This situation playing out in the Northern Hemisphere and USA in particular is worth being mindful of. https://bnonews.com/index.php/2024/04/4-...n-the-u-s/

So for some time now my fibre only has a 100mb download speed, even though I got an email some time back saying that my fibre had been upgraded free of charge to 300mb download speed.
After calling them, they made some excuse that my line is not on Chorus, but ultrafast fibre and the lines they manage dont provide those speeds yet and some other vague reason, i gave up in the end.


I gave up worrying about it in the end as i was getting by at 100 all this time, but my parents live just round the corner and i tested their speed recently and found they were getting 300!
Still didnt have the time to chase them up and ask this, but by now I get a call this week from their sales team and it turns out they had set me up with a business account unbeknown to me all this time!
I bought up the subject about my download speeds and they told me right away that thats not right what I was told.
He said to call 888 and you will get someone based in NZ who can help, so i did that and this was at the end of the day, but they still sorted out the issue within minutes.

Turns out that my ONT has an issue and he could see at his end that it was throttling down to 100megs.
He then told me he was going to get ultrafast fibre to switch the ONT port over to a different port and get me to switch the ethernet cable over, all this done in the matter of 10mins after putting the phone down with them, notified in a txt message when complete.
Worked a treat after that, typically ive had to wait days in some cases for this with regular household customers for this sort of thing.

Just goes to show how these telcos treat business over residential customers.
Here all this time i would call their regular 0800 number and get their overseas call centre and not a single member told me I was a business customer and to call their business team.
Im not complaining, but it still sucks that i have been given the run around all this time, not only on the phone, but in store too!
Its almost like you have to tell these guys how to do their job, but they dont listen, even though you know more about the issue than they do.

Feel a bit sorry for residential customers who dont have access to the priority service, once upon a time like 20+ years ago, everybody got the same customer service.
It feels like im in an exclusive club or something lol

Greens can get stuffed and Act is putting them in their place.
This country used to have 70 million sheep,now down to only 25 million but that's still not good enough for them?
How do they think they can reduce methane without reducing animals?
If their plan is to remove animals then that won't help our economy will it?
Or taxing the poor farmers will make our weather better won't it, meanwhile making food unaffordable?
Now national are proposing genetic engineering as the solution which I'm not too keen on along with methane inhibitors etc, but they asked for it.

For anyone who saw the recent TV series about this dire situation, this is interesting - especially the fact that someone who worked for the Post Office for 20 odcd years 'can't  recall' much of it.



https://www.bbc.com/news/live/business-68893655

Quote:We're soon going to be pausing our live coverage of the Post Office inquiry. But before we do, here's a recap of some of the evidence we heard today from Angela van den Bogerd, who spent 35 years working for the Post Office and was a senior director during the Horizon scandal:

    She began with an apology to former sub-postmasters and postmistresses, saying she was "truly sorry for the devastation caused to you, your family and friends"
    Van den Bogerd maintained that she wouldn't knowingly do anything wrong and blamed Fujitsu for not being transparent about the faults with its Horizon software
    The inquiry counsel showed her a number of emails and documents, starting in 2010, that discussed the ability for Fujitsu staff to remotely access Post Office branch accounts through Horizon. But she argued that she either didn't see the correspondence or didn't fully register what it meant until years later when the scandal came to a head
    Asked about her denials of any fault with Horizon when BBC's Panorama covered the story in 2015, van den Bogerd said she was true to the findings of the investigation by forensic accountants Second Sight
    On the topic of that investigation, she said it was not her understanding that the Post Office wanted to remove Second Sight because it was "too independent" and denied knowledge that she was picked to head investigations in its place
    She also said she could not remember being told that Fujitsu's Gareth Jenkins - who was ditched as an expert witness from Post Office prosecutions - had given "tainted" evidence

The largest independent supermarket in NZ has opened in Hamilton. Started by an Indian man who had only $2000 to his name when he arrived here from India.



https://www.waikatotimes.co.nz/nz-news/3...s-hamilton

Quote:The new supermarket, a concerted initiative between the building’s owner John Sinclair and Thakkar, will offer everything from deli, meat, produce, grocery, and other essentials.
But the grocers will personally be procuring the supplies and stocking as it is an independent store.
“If you go through a franchisee with certain groups like Progressive (Enterprises) or Foodstuffs, we get stocks directly supplied through them.
“But now, being independent, we have to organise the supply.”
However, it also meant more varietyfor customers as they were not tied to one supplier.
“There are so many different ranges of product which is not available in the supermarket that we're going to introduce in our store.”
The supermarket was tailored to “cover the requirements” of Nawton residents, Thakkar said.
“But gradually, once people start buying, we’ll get a better idea of what more is needed here.

Miserable, narrow minded, bigoted bullies. And no doubt this will be seen by the McBishop & his followers as a victory.
I hope this group are successful, because if not then this lot will continue to try to restrict anyone & anything they don't happen to approve of.


And I'm not an expert on the law, but I wonder whether or not this might count as restricting their civil liberties. Specifically the right to be free from discrimination.

https://www.howtolaw.co/know-your-civil-...%20seizure



https://www.msn.com/en-nz/news/national/...45e5&ei=17

Quote:The ultimate action in anti-bullying': Rainbow storytime group targeted by Brian Tamaki cancels tour
A rainbow storytime group targeted by Destiny Church leader Brian Tamaki and supporters is cancelling its nationwide tour to focus on court action. 
Events in Rotorua and Gisborne were shut down amid continuous protest activity by Tamaki's supporters, which also saw Gisborne's rainbow crossing vandalised. 
In a Facebook post, Rainbow Storytime NZ, comprised of Erika Flash [drag queen Daniel Lockett] and Coco [founder Sunita Torrance], said it was "very upset and disappointed" to cancel the nationwide tour planned for later this year. 
"We had an entirely new show ready to go with new books and new songs and new costumes. 
"We know there will be MANY sad kids and parents out there but with the current climate and ERIKA FLASH now staying on in London, we are going to press pause on everything we are doing." 
The Facebook post said they would focus their energy on taking "that hateful, icky group to court to try and create more widespread change in Aotearoa". 
The pair told Newshub last month they were planning to take legal action against Tamaki and are fundraising for the fight.
"This is the ultimate action in anti-bullying and the ultimate message of what our Storytimes are about so we want to do our best!" 
Rainbow Storytime NZ said it was determined to do another tour next year once it had time to regroup.

And about time,too. Finally commonsense has returned & the idiotic law from 1864 stands a good chance of again becoming history. Republicans had tried to make it law once again but three of them have apparently regained some sanity & voted to repeal it.



https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68891522

Proof at last, from a nine year old boy...


Humans are crazy..

https://www.itv.com/news/calendar/2024-0...-in-europe

If this science stacks up, i remain skeptical, but its being developed by an experienced NASA engineer.
Electrostatic forces is what the major discovery is surrounding this, but we all know what happened with EM-Drive, this might be different.
https://interestingengineering.com/innov...of-physics

There seem to be several difficulties with this not so brilliant idea. They just seem to have been in too much of a rush to appear tough & haven't bothered with the details.



https://www.stuff.co.nz/politics/3502549...ng-patches

Quote:"Through the Gangs Legislation Amendment Bill, the Government planned to introduce four new powers to “crack down” on gangs:

1. Making it illegal to wear gang insignia in public.
   
2. Giving police powers to force suspected gang members to disperse.
   
3. Giving district courts powers to make “non-consorting orders”, so “specific gang offenders” cannot communicate for three years.
   
4. Making gang membership an aggravating factor at sentencing.
   

The gang insignia ban and restrictions on communication and congregation have raised significant human rights concerns because the Bill of Rights Act protects freedom of expression and association. These gang laws could be used against people who have not been convicted of another crime, creating their own offences.
Lawyers also said gang membership was already an aggravating factor in sentencing.

If patches and insignia were banned, he expected “gang signs” to become a main identifier of gang members. Robinson showed the committee one sign which was already in use as a gang sign, but in sign language meant “I love you”.

“Imagine a world where we were attacked for using that sign in the wrong space,” he said.
"Overseas, deaf people have died as a result of this... I am concerned you will create a problem here in New Zealand. So I ask the committee to stop the bill to protect our community.“

The Law Society's Chris Macklin said the bill should be withdrawn and sent "back to the drawing board".

He and other lawyers, as well as the Free Speech Union, cast doubt on Government arguments that similar measures had been successful in Australia. He said the studies offshore showed in many cases gangs continued operating underground, and became harder to identify.

Civil liberties campaigner Thomas Beagle said this would “create a new class of New Zealanders with fewer rights”.

Pointing out the gang list could be changed fairly easily, he asked: "Who will be the next group classified as a problem?“

“This bill is rotten right the way through. I am disappointed it has got this far in a rights-respecting nation,” he concluded."