No, there is no technical error. I really haven’t posted anything since Monday. Been otherwise occupied. I intend to fix that this afternoon with a mashup of my recent Crikey pieces about eBay Australia forcing its sellers to use PayPal — which they own. Meanwhile if you’re desperate for your daily dose of Stilgherrian, you could always follow my Twitter feed.
Fox News’ legacy to the world
Even though George W Bush’s presidency has more than 6 moths to run, Fox News has already started writing the hagiography. The Daily Show‘s John Oliver has responded.
If the video doesn’t work for you, go directly to part 1 and part 2. Hat-tip to Peter Black.
Government releases broadband tender documents
The government has released the tender documents for the national 12Mb/second broadband network. As Richard Chirgwin notes, “I don’t think the minister will get 98% of the population, since that last 8% covers a very big geography. And I think that October for announcing the winner is a very slow process. And that a 5 year rollout is a real snail’s pace. But things have started…”
eBay requiring sellers to use PayPal
Anti-competitive behaviour news story of the day: With a few minor exceptions, eBay will require all payments to be made via PayPal — which they own. I’ve just written a piece for Crikey, which will appear around 2pm Sydney time which is now online.
My submissions for Australia 2020
For various reasons I didn’t have much time to write submissions yesterday. Yet I’ve said so much about still believing the Australia 2020 Summit to be important — despite plentiful shortcomings — that I felt obliged to write something. In 500 words or less. So I wrote from the heart…
What emerged were two pieces:
- For the governance topic: Managing continual, rapid change with a clear framework of values [PDF].
- For the topic on “the economy”, which is where discussions of broadband policy ended up: Broadband: It’s about symmetry, not speed [PDF].
I’m well aware that they don’t really provide a properly-researched, well-argued case. Nevertheless I hope that in some way they’ll help influence debate. Comments appreciated — perhaps over where the submissions themselves are blogged.
Marcus Westbury on the web
The wonderful Marcus Westbury, creator of the TV series Not Quite Art (amongst any other achievements) now has a web presence at www.marcuswestbury.net. Enjoy.