BONWAG

Things are gearing up for TechXplore 2002, where I’ll be part of the CA team helping Arthur Phillip High School in Sydney win international recognition for their technology idea, whatever it will be. I’ll keep track of the progress here. Good Luck, guys!

A sweet hacker-tracking initiative called ‘HoneyNet’ is already tasting success; the concept involves parking ‘honeypots’ around the net to attract the vermin, and then catch them in the act. Who says the net wasn’t a self-healing system? (link)

Kelly & Sons Real Estate had a good opportunity to make some money this week. They had a few offers on some choice real estate in South Sydney – which is allegedly what they’re in the business of selling – and apparently chose instead to burn a few bridges.
My sister was looking forward to being able to move into a nice house which she’d had spent a lot of time (and money) arranging with this organisation, and was expecting to sign on the dotted line, when the price negotiations were unexpectedly ‘reopened’. Without going into detail which may get me into trouble; let’s just say that the house has instead been sold to someone else, despite my sister’s belief that the deal had been done. At its best, the outcome shows poor customer service. I’ll leave you to decide what the alternative explanations are.
Despite my Mum’s successful (and honest) career in real estate, I’ve always believed that the Real Estate industry hinges around increasing the price of something without actually producing anything (see Fred Dagg’s commentary, here). I don’t like it when any organisation which has the choice of making twice the amount of money with a little extra honest effort, instead goes for the quick dishonest grab. It doesn’t make business sense. It doesn’t make common sense. That’s when stuff like this happens.
By the way, for the benefit of out of towners, there was a group of outlaws called the Kelly Gang who gained notoriety in Australia’s colonial history for their money-making enterprise: bank-robbing.

If you’ve ever used the Google search engine, and wondered why it works so well, here’s an explanation about how it works. (link) (note: I think this was posted about three weeks ago)

I haven’t decided whether to ‘get into’ Big Brother this year (the reality TV show where 12 people live together in a big house… blahdiblah). Last year, I kept an eye on the cameras and occasionally ventured into the chat rooms, but this time around, the cameras are pay-per-view, and the chat rooms don’t work properly. What’s a boy to do? Frankly, I’m more into the technology and the sociology than the anatomy.
Nonetheless, I’ve found a more interesting exercise: to watch everyone BUT the Housemates’ reactions to the house, through the online forums on the official website. At writing, it’s completely unmoderated, and there’s a big outpouring of negative sentiment right there on the official website: about the cameras, about the new rules, about the site, about the email updates… Now, I’m all for free speech and everything, but normally businesses who have a huge crowd of people screaming abuse at each other in the foyer make some attempt to remove them, or at least see what the fuss is about. In this case, nothing is being done to stop it, so I’m going to pull up a deckchair for a while and study my fellow man.
Perhaps perversely, I don’t think it’s as interesting watching the people locked in, as it is to watch the people *locked out*.

There have been a few interesting developments for the ‘Friends of Kenny’ petition today, which will no doubt lead to a bit more discussion, so I’ve put it on the Message Board; feel free to read, sign up or contribute to keep in touch.

I don’t know what they’re playing at, but it looks like the The Kangaroo Creek Gang has gone out for a little plastic surgery, now that they’re cartoon stars. The new looks aren’t too bad (it was impossible to do *worse* than the old character designs), but will Kenny Kidnarecognise his old friends?

It’s Charli’s Third Birthday today; and although it was a weekday, we still managed to get all the exciting stuff happening; Charli unwrapped all her presents and took delivery from some balloons (all the way from Sydney!) Thanks to Nanna and Poppa in the east!
Charli’s all grown up: she has her own two-wheeled bike and Barbie now, and everyone knows the cool toys are always for ‘3 and up’.

I’m always a sucker for conspiracy theories; I think this one rates pretty well, for what it’s worth. ‘Hunt the Boeing has a few photos it claims disprove the official version of events of September 11 at the Pentagon. I’ve always had a few questions about it, but the implications of this are a little hard to fathom. Nonetheless, it’s an interesting exercise…

In a sort-of tribute to the passing of Dudley Moore, I found myself researching the schools of opinion on the sentence structure which talks about “not only (a) but (b)” and whether an ‘also’ should be in there (Not Only, But Also was the title of a TV series which Mr Moore produced with the brilliant Peter Cook.) (link to the discussion)