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March 10 lifeasdaddy - The lifeasdaddy blog has moved to a new locationHenceforth, this blog will be located at a new address.
Please change your links and readers accordingly.
I've moved lifeasdaddy due to the new intrusive and annoying banner advertisements which now appear at the top of the page courtesy of the blog host. This new advertising regime is also making the blog take a long time to load.
Come along with me, you know you want to....
lifeasdaddy - Malcolm Gladwell on the power lawOccasionally my wife treats me to copy of the the New Yorker magazine . Malcolm Gladwell's written an interesting article about the power law as applied to some human situations.
Read the article called Million-Dollar Murray here.
"Power law" is become a bit of a buzz-phrase. Regardless, Gladwell has used it as a jumping off point for examining how best to solve some previously intractable problems.
Violence in policing is one.
Homelessness is another. The Murray Barr referred to in the title was a homeless man. A human above all. Gladwell examines his case to illustrate that instead of managing the problem of homelessness it may be more effective, and even more economical and cheaper to solve the problem.
Gladwell says it better than I can. He spells better than I can too.
If you're intested,Gladwell's blog is here, and he was added to the blogroll last week.
March 08 lifeasdaddy - M. Night Shyamalan's AMEX advertApparently, TV viewers of the Oscars in the US saw a new American Express advertisement in the My Life, My Card series. This one's directed by and stars M. Night Shyamalan.
Here in Oz, it hasn't aired yet. Meanwhile, it can be viewed here.
It's incredibly carefully crafted, and quite dark. Grant McCracken deconstructs it here. Whilst McCracken notes all of the dark aspects of Mr. Shyamalan's take, he just misses out on the slightly tongue in cheek and self deprecating tinge in the closing moments.
Check out the ad here, see what you think.
lifeasdaddy - flash mobbing: Wasik the inventor?A couple of weeks ago I read that there had been a pillow fight in Union Square, NY, Fred Wilson pointed to this great set of photos here.
That event was organized as a public art event by newmindspace, and there's links to lots more photos here.
Interested in the origin of flash mobbing? Well, Bill Wasik has just written an article for Harper's magazine about how flash mobbing,got started back in '03. Here's part 1 of the article.
Wasik's account of mobbing the lobby of the Grand Hyatt, Grand Central Station, NY was particularly amusing to me as an ol' hotel man. The price of the ticket to NYC would have been worth it to see that.
(pointer from Design Observer)
Apparently some folks up in Brisbane have been done a few.
March 06 lifeasdaddy - Lincoln's Gettysburg addressIf Abraham Lincoln had used Microsoft's PowerPoint to craft his dedication, would it have turned out like this?
Nope, I don't think so. I'm sure it would still have been this.
(Thanks to Hillary Johnson for pointing to Peter Norvig's site. )
(And the story behind the story, by Mr. Norvig.)
lifeasdaddy - Knowledge@WhartonI was recently checking out podcasts on iTunes, looking for some new and interesting content.
If you're interested in business management or investment check this one:
It turns out that the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania has a knowledge dissemination program ( U.S. spelling) called Knowledge @ Wharton. It's got a great website here. You can sign up there for access to 100s of articles on useful business topics.
Apparently, they've got around 400,000 registered users.
The link to their iTunes podcasts also shows up in the right margin.
lifeasdaddy - ANZ job advertisements series.One economic indicator which is usually easily grasped is the ANZ job advertisements series.
The figures for February were released today, and the media release can be read here.
I think the most significant parts are these:
I think it is of some relief to those of us who live in New South Wales that the index rose 2.0% here, against the national trend.
The ANZ also provides this simple note about methodology, and significance:
Interesting that the ANZ makes that statement that the figures should not be used to assess the financial performance of any of the newspapers included in the study. I'd be very interested to see some analysis of job advertisement revenue for the major daily newspapers.
lifeasdaddy - a red sunset.Last night, the evening sky was a startling red colour.
Today is a beautiful day in Sydney.
I guess my mother was right when she said, "Red sky at night, Shepherd's delight!"
lifeasdaddy - Brum live show: Big Town BroadwayEdward likes watching the adventures of Brum.
At the moment there's a Brum live show touring Sydney, and we went to the show at the Harbord Diggers Memorial Club on Saturday.
An item in the Parramatta Advertiser gives a good synopsis of the show here.
The show was a lot of fun for the kids, but the plot was probably a bit complex for 2-year olds. I reckon it's best suited for 4 to 6 year olds.
The sound volume level in the auditorium was way too loud, and I had a headache after only 2 minutes of the show starting.
The Brum car itself is great, and really works well. Obviously radio controlled, and imitated the Brum on television very well.
lifeasdaddy - We built our own Big Red CarAs I've mentioned, Ed likes the Big Red Car. A couple of days ago we made our own Big Red Car at home.
We drew the car on the side of a cardboard box using chalk. Ed liked it just fine.
March 03 lifeasdaddy - Chuck Norris??How come I had to read about this little bit of humour on an Australian website from Doc Searls, who lives in Santa Barbara.
March 02 lifeasdaddy - Podcasts: G'Day World #90 & #91Last night I got to do something I don't do often. Listen to some podcasts.
I took in a couple of recent G'Day World segments, which were episodes #90 and #91.
#91 - Host Cameron Reilly interviews journalist Hugo Kelly, late of Crikey. Hugo is an interesting fellow, but I can't think of anything else complimentary to write about him, so #91 is best avoided.
#90 - Cameron Reilly interviews David Clarke, Managing Director of Webjet. Webjet is a travel and tourism aggregating sales internet site. You can compare lots of competing deals and book the one that best suits your needs.
This interview has some really, really good content. Clarke certainly knows his stuff and tells some good anecdotes about getting the webjet business started in the midst of the dotcom bust. He also outlines the enourmous assistence his team got from Microsoft to launch it. He speaks very knowledgably about the delivery of travel and tourism sales over the internet, and outlines some of the problems they faced, and how they were overcome. Cam Reilly asks some good questions, and carefully persuades Clarke to clarify the meaning of some of the jargon he uses. As I have a knowledge of booking systems used in the tourism industry, I thought Clarke to be very sharp indeed. Clarke has the misfortune to have a pompous sounding verbal delivery, but stick with the interview, it's worth it if you've got an interest in the subject matter.
G'Day World podcasts are now available on iTunes, which makes it very convenient for me.
If you don't have iTunes, you can pick up the podcasts here.
Oh, and I just read here that "Webjet is Australia's leading online travel booking portal ...", which is a much more eloquent description than the one I used above.
lifeasdaddy - Dr. Who's sonic screwdriver.One member of our household is a big fan of Dr. Who.
The fan recently received a Sonic Screwdriver as a gift.
Edward quite likes it.
lifeasdaddy - Does justice depend upon the colour of a person's skin in Australia?There's a story about injustice in our country that every Australian needs to know about.
I found out about it by reading today's The Australian newspaper has an interesting story by Anthony McClellan in the Media section.
There's no link yet to the story on The Australian's site. I'll put up a link here if one becomes available.
(Added: The Australian has put up the link to Mr. McClellan's story. It's here. )
McClellan talks about Black and White Justice, a segment which aired on Channel 9's Sunday programme (26 February, 2006).
I never watch that TV programme, but have now read the transcript. The implication is that in this case (Regina v Hasenkamp [Death of Errol Wyles]), there were errors in the handling of the investigation and the prosecution of the crime.
The Police respond here.
The Queensland Director of Public Prosecutions responds here.
The Police's and the DPP's responses are woefully inadequate, and fail to address the central concerns put by Ross Coulthart.
McClellan, apart from being outraged at the way this case has been handled, also makes observations about the inadequacy of the Police and DPP response to the Sunday reporter Ross Coulthart's story.
McClellan contrasts that with the media ability, especially in damage control, of the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police, Mick Keelty.
Ross Coulthart's storyof this injustice starts like this:
If you can stomache reading further, do it here.
The father of the dead boy:
Want to do something about it? Click here.
February 27 lifeasdaddy - a very funny chemistry joke.You will need a rudimentary knowledge of chemistry to appreciate this very funny joke.
Come to think of it, being raised a Christian is probably a requirement too.
(via Grady Booch)
lifeasdaddy - Autistic teen's hoop dreams come trueNancy Rommelmann draws our attention to this video clip.
It's from the CBS evening news, 23 February 2005. it apparently aired on the CBS Early Show too.
Jason McElwain, you are a hero.
Here's the CBS text story. The video is also playable in the right margin of the CBS site, and there's a full-screen facility.
February 26 lifeasdaddy - Heidelberg Repat Hospital photos now deleted.A note about blog maintenance:
One of my areas of interest has been the maintenance of some war memorial features at the Heidleberg Repatriation Hospital, now part of Austin Health.
The issues now appear to be resolved, so for the purpose of saving memory space I have now deleted the associated photographs from this blog.
The text of the blog entries shall remain for the time being.
Should you wish to have access to my achived photographs on this topic, then please email me: lifeasdaddy@gmail.com.
February 24 lifeasdaddy - "Beach. Beach. Go Beach" - Nope.It's interesting to see the conections which the young mind makes.
Whenever we go to the beach, Gabrielle and I put SPF 30+ sunscreen on Edward's exposed skin. Australia has the world's highest incidence of skin cancer, mainly due to sun exposure.
The tube we use was purchased from the Cancer Council of Australia, and is a distinctive green colour.
On Wednesday morning I thought that Edward may spend some time playing outside in the sun, so I picked up the tube from the shelf in his bedroom. Seeing me do that he said, "Beach, beach, go beach.".
I reckon that's an interesting connection to make.
Ed loves going to the beach, and was disappointed when I explained we weren't going to the beach that day.
lifeasdaddy - Frank Arrigo and Microsoft: reaching out to studentsFrank Arrigo has an interesting post detailing what he presented to students at Swinburne University of Technology (Hawthorn) at Orientation Week about Microsoft and the IT industry.
I've got a soft spot for Frank; indirectly he started me blogging. In February or March last year, 2005, my wife attended a Breakfast Bytes session convened by the PR firm Hill and Knowlton. The session focus was on blogging, and Frank was one of the presenters. My wife told me all about it, and was very enthused by Frank's presentation. I checked out his blog and decided that blogging was something I needed to know about, and that the best way to know was to do. Result: lifeasdaddy
Frank, you've got a lot to answer for.
By the way, Hill and Knowlton have certainly embraced blogging. Here's the link to their corporate blog compilation.
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