Tutorial Task. Getting Political.

Well starting off, I signed an E-Petition protecting Australian citizens from the death penalty. It can be found here.

Next, I found a story on Kevin Rudd announcing the two next Australian Ambassadors for USA and European communities (such as Luxembourg and Belgium) will be Kevin Beazley and Brendan Nelson respectively. I found the story on the Sydney Morning Herald's website, and it was the story I chose to comment on . I lightly commented:

"I find it interesting that Kevin Rudd has appointed a former 'liberal' opposition leader. I knew there was something else with Nelson when he announced his plans to step down 2 - 3 weeks ago. I do like him, just not as a leader. Kim Beazley on the other hand - well, as Ambassador for USA, I 'm skeptical. He has always seemed full of wind to me."

As of writing, my comment is waiting approval but it can be found here.

Going off a news report that was issued only 45 minutes ago (according to Google News) Barack Obama is today denying that much of the opposition he faces from his administrations ideas and policies concern peoples issues of him being black. I woke up this morning to this report on my radio and it got me up out of bed quickly. Racial intolerance makes me sick. Nevertheless, I had imagined Obama's election would face a lot of pressure from racial issues and as the first black man as President - but it in the beginning, it really wasn't so. Only now it seems it's becoming an issue. Pathetic.

My local representative is Cr. Ian Mackensie. My state representative (for Greenslopes) is Cameron Dick, a member for the Australian Labor party. His last address was on September 3rd at 4:27pm and it was titled the Victims of Crime Assistance Bill. My federal representative is Anna Bligh.

And concerning the essay topics, I've narrowed it down two questions: Number 1 and Number 3. Number 1 concerns discussing Marc Prensky's and Dave Weinberger's texts on contemporary internet uses, and comparing them while using specific examples - more closely an essay. Whereas Number 3 seems more relevant to me and less academic; it concerns the discusion of new digital technologies making it easier for amateurs and yet harder for professionals.

And as for what Adam has asked: I don't like the idea of a "Clean Feed". Familiarising myself a little more with the concept, I found a British website that went into depth with the implications such a system would have on users and internet flow. I can understand that there is a lot of indecent material on the internet, relating to the concern of child pornography and anarchic info and resources for terrorists etc. but to put in place what is effectively a 'federal firewall' - it would cause us far more anguish than benefit. Firstly, my experiences with a complete network firewall originates from my days in high-school. The system didnt work. There was too much blocking of legitimate websites, and far less 'illicit' websites that were not even picked up. On a federal scale, it would be messy and counter-productive. All we need to do is really take a look at China - who has what is essentially a federal firewall or clean feed. Besides the problems I've already mentioned, a clean feed leads to censorship issues, and in China, a Communist nation, where the Government tells people what they can and can't look at, this poses a serious problem for people, particularly Democratic people such as ourselves. The people lead the Government, the Government doesn't lead the people - in a democratic nation, censorship leans closer to the latter. In that light, censorship has no place in a Democratic society.