Posts by Christopher Nimmo
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But I still like the 5th, even better than the 9th, which appears to be very clearly saying "Be a christian and you'll be really happy".
Well... closer to "Be a Freemason and you'll be really happy"
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and are not sitting at big shiny computers with broadband and the savvy to download broadcast-quality versions of that music (for free?!).
Yeah, I read several earlier comments about how you can supposedly download (non-contemporary) 'classical' music for free because it was written so long ago.
Which is a rather silly angle, given that it ignores the question of performers. What you could do would be to visit imslp.org, download some sheet music, spend fifteen years and many thousands of dollars learning to play the piano to a concert standard and then enjoy the music you downloaded for free off the internet.
For free and essentially legitimate 'classical' and contemporary 'classical' one can ferret around the internet for long-out-of-print and non-commercially released recordings for radio.
For very expensive 'free' CD borrowing one could sign up at Vic, which has an amazing selection of contemporary music.
And for cheap 'classical' and contemporary 'classical' one can always turn to the amazing Naxos (which releases the bulk of NZSO recordings) and Nonesuch's rather curious prices on iTunes ($1.79 each for Louis Andriessen's De Tijd and De Staat - at 43 minutes and 35 minutes respectively, ot bad. You can also pay $1.79 for the 25 minutes of John Adams' On the Transmigration of Souls ($39.90 at Parsons in Wellington)).
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Well I for one am young and ginga.
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I don't buy the argument that the market should support everything that moves. The NZSO is a mixture of govt funding and private funding and ticket sales. Maori TV sells advertising and receives govt funding. They seem to me to be as important to NZ as Concert, yet it's fully funded?
And as a result the NZSO has suffered really badly from the recession. This season they've reduced the amount of works for large forces (ie. only one concert with two harps I understand) and effectively scrapped two subscription concerts. The volume of contemporary music and in particular New Zealand music is way down on last year outside of the annual Made in New Zealand concert. Somebody mentioned the Mahler concert at the Festival earlier - the last I heard, the Festival organisers were demanding that Mahler's reduced orchestral version be used, which is a slap in the face for the people who paid (too much) money to go see it.
Personally, I'd like Concert to focus more attention on sonic art (rather than confining it to Sound Lounge), which is very much an international music. It's creative, involving and relatively free of cultural baggage; and it also opens the door to some of the more 'arty' electronica.
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These days they'd just put Tootle on the Johnsonville line.
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If you agree that each of us has a different learning style and (hopefully) has a talent to be great at something, why not favour granting vouchers to allow you to c your dream and apply your talents ) whether they be in sport, music, journalism art or whatever?
How about because "I" am a child, with no particular hopes and dreams? "I" don't yet know what "I" want, except maybe to be a choo-choo train*? It's a fallacy to suggest that vouchers would help children to make choices. They might help parents to make the choices for their children. Sometimes these interests might align (temporarily), but indulging child/parent fantasies probably isn't what the state expects in return for the money it shells out.
* I do have to admit that choo-choo train academy would be pretty awesome
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GST increase will have only minor temporary effect judging by last time, say tax group head Bob Buckle, historian Paul Goldsmith and Retailers Association honcho John Alberton.
Yeah, but what do those people think they're saying? Of course a rise in GST only causes a 'small blip' in inflation. That's because you don't increase it by 2.5% every year. A "small blip" is a 2.5% increase in the price of goods and services until it is repealed.
And there they talk about supposed big ticket items which have never been anybody's problem with increasing GST. So you can 'save' by buying these before the rise takes effect. So? Unless they expect everybody to live off canned goods for the next few years, how exactly does that deal with the real issues?
Meh. Maybe I'm talking out of my ass. But they sure are too.
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15% is a pain - one now needs to divide by 7.6666666....
Or you could multiply by 0.15?
(edit - wait, no it's probably not that simple)
(edit 2 - yeah, I'm being an idiot)
Of course, it might not necessarily be 15%. They might find a nice roundish number for you to divide by.
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He makes some pertinent points, but his powers of deduction are not all that very good.
He's an economist. You don't need to get your expectations too high.
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Ah, but the editors will be getting a tax cut.
And Key himself was talking about a "3 or 4 billion dollar package", wasn't he?
And Johnny would never tell a lie!