An ongoing list of interesting internet stuff
This is going to become a list of cool, interesting stuff which I discover on the internet daily (although, I will be much slower until I get a steady flow of traffic to the site). For some time, I have shared these kinds of things with people at websites such as Reddit and Newsvine... however, I would prefer to give them to folks on my own website. I hope you find them as delicious as I have. Please note that the article links are in the black text below and to the left of each block. The large brown title text will lead you to a page where you can comment on the article, if you feel led to do that.
- This is a 24 hour internet stream of "Radio Australia" - from the Australian Broadcasting Company (ABC)
This is a fascinating discussion which I found on an Australian public radio website about Bhutan. GNH (Gross National Happiness) is a very central concept in how the Bhutanese people choose to forge their society's future. And it's great to see that Australians are forward thinking enough to see the power of this idea.
While other countries pursue "Gross National Product" - the Bhutanese will be looking for "Gross National Happiness." I'll leave it to you to conclude who will be more successful at achieving fulfilled and happy lives.
This is a fascinating extended interview with Alan Alda on the Australian public broadcasting network - ABC - on their "Elders" series. This is a really thorough piece. I have come to appreciate the value in public broadcasting from different parts of the world. It's fascinating to me also to watch the interviewer's expressions. He's a great interviewer, but I can tell that he doesn't know how to personally connect with Alda - there's an unfair judgement about Alda's character and mindset which is pretty evident from the reticence in his expression.
I always have really admired Alan Alda. His ideas and approach to life really I see as insightful, and I see him as a great role model.
I was just chuckling tonight listening to this interview with a big name television morning show host in New Zealand - Oliver Driver.
You would never see a person who is as professional as this, hired for a morning show program in the Usa. This guy has a background of a theatre person. And here, he's talking about a project where he's talking about putting actors on salary.
You can watch Oliver Driver's morning show here.
This is a very interesting interview with a New Zealand educator in a secondary school who is talking about a way in which he deals with bullies in the classroom. Basically, he gets a team together which involves two of the worst bullies, and two of the more popular kids who hadn't been doing anything about the problem before that point. Those four people are an "undercover" team which is instituted to resolve the problem of bullying in the classroom.
He's had a 100% success rate with 27 teams which he has set up like this, over the years.
The reason this is something that's on the news in New Zealand, is because New Zealanders don't have this belief that is prevalent in the Usa where it's thought that there are a group of bad and irredeemable people out there, who are genetically predisposed to bad behavior.
New Zealand has a much tamer frame of reference which says that people may have bad character, but that character can change over time.
These are some fascinating three dimensional images of Japan before world war II. One popular thing at the dawn of photography was a little viewer called a stereoscope. People would take two photographs at the same time, and then you would be able to see the scene in 3d.
Somebody had the bright idea of just creating animated gif images with these old photos - where the picture switches back and forth between the two. This effectively gives you a conception of 3 dimensions, although it is a bit dizzying at first.
This is a very fascinating interview conducted by a woman by the name of Catherine Clark who is the daughter of a former Canadian Prime Minister: Joe Clark. She is interviewing another child of a Canadian prime minister - Justin Trudeau; Pierre Trudeau - Justin's father - was one of the most charismatic prime ministers Canada has had in recent decades. He was something like a Barack Obama figure, actually.
It's a very interesting interview to watch - because the social dynamic is pretty unusual - to have one of child of state interviewing another.
- Watch the interview at CPAC (as long as it is available)
This is an excellent extended interview which shows a glimpse into the daily life of this man.
New Zealand is a very unique kind of place. There is a big debate right now about changing the name of a city so that it's more faithful to the original native name which was used. The city is Wanganui... and the decision has been to change it to Whanganui. The extra "h" is significant because it effectively should change the pronunciation from a "W" sound to an "F" sound (although apparently it won't, for now).
There was a 77% vote of the citizens of the town in favor of keeping the original name. However, apparently the edict has come down from on high, that the name will be changed.
Imagine if the government of the state of Washington or the federal government of the Usa would order the city of Seattle to change its name to "Sealth" so that it is more faithful to the native name of the chief for whom the city was named.
The mayor of Wanganui (Michael Laws) has been adamantly opposed to the name change. New Zealand government policies seem to involve a lot of power vested in the federal goverment which tends to override the right for communities to have self-determination. For example, another big event happening currently is that Auckland is extending its boundaries to encompass a lot of outlying areas. Again, the citizens of those districts are not allowed to choose whether they will join Auckland or not. The federal government is making the decision for them.
I think a name change from Wanganui to Whanganui is really irrelevant when it comes to the interests of the Maori being served. If they honestly want to honour the treaty of Waitangi, the best way to do that in my view, would be to give a portion of land back to the Maori and make a separate nation - independent of New Zealand. But if you aren't going all the way and doing what needs to be done when it comes to righting the wrong of the europeans having stolen the land - I think that you need to generally honour the right of self-determination of the people who populate that area, today.
I always follow the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation podcasts for some of the best food for thought available today. Paul Kennedy is one of the best hosts with his "Ideas" show. This is a very thought provoking hour long debate at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.
Many people who are bleeding hearts and want to help others and who feel so guilty when not enough is done - often have poor judgement with how they are trying to help those who receive their aid. I have visited many a homeless shelter, for example, which is run by a very strained and odd set of ideas about what is ethical and what is constructive in terms of their assistance programs.
This includes Dambiss Moyo, who is a Zambian who gives a wonderful first hand account of what she sees occurring around aid which is distributed in Africa. She is very adamant that what is needed is investment and development, rather than the aid which breeds corruption. One thing she pointed out in this debate was that governments in Africa don't provide public services. That job is done by aid organisations instead. This is such a powerful effect that one of her friends who was talking about elections joked that they should be voting between aid organisations, rather than choosing between candidates for government.
Hernando de Soto was another speaker here, and he pointed out a realisation that we have forgotten on the dusty pages of history books somewhere. Hundreds of years ago, we had big debates about property rights in the West. Now, these days we have these fools who call themselves "libertarians" who misinterpret all this historical literature. They have a specter of big bad government in mind, and fret when someone in town loses their property to an eminent domain claim by the state. Indeed, what folks in olden days were talking about when they addressed property rights was a fact about economics. You can't have a functioning economy, without the investments being backed by assets. He was particularly angry about what has been done to the Native Americans in the Usa. They're stuck in a 19th century treaty agreement in which they have dead assets. Their land cannot be sold or used in ways which other land outside reservations can be. It cannot be used to back investments.
So the lesson is that people who care about others need to really have their ears open to those who have experienced the hardship which they are concerned about.
The munk debate on the proposition: Foreign aid does more harm than good - (mp3 - 25 megabytes - one hour)
