Cardinal 7s

I have previously written an article on the Air Jordan VII - being the Bordeaux colour scheme. This article is on the same shoe, but in a different colour scheme - the Air Jordan VII Retro - Cardinal.

As opposed to the Bordeaux colour scheme VIIs, the Cardinals are very similar to each other. They also differ by replacing the suede / nubuck upper material with a tumbled leather. And besides the obvious colour differences, I cannot really comment on them being much different from the Bordeaux ones.

The appeal of this shoe is one I think will be broader than the Bordeaux. Whiteish shoes appear to be more popular than darker shoes, and I believe this will appeal to a younger demographic as opposed to the Bordeaux, which appealed to an older demographic who may have once upon a time have owned a pair. I do not think these shoes will be used very much for playing basketball, and will find their way onto feet of people into fashion.

Without taking up too much more time, here are the images:

These shoes were obtained from the Footlocker on Swanston Street, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Things they could fix in Canberra #10

This next "thing" to fix in Canberra is going to be quite harsh, but I believe it is a reflection of the environment - the suicide rate in Canberra. My intention is not to offend or disrespect the memory of anyone lost to suicide - but to address a propaganda campaign trying to attract people to the region.

For many years, people have speculated about the suicide rate in Canberra being high. There is now documentation that the suicide rate per capita in Canberra is higher than New South Wales, Victoria, and Queensland (the suicide rate is published in a brochure made by the Australian Government).

Loss of life, especially when someone takes their own, is truly a sad event. Suicide is very tragic.

According to the liveincanberra.com.au website's front page:

Take advantage of the employment opportunities and lifestyle benefits available in Canberra, Australia's capital city.

There are jobs available right now in Canberra for skilled workers across selected industries. Canberra's unemployment rate is consistently among the lowest in the nation at around 3.0%. The pay's good too - in fact, workers in Canberra enjoy the highest full-time average income in Australia.

What's more, Canberra offers a fantastic lifestyle for you and your family, with an outstanding school system, excellent health services, shorter commuting times, plenty of fresh air and community living. Much of what is best about Australia can be found in the nation's capital - it's a clean, safe and relaxed place to live.

Canberra has all the lifestyle amenities, city services and events of a world-class capital, yet the bush is on our doorstep and Sydney, the snowfields and south coast beaches are within easy reach.


If Canberra was so good, why is their per capita suicide rate higher than some other areas in Australia? Surely people would flock to Canberra and find it an utopian paradise.

I believe what the website fails to mention is that with the advantages of working in Canberra, comes the disadvantages of higher cost of living, higher petty crime, higher drug usage, all stemming from a higher boredom - as there is very little to do in Canberra. The typical resident is still elitist and arrogant.

To address this problem, the local Canberra government needs to determine why the city is "soulless" and boring, and why the mentality of its residents is to be elitist and arrogant. It will require a huge mentality shift in the people who choose to reside there. If they can bring in schemes to counter those problems, the city would be far more livable, it would attract more people, and, dare I predict, the suicide rate would be lowered.

Carbon Tax - is it worth it?

I recently received this in an email from ninja (someone I used to go to University with):

Carbon Tax explanation. EVERYONE can understand when it’s put like this...

ETS (Emissions Trading Scheme) tax for dummies - regardless of your political persuasion. Let's put this into a bit of perspective for laymen!

ETS is another tax. It is equal to putting up the GST to 12.5% which would be unacceptable and produce an outcry.

Read the following analogy and you will realize the insignificance of carbon dioxide as a weather controller.

Pass on to all in your address book including politicians and may be they will listen to their constituents, rather than vested interests which stand to gain by the ETS.

Here's a practical way to understand Julia Gillard’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme.
Imagine 1 kilometer of atmosphere and we want to get rid of the carbon pollution in it created by human activity. Let's go for a walk along it.

• The first 770 meters are Nitrogen.
• The next 210 meters are Oxygen.
• That's 980 meters of the 1 kilometer.
• 20 meters to go.
• The next 10 meters are water vapor.
• 10 meters left.
• 9 meters are argon.
• Just 1 more meter.
• A few gases make up the first bit of that last meter.
• The last 38 centimeters of the kilometer - that's carbon dioxide.
• A bit over one foot.
• 97% of that is produced by Mother Nature. It’s natural.
• Out of our journey of one kilometer, there are just 12 millimeters left.
• Just over a centimeter - about half an inch.
• That’s the amount of carbon dioxide that global human activity puts into the atmosphere.
• And of those 12 millimeters Australia puts in 0.18 of a millimeter.
• Less than the thickness of a hair. Out of a kilometer!

As a hair is to a kilometer - so is Australia 's contribution to what Julia Gillard calls Carbon Pollution.

Imagine Brisbane's new Gateway Bridge, ready to be opened by Julia Gillard. It's been polished, painted and scrubbed by an army of workers till its 1 kilometer length is surgically clean. Except that Julia Gillard says we have a huge problem, the bridge is polluted - there's a human hair on the roadway. We'd laugh ourselves silly.

There are plenty of real pollution problems to worry about.

It's hard to imagine that Australia's contribution to carbon dioxide in the world's atmosphere is one of the more pressing ones. And I can't believe that a new tax on everything is the only way to blow that pesky hair away.

Pass this on quickly while the ETS is being debated in Federal Parliament.

I do not know about the validity or the truth behind the analogy, but it made me think.

I don't oppose a carbon tax. Not at all. I believe something which is implemented to take care of the environment is a good idea. Something which stops people from just wasting resources on this finite planet is a good idea.

What I oppose is what will happen to the revenue of the carbon tax once it is collected. Will the funds be allocated correctly? Take for instance the tax on cigarettes. Around 2005, it raised over $6 billion in revenue for the Australian government. I would say it would exceed that amount today. My query is where does that $6 billion in revenue go? I doubt it would all go back to the health systems. Ministers need to pay for their superannuation funds, their air flights, and their spending budgets. The same can be said about the vehicle fuel excise, which should be used to upgrade the infrastructure / roads of Australia, but rarely is.

With the current "sales campaign" of the government, they have allocated $25 million to spend in "educating" the Australian public on carbon tax. Where did that money come from?

While I do not have a problem with the principle of the carbon tax, I do have a huge concern over the accountability of the funds raised in this manner. I seriously doubt it will be used to make the environment of this planet any better.

I welcome anyone's comments on anything I have written in this article, as well as anyone who can sustain or refute ninja's email. Is it misinformation, or is the government trying to increase taxes by pulling to wool over the eyes of the Australian tax payer? Will it mean an increase of conscious companies trying to clean up their businesses, or will it just mean an increase in the cost of living for all Australians? I hope this tax does not get implemented, and then Australians just get used to living in a more expensive society with less money...

Another person's view on WebSphere

As some of you may know, I work with computer "thingies", and this will usually involve me working with application servers. While not the most fun of all roles, it is interesting enough to keep me involved.

Recently, Chewie has gotten involved, and has started his own blog on doing WebSphere - WebSphere being a Java application server from IBM.

I look forward to seeing what he has to write up...

Australian Internet filter is easily bypassed

The good Senator Conroy is in the belief that he is still doing the correct thing - trying to save Australian net users from the dangers and disgust of an unregulated Internet. Even though he looks like he may be blocked in the Australian Senate, I believe he is still trying to advance his agenda for an internet filter for Australia - and still going ahead with rollout.

The rollout on Optus has an interesting twist in this story. The filter can be defeated by changing the DNS server in the operating system.

The news of bypassing the filter irritates me. A lot! The reason being is that I would have thought that to bypass the internet filter would require some fancy manipulation and installation of some interesting proxying software - not something a child or teenager can do in under 30 seconds. This is a multi-million dollar system, that can be bypassed with the simplest of ease. And this multi-million dollar filter is going to slow the internet down for all other users. The filter is useless and a huge waste of money, and just like the carbon tax, it will be paid for by Australian taxpayers.

If this article has inspired anything within you, please click on the link below and try to do something about it.

Do something (useful) now!

Jay gets older, Win Scripting is poor, and NBA is out

I have not got much to report at the moment. It has been a while since my last post, and while I am busy, I am effectively news-less.

What I can say is that my bro Jay is another year older. Happy Birthday to him.

I have also been doing quite a bit of Windows scripting in my current role to get application servers installed onto Microsoft Windows servers. While this does not sound like a difficult task, being exposed to other forms of scripting has essentially spoiled me. I much prefer the scripting on a UNIX / Linux system. It allows for better handling of different conditions - for example, checking to see files or directories exist, and acting appropriately afterwards. This experience only inspires me more to write more in my series on how to script on this blog.

Lastly, if you have not heard, the NBA is under a player lockout as they have not come to an agreement with the player's association for the "working conditions" for the players. The NBA wanted to introduce a new range of conditions that effectively means they can cut down on the amount of money that goes to the players. I have a mixed mind on this matter. I know at the end of the day, these players earn millions of dollars in today's modern game, and effectively we (the fans) are paying them to distract us from our day to day troubles, but I also understand that to a lot of these players, all they have is sports, and if you take that away from them, they will have little else.

If I think of anything else, I will be sure to jot it down here...