Well, I let my blog drift again. I guess I did warn people that it would probably happen. But while I was silent, a number of visitors showed that some of the posts were useful. Oddly enough, my post about the Backstreet Boys in concert in Guadalajara was the most viewed. I reckon the boy band fan base is a lot larger than people think.
I hope to get back into the whole website/blogging thing. Now winter is coming, maybe there’ll be more late nights to do it. Stay tuned …
I have two albums in my iTunes collection that I think deserve a bit a positive press. The first I downloaded last year was a freebie called We Are Smug, by Darren Hayes (of Savage Garden fame) and Robert Conley.
Darren Hayes is a pretty arrogant little artist, who perhaps let fame get to him a little much. Since finishing with his Savage Garden partner and brand and launching off on his own, his career has fallen with every album, despite them being overall very good pop albums.
Darren Hayes suffers from a curse in that he’s known for writing cheesy pop love songs, and his voice often suits that style, but his art wants to take him in a more electro-alternative direction. In an interview, he sounded almost grumpy that his new album (Secret Codes and Battleships) had to be another sweet pop album, albeit (again) a very good one.
We Are Smug was done pretty much only by Darren and Robert, released as a free download on the net with no publicity or marketing, so Darren was free to let loose and create songs just like he wanted. And it shows – the album is more of a true mirror to Darren’s art and personality. It’s snarky and sarcastic, fun and risqué, full of experimental and old-school electronic elements, bewilderment at lost fame, yet unapologetic and brash. I love it.
Because it’s not promoted, only hard-core fans had probably looked for this album. It’s not generic pop music for the radio. But it’s well worth the download, not least because it’s still free.
The second is one I’ve just bought – Joe Jonas’ Fastlife. I’ve read a couple of reviews who said things like ‘he’s trying to be R&B’ ‘it doesn’t work’ ‘he doesn’t sound like he means what he’s singing’ ‘it falls flat’. Now I’m way too old to be a Jonas Brothers fan, but now that Joe Jonas is all growed up, I can at least be a Mr Joe fan. I reckon that most reviewers have pre-judged him “Oh look, a Jonas brother trying to make a real record.”
In reality, this is a very good pop record. Like Britney Spears (who he’s currently touring with), he’s harnessed a bunch of great producers and musicians to make his songs sound good. Unlike Britney, he can write clever, mainstream, catchy pop songs that work really well within the R&B/dance/pop pastiche that is applied over them.
So get over the whole teen-screaming J-Brothers thing and crank up Fastlife on the radio when you want a cool up-tempo beat and some smooth pop.
The USA really does have a grand name, doesn’t it. Unfortunately it’s not an entirely accurate name, as the country doesn’t even unite the states of North America, let alone all of America. Only the 48 states in a central zone of North America, Alaska, the Hawaiian Islands and a few other territories are included. But as currently the most powerful country on earth, the USA deserves its grand name.
Many people inside and outside the USA grumble that the country just can’t seem to get some essential things right: debt, healthcare, immigration, plutocracy. I can’t help the US with these problems, but at least I can fix their time zones!
Go here to see my Time Zone Refresh for Mexico and Canada.
At the moment, the USA has the following time zones:
Hawaii Time Zone (-10 GMT): Hawaii
Alaska Time Zone (-9 GMT): Alaska
Pacific Time Zone (-8 GMT): Washington, Oregon (excluding an eastern segment), Nevada, California, North Idaho.
Mountain Time Zone (-7 GMT): Montana, Idaho (excluding the northern panhandle), Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, El Paso Texas, southwest North Dakota, western South Dakota and Nebraska, and a sliver of west Kansas.
Central Time Zone (-6 GMT): The remainder of North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska; almost all of Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas (excluding El Paso), Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Wisconsin, Illinois, the northwest sliver of Michigan, west Kentucky, west Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, and the western part of the Florida panhandle.
Eastern Time Zone (-5 GMT): Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, West Virginia, most of Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, east Kentucky, East Tennessee, Maryland, District of Columbia, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida.
Daylight Savings is used by most places, except Arizona (excluding some First Nations in the northeast), and Indiana.
There is a strong possibility I got a few details incorrect, missed a few exceptions to these time zones, or even missed an entire state. If you know of any problems, please let me know and I’ll update this post.
Here are the changes that should be made.
Alaska needs to move one hour back, to join Hawaii at -10 GMT. The Alaskan panhandle however should stay at -9 GMT – also called the new Yukon Time Zone.
All of Oregon and Idaho need to be in the Pacific Time Zone. Also, Montana west of the Continental Divide/Helena should be there too.
Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas need to join the Mountain/Plains Time Zone, as does the remainder of North Dakota, South Dakota and Nebraska.
The following states need to move into the Central Time Zone: Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee and Georgia. The remainder of Kentucky, Tennessee and all of the Florida panhandle west of Highway 75 need to do the same. If Georgia really compains, maybe the coastal third of the state could stay in the Eastern Time Zone.
All in all, the USA hasn’t done too badly in their interpretations of time zones, with the exception of Alaska. The states just need to be moved around some to better align with the real time zones. I haven’t split states by time zones, except where there’s a clear geographical split like a mountain range or a panhandle.
As usual, I dislike Daylight Savings, but if a state decides to adopt it, they should exercise their power and apply it over the entire state.
I was stunned to hear that the cheapest price for 2 liters of milk in New Zealand is now $4.30 ($USD 3.30, or 3.7 grams silver.) Here in Mexico, the price of 2 liters of milk is 15.8 pesos ($USD 1.29, or 1.4 grams silver.)
One of New Zealand’s largest export earners is dairy products. It’s famous for its green rolling pastures, long growing season, few diseases, highly efficient farms, and advanced dairy technology. Mexico has only a few dairy farms, is a semi-arid country, and is known for needing to bring in cow feed most of the year, hot, dry summers, inefficient farming methods, and low use of technology.
Neither country uses subsidies or tariffs for its dairy products anymore.
What am I missing here?
Demographia have released their latest report of housing affordability in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and United Kingdom. Below is a selection of results I found interesting.
A ratio of 3 or less is considered an affordable housing market. That is, the median house price is three times the gross median household income. 3 – 4 is moderately unaffordable. 4 – 5 is seriously unaffordable. Over 5 is severely unaffordable.
Atlanta – 2.3
Las Vegas – 2.6
Phoenix – 2.7
Merced – 3
Fresno – 3.3
Edmonton – 3.5
Calgary – 4
Portland – 4.4
Seattle – 5
Wellington – 5.5
Los Angeles – 5.9
Christchurch – 6
New York – 6.1
San Diego – 6.2
Auckland – 6.4
Tauranga – 6.5
Brisbane – 6.6
San Francisco/Oakland area – 7.2
Vancouver – 9.5
Sydney – 9.6
Hong Kong – 11.4
Interesting, aye! Demographia blames this housing unaffordability on land use constraints and urban growth boundaries. This is so simplistic, it’s laughable. Yes, urban fences do tend to limit supply of suburban sprawl, thus raising prices. But there’s more than just urban fences going on.
So what’s the solution? Build more houses. A variety of houses for all the myriad of different people out there. Not cookie-cutter houses covering hillside after hillside. Cheap, expensive, large, small, apartment, townhouse, single houses. Variety. But economise on the land used. Use urban design to get more people into a smaller area, and improve their life at the same time.
As a young guy who dreams about owning his own home again, housing affordability is a big issue for me. But merely opening up more land for developers to push cloned housing out into the horizon, with all the attendant social, environmental and transport problems that come with those suburbs, is not the answer.
Brandon at mastersplanning posted this old New York City study by the Municipal Art Society of New York. It has a whole bundle of clips illustrating what makes a good city public space. I found it fascinating.
Here’s the video:
Some of the key lessons I learned from it:
The interesting thing for me, watching this video, was seeing how well Mexico towns and cities do all this instinctively. Many public works in Mexico are dismal, but public spaces are not. Whenever you go to a downtown, there will be fountains, plenty of places to sit, lots of activities for the kids, food stalls, exhibitions and shows, shops all facing the street, good public transport, pedestrian malls, underground or behind-wall parking, friendly security, historic buildings - and many more things that make Mexico plazas a joy to hang out in. Rather than field trips to Old Europe, urban design students would do better to go to Mexico.
Canada is a country that’s dear to my heart. There are many great good things about Canada: the Rockies, the friendly people, the liberal attitude, the multicultural, dynamic cities, but its time zones need a bit of a refresh.
Go here to see my Time Zone Refresh for Mexico.
At the moment, Canada’s provinces have the following time zones:
Yukon Territory: Pacific Time (-8 GMT). Daylight Savings – yes.
British Columbia: Pacific Time (-8 GMT). Daylight Savings – yes, except for Fort St. John, Charlie Lake, Taylor and Dawson Creek in northeast BC, and Creston in southeast BC.
Northwest Territories: Mountain Time (-7 GMT). Daylight Savings – yes.
Alberta: Mountain Time (-7 GMT). Daylight Savings – yes.
Saskatchewan: Mountain Time. (-7 GMT) Daylight Savings – no. Also, the town of Lloydminster is on the border of Saskatchewan and Alberta, so it joins Alberta’s time.
Manitoba: Central Time (-6 GMT). Daylight Savings – yes.
Nunavut: Nunavut east of 102° West, and all communities in the Kitikmeot Region, follow Mountain Time (-7 GMT). Central Time (-6 GMT) is followed between 85° West and 102° West, except for western Southampton Island. Eastern Time (-5 GMT) is followed east of 85° West, and for Southampton Island. The land east of Iqaluit is on Atlantic Time (-4 GMT), with a few exceptions. Daylight Savings – yes, except for Southampton Island.
Ontario: Central Time (-6 GMT) is observed west of Thunder Bay, excluding Atikokan, and Eastern Time (-5 GMT) is observed by the rest. Daylight Savings – yes.
Quebec: Eastern Time (-5 GMT), except for far eastern Côte-Nord and the Magdalen Islands, which are on Atlantic Time (-4 GMT). Daylight Savings – yes, with a number of municipal exceptions.
New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Labrador: Atlantic Time (-4 GMT). Daylight Savings – yes, except for land east of 63° West.
Newfoundland: Newfoundland Time (-3.5 GMT). Daylight Savings – no.
What a mess! There is a strong possibility I got a few details incorrect, or missed a few exceptions to these time zones. If you know of any problems, please let me know and I’ll update this post.
Now for the easier part – giving poor ol’ Canada a better set of time zones.
Yukon: sorry, but you really do need your own time zone. And since you’re the only decent-sized piece of land within your GMT, let’s call it Yukon Time -9 GMT.
British Columbia and Alberta: you should both be in Pacific Time. While parts of BC and Alberta are east and west of this time zone, most of the population is within it.
Saskatchewan should be in the Mountain Time zone. The name doesn’t make much sense, with Saskatchewan being as flat as a pancake. So lets call it “Plains Time” zone.
Manitoba is difficult to place, as it is halfway between Plains Time and Central Time. Winnipeg has 60% of the population and is closer to Ontario than Saskatchewan, and Manitoba is already Central Time, so let’s keep it there. But if they want to switch, or divide their province into two time zones, I have no problem with that.
Ontario should still have two time zones (Central and Eastern), but the boundary should be in a different place – at 82.5° West, in other words from the town of Timmins westward. This keeps Toronto, the Great Lakes peninsula and Ottawa in the Eastern Time zone, but puts more of hinterland Ontario in the Central Time zone.
Quebec is perfect where it is, in the Eastern Time zone.
The Maritime provinces likewise are perfect in their Atlantic Time zone, except for Newfoundland. Why it is still half an hour ahead of the rest of the Maritimes I’ll never understand. I know Newfoundland was still a dominion when the time zones were set up, but let’s rectify that now. Newfoundland needs to be Atlantic Time, -4 GMT.
The territories of Nunavut and the Northwest Territories are impossible to place into any one time zone, as they are so large. So let’s make it easy and simply apply the four main time zones where they fall, and fit the northeast and northwest corners of these territories into their nearest zone. West of 112.5° is Pacific Time, between 112.5° and 97.5° is Plains Time, between 97.5° and 82.5° is Central Time, and east of 82.5° is Eastern Time. After all, the combined population of both territories is less than 75,000, mostly spread out among tiny towns isolated from each other. It makes sense for each town to have its appropriate time.
And Daylight Savings? I dislike the notion, but if a province decides to adopt it, they should exercise their power and apply it over the entire province. All these exceptions are ridiculous.
I am very concerned for Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks. His website used to be an amusing outlet valve for delicious little secrets that organisations had tried to keep hidden. But now he’s releasing information about major world governments, and they are pissed.
Granted, I haven’t read anything so far that has really surprised me. The latest news explosion, where U.S. diplomats think that Mexico’s armed forces are bureaucratic, corrupt, untrained and unfit to take on sophisticated drug trafficking organisations (DTOs), won’t be news to anyone in Mexico. And remember, the army was sent in because the police are even worse.
All the Wikileaks cables are releasing is information that is already known, or at least suspected, but is just not talked about in offical government circles. To show that such things ARE talked about in non-official government circles is apparently a big deal.
The U.S. has been most strident in its condemnation of Wikileaks. Crazy Tea Party Lady Sarah Palin has called for his blood to run, as have government officials and leaders. They’ve been putting pressure on other governments and agencies to do their part in cornering Julian Assange, with the hope that this particular snake won’t be a Hydra.
I know there are some concerns that Wikileaks is harming diplomacy and putting lives at risk. That may have been a problem with previous releases of Iraq war information and details of informants, but I understand that since the first contentious release Wikileaks has been very careful to edit out details that would risk combatants lives. It is sadly amusing however to see that the greatest outbusts of condemnation have not come after publishing accurate war data, but after revealing the words of world leaders to their subjects.
I believe that on balance Wikileaks is supporting democracy, and the right of citizens to find out the truth of what their governments are actually doing behind their back, the better to hold them to account. We can applaud the governments who are actually doing in private what they said they’d do in public, and shame those who are doing the opposite.
Yet the self-righteous, hypocritical politicians appear to be very thin-skinned. They have schemes to take down the public face of Wikileaks, and hopefully the organisation with it. Julian is a brave man. He has done what many of us would dare not. And he will probably pay a major price for it, beyond being forced into hiding. I just hope that he’s set up his organisation to survive and thrive after he’s gone. Our world is more open and just with Wikileaks around, however much it hurts the pride of national leaders.
I’m rooting for Julian.
The New Zealand National Party currently in government has this hang-up about “catching up to Australia”. Australia, after all, has better weather, better beaches, better shopping, more and better-paid jobs, and most importantly for the National Party, a better economy. An important reason why Australia is so rich is its mineral wealth. It exports its natural resources to the growth economies of Asia and other parts of the world.
These are some of the reasons why half a million kiwis (12% of New Zealand’s population) live in Australia. And having a healthier economy and better-paid jobs are good goals.
So the New Zealand National politicians think: hey, we have some mineable materials as well, and hey – a lot of them are under conservation land! Excellent, we own it, we can dig it up!
It sounds like a scene from Saruman’s lair, but bizarrely enough for a country with the marketing slogan “100% Pure“, it’s actually happening. National parks, conservation areas, marine reserves, all are fair game if they have something excavatable.
The reasons why this is a Bad Idea should be obvious. But in case they aren’t, I’ll outline some below.
1. These particular areas of land and ocean are protected for a reason. They contain rare flora and fauna, unique landscapes, natural ecosystem processes, and indigenous heritage. The National Party argues that some of this land isn’t really that important, and in any case the mined area will be a small percentage of the total land. If that’s the case, then the land should be reclassified from conservation estate to productive land, using an impartial cost-benefit assessment by a multidisciplinary panel of experts, and a full public process. If the land really is not all that great, then this open, impartial process would determine that.
2. Mining takes wealth out of the land in the short-term, but long-term it leaves a man-made reconstruction (like a lake, or forest) at best, and at worst leaves a toxic, polluted, desolate environment. Tourism, recreation and passive enjoyment of the land, if managed properly, can continue in perpetuity. When looking at long term cumulative benefits it’s far better to leave conservation land in its natural state as much as possible.
3. There isn’t that much resource down there anyway. The National Party is claiming that New Zealand has $140 billion worth of mineable materials. Wow, that sounds great! Hang on – Statistics New Zealand did a careful job 8 years ago of cataloging New Zealand’s resource inventory, including coal and petroleum, and came up with a range of $3.6 – $6.5 billion, depending on market prices (hat tip to No Right Turn). Hmm.
4. Mineable minerals in New Zealand are generally spread out in low concentrations, meaning that open-pit mining is the only real economic option in most cases. Imagine how ugly that would get for the virgin native bush, crystal streams and endangered species on conservation land.
These open-cast mining areas can be huge - the size of entire towns. © Coromandel Watchdog
They even want to mine aggregate in the Parakawai Ecological Area in the Coromandel, a resource common across New Zealand, and comparatively low value. It’s just not worth it.
Bridge on the Parakawai Valley walkway, Coromandel. © bobandlync, Flickr
5. Mining on protected land would severely harm New Zealand’s self-image and image to the world. With New Zealand’s tourism advertisements filled with photos of national parks, imagine the look when people find out these pristine areas are being carved up by multinational mining companies.
Two areas come to mind – the Coromandel and Great Barrier Island. Many kiwis love to holiday there, and those that haven’t, like the idea that they could some day. And those that won’t, appreciate very much that New Zealand has these beautiful places. If these areas are dug out, even if they are reconstructed at the end (which is never the same), these intrinsic values would be lost.
Here’s hoping the National Party sees sense. Or at least acknowledges the public opposition, and back down. Otherwise an important precedent will be set – that New Zealand’s national parks, forest parks and other conservation land is fair game for greedy industrialists and big business to carve up, take their money and run, leaving behind the devastation to rue.
The brilliant Vancouver Winter Olympic Games last month triggered memories of recent summer Olympic Games and how massive they were. I was going to begin this blog with a blaze of statistics and graphs on the numbers of athletes, events, and budgets of the Summer Olympic Games, and how they have grown over the years. However, such statistics aren’t that easy to come by in a collective form, so rather than spending hours collating the statistics myself, I’ll rely instead on hyperbole and conjecture. Sorry.
The number of events in the Olympics need to be cut. The head-count of athletes participating is now around 10,500, and the number of individual events is over 300. This means massive infrastructure investments by the host city and nation, and rarely does the spectacle turn a profit. It also restricts all but major wealthy world cities from hosting the Games.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the Olympic Games. But I’m concerned about the cost of the games, which limits the number of cities that can host them. I also think that the Olympic formula and schedule is set up for individual competitors, not multi-game team sports.
A way to reduce the current bulk of the Games is to return the Summer Olympics to its focus on efforts by individuals, and also units (like doubles or quad rowing). So although the events for the London 2012 Olympics have already been chosen, if it were up to me, these would get the cut:
Basketball, football, handball, hockey, synchronised swimming, water polo, and volleyball (beach and regular). I’d also get rid of rugby sevens which is coming to Rio de Janiero 2016.
To further reduce athlete numbers, the “team” events in running, swimming, cycling, and other speed sports should also be taken out.
I don’t advocate a forced raising of qualification standards to reduce athlete numbers, as this would reduce the number of athletes from small nations and diminish worldwide interest in the games. And in some events like the 100 m running, the athlete skill level range is so narrow that cutting back the number of participants may cut out a potential medal winner.
The Winter Olympics, Paralympics and Youth Olympics don’t seem to be as clogged with sport events and athletes, so there’s no reason to trim things out there.
At least the IOC seems to be cutting back on some team events. For example, baseball, polo, rugby, softball, and bizarrely, tug-of-war, have been taken out of the Olympic canon. It should keep up this trend.
The modern Olympic Games' first opening ceremony in Athens 1896.
The latest summer Olympics opening ceremony in Beijing 2008. The pitch is getting mighty crowded!
