by cameron | Nov 24, 2006 | Uncategorized
Des Paroz sent me a link to this article in The SMH that talks about how inaccurate the food labels in Australia are.
Julie Robotham reports:
Of the 19 products that claimed to be low in fat or calories, 19 per cent exceeded the fat content published on the panel while two-thirds contained more calories than specified – in one case by nearly three times.
So it’s even worse than I imagined. I knew you couldn’t believe it when a food product is claimed to be “lite” or “low fat”, for reasons I’ve discussed here before. This new data just makes it even harder though to know how many calories you are consuming and what percentage of those calories are coming from fat. In a country where Type 2 Diabetes and obesity are on the rise, we need to do a much better job of
a) educating people how to eat sensibly and
b) making sure that food manufacturers accurately report what their foods contain
This should partly be the responsibility of the government, partly of the media (congratulations to Fairfax and Julie for getting this story out) and partly it lies with us, folks. We need to vote with our dollars. Perhaps someone should start a “website of shame” that highlights companies who aren’t giving us accurate information.
by cameron | Nov 23, 2006 | science, Uncategorized
From David Berlind over on ZDNET:
Judge Leonard Davis ruled that a patent granted in 1996 to the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Australia’s national science agency, is valid. The patent describes the implementation of several aspects of the 802.11a and 802.11g wireless standards developed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). The court also ruled that Buffalo Technology, a small maker of Wi-Fi routing gear, had violated this patent….
…..More than 100 companies could end up paying royalties to CSIRO for use of the technology, claimed Daniel J. Furniss, a partner at Townsend and Townsend and Crew, the law firm representing CSIRO.
I know people who know people at CSIRO. I’ll try and hook up someone for the show in the immediate future to get to the bottom of this. It seems that not only did CSIRO invent insect repellant, gene splicing and myxomatosis, they also invented wifi. Hot damn. Maybe they can explain why I can’t get my modded xbox to talk to my new netgear router and therefore have to waste lots of blank dvds to get the latest episodes of Weeds, Heroes and Studio 60 onto it.
by cameron | Nov 23, 2006 | Podcast, Uncategorized
In today’s news:
The Pew Internet and American Life Project said Wednesday that 12 percent of Internet users have downloaded a podcast, an increase from 7 percent earlier in the year.
However, only about 1 percent said they download a podcast on a typical day — unchanged from the survey earlier this year. The rest do so less frequently, perhaps only once.
link
I read this as “lots of upside”. 🙂
by cameron | Nov 22, 2006 | Uncategorized
That’s what Jerry Seinfeld had to say to Letterman’s audience during Michael Richards’ apology.
The full interview is now up on YouTube.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dufHYw-W6j4]
by cameron | Nov 22, 2006 | Uncategorized
God it shits me when the media in this country go apeshit over someone because of their sporting prowess. Ian Thorpe has retired from competitive swimming. Frak, with the blanket media coverage this morning you’d think peace had been declared in the middle east. Actually I don’t think that would get this much press.
Channel 7’s Sunrise show has declared it “Thorpe Day”. Get over it people. He can swim. Yeah – pretty fast. Great. Wonderful. Do you realize he kicks his feet for a living? That’s it. That’s his contribution to the world. Kicking his really big feet fast. Is this reason to get all slobbery over him like teenage girls at a Robbie Williams concert?
Bigger news this morning is that Robert Altman died aged 81. He directed 87 films and TV shows since 1951, including classics such as MASH, McCabe and Mrs Miller, Nashville, The Player, Short Cuts (I still fondly remember Julianne Moore’s full frontal doing the ironing)… oh and Popeye. Altman was Mr Ensemble. He had the ability to pull together a large cast of character actors and bring them together into a cohesive ensemble. If you haven’t seen those films, treat yourself this weekend.
by cameron | Nov 21, 2006 | Uncategorized
I do love a well-crafted headline… today’s winner is “This racism is making me thirsty.“, Ms Fits’ post on Michael Richards’ racist outburst from stage during his stand-up routine. I *still* haven’t been able to watch this on video. The link to AOL Video that Ms Fits has doesn’t work for me – you guys able to see this? Or find it on YouTube?
