From todays Weekly Water Update:
Storages are now 29.6% full (524,546 million litres) compared with 31.5% (558,019 million litres) for the same period last year. This is the first time in 2008 that storages have dipped below 2007 levels and coincides with a one-in-30 year storm in late June 2007, when reservoirs saw some of their largest one-day gains on record.
So we’re now the bottom line on their graph..
There are some real benefits from being able to work at home sometimes! 🙂
Bruce Schneier has a great blog article on “The War on Photography” that is causing problems for photographers in formerly free countries around the world. If you are into photography (and/or freedom) it’s well worth a read. One part I will reproduce here is a paragraph with some useful links for us photographers (I’ve added the link for “photographers rights” which wasn’t in the original).
This is worth fighting. Search “photographer rights” on Google and download one of the several wallet documents that can help you if you get harassed; I found one for the UK, US, and Australia. Don’t cede your right to photograph in public. Don’t propagate the terrorist photographer story. Remind them that prohibiting photography was something we used to ridicule about the USSR. Eventually sanity will be restored, but it may take a while.
The Aussie version is already printed and in my camera bag, and remember that:
The 9/11 terrorists didn’t photograph anything. Nor did the London transport bombers, the Madrid subway bombers, or the liquid bombers arrested in 2006. Timothy McVeigh didn’t photograph the Oklahoma City Federal Building. The Unabomber didn’t photograph anything; neither did shoe-bomber Richard Reid.
It’s just security theatre..
Links to useful documents:
For those who’ve heard about the crazy news about the patent trolls that are invoicing people based on their claims to have invented image linking in 2000 (and patented it in 2002) there is a site that is gathering information about the patent itself (Republic of Singapore Patent No. 95940) and the Australian company behind it.
The site is at http://suevuestar.biz/ and includes the handy information that the Australian patent actually lapsed because they failed to pay the renewal fees!
CSIRO has developed a biodegradable plastic that’s made from wheat starch. They say:
The wheat starch plastic has similar properties to conventional plastic, but it will break down in the compost heap in 40 to 50 days.
They also claim that it won’t contaminate the food it holds, but I wonder if it is suitable for coeliacs given that wheat starch is known to contain residual gluten ?
(Hat tip to Jeremy for that).
The Victorian Country Fire Authority (CFA), the volunteer fire brigade that covers most of rural Australia and a lot of suburban Melbourne, now has an RSS feed for the incidents that they’re dealing with.
Very handy for keeping an eye on what’s going on. Be even nicer if you could get an RSS feed per CFA region, rather than just the entire state!
Westall Secondary School in Clayton South, Melbourne, has started using KDE under KUbuntu Linux to allow them to replace the 3.0GHz Intel PC’s they were using with older 2.1GHz PC’s, extending their lives and avoiding landfill. The systems use KDE’s Kiosk framework to let the staff lock down the systems for their library system. The 3.0GHz machines released from this role will be going back into the main school for teaching duties there.
In explaining why the school went for Kubuntu, Stefyn said the students responded well to CDs put out by the Ubuntu project. Many had tried Ubuntu at home, which led to a decision to provide a familiar working environment at the school as well.
They got help both directly from Peter Lieverdink and also from the Linux Users of Victoria. They are also encouraging students to experiment with Linux, with old PC’s as a prize:
During our last hardware cleanout, we challenged the students to create the best Linux install and customization, and the winners would get to keep the hardware once it was decommissioned.
and all that apparently unnecessary desktop bling helps to get attention, according to the schools IT manager and teacher:
The kids were rapt with Compiz Fusion and this scored magic brownie points, because even the magical Vista couldn’t compete with the graphics. This was a great step into having them explore the other functionalities of Linux
Great stuff!
So Jeff Waugh has announced the “Australian Open Source Industry & Community Report” has been published as a PDF (( or you can buy a hardcopy version )), hopefully the first of many.
Come and see what Open Source really does for Australia!
Our conservative projection of earnings suggests that the Open Source industry generates $500 million in revenue each year, with over 50% of that being directly related to Open Source.
The report is covered by a CC license:
The Australian Open Source Industry & Community Report is published as a freely downloadable PDF on the Census project website and is redistributable under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives license.
What’s all this wet stuff falling out of the sky ?
The Bureau of Meteorology warns that, at 9:55 pm, severe thunderstorms were detected on weather radar near Craigieburn, St Albans and Werribee. These thunderstorms are moving towards the east. They are forecast to affect Caulfield, Dandenong, Footscray, Frankston, Glen Waverley, Greensborough, Melbourne City, Preston, Ringwood and Rosebud by 10:40 pm and Healesville, Pakenham and Phillip Island by 11:25 pm.
Hmm, I think this is what they mean..
