da Scriffles

Broadband is not just infrastructure - it represents the hopes, the dreams, the survival and the future of young people, farmers, teachers, business people, entrepreneurs, students, the elderly, the sick.

It represents a creative nation which has been waiting to be born since the Keating Government was thrown out - along with the visionary Creative Nation policy. WASTE!

Before the Internet took hold, Paul Keating recognised the value of digital "CONTENT" and "CREATIVITY" in a digital economy.

So when I discovered Paul Keating was at the University of Queensland's Centennial Oration by Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz recently I had to ask why no one ever took up the Creative Nation vision since.

"They don't understand the information economy," he said.

Creative Nation talked about CD ROMs and such now replaced by websites and blogs and interactivity yet to be created and enjoyed - such as augmented reality. 

Creative Nation captured my imagination in 1994 - I was an arts reporter for the Courier-Mail furiously writing stories that almost snared Naisda away from Sydney to live in Brisbane's Powerhouse.

A lot of good gets thrown out when governments change - as public servants know.

As I listened to Communications Minister Stephen Conroy at a community meeting this week, I tossed around my objections to the silly idea of a general internet filter and my fear of losing the NBN - just like we lost Creative Nation. I don't know whether the Opposition's broadband policy will work. I do know that the NBN is underway. I believe it's as crucial to the future of this country as addressing climate change. 

I've waited for someone to come along again who could resurrect the Creative Nation vision. Now there's a chance - the National Broadband Network is that chance. Funny but ordinary people - like those at Stephen Conroy's community meeting at Mansfield State School - do understand the digital economy. They LIVE it! The loss of the NBN will be deeply felt by many. WASTE!

The Government's announced $11B Telstra deal  retrains all of Telstra's linesmen to work on broadband fibre optic instead of copper which is being pulled out of the ground.

The Government has even forked out for Telstra to meet its "universal service obligation" to provide equitable services to regional and isolated communities - THAT is impressive! 

We want migrants to move west don't we? Well they need infrastructure too to secure their future and become productive citizens. I'd move if there was broadband.

Telstra abhors the imposition of the universal service obligation because there's no profit - the deal protects Telstra shareholders! 

Considering Telstra's plummeting fortunes - people tossing in fixed lines (copper or the twisted pair) - this is like a lifeline, isn't it?

Conroy said the new broadband plans offered by Primus, Telstra, Optus, iiNet vary from $30-$130 for voice & data -  25 MB download speeds but only 3MB upload speeds.

Townsville, Albion, Ascot, Nundah, Toowoomba, Springfield Lakes as well as Armidale and Brunswick rollouts are next.  Townsville will be live in March-April.

The NBN workers continue the rollout despite the uncertainly of not knowing if they have jobs after Saturday - if a Tony Abbott Government is elected.

Are we a "young" and "vital" nation? It doesn't feel like it. ALL this negativity. WASTE!

Meanwhile, there's a school in Gladstone with kids learning Korean who are looking forward to video conferences with Korean classrooms - video conferencing requires fast upload as well as fast download which is not possible often on wireless, as being offered by the Opposition.

Creativity is forged by hardship but in the end there's got to be OPPORTUNITY. Jericho, Emerald, Darwin are on the same map as Sydney and Melbourne and Brisbane - the NBN map.

I guess I'm the only one who felt the loss of Creative Nation. I even kept the press release and book.

I DON'T want to hear about the debt Mr Abbott - I want to hear about investment in the future, in people, in infrastructure, in a Creative Nation which will pay it's debts by building a new economy.

Australians - are finally present. They have not spoken, they have issued a blood-curdling cry.

What all sides of politics should realise is that the CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER is the lack of attention to what's important - community, not individual, not personal, not party, interests.

There's evidence that Australians are thinking - thinking about the future. Independent for Kennedy, Bob Katter, has a 70pc swing of support.

Rural Australia is finally being heard but Mr Katter, Mr climate skeptic, the swing to the Greens means we - as a community - are worried about climate change.

One scrutineer found Family First preferences leaking to the Greens in the Queensland electorate of Forde.

The politicians are finally standing to attention before the nation.

This is a declaration of war - this revolution has just begun.

This sentiment is a groundswell that will change Australia in the next 10 years - five years ago, no politicians (let alone Bob Katter) talked about broadband.

Five years ago, the climate skeptics had the upper hand. "We" were "all" in denial.

Now, we have a 3.6pc swing to the Greens.

Ain't it grand Mr Abbott? Do you really think you can deliver stable government without addressing climate change and broadband?

If Australians are willing to think differently then I think it is incumbent upon our politicians to do the same.

NEW POLITICS. New media. New thinking. WE WANT UNPRECEDENTED for the GOOD of the NATION! Or...

The Big Kiss-off

Photographed the beautiful National Trust Property, the Eclipse Theatre, which sits on the New England Highway, Tenterfield. It sort of represents what the Country Independents care about. A cultural metaphor. Motorists speed past The Eclipse which nourishes her country just as the lovely Sydney Opera House nourishes Sydney. One of the movies shown recently at the Eclipse out there on the Queensland border was Twilight Eclipse. How's that for a cultural statement? Wonder what the National Broadband Network will do to the Eclipse Theatre? Could go digital, eh? Could be on an Australian architectural heritage trail? After all, Australia's a country, not a city now. Wink. Wink.

That's why we have seen the annunciation of Country Independents who have today anointed a Gillard Labor Government.

Wanted to publish Dorothea Mackellar's My Country - which I would have thought belonged to Australia not to "estate" - but they reserve the right to refuse use.

""Dear Lisa,

Thank you for your enquiry.

I have contacted the Estate regarding this permission. I will get back to you when I get a response.

Regards""" - - - 

"""Dear Lisa,

I have received notice from all of the beneficiaries and in this case they are not willing to grant permission. I am very sorry if you had your heart set on this but we must respect their decision.

Best wishes  ----- """ 

"

I often feel like a character out of a Jane Austen novel - rarely the heroine these days.

I know my character flaws and over the years I have tried very hard to be the "good", do the "right". If I were a character in a Charles Dickens' novel I would be the one who never got away with anything and was always required to "be good".

My belief is that life is not about actual "right". It's not about actual "good" because these are relative - you can be right all the time if you hang out with people who think like you do. You can all be wrong together. Just think of the climate change debate. Just look at the political reporting about the Labor leadership and Prime Ministership of Julia Gillard.

All the fuss over who said and who did what to whom boils down to nothing but hot air. I guess if you want to be remembered do something worthwhile, say something worthwhile. 

Do you think that Alexander The Great should be considered "great" just because he conquered the "known" world? Maybe. But it didn't last long - well, he died so he didn't have time to do anything, so I guess he's great. Does anyone know what benefits flowed from this "great" acheivement? So he used elephants! But he did add to the sum total of knowledge at the time and probably opened up new trade routes. You probably can find Greek pottery in India thanks to Alexander. Many a mere ordinary mouse appears to think themselves an Alexander these days.

I fear that today we don't examine this idea of "worthwhile" too much unless it applies to us personally. I won't be around when the Torres Strait Islands sink beneath the waves and the stars go black so I don't care. How many times have I heard a similar refrain? 

For some people, worthwhile is bringing up a family, for others it is cooking food for others, or teaching. It's all cool and awesome in my book. It's "great"! 

Maybe worthwhile is as simple as peace of mind, the ability to turn the other cheek and show compassion. That's not easy. The ABC recently screened a series by Jimmy McGovern called The Accused - you should catch it if you can. It is crazy amazing and awesome!

There's a norm and you've got to find it and conform otherwise ... I think this is the part in the Bible which refers to "the meek". The meek shall inherit the Earth, not the powerful, because it takes immense (great) strength to be meek.

Try not exploding over dinner with someone you have known forever who obviously has an axe to grind but does not say a word in order to apply the pressure - there's Dickensian bile.

If you manage to show compassion, or do something worthwhile,  six out of 10 times (that is a passing mark) people still tend to only count the four times you didn't turn the other cheek. Fat people must walk the plank along with old people, poor people, people of different races ... the list could go on depending on who you meet. 

Legislate all you like to stamp out discrimination but the Dickensian Truth of Humanity and the Darwinian Theories will prevail. 

Sydney University's Professor Paul Griffiths spoke at last year's Happiness Conference in Brisbane about Darwin's theory of Group Selection - he tried to explain how altruism flourishes in society.

Google this topic and all you get are academic/scientific abstracts - no wonder this kind of thinking does not pass into general knowledge. I can't think that a busy teacher would have time to read this stuff in a world saturated with information.

Prof Griffiths told the 2011 conference that Darwin's theory of Group Selection had been discredited but was again gaining credibility. A successful society co-operates. FACT.

So even though it appears that selfishness prevails in our society there are enough altruistic individuals in our midst to dissipate the selfishness. As altruism flourishes in one group, individuals break away to move to another group to seed the process again. Eventually, selfish groups should become extinct because they fail. See Libya, Syria... despotic regimes. 

The more I blog, the more I write, the more I am in awe of great writers like Charles Dickens who build the truth of the world in words. If I could have dinner with anyone alive or dead it would be Charles Dickens and Charles Darwin.

If only Charles Dickens were alive to provide the commentary on our rapidly transforming world today! Recognizing a Dickensian moment is possible but putting it down on paper with panache - that's something else.

Define "good", "worthwhile", "great", "awesome". Define "right". Then take your self-interest out of the equation and redefine it. Who says there is nothing left to explore?