Shannon He, you speak so much sense. I think I’m in love.
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Archive for category China
Filtergate! Post #1
Jan 1
They’re at it again! They’re ma gonna filter our internet!
Thankfully, the geniuses behind this plan can be contacted at senator.fielding@aph.gov.au and senator.conroy@aph.gov.au
Incidentally, I decided to email Steven Conroy my thoughts:
Mr Conroy,
I read today on the BBC’s news online service that regarding the apparent nebulous nature of an opt-out filtering system: “The minister stressed that if people equated freedom of speech with watching child pornography then he would always disagree with them. ” I wonder were you also stressed to make such a disingenuous logical fallacy in the argument supporting this abhorrent legislative mistake, or are you naturally talented at such a manner of malfeasant equivalence? Are you also aware that Child Pornography is illegal under Australian law or are you as misinformed on that issue as you are on the feasibility of implementing this moronic reactionary filtering system? What industry bodies/individuals have you consulted regarding this issue? I’m sure you’ll find that it’s utterly impossible to implement without significant cost and performance impacts on existing services.
I hope you understand that this moronic legislation rings a death knell for the competitiveness of current and up and coming ISP’s in Australia, and sets us back even further than the unfathomably foolish decisions of Helen Coonan.
Further, I’d like to know what actual network/communications experience you have that justifies you receiving this portfolio?
I strongly, strongly urge you to look into the feasibility of the implementation of this system before you make grand sweeping statements about the technology. You’re supposed to undo the idiocies of Coonan, not make Alston look like a technological wunderkind.
Sincerely Yours,
Daniel Nolan
I don’t expect a reply.
Make sure to email the Senator about how incredibly daft this plan is.
Actually, on second thought, don’t worry, I will email him more than enough.
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Tonight: I pontificate in forums. Then: Copypaste to show I still have keys to the blog.
Jan 10
Posted by Captain Hero in Cancer, China, Future, News and Commentary, Science-Team, Terrorism, Thieves | Comments
Topic: Aren’t kittens cute and wubbly
Page: 36
[QUOTE=Cadbury;8295096]Dont buy the hype. A well made mini reactor is extremely safe. It cant blow up. It cant irradiate several city blocks. At worst, some radioactive coolant might leak out – requiring a cleanup crew.[/QUOTE]
I essentially agree with you, at least regarding the safety of these reactors in normal operation. However, what if somehow – maybe 50 years down the track, if we’re still here – some nefarious agent gets hold of the ‘depleted’ material in the core? Mother Russia built modular nuclear powerplants back in the day, to power autonomous lighthouses and whatnot. There’s a bunch left unaccounted for. Decades after the fact, a small group of hunters/trappers came across a discarded (still happily radiating) beryllium heater core from one of those bad boys, dragged it to their camp for warmth and died, hard, for the convenience. The incident was not isolated.
That anecdote is paraphrased from a New Scientist I read last year, dredge it up in their archives if you want. The point is not that nuclear powerplants are bad, or unsafe, and certainly not unreliable – it’s that the material they contain can and will be rendered extremely lethal in the wrong hands. It should not be packaged up in a block of concrete under some apartment building, where it can be lost and forgotten far more readily than a massive central reactor.
Worst-case scenario: Global warming may kill us all, sure. Nuclear war will, and then it’ll salt the earth so nothing will ever grow again (with poetic license). Let China burn coal.
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