I just watched one of my favourite movies again: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

I’m not ashamed to mention that I’m constantly touched by it, it’s sad, happy, lovely… a relationship that feels so real you can touch it, with the good bits and bad bits, the underlying longing to connect with another human being.

Now I’ve succeeded in not blowing myself up with the gas oven… which I couldn’t get to light even though there was the smell of gas permeating the kitchen… and I shall sit outside on my new old table and 1950s wicker chairs.

Okay, thanks to this article, the treo might just be syncing properly…

I deleted all the windows sync settings from the treo, and have paired the computer and the treo once again.

If this works, I might just call it a night. It’s only been 4 hours. All right, 3 and a half at this point (I arrived here at about 6.30pm).

Well, it kind-of works. There’s still more contacts on the Palm than on the PC.

The addressbook seems to have synced properly though, so that’s nice.

Screw it. It’s after 10pm. I’m going home.

This is very interesting

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTehTbT7aho&rel=1]

They’re right when they say that the studios are only assessing and distributing movies that they can make a buck off of; the same as every other business out there. Movie-making is a business, it’s not about creativity.

I, and friends, have a similar issue with the publishing industry.

The music industry is exactly the same.

This is the beginning of something interesting and new; the net has given us a way to communicate ideas and our creativity — be it good or bad — to the entire world (other than those countries being actively censored of course). The concept is revolutionary, and totally circumvents the business models which have worked for the last 100 or more years.

Now the key is to keep-up the momentum, so here are some additional links:

• Publish your book or periodical online at Lulu.com
• Show your movie or short film online at youtube.com
• Play your music for anyone to hear at myspace.com

These aren’t the be-all and end-all; there are plenty of other ways to get music, movies and books out there into the wide world; the next stage is getting it known.

And that’s where HTML metatags come in handy. You have to capitalise on the bots by working out the best search terms which will get your content to the top of the search results…

Ultimately, this is open-source for everything else. We’ve got open-source software, there’s the potential for open-source hardware, but open-source music, movies and books is a new development…  And like everything else that’s happening in the world, it’s making big-business very very scared.

Good.

For the love of…

What’s all this sudden panic and worry about oil and the cost thereof? For crying-out-loud, Peak oil has been and gone. Why the hell aren’t we — in this Great Southern Land of high temperatures and lots of sun– putting stacks of money into solar and alternative fuel research.

All this will do is expend millions on what’s a band-aid solution at best, and a total waste of money at worst. Why not stick some serious money into something we can supply in abundance: sunshine? If they spent all the money they’re going to spend on searching for gas and petroleum into a solar panel for every rooftop in the country, we won’t need anywhere near as much fuel as we’re consuming now and into the future.

Amazing.

This is our former government at work; like kids who have had their toys taken away, they’re kicking-up a stink.

I didn’t think Kevin Rudd’s statement “…infantile bickering, point-scoring and mindlessly partisan politics…” – uttered during the apology to the stolen generation – was a call-to-arms; it sounded more like an honest appraisal of the behaviour of politicians on both sides of the fence during the last 10 years of parliamentary rule.

The opposition seem intent on dragging the parliament into disarray; all they’re doing is showing what childish morons they actually are.

It’s been a long time coming, and it’s odd that a word of two syllables, and only 5 letters could take ten years to be said.

But it’s happened.

The new government, has taken an amazing first step: They’ve apologised to the Stolen Generation.

I went to Federation Square, here in Melbourne, to watch the big screen and see it as it happened.

Kevin’s speech wasn’t particularly political, it was heartfelt and… dammit, it seemed honest. He constructed it in consultation with those that are the unfortunate members of the Stolen Generation. I particularly thought his comment about “…infantile bickering, point-scoring and mindlessly partisan politics…” said a lot about what had been happening prior to today.

It’s a brave new world… hopefully this first spark will be enough to light the fire of change.

I mentioned to S on Skype that if this is actually carried-through, her kids will never know a country where an Aboriginal person is treated any differently from everyone else, where they are just as educated, healthy and long-living as all of us.

Brendan Nelson, on the other hand, copped it sweet during his speech, when he started going on about modern removal of children; Ignoring this would be wrong, but to bring it up during an apology regarding the legal separation of families is pretty dim. Fully a third of the audience at Federation Square turned their back. There were chants of “Get Him Off!” and derisive clapping.

(picture from the ABC website)

In a way, it very much appeared he was trying to accept the truth of the situation, while distancing from the actual apology. He also dragged the old wartime paradigm into the mix, which is… I don’t know… I found it very much labouring a point which wasn’t particularly valid in the first place.

A friend, R, in Canberra for the apology commented “…Nelson said some ill-considered things that were poorly received. He could’ve left out comparisonsof suffering and war!”

However, overall, it’s a good first step. Now comes the work, and as Kev said, it won’t be easy, but it’s certainly worthwhile. R noted “…so overdue and so needed. Good to be here with those survivors…”.