Posts by Ben Curran
-
I'd already read most of the Ender series when I found out about Card's attitudes. I still think Enders Game is a good book. It did sort of colour the rest of his writing for me though, I've never been able to get into any of his other writing. I've never been sure though whether it's because they're not as good or because I'm put off by Card himself.
Scott Adams is the other author I've had this happen to me with. I can't read Dilbert any more. Reading stuff that I'm pretty sure I used to find funny begets a deadpan "meah" from me now. With Adams though, I'm pretty sure it is the author putting me off.
-
Hard News: Fact and fantasy, in reply to llew40,
There is an element in our media culture (Gordon MacLaughlin may argue it is inherent in kiwi culture) that wants to scour the world looking for negative perceptions to highlight back to ourselves. Our rugby media is a great example.
Whatever the merits of those offshore perceptions, the reality is that they are usually centred on issues all countries are grappling with.
True, but the fact that everyone else is dealing with these issues is no reason not to put our own house in order though. And it's not necessarily a bad thing that we look overseas for someone else to highlight our flaws.
It's like the country has a little voice of in the back of it's head (Joy et. al.) telling us we need to take a bath. The little voice is being steadfastly ignored until someone else actually turns around and tells us we stink.
-
OnPoint: MSD's Leaky Servers, in reply to Ben McNicoll,
I just hope someone somewhere has still got the cover your ass email/memo where they pointed this lack of security out years ago but were told the solutions were too expensive.
If I was a sys admin with this, I'd be presenting front and centre about now.
-
You got a response from WINZ on a Sunday?
That was the 2nd thought that occurred, after the obligatory wtf?
-
Do the numbers make more sense if you include sickness and/or superannuation?
-
Hard News: Changing news, in reply to Russell Brown,
Actually it is a marketing name.
I stand corrected. But they do ask that people they deal with use their marketing name, believe me.
It's fine to use it. It is one of those little niggly things that's automatically makes me want to point out how silly it is every time I hear it though. Autonomic reflex is not the quite the phrase I'm looking for :)
This ought to be a more productive relationship between the Herald and the University of Auckland's Statistics faculty than the paper having its homework constantly corrected in StatsChat.
Productive yes, more fun though? You have to laugh at some of the abuses statschat finds, though admittedly, not just in the herald. it's laugh or weep quietly into your cornflakes.
-
There was a segment in one of the latest More or less pod-casts about the how statistically significant Ye Shiwen's performance was - sorry, can't remember exactly where in the pod-cast. Turns out that her performance looks like a statistical outlier, but not really a suspicious one when you compare it to other record breaking feats. It was a good discussion of all the various factors they take into account when calculating the likelihood of records being broken.
-
Legal Beagle: MMP Review - The Proposals, in reply to Mikaere Curtis,
Have I misunderstood this change, or does this mean that the Maori Party, who have never received a single seat from list votes, will lose any electorate seats that are in excess of their party vote ?
As I understand it, no. It means that if there would be an overhang under today's system, the system that is used for calculating who gets the next list mp stops before reaching 120. So if we had a party with 1 more electorate mp than their party vote entitled them to, the Sainte-Laguë system which is currently used to calculate who gets what, would stop at the 119th mp rather than the 12th mp. I think.
Gareth: that makes sense. on the other hand, the drop to 4% will increase proportionality and I've no easy way in my head of figuring out if the total of decrease and increase from the two aspects of change results in a net increase or net decrease. Still, reasonably happy with it all.
-
Legal Beagle: MMP Review - The Proposals, in reply to linger,
But it still reduces proportionality. It would have been better to have the threshold for extra seats set lower, e.g. 1.5% -- if there must be a threshold at all.
i don't get how it reduces proportionality. Surely it increases it? Maybe not as much as setting the threshold lower, but still it's offers more proportionality than 5%.
-
Not the primary, but it was one of the reasons I was happy to sign the petition calling for a referendum on asset sales: it was well worded and asked a relevant, clear and to the point question.