Posts by Michael Xion

Not sure if the same thing is available in blighty, but here in Oz we have products called Reverse Mortgages. Basically, the lender gives you the money now for a stake in your property, then when you kick the bucket, they take a proportion of the proceeds from your house sale to cover the loan and accrued interest. Can go spectacularly wrong if you don't set it up right (like the lender turfing you out before you die because the loan equals the equity in your house), but can be good if set up correctly. Quite popular with older people who have substantial capital tied up in their home, but little superannuation to draw on (a lot of baby boomers are in this situation due to the housing price bubble in Australia over the last 20 years).

Re: 2015: Close that barn door!

Actually, bypassing Geoblocking is not illegal (at least in Australia). As a breach of the Terms of Service, the most you can expect is for your account to be cancelled. There's a very good reason that iTunes, Netflix and HBO don't make it hard to get around geoblocking (which they could easily do) - they still get the money. Most estimates I've seen is that somewhere between 100,000 to 200,000 Australians accessed Netflix US via smart DNS or VPN before it launched locally, that's a hefty chunk of change. Particularly if you didn't have to pay for the licensing rights to that content for Australia.

I have a better dream: politicians in prison as they're the ones who make the rules that allow the bankers and tax cheats to get away with it.

Re: Demand for Labor's FTTP network: 38% at 12Mbps, 38% at 25Mbps

Also, how many of those who took up the lower speeds mentioned were languishing on ADSL of less than 10mbps? From memory, the 'average' broadband speed in Oz is something like 7-8mbps. For me, and many of the people I know, upstream speed is the issue at the moment - something that FTTH can fix.

Re: Bumper Sticker?

I tend to agree. I'm lucky enough to live on a rural property (1 acre) on the Sunshine Coast hinterland (Qld). I can drive to work in about 35 minutes on country roads through gorgeous countryside (The Glasshouse Mountains). However, if I want to go further south to Brisbane, I'll inevitably get caught in the traffic snarl of the Bruce Highway (it's Australia, there's always something called Bruce). The biggest problem is that most of the jobs and infrastructure are concentrated around the capital cities, and certain regional centres. There is bucket-load of land available for people, but little infrastructure (jobs) outside of those urban centres. A forward thinking country would invest in something like an NBN or at least a decent national rail network to distribute those jobs around, but unfortunately the politicians in Australia seem more concerned about trite political slogans. I guess it's probably the same everywhere else :-(

Re: One simple point

Yes, and iinet are offering 50/25 for $75 per month which is $15 per month less than I'm currently paying for ADSL2+ at 9/0.7. If i could get those upload speeds I'd be happy. To be honest, I'd be happy to split the difference with Telstra and go for 4.5/4.5.

Re: Quit while you're ahead

All other things aside. I'm currently paying $75 per month for ADSL2+ that tops out at 7Mbps but most of the time only gives me 1-3Mbps on a 50Gb download cap. I'd be happy to pay $100 per month for a 30 Mbps connection and a large cap. Because of where I live, I only have Telstra Bigpond as an option. At least if the FTTH NBN had gone forward I may have had a choice of ISP.

Re: Southsea Arcade

Ha, ha.. Good old 'Slots of Fun' at the Clarence Parade Pier. I was a 'Floorwalker' there in 1987 (9am - 11pm, mon to sat for £90 per week). .The job basically involved keeping an eye on the punters to make sure they didn't bump the money drop machines or shove wadded paper in the payout slots of the one arm bandits to later come and collect the winnings. Punch ups on Friday nights between opposing football fans were a semi-refular occurrence and most of the staff were pretty dodgy too. The space harrier cabinet had pride of place right at the front of the arcade and was pretty much the only decent game in there.

Re: Lame.

Actually, the controllers were pretty good. Each game came with a plastic insert that went over the keypad with colourful symbols indicating which keys did what. The round doohickey was a reasonably responsive joystick thingy.

I've read all Banks SF novels, and the 'Algabraist' was hard (but rewarding) work. Try 'excession' for something a bit more straight forward(ish).

Re: Ally 1

Ahhhhh, nope.

Re: My manager at work...

Ha ha. I'm ok with gangnam style. Not a big fan of pop music, but its catchy and fun. One thing I can't stand is the innumerable tv/radio personalities that refer to it as 'gangam style'. There's and 'n' in there, use it.

Re: @Xion

Ok, I'll bite <:-)>

I've never understood how 'electing' an official is inherently better than said official being appointed through a competitive process designed to select the best applicant (and yes, I know that the process can be subverted). I've also never understood why it's so important to know the political views of the local dog catcher. I can see why you would want a say in who is on the School board, but not why you'd have a school board in the first place (shouldn't the curriculum be set by professional educators).

Another poster made mention of the fact that if people can't complete a ballot with 30 choices, they shouldn't be voting. I'm sorry but western politicians, by their nature, seem to pander to the lowest common demnominator, so people of differing abilities will be voting. Additionally, given the low voter turnout in US elections, I'd have thought making the process as simple and efficient as possible would be in the interests of a truly participatory democracy.

And while I'm on the subject...what's with getting people to vote on a Tuesday? It certainly doesn't enfranchise those on minimum wage, working long hours who probably wouldn't be given time off work to vote.

PS if my local school was run by a 'Board', I probably would want a say on who's on the board.

I guess at the end of the day, every four years the same thing happens.....a bunch of horses run around in a circle in Australia and two blokes apply for the same job in the US. It doesn't really matter whether the winner is a horse or a human.