telstra, defender of the universe

I… don’t know what the hell is going on.  Telstra, harbinger of telecommunications doom, monopolistic behemoth extraordinaire, profit driven dinosaur which ambles across the land devouring its small, innovative mammalian competitors, has made a radically pro-human rights submission…

religious fundamentalists reach new low with bushfire comments

I really wanted to believe that this was fake when it was first emailed to me – but no, there it is on the Catch the Fire Ministries website: Pastor Danny Nalliah, leader of that esteemed fundamentalist Christian…

no surprises

Australia continues its proud tradition of protecting the practice and expression of (Christian) religious beliefs, but failing to do the same in respect of atheism: article.  Sigh. There are buses rolling around Adelaide with Christian messages on them…

do not want

I totally agree with this proposal: that telemarketing should be entirely ‘opt-in’ rather than ‘opt-out’.  In other words, unsolicited commercial telephone calls should be illegal unless the victim recipient has previously agreed to receive them.

At the moment…

getup save the net campaign

iinet case update

This is quite a good summary of some of the legal issues in the iinet case.

internet censorship – national protests

Further to the previous post, there are national protests on 13 December 2008 in relation to Labor’s mandatory Internet filtering scheme. Details here. Attend, if you don’t want the federal government to decide what you can and cannot…

internet filter – positive noises from… the Liberal Party?

No doubt stung by the fact that no-one in the electorate actually pays them any attention at all (or maybe just because they don’t have to pal up to right wingnuts like Steve Fielding any more), the Liberal Party appear…

crazy cult update

A couple of ex-Exclusive Brethren members are asking Justice North in the Federal Court in Victoria (VID904/2008) to order that the AFP investigate the cult: link.

Former Brethren members Lydia Desai and Priscilla D’Souza have accused Exclusive Brethren

…

flame/legal/political/technical discussion

To add to the previous post, there is an epic flame/legal/political/technical discussion of the iiNet case at Whirlpool: link.

There’s also a discussion at Slashdot: link (more from a “you crazy Australians and your crazy laws” perspective).

iiNet film piracy case

You might remember this from a few days ago – a federal minister reading directly from the film and music industry script about the evils of piracy.

Now, in what seems not to be a coincidence (perhaps a…

just another afternoon in sunny Adelaide

This just happened in one of the busiest locations in the Adelaide CBD in the middle of a weekday afternoon: link. It sounds like two groups of Sudanese youths had a very serious fight with knives. This is…

DVD piracy = child molesting

And so it begins: link. If you copy DVDs, you are directly supporting drug trafficking and the rape of small children. As if you didn’t know that, you raping, drug-dealing monster, you.

The USA has been subjected to…

no clean feed

This is probably the most significant issue for Australian democracy since the amendments to the ASIO Act by the Howard government: link.

More on it later.  If you already know about it, get a move on and write…

an idea about police spying

This kind of thing makes grim but not at all surprising reading. Just as they did in the 1950s and 1960s, the powers that be are making it their business to infiltrate groups of citizens attempting to exercise their legitimate…