome. The US has plenty of problems as well; they may suit you better, they may suit you worse.
That said, the internet in Australia was so slow and expensive I'm not sure censorship should be the primary worry.
This is the beginning of the end. I'm seriously considering moving overseas.
Or would it be more reasonable to route only select data like HTTP, FTP and email? I s'pose any instant-messaging too..
Bottom line; use UDP for your tunnels and a proper VPN.
But honestly, moving overseas because of introduction of internet censorship? Why not campaign against it instead? Are there other things that disturb you here, or were you perhaps not being serious when you said you were 'seriously considering'?
If freedom of speech is what interests you, the RSF places Australia as having more freedom of speech than the UK, the US, and Canada. NZ and Ireland rate higher, so you may want to emigrate to one of those, but beware that the economies of both those places might make it tough to find a job.
If you're a polyglot, you've got a bit more choice: http://en.rsf.org/press-freedom-index-2010,1034.html
As if they have any intention of even notifying sites they choose to block.
Edit: Conroy have stated TPG [and Internode] wouldn't join: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/government/mor...
[0] http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/06/22/3250398.htm
Edit: Looks like it's part of the hacking crackdown according to this article: http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/national/police-win-ph... Warrantless requests for electronic data.
"Without these laws we were able to do our job, therefore, pass these laws".
I'm a fan of Netspace's Naked plan.
> "The ACMA will compile and manage a list of URLs of child abuse content that will include the appropriate subsection of the ACMA blacklist as well as child abuse URLs that are provided by reputable international organisations (to be blocked)," the spokesman said.
Obviously, we all know URL filtering is useless and that the serious offenders are using P2P or encrypted connections (SSH tunnels through foreign VPS's, for example). In fact, it's even mentioned in the article[1].
[1] "Child abuse material is more likely to be exchanged on peer-to-peer networks and private networks anyway and is a matter for law enforcement." http://www.news.com.au/technology/internet-filter/telstra-op...