the self-discovery adventure of Brett Taylor
Your Linguistic Profile: |
| 40% General American English |
| 35% Yankee |
| 20% Dixie |
| 5% Upper Midwestern |
| 0% Midwestern |
I couldn’t resist taking this test when I saw it; I like to consider myself somewhat au fait with the Queen’s English and its incongruencies. But I’m probably kidding myself… 
On a lighter note, I am really getting into my Subway sandwiches. So tasty. Here’s my current flavorite:
~ Chicken & Bacon Ranch ~
on a lightly toasted italian herbs & cheese roll
filled with melted mozzerella cheese
with lettuce, tomato, onion, gherkin, olives
topped in ranch sauce
sprinkled with salt & pepper
Mmm… so good. Can’t get enough.
I think John C. Dvorak, a prominent column writer for US PC Magazine missed the point of Creative Commons in his latest column. Did he even WATCH the flash animation? Has he read Free Culture? Screw him. He’s spreading FUD.
He would have learnt that Creative Commons is a way to grant everyone permission to use your works in certain ways without giving up your copyright, encouraging a world where you don’t have to hire a pack of rabid lawyers just to clear permissions. “Permission is already granted”.
Creative Commons is about encouraging creativity. Because creativity always builds on the past. But the past is wrapped up in red tape. So we have CC licences that allow those who would build upon your work to cut through that red tape.
It’s not hard to understand. Less Lawyers = Good Thing.
Sure, adding a CC licence to your blog might be ‘trendy’, and I can safely assume very few, people, if any, are going to take my blog posts and build something new and exciting from them. But what’s wrong with saying “I don’t mind if you do”, even if the chances of that happening are slim-to-none?
John C. Dvorak, I thought you were cool, working with Chris Pirillo on that book of yours and all. I do realise this is an opinion piece, but come on, it feels a bit premature. You really should do your damned research.
If you’re a New Zealander like me, you’ll probably know that there’s an election coming up, and good old Don Brash of the National Party, like so many politicians at election time, is advocating tax cuts. Apparently the Government can afford it, assuming they get rid of some of the less-important functions of the government.
Public Address have put together a handy little tax break calculator! You enter your salary, and punch in the percentages of tax you want to pay, and it tells you how much money per week you’ll be scoring. w00t! NZD$202 extra a week 
However, it goes forward to explain how much money it’ll need to recoup from giving the tax break to the nation. For me it was NZD$3,935 Millionbut luckily it goes on to offer suggestions of things it could get rid of, you know, to keep the government running smoothly. You know, the controversial things, like hip-hop tours, woman’s affairs, artist’s dole.
For example: Getting rid of the Wananga O Aotearoa? Sure, but what about all the students? — they’ll still be interested in tertiary education — onto student loans they go…
Largest 1-year funding the Wananga ever recieved: $239 Million
Cost of a third of ex-Wananga students going elsewhere: $220 Million
Net Money Recovered: NZD$19 Million.
Still to Recover: NZD$3,916 Million.
Ooo big savings. NOT.
Seriously, I think I can safely assume that National is unable to give a significant tax break. As the fellows at Public Address said:
There’s a word for that, and it’s nothing so prim as “baloney.”
For the record, I’m happy with how I’m being taxed. Maybe the rich should be taxed more, and the poor taxed less. What do you think?
So several crazy things happened this week:
So yeah, pretty weird up and up week. It’s nice when things seem to be turning out for good!