Last night the PM graced Q&A. As the transcript shows she did a remarkable job on handling the climate change/carbon tax question.
I'm actually glad you asked me that question because it gives me an opportunity to explain and I do want to talk to the Australian people about what I said in the last election. Now, I did say during the last election campaign - I promised that there would be no carbon tax. That's true and I've walked away from that commitment and I'm not going to try and pretend anything else. I also said to the Australian people in the last election campaign that we needed to act on climate change. We needed to price carbon and I wanted to see an emissions trading scheme. Then we had the election and the 17 days that were and we formed this minority government. Now, if I'd been leading a majority government I would have been getting on with an emissions trading scheme. It's what I promised the Australian people. As it is, in this minority parliament, the only way I can act on climate change by pricing carbon it to work with others and so I had a really start choice. Do I act or not act? Well, I've chosen to act and we will have a fixed price, like a carbon tax, for a period and then get to exactly what I promised the Australian people, an emissions trading scheme. Now, when I said during the election campaign there would be no carbon tax I didn't intend to mislead people. What I believed then is an emissions trading scheme is right for this country. I believe that now and we will get to that emissions trading scheme.
I think technically though she didn't lie! When she said there wouldn't be a carbon tax under the government she led she really meant "if I have an absolute majority". I think it is perfectly reasonable for her to say "my interpretation is this is the what the Parliament will support, and the Parliament is the expression of the wishes of the Australian people".
She also did an admirable job of explaining that the point of a carbon tax is to change relative prices not to increase costs.
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Prime Minister, isn't the whole point of having a carbon tax to affect the prices that consumers pay? If there's no change in consumer behaviour, you're not going to achieve what you're trying to achieve to reduce carbon pollution. So if it's compensating households, aren't you simply undermining the effect that your tax is going to have and ultimately make no change?
JULIA GILLARD: That's a very perceptive question and I think a lot of people are thinking about his, about how does it work? If I'm getting compensation, what's actually changing? Let me just explain that. The carbon price affects the big polluters. Yes, they will cause some price impacts for consumers. That's true. We will then assist consumers and I can understand why people then intuitively go, well, how does all of this work? Isn't, you know, sort of money going in and money going out? What's the effect? Well, the effect is that in the shops when you come to buy things, products that are made with relatively less carbon pollution will be cheaper than products that are made with more carbon pollution. So you're standing there with your household assistance in your hand. You could still keep buying the high carbon pollution products if you want to or what you're far more likely to do is to buy the cheaper, lower carbon pollution products. That means that the people who make those things will get the consumer signal, gee, we will sell more, we will make more money if we make lower pollution products. That drives the innovation. So I want you to have that household assistance in your hand but I also want you to see price effects which make cleaner, greener things cheaper than high pollution commodities. That's why it works.
Meanwhile Tony Abbott seems to get off still saying carbon dioxide isn't the enemy, but having a policy of direct intervention to reduce it.
His policy is to incur massive Government expenditure on these programs - but not to raise taxes. Presumably he will just cut expenditure on other things.
But also, you and I don't get the choice. It is not then determined by how we are prepared to modify our behaviour but what young Tony and his guys decide.
It is mighty odd that it is the ALP that is promoting market mechanisms and the coalition that is promoting centralist planning. It is mighty odd that it is the ALP promoting a budget neutral approach and the coalition proposing massive public expenditure.
Meanwhile the Assange question was just pure unadulterated nonsense. Yes, the Australian government does share information with other Governments about potential security risks that might involve Australian citizens. We WANT IT TO DO THAT.
Meanwhile Dennis Atkins has dreamt up Labor's ten time bombs. They are:
1. Selling the carbon tax.
2. Selling/finalising the mining tax.
3. The tax summit promised to Oakshot.
4. The May Budget.
5. Finalising the Feb 13 health agreement.
6. Offshore processing centre.
7. Managing the onshore detention problem.
8. Same sex marriage.
9. Debating taking back cacus' power to appoint Ministers.
10. Managing/controlling K Rudd.
Actually written like that without the prose they aren't much at all. The PM in the first term rolled back work choices and ran education - including national testing and my school.
For Julia that is simply a "To Do List" - not a list of "time bombs."
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Politics 1 - NSW
I have long been a fan of Cyril Pearl's book The Wild Men of Sydney
.
Writing on The Punch today David Penberthy says:
To this day, it captures the language of Sydney, the culture of government and business, the sense of entitlement which colours the conduct of so many MPs in this State. ...
It’s a culture which revolves around a strong sense of mateship formalised through a robust factional system, the profanity-laden denunciation of opponents internal and external, covert deal-making with threats to ostracise or destroy anyone who challenges or exposes the deal. ...
Little has been done over the years to change the political culture of Sydney. ...
Come Saturday week Barry O’Farrell will be Premier and my tip, based on the culture of this State and, particularly, city, is that we’re in for four years of pea-hearted inertia.
There is nothing remotely brave about Barry O’Farrell. ... Some of the most senior members of his team are the most long-serving and this doesn’t reflect a reassuring depth of talent and experience, rather an inability to recruit.
The factions are still run by old stagers such as the small-l liberal Michael Photios, and the vitriol which emanates from the capital-c conservatives over religious hardliners such as David Clarke suggests that, in government, O’Farrell will struggle to maintain discipline.
Right now though every member of the Liberal Party knows that all they have to do is keep their heads down and they will romp it in. The magnitude of their victory will be amplified by the fact that they should have won in 2007 but didn’t, for the simple reason that they were a rabble with no policies. They look less of a rabble now. Policy-wise they remain a mystery as O’Farrell has made himself such a small target that he has avoided big ideas.
A crueller analyst would say he’s ignored big ideas because he doesn’t have any. If he does, he is keeping them to himself. I don’t know anyone who could identify the one big thing an O’Farrell Government would do, other than not be a NSW Labor Government.
And there you have it in a nutshell.
Let's go through it in more detail. Labor is "on the nose" because of some very low level corruption that it has dealt with, and the fact that it seems to have personal scandals extruding from it like sweat from a triathlete.
Let's look at the claims in the "real change for NSW" ad.
They are.
1. Cut taxes and provide more help for families with the cost of living.
2. We'll provide more beds and more nurses.
3. We'll fast-track public transport and road projects.
4. Our jobs action plan will create 100,000 new jobs.
5. We'll hire 900 extra teachers across the State.
There is precious little explanation of how this miracle of cutting taxes and increasing services will be achieved. The coalition's Jobs Action Plan doesn't appear as a separate policy on their website. The downloadable copy of their Action Plan seems to suggest the full extent of the Jobs Action Plan is to cut payroll tax on jobs added by an employer.
The finance detail seems to be entirely built on a premise that the coalition can and will increase the growth rate of the State economy, hence creating increased government revenue and hence increasing services.
If this sounds familiar it is because it is - it had a name in the 1980s - Reaganomics.
IT DOESN'T WORK!
The 2011 election really should be like the 2007 election. Neither option is particularly good, but maybe the devil you know is better than the devil you don't.
(Note: A good deal more of the economic mumbo-jumbo in the O'Farrell plan is about a "decade of decentralisation" and the "regional kick-start package" - the latter is about paying people $7,000 to relocate to regional NSW and spend 30% of infrastructure funds in regional areas. You know a power station to provide power to Sydney is infrastructure in a regional area!
For good measure the market oriented Liberals are vowing to introduce "Industry Action Plans" for "high performance and high potential industries". As if that's not been tried before.)
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
. Writing on The Punch today David Penberthy says:
To this day, it captures the language of Sydney, the culture of government and business, the sense of entitlement which colours the conduct of so many MPs in this State. ...
It’s a culture which revolves around a strong sense of mateship formalised through a robust factional system, the profanity-laden denunciation of opponents internal and external, covert deal-making with threats to ostracise or destroy anyone who challenges or exposes the deal. ...
Little has been done over the years to change the political culture of Sydney. ...
Come Saturday week Barry O’Farrell will be Premier and my tip, based on the culture of this State and, particularly, city, is that we’re in for four years of pea-hearted inertia.
There is nothing remotely brave about Barry O’Farrell. ... Some of the most senior members of his team are the most long-serving and this doesn’t reflect a reassuring depth of talent and experience, rather an inability to recruit.
The factions are still run by old stagers such as the small-l liberal Michael Photios, and the vitriol which emanates from the capital-c conservatives over religious hardliners such as David Clarke suggests that, in government, O’Farrell will struggle to maintain discipline.
Right now though every member of the Liberal Party knows that all they have to do is keep their heads down and they will romp it in. The magnitude of their victory will be amplified by the fact that they should have won in 2007 but didn’t, for the simple reason that they were a rabble with no policies. They look less of a rabble now. Policy-wise they remain a mystery as O’Farrell has made himself such a small target that he has avoided big ideas.
A crueller analyst would say he’s ignored big ideas because he doesn’t have any. If he does, he is keeping them to himself. I don’t know anyone who could identify the one big thing an O’Farrell Government would do, other than not be a NSW Labor Government.
And there you have it in a nutshell.
Let's go through it in more detail. Labor is "on the nose" because of some very low level corruption that it has dealt with, and the fact that it seems to have personal scandals extruding from it like sweat from a triathlete.
Let's look at the claims in the "real change for NSW" ad.
They are.
1. Cut taxes and provide more help for families with the cost of living.
2. We'll provide more beds and more nurses.
3. We'll fast-track public transport and road projects.
4. Our jobs action plan will create 100,000 new jobs.
5. We'll hire 900 extra teachers across the State.
There is precious little explanation of how this miracle of cutting taxes and increasing services will be achieved. The coalition's Jobs Action Plan doesn't appear as a separate policy on their website. The downloadable copy of their Action Plan seems to suggest the full extent of the Jobs Action Plan is to cut payroll tax on jobs added by an employer.
The finance detail seems to be entirely built on a premise that the coalition can and will increase the growth rate of the State economy, hence creating increased government revenue and hence increasing services.
If this sounds familiar it is because it is - it had a name in the 1980s - Reaganomics.
IT DOESN'T WORK!
The 2011 election really should be like the 2007 election. Neither option is particularly good, but maybe the devil you know is better than the devil you don't.
(Note: A good deal more of the economic mumbo-jumbo in the O'Farrell plan is about a "decade of decentralisation" and the "regional kick-start package" - the latter is about paying people $7,000 to relocate to regional NSW and spend 30% of infrastructure funds in regional areas. You know a power station to provide power to Sydney is infrastructure in a regional area!
For good measure the market oriented Liberals are vowing to introduce "Industry Action Plans" for "high performance and high potential industries". As if that's not been tried before.)
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Monday, March 14, 2011
Incomprehensible rubbish from the Hon. Malcolm Turnbull
Someone claiming to be Malcolm Turnbull has offered a comment on a story about a radio interview he did. It may well be Malcolm.
If so it is very, very sad. He says:
I think you miss the point about HFC. My simple point is this. If the objective is to provide fast broadband to all Australians at an affordable price then we should try to do so in the most cost-effective fashion. If there is infrastructure which enables us to do that (HFC for example) then it makes sense to use that rather than overbuild it. You make a point about Telstra not being prepared to make it available as a wholesale service, well all of those structural issues can be addressed in the separation of carriage and service which we support. The mistake the Gillard Government has made is never to even ask the question: how do we do this for the least amount of taxpayers' dollars, and instead rushing to what must be the most expensive solution. For example, I was very interested to see in Incheon where there is a new broadband enabled city being built that the fibre runs to the basement of the brand new towers and the service then runs over the buildings LAN, on ethernet. So it is very much fibre to the basement. In Singapore on the other hand the Government is requiring that fibre is pulled through to every apartment. Nonetheless here there is no obligation for Singtel to decommission its copper and no restriction on the HFC network being used to compete with the new fibre. So there is both here and in Korea continuing facilities based competition. So in summary: there is no dispute between us and Labor on the need to have universal fast broadband. We differ on two main points. 1) The cost, we do not accept that this is the most cost effective way of delivering it and cannot understand why they did not follow their stated policy of having a cost benefit analysis, 2) the establishment of a new government owned telecoms monopoly is turning policy on its head and going back to the days of government owned Telstra, added to that preventing facilities based competition runs the real risk that this will result in a more expensive network than a different approach would have delivered.
So on the one hand the Government has erred by rushing hrad long into fibre because it might have been cheaper to use the HFC. But on the other hand the Government is erring by not leaving the HFC in place when it does deploy fibre.
His greatest line is "You make a point about Telstra not being prepared to make it available as a wholesale service, well all of those structural issues can be addressed in the separation of carriage and service which we support.", but he hasn't told us how he would pull off structural reform of the industry. He really should read Paul Fletcher's book.
By the way he says fibre "must be the most expensive solution". This is not necessarily true, because if you believe any other solution is at best temporary till we need to build fibre anyway, then A the expenditure on the temporary solution is wasted. That is what the NBN Expert Panel told the Government - it is there in the documents that were released when the announcement was made.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
If so it is very, very sad. He says:
I think you miss the point about HFC. My simple point is this. If the objective is to provide fast broadband to all Australians at an affordable price then we should try to do so in the most cost-effective fashion. If there is infrastructure which enables us to do that (HFC for example) then it makes sense to use that rather than overbuild it. You make a point about Telstra not being prepared to make it available as a wholesale service, well all of those structural issues can be addressed in the separation of carriage and service which we support. The mistake the Gillard Government has made is never to even ask the question: how do we do this for the least amount of taxpayers' dollars, and instead rushing to what must be the most expensive solution. For example, I was very interested to see in Incheon where there is a new broadband enabled city being built that the fibre runs to the basement of the brand new towers and the service then runs over the buildings LAN, on ethernet. So it is very much fibre to the basement. In Singapore on the other hand the Government is requiring that fibre is pulled through to every apartment. Nonetheless here there is no obligation for Singtel to decommission its copper and no restriction on the HFC network being used to compete with the new fibre. So there is both here and in Korea continuing facilities based competition. So in summary: there is no dispute between us and Labor on the need to have universal fast broadband. We differ on two main points. 1) The cost, we do not accept that this is the most cost effective way of delivering it and cannot understand why they did not follow their stated policy of having a cost benefit analysis, 2) the establishment of a new government owned telecoms monopoly is turning policy on its head and going back to the days of government owned Telstra, added to that preventing facilities based competition runs the real risk that this will result in a more expensive network than a different approach would have delivered.
So on the one hand the Government has erred by rushing hrad long into fibre because it might have been cheaper to use the HFC. But on the other hand the Government is erring by not leaving the HFC in place when it does deploy fibre.
His greatest line is "You make a point about Telstra not being prepared to make it available as a wholesale service, well all of those structural issues can be addressed in the separation of carriage and service which we support.", but he hasn't told us how he would pull off structural reform of the industry. He really should read Paul Fletcher's book.
By the way he says fibre "must be the most expensive solution". This is not necessarily true, because if you believe any other solution is at best temporary till we need to build fibre anyway, then A the expenditure on the temporary solution is wasted. That is what the NBN Expert Panel told the Government - it is there in the documents that were released when the announcement was made.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Who is out of control?
Our media has been full of reports like this that "Kevin Rudd is out of control".
Michelle Grattan tells us that "commonsense" tells you that the PM and the Foreign Minister should be talking directly not through officials. She doesn't say how commonsense dictates which has to make the midnight phone-call, or reflect that each actually have schedules where they are talking to third persons so they don't have unlimited freedom.
She doesn't admit that she's trying to suggest that Gillard should actually adopt the behaviour for which Rudd was dumped, that is, micro-managing a Minister.
But worse I think she misses the real story. She writes;
Meanwhile, an adviser to Gillard was quoted as saying the Foreign Minister was ''out of control'', issuing press releases without running them through Gillard's office..
How come she doesn't notice that the issue here is an advisor by the PM being quoted about ANYTHING to do with the relationship with a Minister. To think that Julia herself built her challenge on the strength of the snub that Alistair Jordan, Rudd's former CoS, was "doing his numbers".
It is the PM's office staff who need better control. A really good first solution would be to REDUCE the number of staff in the PMs office. Quality of staff is far more important than quantity. And office staff let Departmental staff duck accountability.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Michelle Grattan tells us that "commonsense" tells you that the PM and the Foreign Minister should be talking directly not through officials. She doesn't say how commonsense dictates which has to make the midnight phone-call, or reflect that each actually have schedules where they are talking to third persons so they don't have unlimited freedom.
She doesn't admit that she's trying to suggest that Gillard should actually adopt the behaviour for which Rudd was dumped, that is, micro-managing a Minister.
But worse I think she misses the real story. She writes;
Meanwhile, an adviser to Gillard was quoted as saying the Foreign Minister was ''out of control'', issuing press releases without running them through Gillard's office..
How come she doesn't notice that the issue here is an advisor by the PM being quoted about ANYTHING to do with the relationship with a Minister. To think that Julia herself built her challenge on the strength of the snub that Alistair Jordan, Rudd's former CoS, was "doing his numbers".
It is the PM's office staff who need better control. A really good first solution would be to REDUCE the number of staff in the PMs office. Quality of staff is far more important than quantity. And office staff let Departmental staff duck accountability.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Hard to keep a public sector agency down
The relationship between Government agencies and the radio-communications frequency has always been fraught. It was the needs of Defence that saw Governments worldwide assert their right to manage spectrum. With the move to price based allocation of spectrum it is Government agencies that want access to spectrum so that its cost is not included in the cost of their project.
In 2007 the Australian Communications and Media Authority received a report it had commissioned on Government Spectrum Holdings. That report was in response to calls from various agencies for more spectrum. The report concluded that more effective use of existing spectrum for land mobile should be made by replanning the 400 MHz band.
This work led to a four stage process that was last updated in December 2010.
No sooner does the Government get clarity than two separate projects emerge seeking more spectrum for Government or public service use.
The various State Emergency Services Agencies (ESAs) have been running a campaign for some time to have some of the Digital Dividend spectrum allocated to them. However, work by the Attorney-General's Department concluded there was no case.
Not to be deterred they have used the recent natural disasters to whip up political support for a Senate inquiry on The capacity of communication networks and emergency warning systems to deal with emergencies and natural disasters. The Terms of Reference include;
new and emerging technologies including digital spectrum that could improve preparation for, responses to and recovery from, an emergency or natural diaster (sic).
Of course, no spectrum is actually "digital" - it is only the transmission over the spectrum which is digital - but we know what they mean.
Elsewhere the railways all have decided that they too need their own wireless network and have been putting together 1800 MHz licences (actually the old One.Tel licences). They too are having to go political getting Anthony Albanese to lobby on their behalf.
My difficulty with all this is that
(a) radio infrastructure has economies of scale - a network to support just a few trains in inefficient. Ditto a network for emergency services.
(b) modern technologies (e.g. LTE) can prioritise the traffic, so the public networks could prioritise emergency traffic
(c) the proposed use of spectrum for ESAs limits the utility of the public network services
(d) even if the ESA or railway isn't required to make the transfer payment for use of the spectrum the Cost Benefit Analysis for their project needs to value the spectrum at its next best use - i.e. what they would have paid in a price based allocation.
But you can't keep a good government agency down!
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
In 2007 the Australian Communications and Media Authority received a report it had commissioned on Government Spectrum Holdings. That report was in response to calls from various agencies for more spectrum. The report concluded that more effective use of existing spectrum for land mobile should be made by replanning the 400 MHz band.
This work led to a four stage process that was last updated in December 2010.
No sooner does the Government get clarity than two separate projects emerge seeking more spectrum for Government or public service use.
The various State Emergency Services Agencies (ESAs) have been running a campaign for some time to have some of the Digital Dividend spectrum allocated to them. However, work by the Attorney-General's Department concluded there was no case.
Not to be deterred they have used the recent natural disasters to whip up political support for a Senate inquiry on The capacity of communication networks and emergency warning systems to deal with emergencies and natural disasters. The Terms of Reference include;
new and emerging technologies including digital spectrum that could improve preparation for, responses to and recovery from, an emergency or natural diaster (sic).
Of course, no spectrum is actually "digital" - it is only the transmission over the spectrum which is digital - but we know what they mean.
Elsewhere the railways all have decided that they too need their own wireless network and have been putting together 1800 MHz licences (actually the old One.Tel licences). They too are having to go political getting Anthony Albanese to lobby on their behalf.
My difficulty with all this is that
(a) radio infrastructure has economies of scale - a network to support just a few trains in inefficient. Ditto a network for emergency services.
(b) modern technologies (e.g. LTE) can prioritise the traffic, so the public networks could prioritise emergency traffic
(c) the proposed use of spectrum for ESAs limits the utility of the public network services
(d) even if the ESA or railway isn't required to make the transfer payment for use of the spectrum the Cost Benefit Analysis for their project needs to value the spectrum at its next best use - i.e. what they would have paid in a price based allocation.
But you can't keep a good government agency down!
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Fatuous bullshit
Senator Conroy has signed another of his Digital Economy MOUs.
This one with NEC is just like the one with Intel. The commercial firm that really wants to lobby Government has agreed that it will lobby Government (oh sorry - "will keep the Government informed about its activities, particularly, in the areas of aged care and intelligent transport systems").
This time it is not as clear what the Government gives - only saying "It further signals the Government's intention to collaborate with industry to deliver an NBN-enabled digital economy.
The Intel agreement stated:
Through the agreement the Gillard Government will:
•provide Intel with updates on progress and development of the Government’s Digital Economy Strategy
•work with Intel as a sounding board on possible initiatives to promote an NBN-enabled Digital Economy
•Share relevant research on an NBN-enabled digital economy.
As I said then how is Intel/NEC different. Isn't every business entitled to know what the Government is doing with the NBN?
I said the last one might be "merely a piece of paper promoted by Intel to the Government signed by the Government to create five minutes of positive press".
Now it looks like these MOUs are going to become fatuous bullshit peddled to every ICT firm.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
This one with NEC is just like the one with Intel. The commercial firm that really wants to lobby Government has agreed that it will lobby Government (oh sorry - "will keep the Government informed about its activities, particularly, in the areas of aged care and intelligent transport systems").
This time it is not as clear what the Government gives - only saying "It further signals the Government's intention to collaborate with industry to deliver an NBN-enabled digital economy.
The Intel agreement stated:
Through the agreement the Gillard Government will:
•provide Intel with updates on progress and development of the Government’s Digital Economy Strategy
•work with Intel as a sounding board on possible initiatives to promote an NBN-enabled Digital Economy
•Share relevant research on an NBN-enabled digital economy.
As I said then how is Intel/NEC different. Isn't every business entitled to know what the Government is doing with the NBN?
I said the last one might be "merely a piece of paper promoted by Intel to the Government signed by the Government to create five minutes of positive press".
Now it looks like these MOUs are going to become fatuous bullshit peddled to every ICT firm.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Ayn Rand "influential"
Ross Cameron writing in this morning's SMH would like us to revere Ayn Rand as a woman of real influence. Before we respond we should consider what that influence has been.
Cameron chooses to label her philosophy “ethical egoism”. Other titles for it as I mentioned in my first Rand blogpost are "objectivism" or "enlightened self-interest". The problem being there was nothing ethical about it, it was a philosophy of pure unadulterated selfishness. It thoroughly rejected the ethical precept known as the Golden Rule and found in every religion of doing to others what you would have them do to you.
If all people live according to Rand’s philosophy none of the essential ingredients of the state to support a market economy, especially the least co-operative enforcement of property rights, can exist. It was not only anti-totalitarian but also anti-capitalist.
She was not only an atheist. Her philosophy is totally inconsistent with any religious belief. You cannot claim to be a Christian, a Muslim or a Jew and also ascribe to her philosophy.
Rand may well have had real influence, but so did Stalin and Mao. Or as was raised in a later discussion here "Of course its an unsustainable philosophy -- Ayn Rand is to the real world as Karl Marx is. They are both idealists."
Rand's philosophy is as degenerate as the worst writings of Marx or Hitler's Mein Kampf. She should not be held up for any kind of praise.
(And a small aside on copyright. Students of history often wonder how come the British were so naive about Hitler's intentions given he'd laid it all out before hand. The simple answer is that the English translation did not come out till after the war. As copyright holder Hitler refused requests to authorise a translation beforehand - his intended audience was only German speakers.)
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Cameron chooses to label her philosophy “ethical egoism”. Other titles for it as I mentioned in my first Rand blogpost are "objectivism" or "enlightened self-interest". The problem being there was nothing ethical about it, it was a philosophy of pure unadulterated selfishness. It thoroughly rejected the ethical precept known as the Golden Rule and found in every religion of doing to others what you would have them do to you.
If all people live according to Rand’s philosophy none of the essential ingredients of the state to support a market economy, especially the least co-operative enforcement of property rights, can exist. It was not only anti-totalitarian but also anti-capitalist.
She was not only an atheist. Her philosophy is totally inconsistent with any religious belief. You cannot claim to be a Christian, a Muslim or a Jew and also ascribe to her philosophy.
Rand may well have had real influence, but so did Stalin and Mao. Or as was raised in a later discussion here "Of course its an unsustainable philosophy -- Ayn Rand is to the real world as Karl Marx is. They are both idealists."
Rand's philosophy is as degenerate as the worst writings of Marx or Hitler's Mein Kampf. She should not be held up for any kind of praise.
(And a small aside on copyright. Students of history often wonder how come the British were so naive about Hitler's intentions given he'd laid it all out before hand. The simple answer is that the English translation did not come out till after the war. As copyright holder Hitler refused requests to authorise a translation beforehand - his intended audience was only German speakers.)
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Tuesday, March 08, 2011
Beat Up of the Week
Under the headline Books get the shove as university students prefer to do research online the SMH reports today on a process of culling books at the UNSW Library asserting:
The University of NSW is throwing away thousands of books and scholarly journals as part of a policy that critics say is turning its library into a Starbucks. Academics say complete journal collections, valuable books and newspapers dating to the 19th century are being thrown out to clear space for cafe-style lounges.
I suggest the author and the academics wake up and smell the roses. No library is collecting current issues of journals as on-line versions are more accessible and easier to store. Most journals have had their entire archive digitised as either part of their electronic publishing or as part of one of the major archiving projects (such as Jstor).
An electronic journal article gives you a pristine *.pdf, with no need to photocopy if you want to take it with you. You never suffer because the issue you are after has gone off for binding or is simply on a sorting shelf somewhere. You don;t ever have to face damaged or defaced pages.
Some books are also making their way to electronic form.
But libraries have always culled the book collection, though the University of Sydney tends to send a lot to offsite storage rather than dispose of them. I've previously bought books that were being culled from the Macquarie University collection.
And far be it from "cafe-style lounges" being created, if you've visited a University Library you will know that there is always a queue for the computer terminals (though increasingly the library resources are available off-site through your student log-in - but that doesn't work if you are just a visitor).
Of course, large libraries like the NLA and State Library make more efficient use of racking space by using stacks. Macquarie Uni is going one better with the implementation of a new fully automated stack.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
The University of NSW is throwing away thousands of books and scholarly journals as part of a policy that critics say is turning its library into a Starbucks. Academics say complete journal collections, valuable books and newspapers dating to the 19th century are being thrown out to clear space for cafe-style lounges.
I suggest the author and the academics wake up and smell the roses. No library is collecting current issues of journals as on-line versions are more accessible and easier to store. Most journals have had their entire archive digitised as either part of their electronic publishing or as part of one of the major archiving projects (such as Jstor).
An electronic journal article gives you a pristine *.pdf, with no need to photocopy if you want to take it with you. You never suffer because the issue you are after has gone off for binding or is simply on a sorting shelf somewhere. You don;t ever have to face damaged or defaced pages.
Some books are also making their way to electronic form.
But libraries have always culled the book collection, though the University of Sydney tends to send a lot to offsite storage rather than dispose of them. I've previously bought books that were being culled from the Macquarie University collection.
And far be it from "cafe-style lounges" being created, if you've visited a University Library you will know that there is always a queue for the computer terminals (though increasingly the library resources are available off-site through your student log-in - but that doesn't work if you are just a visitor).
Of course, large libraries like the NLA and State Library make more efficient use of racking space by using stacks. Macquarie Uni is going one better with the implementation of a new fully automated stack.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Monday, March 07, 2011
It just doesn't follow
My Friday collection of brief links included one about comments made about the NBN. This elicited a comment from Ian noting he wasn't sure if my reference was sarcasm but that the AFP argument was ludicrous.
For the record, it was, and I agree with the assessment.
But these sort of things abound. Let's also look at the review of the TIO I also mentioned on Friday.
In announcing the review Minister Conroy said;
The recently released TIO statistics show that complaints to the Ombudsman remain at very high levels and this is not acceptable. While I acknowledge the hard work the TIO does to deliver consumers with quick and effective solutions, I want to ensure it has the appropriate tools to deal with complaints.
This got written up by one online journal as;
In a statement, Conroy said he had called for the review, because the number of complaints received by the TIO was unacceptably high.
This doesn't follow. It is at the very least not an accurate description of the Minister's release. If it is a restatement following a discussion, it still doesn't follow.
Why would a high level of utilisation of a service ever imply something wrong with the service? Surely the correct focus is on the providers, as the ACMA is doing with its Reconnecting the Customer project.
Meanwhile Lucy Battersby has done a really good job of looking at the cause and implications of Telstra's move to "per minute" billing.
The item points out that Telstra justified moving fixed line from per second to thirty second blocks two yrars ago to harmonize with mobile billing. But now they are taking both to per minute claiming it puts them in line with "industry standards".
Optus "followed suit" on the per second to thirty second move - claiming the move was to make price comparisons easier.
Telstra goes on to say that of course most customers won't be affected because they are on some kind of bucket plan and don't use the whole bucket.
Unfortunately Chris Zinn from CHOICE decides to hone in on the flagfall charges rather than asking the really obvious question. Since all of the price moves have been justified as simplifying things for customers, including price comparison, why not simply agree an industry standard measure and have everyone stick to it? It really isn't much different to agreeing to measure weight in kilograms and distance in kilometres. Standardisation of units of measure is an important institution that makes markets work!
I know the answer will be about competition and innovation. But it doesn't follow. As the providers own rhetoric shows consumers can't price compare plans using different charging bases.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
For the record, it was, and I agree with the assessment.
But these sort of things abound. Let's also look at the review of the TIO I also mentioned on Friday.
In announcing the review Minister Conroy said;
The recently released TIO statistics show that complaints to the Ombudsman remain at very high levels and this is not acceptable. While I acknowledge the hard work the TIO does to deliver consumers with quick and effective solutions, I want to ensure it has the appropriate tools to deal with complaints.
This got written up by one online journal as;
In a statement, Conroy said he had called for the review, because the number of complaints received by the TIO was unacceptably high.
This doesn't follow. It is at the very least not an accurate description of the Minister's release. If it is a restatement following a discussion, it still doesn't follow.
Why would a high level of utilisation of a service ever imply something wrong with the service? Surely the correct focus is on the providers, as the ACMA is doing with its Reconnecting the Customer project.
Meanwhile Lucy Battersby has done a really good job of looking at the cause and implications of Telstra's move to "per minute" billing.
The item points out that Telstra justified moving fixed line from per second to thirty second blocks two yrars ago to harmonize with mobile billing. But now they are taking both to per minute claiming it puts them in line with "industry standards".
Optus "followed suit" on the per second to thirty second move - claiming the move was to make price comparisons easier.
Telstra goes on to say that of course most customers won't be affected because they are on some kind of bucket plan and don't use the whole bucket.
Unfortunately Chris Zinn from CHOICE decides to hone in on the flagfall charges rather than asking the really obvious question. Since all of the price moves have been justified as simplifying things for customers, including price comparison, why not simply agree an industry standard measure and have everyone stick to it? It really isn't much different to agreeing to measure weight in kilograms and distance in kilometres. Standardisation of units of measure is an important institution that makes markets work!
I know the answer will be about competition and innovation. But it doesn't follow. As the providers own rhetoric shows consumers can't price compare plans using different charging bases.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Friday, March 04, 2011
It is all too much ...
King John wasn't evil, just a bad politician. It was all just made up by the Victorians (those south of 1900 not the Murray River).
The NBN will help kiddie fiddlers because there will be too many service providers for the spooks to watch. And I thought the real problem was the NBn would be too slow because of the "filter".
The Pope seems to think it important to exonerate the Jews over Jesus' death. I never understood the whole idea of "blaming" them. According to Christian theology Jesus had to die on the cross as atonement for our sins. He had to be resurrected for us to believe in his resurrection. If he hadn't been executed he'd have died a forgotten old man.
Time to go watch some rugby. Go the 'Tahs.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
The NBN will help kiddie fiddlers because there will be too many service providers for the spooks to watch. And I thought the real problem was the NBn would be too slow because of the "filter".
The Pope seems to think it important to exonerate the Jews over Jesus' death. I never understood the whole idea of "blaming" them. According to Christian theology Jesus had to die on the cross as atonement for our sins. He had to be resurrected for us to believe in his resurrection. If he hadn't been executed he'd have died a forgotten old man.
Time to go watch some rugby. Go the 'Tahs.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
I told you so ...
Writing in itNews in November I discussed disquiet with the TIO.
I concluded;
It seems abundantly clear that the industry that created the scheme either needs to exercise its responsibility to review it in such a way that all the criticisms are resolved, or the Federal Government will need to include the future of Ombudsman arrangements under its forthcoming Convergence Review.
The Government didn't include it in that review but has today commenced a separate review of the scheme.
This is mighty odd given that the TIO Board has commissioned KPMG to undertake its own - much overdue - review. They just seem to have neglected to tell anybody.
(Note: I was a member of the Board of the TIO from 13 Dec 2000 to 12 Dec 2003).
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
I concluded;
It seems abundantly clear that the industry that created the scheme either needs to exercise its responsibility to review it in such a way that all the criticisms are resolved, or the Federal Government will need to include the future of Ombudsman arrangements under its forthcoming Convergence Review.
The Government didn't include it in that review but has today commenced a separate review of the scheme.
This is mighty odd given that the TIO Board has commissioned KPMG to undertake its own - much overdue - review. They just seem to have neglected to tell anybody.
(Note: I was a member of the Board of the TIO from 13 Dec 2000 to 12 Dec 2003).
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Insurance
The deal the Government has had to do with Nick Xenophon to get the flood levy approved highlights a great deal of stupidity in public policy and discussion of it.
In summary existing Federal/State arrangements are that the Federal Government pays 75% of the cost of disaster relief. Xenophon has agreed to a levy for the Commonwealth share of this on condition to the rule being amended to the funds only being available if the state insures its risk.
First off we have Kenneth Wiltshire in the Oz bemoaning the fact we now have to pay the levy, writing in part;
Consider the proposed flood levy and the process of its introduction, which reveals all the flaws of our present system.
...
The result is that the taxpayers of Australia, including those who had already made voluntary donations to the flood appeals, will have to foot the extra bill for the levy plus the cost of the promises made to the Greens and independents.
And, given the Gillard government's appalling record in governance and delivery of infrastructure projects, there is no guarantee that payments from this levy will be administered without waste and corruption.
To make matters more complex, independent Nick Xenophon made his support for the levy conditional on the commonwealth forcing states to take out comprehensive insurance on their assets: a strange requirement that is a denial of the sovereignty of the states in the federation
If the Queensland government is reckless enough to neglect to insure its assets it should simply be held accountable by voters at the forthcoming election.
This spray is used to claim we need a new election because of the power being exerted by the Greens and independents. Let's ignore for a second the question of what programs the Government might have additionally agreed to, and go to the substance.
The first thing to note is that not one cent more of additional money will be spent by the Commonwealth because of the levy. It was always going to fund its share of the reconstruction. The levy does not increase, therefore, any risk of maladministration.
The second is the nonsense about voluntary donations versus the levy. These go to different things. Your voluntary donation helps individuals who lost houses, possessions and income. The levy rebuilds roads.
The third is the repetition of the claim that it was "reckless neglect" on Queensland's part not to insure. This ignores that the size of the Commonwealth contribution is based on the cost (they pay 75%) not on how much the Queensland Government can pay.
But it also ignores the facts as Anna Bligh outlined them on Q&A
These disasters without precedent in Australia's history. We've had floods before. We've had cyclones. But we've never had in any state of Australia all of them at once over such a large area in such catastrophic proportions. The disaster arrangements in Australia that have prevailed under all sides of politics for more than a decade - I think a couple of decades now, are a set of arrangements by which the commonwealth government pays 75 per cent of the cost of restoring essential public infrastructure. Not just state infrastructure but much of what gets damaged in these things are the infrastructure of local councils and what we've got is a great example of it here in Queensland. Many of the councils worst affected are some of the smallest councils in Australia. So the roads that they have are really important to everyone, but they've actually got a very small group of ratepayers and a very small ability to cope with fixing it. And the state government pays 25 per cent. So we've got the money to pay our 25 per cent but it will really stretch our budget. The Commonwealth are saying in order for us to fix something of this scale, not only in Queensland - they've this massive event in Queensland, as well as what happened in Victoria and to some extent Western Australia. They're saying in these circumstances we need Australians to pitch in and help in a way that Australians have done before.
When asked why Queensland did not insure itself she said:
That's a very good question. I'm very pleased to have a chance to answer it. For exactly the same reason that under John Howard the Commonwealth Government decided not to be insured either and that is because it is not cost effective in a state as big as Queensland. We went out to the market about seven years ago. The cost of - well, first of all they won't insure us for roads. They don't ensure New South Wales for roads. They don't ensure other states. You can't get insured for roads. More than 80 per cent of the cost of this disaster is roads. So when we went out to the market and said we are a big state that has a lot of disasters and we want insurance, the cost of getting the insurance as actually more than it was for effectively self-insure. So we are doing the exactly the same as the Commonwealth decided to do under the Howard Government, which is also not insured. What it does is self insure, because it's more cost effective for taxpayers.
She then pointed out they put money aside in every budget - $700M in the last one as part of self insurance. As Acting Premier Paul Lucas alluded insurance isn't a "free" risk protection scheme. The insurer needs to make a profit.
And size of risk does matter. There aren't many insurers that can absorb the risk - and the consequence can be the worst of all worlds. You pay your premium and the insurer goes under just when you need to claim.
And the poor mugs who will pay are taxpayers unnecessarily lining the pockets of insurers.
Bad decision.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
In summary existing Federal/State arrangements are that the Federal Government pays 75% of the cost of disaster relief. Xenophon has agreed to a levy for the Commonwealth share of this on condition to the rule being amended to the funds only being available if the state insures its risk.
First off we have Kenneth Wiltshire in the Oz bemoaning the fact we now have to pay the levy, writing in part;
Consider the proposed flood levy and the process of its introduction, which reveals all the flaws of our present system.
...
The result is that the taxpayers of Australia, including those who had already made voluntary donations to the flood appeals, will have to foot the extra bill for the levy plus the cost of the promises made to the Greens and independents.
And, given the Gillard government's appalling record in governance and delivery of infrastructure projects, there is no guarantee that payments from this levy will be administered without waste and corruption.
To make matters more complex, independent Nick Xenophon made his support for the levy conditional on the commonwealth forcing states to take out comprehensive insurance on their assets: a strange requirement that is a denial of the sovereignty of the states in the federation
If the Queensland government is reckless enough to neglect to insure its assets it should simply be held accountable by voters at the forthcoming election.
This spray is used to claim we need a new election because of the power being exerted by the Greens and independents. Let's ignore for a second the question of what programs the Government might have additionally agreed to, and go to the substance.
The first thing to note is that not one cent more of additional money will be spent by the Commonwealth because of the levy. It was always going to fund its share of the reconstruction. The levy does not increase, therefore, any risk of maladministration.
The second is the nonsense about voluntary donations versus the levy. These go to different things. Your voluntary donation helps individuals who lost houses, possessions and income. The levy rebuilds roads.
The third is the repetition of the claim that it was "reckless neglect" on Queensland's part not to insure. This ignores that the size of the Commonwealth contribution is based on the cost (they pay 75%) not on how much the Queensland Government can pay.
But it also ignores the facts as Anna Bligh outlined them on Q&A
These disasters without precedent in Australia's history. We've had floods before. We've had cyclones. But we've never had in any state of Australia all of them at once over such a large area in such catastrophic proportions. The disaster arrangements in Australia that have prevailed under all sides of politics for more than a decade - I think a couple of decades now, are a set of arrangements by which the commonwealth government pays 75 per cent of the cost of restoring essential public infrastructure. Not just state infrastructure but much of what gets damaged in these things are the infrastructure of local councils and what we've got is a great example of it here in Queensland. Many of the councils worst affected are some of the smallest councils in Australia. So the roads that they have are really important to everyone, but they've actually got a very small group of ratepayers and a very small ability to cope with fixing it. And the state government pays 25 per cent. So we've got the money to pay our 25 per cent but it will really stretch our budget. The Commonwealth are saying in order for us to fix something of this scale, not only in Queensland - they've this massive event in Queensland, as well as what happened in Victoria and to some extent Western Australia. They're saying in these circumstances we need Australians to pitch in and help in a way that Australians have done before.
When asked why Queensland did not insure itself she said:
That's a very good question. I'm very pleased to have a chance to answer it. For exactly the same reason that under John Howard the Commonwealth Government decided not to be insured either and that is because it is not cost effective in a state as big as Queensland. We went out to the market about seven years ago. The cost of - well, first of all they won't insure us for roads. They don't ensure New South Wales for roads. They don't ensure other states. You can't get insured for roads. More than 80 per cent of the cost of this disaster is roads. So when we went out to the market and said we are a big state that has a lot of disasters and we want insurance, the cost of getting the insurance as actually more than it was for effectively self-insure. So we are doing the exactly the same as the Commonwealth decided to do under the Howard Government, which is also not insured. What it does is self insure, because it's more cost effective for taxpayers.
She then pointed out they put money aside in every budget - $700M in the last one as part of self insurance. As Acting Premier Paul Lucas alluded insurance isn't a "free" risk protection scheme. The insurer needs to make a profit.
And size of risk does matter. There aren't many insurers that can absorb the risk - and the consequence can be the worst of all worlds. You pay your premium and the insurer goes under just when you need to claim.
And the poor mugs who will pay are taxpayers unnecessarily lining the pockets of insurers.
Bad decision.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Harmony Day GOAL!!!!
Tweeted by Kate Lundy, promoting a really important day, but it is the Conroy goal I love!
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Self-publicity
My latest in my series of columns for itNews raises the prospect that NBN Co will have significant hurdles to cross in getting its Special Access ndertaking accepted by the ACCC.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
The US Military-Industrial Complex
It is a long time since the structure of American Capitalism was labelled the "US Military-Industrial Complex." It was used by Dwight Eisenhower in his farewell speech as US President in 1961 saying;
we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex
General consensus is that "we" (meaning all of us - not just the US) failed.
The concept was further advanced by J. K. Galbraith in his The New Industrial State
. Galbraith noted that the US was as much a planned economy as the USSR, just the planning was conducted by large corporations.
Yet another Huawei story shows this in operation. Here we have a US embassy official doing his bit to discredit a foreign competing firm.
What is the charge? That the supplier - Huawei - was less than brilliant in following through on a contract.
But let's roll the tape on Senator Conroy's quizzing Telstra at Senate estimates in 2006. He said, in part,
Perhaps I could read to you from a document, a Telstra document marked ‘Commercial-in-confidence’ entitled ‘Alcatel issues’. It is three-pager with an attachment. I will table it. It states:
Summary of Route Causes
In the last 10 years there have been a number of problems with Alcatel projects at Telstra ...
The systematic reasons behind these problems are listed below—
• Knowingly overselling capabilities and timeframes
• Short cuts taken to then deliver sub standard solutions
• Finding clauses in contracts and specifications to avoid obligations rather than delivering working solutions and / or what was sold in the first place.
• Alcatel overcharging Telstra whenever it had the opportunity
• Alcatel Australia inventing specials which then don’t fit in with worldwide Alcatel strategy
increasing the cost of the project and creating a risk Alcatel Australia would exit the project if Telstra did not continue to pay
• Poor software quality and testing—in particular poor exception handling consideration at the
design stage; poor quality processes ie peer review, configuration management and testing
• Poor system integration capability and problems managing projects requiring interfacing to
different components / vendors.
In some respects, issues such as Alcatel’s overselling of their capability in the late 90s were prevalent throughout the whole industry but Alcatel was on the leading edge of this trend.
(The actual document was tabled).
The claims about Huawei being a security threat all seem to be similarly trumped up charges motivated by Western vendors trying to exclude Huawei. To my list in itNews of transgressions by other nations, let's add Ericsson. Why should we trust a vendor from a country that many believe has trumped up charges against an Australian citizen (Julian Assange) to support the US?
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex
General consensus is that "we" (meaning all of us - not just the US) failed.
The concept was further advanced by J. K. Galbraith in his The New Industrial State
. Galbraith noted that the US was as much a planned economy as the USSR, just the planning was conducted by large corporations.Yet another Huawei story shows this in operation. Here we have a US embassy official doing his bit to discredit a foreign competing firm.
What is the charge? That the supplier - Huawei - was less than brilliant in following through on a contract.
But let's roll the tape on Senator Conroy's quizzing Telstra at Senate estimates in 2006. He said, in part,
Perhaps I could read to you from a document, a Telstra document marked ‘Commercial-in-confidence’ entitled ‘Alcatel issues’. It is three-pager with an attachment. I will table it. It states:
Summary of Route Causes
In the last 10 years there have been a number of problems with Alcatel projects at Telstra ...
The systematic reasons behind these problems are listed below—
• Knowingly overselling capabilities and timeframes
• Short cuts taken to then deliver sub standard solutions
• Finding clauses in contracts and specifications to avoid obligations rather than delivering working solutions and / or what was sold in the first place.
• Alcatel overcharging Telstra whenever it had the opportunity
• Alcatel Australia inventing specials which then don’t fit in with worldwide Alcatel strategy
increasing the cost of the project and creating a risk Alcatel Australia would exit the project if Telstra did not continue to pay
• Poor software quality and testing—in particular poor exception handling consideration at the
design stage; poor quality processes ie peer review, configuration management and testing
• Poor system integration capability and problems managing projects requiring interfacing to
different components / vendors.
In some respects, issues such as Alcatel’s overselling of their capability in the late 90s were prevalent throughout the whole industry but Alcatel was on the leading edge of this trend.
(The actual document was tabled).
The claims about Huawei being a security threat all seem to be similarly trumped up charges motivated by Western vendors trying to exclude Huawei. To my list in itNews of transgressions by other nations, let's add Ericsson. Why should we trust a vendor from a country that many believe has trumped up charges against an Australian citizen (Julian Assange) to support the US?
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Wednesday, March 02, 2011
Media ownership
Last Crikey's comments section published the following contribution from me;
The reports on the technical legality or otherwise of Lachlan Murdoch’s multiple roles in Australian media overshadow a potentially bigger story.
The various recent forays including the move on TEN, the presence of Seven in CMH, the strange position of Bruce Gordon in both WIN and TEN, the consolidation of radio, the Seven WAN transaction and the continuing uncertainty at Fairfax would seem to suggest that a group of key players really expect the rules on ownership to change soon.
I don’t think for a moment that there has yet been a deal done with Government. It feels far more like these are the pre-emptive transactions before the proposition is put to Government that the rules must change with the NBN, that globalised content and the long tail mean the existing rules are already rendered obsolete.
It really looks like Seven is preparing to acquire Fairfax and that News is preparing to acquire TEN (more likely that a News Corp/Murdoch family/partially listed company will put together the News print assets and TEN). It’s just that the players have decided that they’ll place the Government in an impossible position first rather than negotiate permission.
To a degree I thought it was just my own fanciful murmurings. But today Senator Conroy has outlined in a speech (not yet on his site) that the Terms of Reference for the Convergence Review are
sufficiently broad to allow the committee to cover a wide range of issues that may include:
* licensing and planning, including broadcast licence fees
* public service programming including Australian, children’s and local content obligations
* protection of community standards including broadcast classification and timezones, accuracy and impartiality of news reporting, advertising standards, internet content
* recognising the rights and interests of consumers in the convergent media age, and
* media ownership and control regulations. (emphasis added)
Based on that Conroy was very right to go on to say;
I don’t think anyone here today would be under the illusion that this is going to be an easy task...
Decisions will need to be made that take into account all of the many opinions and ideas about where we are heading and what is the appropriate regulatory environment.
I know there are many different views about what the regulatory settings should be, and I am confident that the Committee will lay the foundation for a system that will serve Australia’s needs in this converged media age.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
The reports on the technical legality or otherwise of Lachlan Murdoch’s multiple roles in Australian media overshadow a potentially bigger story.
The various recent forays including the move on TEN, the presence of Seven in CMH, the strange position of Bruce Gordon in both WIN and TEN, the consolidation of radio, the Seven WAN transaction and the continuing uncertainty at Fairfax would seem to suggest that a group of key players really expect the rules on ownership to change soon.
I don’t think for a moment that there has yet been a deal done with Government. It feels far more like these are the pre-emptive transactions before the proposition is put to Government that the rules must change with the NBN, that globalised content and the long tail mean the existing rules are already rendered obsolete.
It really looks like Seven is preparing to acquire Fairfax and that News is preparing to acquire TEN (more likely that a News Corp/Murdoch family/partially listed company will put together the News print assets and TEN). It’s just that the players have decided that they’ll place the Government in an impossible position first rather than negotiate permission.
To a degree I thought it was just my own fanciful murmurings. But today Senator Conroy has outlined in a speech (not yet on his site) that the Terms of Reference for the Convergence Review are
sufficiently broad to allow the committee to cover a wide range of issues that may include:
* licensing and planning, including broadcast licence fees
* public service programming including Australian, children’s and local content obligations
* protection of community standards including broadcast classification and timezones, accuracy and impartiality of news reporting, advertising standards, internet content
* recognising the rights and interests of consumers in the convergent media age, and
* media ownership and control regulations. (emphasis added)
Based on that Conroy was very right to go on to say;
I don’t think anyone here today would be under the illusion that this is going to be an easy task...
Decisions will need to be made that take into account all of the many opinions and ideas about where we are heading and what is the appropriate regulatory environment.
I know there are many different views about what the regulatory settings should be, and I am confident that the Committee will lay the foundation for a system that will serve Australia’s needs in this converged media age.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
The story of Australian telecommunications ...
I can't fulfill the promise of the introduction but I can take you yo two really great bits of it. Both are based on items in the issue before the current one of the Telecommunications Journal of Australia.
The first is an excerpt from the obituary for Mel Ward. It tells a story quite concisely of an opportunity missed in Australian innivation and technology.
Mel moved to the Electronic Switching Division in 1967 and soon emerged as a key player in a major research project called the IST (Integrated Switching and Transmission) Project, very advanced for its time, which involved the investigation of two key ideas. The first was the concept of using software-controlled computers to perform the control functions (previously implemented by electromagnetic relays) in a telephone exchange, and the second was the idea of using digital solid-state devices to switch telephone traffic in a digital form. At the time, transmission systems carrying digital traffic were being introduced into the telephone network, but conversion of the traffic back to analogue form was necessary to perform the switching function in telephone exchanges. These two ideas underpinned the dawn of the era of computer-controlled digital telecommunications, an era which continues today although the early time division multiplexing technique of switching has by now, more than forty years later, been largely superseded by packet switching.
Mel’s participation in the IST Project took him and Margaret to Bell Telephone in Antwerp for about six months, starting in June 1968, where he worked with the designers of the new, specialised computers needed to perform switching control functions at high speeds. He returned to Australia as the key designer, together with the late Fred Symons and the late Andy Domjan, of the functional specifications of the IST switch being developed in the Laboratories. This experimental switch, the first computer-controlled digital telephone exchange in the world to handle live traffic, was implemented and finally installed in the Windsor exchange building in Melbourne in 1974, where it carried telephone traffic for many years thereafter.
The world's first "computer-controlled digital telephone exchange" was built and installed in Australia. The question is what happened next - why was the exchange not commercialised, why did Telecom then go on to buy the 10C and AXE exchanges?
Part of the answer probably lies in their experience at the same time of the Common User Data Network (or CUDN) which was an attempt to build a message switching network. (Message switching is more like packet switching than circuit switching but switches the whole message. Ultimately e-mail is a kind of message switching.)
I believe, however, that somewhere in the decision making there was a decision that basically said "We can't develop this we are too small." Yet we bought our switches from a firm in a similar sized economy.
The second is from a great article by the irrepressible Jock Given who delights in delivering short essays on Australian communications history. He relates the story of representatives from Marconi demonstrating wireless telegraphy to politiciand in 1906, and the development of the "National Wireless Network" (as he dubs it).
It is a classic tale of communication ambition, stark political reality and the interaction of the public and private sector. It is well summarised by this excerpt from the article;
Postmaster-General Chapman – the Stephen Conroy of the day – sent a message on behalf of the mainland press to the press of Tasmania: ‘No limits can be set to the beneficent influence of journalism now that the atmosphere has, at the bidding of genius, become its servant.’ (Marconi’s 1906) Chapman had visited wireless stations overseas, including in Italy. He thought people who asked ‘Will this pay?’ needed ‘to look at the matter from something more than the commercial aspect’.
Jock ends the piece (which was originally a speech celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Journal) with:
I could tell a long story about Australian telecommunications, but it may sound like a short
story told many times.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
The first is an excerpt from the obituary for Mel Ward. It tells a story quite concisely of an opportunity missed in Australian innivation and technology.
Mel moved to the Electronic Switching Division in 1967 and soon emerged as a key player in a major research project called the IST (Integrated Switching and Transmission) Project, very advanced for its time, which involved the investigation of two key ideas. The first was the concept of using software-controlled computers to perform the control functions (previously implemented by electromagnetic relays) in a telephone exchange, and the second was the idea of using digital solid-state devices to switch telephone traffic in a digital form. At the time, transmission systems carrying digital traffic were being introduced into the telephone network, but conversion of the traffic back to analogue form was necessary to perform the switching function in telephone exchanges. These two ideas underpinned the dawn of the era of computer-controlled digital telecommunications, an era which continues today although the early time division multiplexing technique of switching has by now, more than forty years later, been largely superseded by packet switching.
Mel’s participation in the IST Project took him and Margaret to Bell Telephone in Antwerp for about six months, starting in June 1968, where he worked with the designers of the new, specialised computers needed to perform switching control functions at high speeds. He returned to Australia as the key designer, together with the late Fred Symons and the late Andy Domjan, of the functional specifications of the IST switch being developed in the Laboratories. This experimental switch, the first computer-controlled digital telephone exchange in the world to handle live traffic, was implemented and finally installed in the Windsor exchange building in Melbourne in 1974, where it carried telephone traffic for many years thereafter.
The world's first "computer-controlled digital telephone exchange" was built and installed in Australia. The question is what happened next - why was the exchange not commercialised, why did Telecom then go on to buy the 10C and AXE exchanges?
Part of the answer probably lies in their experience at the same time of the Common User Data Network (or CUDN) which was an attempt to build a message switching network. (Message switching is more like packet switching than circuit switching but switches the whole message. Ultimately e-mail is a kind of message switching.)
I believe, however, that somewhere in the decision making there was a decision that basically said "We can't develop this we are too small." Yet we bought our switches from a firm in a similar sized economy.
The second is from a great article by the irrepressible Jock Given who delights in delivering short essays on Australian communications history. He relates the story of representatives from Marconi demonstrating wireless telegraphy to politiciand in 1906, and the development of the "National Wireless Network" (as he dubs it).
It is a classic tale of communication ambition, stark political reality and the interaction of the public and private sector. It is well summarised by this excerpt from the article;
Postmaster-General Chapman – the Stephen Conroy of the day – sent a message on behalf of the mainland press to the press of Tasmania: ‘No limits can be set to the beneficent influence of journalism now that the atmosphere has, at the bidding of genius, become its servant.’ (Marconi’s 1906) Chapman had visited wireless stations overseas, including in Italy. He thought people who asked ‘Will this pay?’ needed ‘to look at the matter from something more than the commercial aspect’.
Jock ends the piece (which was originally a speech celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Journal) with:
I could tell a long story about Australian telecommunications, but it may sound like a short
story told many times.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Monday, February 28, 2011
Conroy right on factions, but also wrong...
A report today that Stephen Conroy has noted that factions are "a fact of life, so to try and pretend that you can wave them away is to, again, spend your time indulging yourself in a debate that's utterly pointless."
He was responding to calls from Kevin Rudd that if Labor was to remain a viable party of the people, that it eliminate the power of factional leaders and factional bosses.
Conroy is right that factions will emerge in any group where majority rule works. Factions are just the manifestation of how people will agree to side with one another to achieve common objects. That, after all, is why factions now emerge in the Liberal Party. Indeed the stronger the party discipline on not crossing the floor of Parliament has become, the stronger the Liberal factions become.
Conroy is also right that rule changes about the term of the national president are just "indulgences."
But what both Rudd and Conroy should embrace is the possibility to get factions to again be concerned about philosophical and policy positions rather than the mere thuggery of the ability to exercise power. The latter is what the NSW Right has become, and it does so through the exercise of power through the union part of the structure not the branch part.
(Note, I know there are many right branches, but these are often people who are counting on patronage from the industrial right. Neither Left nor Right stands for any ideological position. The Left has been as much to blame for the gutting of debate from part activity as the right.)
As a case in point consider the question of appointing the Ministry. If the PM gets to appoint Ministers then you run the risk of Ministers not being prepared to speak up on matters of importance for fear of punishment. But the caucus appointment system degenerated to lists generated by factions and sub-factions to share around the spoils. Neither of those is guaranteed to generate the best Ministry.
But if you genuinely said to the caucus, I want you to list the thirty people you think would do the best job at running the country, and by extension winning an election, then I'm prepared to bet you'd get the very best Ministry. It all went south when Robert Ray and John Faulkner used the factional system to deliver to Bob Hawke the Ministry he wanted.
The evil is "show and tell". We have a secret ballot for general elections for a reason - it stops bribery and tammany practices. Yet the ALP is prepared to condone it at annual conferences and in the caucus. By all means let factions discuss and agree, but remove the thuggery.
As for Rudd, he has no one to blame but himself. Firstly he allowed himself to believe in the importance of the NSW Right. Having done so he became their hostage. Though the move against him came initially from other States it remained the NSW Right that pulled the trigger.
And what cost Rudd his job was doing Bitar and Arbib's bidding on climate change.
The reports (1, 2 and 3) on the secret parts of the ALP review make interesting reading. The NSW Right is proud of its achievement in winning Greenway and holding Lindsay but they benefited from the Liberal's failure to campaign well.
But the telling part is that all the stuff Rudd did to help retain the Western Sydney seats alienated the rest of the support base.
Ultimately I think that Rodney Cavalier has it right with his tireless campaign about the role of the unions in the party. Until the ALP is run by a membership of people who have decided they want to be part of the party it will continue to only act in the interests of the political class. Can anyone explain to me why Joe be Bryun of the shoppies and Paul Howes of the AWU should be as influential as they are?
Second note: My concern is not a Howard-like rejection of unions nor their right to engage in political campaigns. It is against the idea that unions any longer as a group accurately represent the aspirations and interests of the working class.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
He was responding to calls from Kevin Rudd that if Labor was to remain a viable party of the people, that it eliminate the power of factional leaders and factional bosses.
Conroy is right that factions will emerge in any group where majority rule works. Factions are just the manifestation of how people will agree to side with one another to achieve common objects. That, after all, is why factions now emerge in the Liberal Party. Indeed the stronger the party discipline on not crossing the floor of Parliament has become, the stronger the Liberal factions become.
Conroy is also right that rule changes about the term of the national president are just "indulgences."
But what both Rudd and Conroy should embrace is the possibility to get factions to again be concerned about philosophical and policy positions rather than the mere thuggery of the ability to exercise power. The latter is what the NSW Right has become, and it does so through the exercise of power through the union part of the structure not the branch part.
(Note, I know there are many right branches, but these are often people who are counting on patronage from the industrial right. Neither Left nor Right stands for any ideological position. The Left has been as much to blame for the gutting of debate from part activity as the right.)
As a case in point consider the question of appointing the Ministry. If the PM gets to appoint Ministers then you run the risk of Ministers not being prepared to speak up on matters of importance for fear of punishment. But the caucus appointment system degenerated to lists generated by factions and sub-factions to share around the spoils. Neither of those is guaranteed to generate the best Ministry.
But if you genuinely said to the caucus, I want you to list the thirty people you think would do the best job at running the country, and by extension winning an election, then I'm prepared to bet you'd get the very best Ministry. It all went south when Robert Ray and John Faulkner used the factional system to deliver to Bob Hawke the Ministry he wanted.
The evil is "show and tell". We have a secret ballot for general elections for a reason - it stops bribery and tammany practices. Yet the ALP is prepared to condone it at annual conferences and in the caucus. By all means let factions discuss and agree, but remove the thuggery.
As for Rudd, he has no one to blame but himself. Firstly he allowed himself to believe in the importance of the NSW Right. Having done so he became their hostage. Though the move against him came initially from other States it remained the NSW Right that pulled the trigger.
And what cost Rudd his job was doing Bitar and Arbib's bidding on climate change.
The reports (1, 2 and 3) on the secret parts of the ALP review make interesting reading. The NSW Right is proud of its achievement in winning Greenway and holding Lindsay but they benefited from the Liberal's failure to campaign well.
But the telling part is that all the stuff Rudd did to help retain the Western Sydney seats alienated the rest of the support base.
Ultimately I think that Rodney Cavalier has it right with his tireless campaign about the role of the unions in the party. Until the ALP is run by a membership of people who have decided they want to be part of the party it will continue to only act in the interests of the political class. Can anyone explain to me why Joe be Bryun of the shoppies and Paul Howes of the AWU should be as influential as they are?
Second note: My concern is not a Howard-like rejection of unions nor their right to engage in political campaigns. It is against the idea that unions any longer as a group accurately represent the aspirations and interests of the working class.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
AFACT and iiNet
The decision in the AFACT appeal in the iiNet case has led to much commentary.
Typical in the IT news have been the suggestion that the copyright holders continue to misrepresent the extent of copyright theft, and the repetition of the ISP industry claim that they are a mere conduit.
The decision in fact really went mostly the way of AFACT. As they outlined in their press release. As the article in The Age more succinctly put it;
It considered that iiNet, by sitting on its hands, would have been liable for authorising the infringements if the notices had contained more verified and more specific information. However the notices given by the film companies were, in the form that they were given, insufficient to require iiNet to take steps to prevent the infringements...
Although iiNet won the appeal, this was simply because of the shortcomings in the way that the notices had been given. Copyright dependent industries now have guidance on how to give ISPs notices that will require ISPs to take reasonable steps to limit the notified infringing activity, or else be liable for authorising its continuance. ISP immunity from damages is now conditional upon ISPs adopting realistic repeat-infringer account termination policies.
It is important to address the "mere conduit" argument that the second referred article relied upon, and which the industry association the IIA also wanted to rely upon. The comment on the itWire story from Verity Pravda really nails it;
Let's be really simple about this, if I assist you to commit a crime it really is my intent that matters.
At the simplest level if I don't know you are committing a crime and do nothing to encourage it, I am blameless. If you rob a bank and catch a ride in my taxi for the getaway I am not an accomplice.
If I say you can borrow my car and I have no idea what you want to use it for and you use it as the getaway car then I am also blameless. If however I say "if you want to rob banks you can borrow my car for the getaway" or if someone else tells me you've been robbing banks when you borrow my car and I then do nothing about it you then are an accomplice.
iiNet got off on the first of these - just. ISPs need to be very cautious about promoting the use of their services for downloads. (The specifics were the accusation that iiNet promoted downloading something in an ad that at the time could only be downloaded from a copyright infringing source. Part of the issue is its not the downloading that creates the copyright breach).
It got off on the second because AFACT did not craft its notices well. If AFACT takes a more co-operative approach rather than demanding approach with ISPs it will do better.
The appeal also did wonders for the regulatory compliance industry. The trial judge had found iiNet could use safe harbour provisions because iiNet had a disconnection policy that was, in effect, in the CEOs head. All three appeal court judges found that not to be the case, that actually a policy needs to be expressed in more detail and formally adopted.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Typical in the IT news have been the suggestion that the copyright holders continue to misrepresent the extent of copyright theft, and the repetition of the ISP industry claim that they are a mere conduit.
The decision in fact really went mostly the way of AFACT. As they outlined in their press release. As the article in The Age more succinctly put it;
It considered that iiNet, by sitting on its hands, would have been liable for authorising the infringements if the notices had contained more verified and more specific information. However the notices given by the film companies were, in the form that they were given, insufficient to require iiNet to take steps to prevent the infringements...
Although iiNet won the appeal, this was simply because of the shortcomings in the way that the notices had been given. Copyright dependent industries now have guidance on how to give ISPs notices that will require ISPs to take reasonable steps to limit the notified infringing activity, or else be liable for authorising its continuance. ISP immunity from damages is now conditional upon ISPs adopting realistic repeat-infringer account termination policies.
It is important to address the "mere conduit" argument that the second referred article relied upon, and which the industry association the IIA also wanted to rely upon. The comment on the itWire story from Verity Pravda really nails it;
Let's be really simple about this, if I assist you to commit a crime it really is my intent that matters.
At the simplest level if I don't know you are committing a crime and do nothing to encourage it, I am blameless. If you rob a bank and catch a ride in my taxi for the getaway I am not an accomplice.
If I say you can borrow my car and I have no idea what you want to use it for and you use it as the getaway car then I am also blameless. If however I say "if you want to rob banks you can borrow my car for the getaway" or if someone else tells me you've been robbing banks when you borrow my car and I then do nothing about it you then are an accomplice.
iiNet got off on the first of these - just. ISPs need to be very cautious about promoting the use of their services for downloads. (The specifics were the accusation that iiNet promoted downloading something in an ad that at the time could only be downloaded from a copyright infringing source. Part of the issue is its not the downloading that creates the copyright breach).
It got off on the second because AFACT did not craft its notices well. If AFACT takes a more co-operative approach rather than demanding approach with ISPs it will do better.
The appeal also did wonders for the regulatory compliance industry. The trial judge had found iiNet could use safe harbour provisions because iiNet had a disconnection policy that was, in effect, in the CEOs head. All three appeal court judges found that not to be the case, that actually a policy needs to be expressed in more detail and formally adopted.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
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