Ratfish

What a rubbish headline. And to think the owner is quoted in the same article saying ""They weren't in for a free-for-all". Bad reporting.

And I have no idea how this came to be a religious debate. New Zealand is pretty much secular and religion has almost no bearing on the lives of the majority and is pretty much absent from politics. Especially in Hamilton. Go there on a Friday when there is a holiday and petty theft will seem tame!

Edit: a slighty better version of story. Wow they open early. http://www.3news.co.nz/Computer-glitch-opens-Hamilton-Pak-n-...

To add to this, The Steiner system places a lot of value in surroundings and buildings and a lot of time and effort (or is it money?) goes into making the "learning environment" inspiring and stimulating.... Etc etc. Basically the ones I've been to look fantastic.

Can confirm technophobia in the New Zealand Steiner system too. I believe things have improved somewhat, but TV was definitely the Antichrist.

"forty years of complete absence of nuclear accidents"? The same Wikipedia has a fairly large section on accidents at nuclear power plants, stating "worldwide there have been 99 accidents at nuclear power plants from 1952 to 2009 (defined as incidents that either resulted in the loss of human life or more than US$50,000 of property damage, the amount the US federal government uses to define major energy accidents that must be reported), totaling US$20.5 billion in property damages.[4] Fifty-seven accidents have occurred since the Chernobyl disaster, and almost two-thirds (56 out of 99) of all nuclear-related accidents have occurred in the USA." On a brighter note however, "There have been comparatively few fatalities associated with nuclear power plant accidents"

I know it's easy to suggest as a New Zealander (lots of mountains, lots of rain, and not that many people), but that hydro you mention is ace, wish all our power came from it.

Android open? Like honeycomb?

"Both RIM and Microsoft "get" the Enterprise. This matchup makes sense for both of them"

Based on what? I'd argue that they "got" enterprise, but are in the process of losing it. Are a very cruse measure, what about share price over time? Or units shipped? or...?

It should be noted that UNSCREAR use the linear no threshold theory despite the lack of evidence regarding lower doses . Err on the side of safety.

Have you a source for that? I could well believe that the cancer risk is low and obviously is is uncommon for a dose of radiation to be large, but 'comparatively large' doses of radiation are given regularly in hospital catheter labs, CT/PET scanners. And while generally these would be in the 10-20-30 mSv range, for many patients scans are repeated regularly for long time periods, rapidly reaching the 150-500mSv range discussed in the below article. Of course this is a fractionated dose and it would be much more dangerous as a single hit. I cannot find any reference to radiation dose verses cancer risk. Somewhat supporting you is this article which discusses over estimation of dose risk. Interesting discussion too: http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc073513

A 'spokesman' has just announced in the last few hours that there are high cesium levels in leaking water that is measuring 1Sv per hour. That going to be somewhere in the depths of the plant, but living about as far away from this ad is possible is a comfort to me.

Perhaps the authorities are to blame for this problem. They are far from open about the issues and the plant has a long history of record falsification and other shenanigans. Now we get to read about a faulty initial installation of the steelwork with a botch job repair.

The great thing about procrastination is that the reward comes now. Don't take that away from me.

Weird how the quality of conversation gets discussed repeatedly. And it's also strange to see a conversion of that length without typos (I couldn't see any..) or annoying emoticons. The random topic changes almost make it seem more real. Would be interestig to see it in real time (are the reply delays realistic?). Great idea.

I've got a business idea. I'll make this thing, you'll pay heaps for it, then pay each month to have it. Then, whenever someone wants you to do something they can press a button and get you and get you to change your plans. I bet no one likes my idea though. Additionally, I'm damned if I know how I fell into the trap of cell phones. Sent from my iPhone.

Another agreement. My pet peeve. Real-estate agents should put a price on houses they are trying to sell. I'll either buy, or I won't. Who wants to pay for building reports and lawyers before an auction just to turn up and realize they can't afford the property? Agents underestimate sale price to get people to come to auctions. And what's with silent auctions, and all their other BS. Ask for what you want by putting a price on whatever your selling.

I recently watched a blu ray at a friends, then tried to watch the special features listed on the cover. We couldn't. Turns out the blu ray player didn't have the most current firmware. WTF was my reaction, and I came to fully understand Jobs.

Product idea?

It's interesting how great a baring the quality of the question has on the quality of the answer. Good questions get (usually) good answers. I regularly get caught in the crossfire resulting from poor questions resulting on poor answers.

Does "I told you so" ever work in any situation? It only ever makes people mad. Unfortunately being right can't be pointed out in many situations.

The Christchurch figure is a debatable one, as the government is talking it up so as to justify an asset sale (national park mining and power companies are current favourites) while the true figure seems unknown (I can't find a good source, any you know of?). The EQC only pay part of some claims, but here are their stats http://canterbury.eqc.govt.nz/repair-replacement/progress

As I understand it, spreading out the waste leads to more material being contaminated. Surrounding concrete, pipes, cranes beams etc... Most equipment used ends up contaminated. I know an engineer who cleans these places up, and its mad, bad and very very expensive. Massive amounts of planning for simple jobs. Plotting safe routs, zones, dose rates etc. Maximum containment makes the job way way easier.

Are the containment domes intact in Japan? Edit: found this on IAEA site: "Containment remains intact at Fukushima Daiichi Units 1, 2 and 3". It doesn't even mention the 4th, but does say the explosion occurred outside unit 1s primary containment dome. What does that mean? It's outer shield is wrecked?

Go easy... "it was the earthquake and tsunami." they didn't go together in any of the scenarios they ran.

Wondered when someone would mention that. Had seen the link to it in the comments on the Cringely article, posted by a Cringely sceptic. Weird coincidence that it happen the month it was due to be decommissioned.

I think that people (self included) are generally more accepting of risk if it's control is within their own hands. Dying of tobacco related illnesses or obesity is mostly within my own control. Dying because a a nuclear reactor leak is pretty much 100% out of my control.

The Bosnian airport shooting saga comes to mind. However in this case, there would seem to be little to be gained by fudging the issue.

Exactly. They would be considered by some (or all?) to have a leftwing slant and therefore be tainted somehow. They are considerably to the left of most American papers for example.

The U.K. Papers www.independent.co.uk and www.guardian.co.uk often have quite interesting stories on Dubai, but their stories aren't really from the standard political perspective.

Have a look at this. http://www.geonet.org.nz/earthquake/quakes/recent_quakes.htm... Christchurch, New Zealand. Main quake, 7.1 on the scale (and with hindsight, not all that bad), was almost six months before a very shallow 6.3 aftershock which was very bad and had lots of deaths. So far there have been something like 8000 aftershocks. People from the area often seem shell-shocked.