ozanzac

A very humbling article indeed. Almost all of my local media's attention concerning the cartoons, Â has been of the 'flag burning mob' variety. There has been very little effort to report the feelings of the 'muslim man on the streets' towards both the cartoons, and of the resulting attacks on embassys. All that has been focused on is the violence that's ensued. As a result, the grumblings of the local community, and of western society in general, is of the 'bloody muslims causing trouble for the sake of causing trouble again' opinion. Freedom of speech, don't shoot the messenger, e.t.c., it maybe... But it just goes to show how much influence that the media has over swaying the general population.

In other news..... New candidate nominated for a Darwin award. What some will call a martyr, I'll call an idiot.

I've seen either a trailer to this movie at the cinemas, or saw a very crappy documentary pseudo movie on a pay TV channel, and turning such an event into a mainstream movie, is extremely disturbing, to say the least. Damn it. Enough of the patriotic flag waving factor in entertainment, already! If it has to be patriotic, it’s got to be comical, in a ‘Team America’ type sense. (Doubtful that anything remotely humorous could be incorporated into the Flight 93 story, but that’s what irks me; it’s a story far too serious to be touted as entertainment.) It's like the people who create these movies are either missing a conscience, take themselves and their nation far too seriously, or see the events as a propaganda bonanza. Or, a combination of all three!

Woo, 364 days til 2007! Might be a bit late, as I've only just woken up post BIG celebrations, but happy new year everyone.

I took a sneak at my presents, and alas.....It looks like santa delivered another christmas eve hangover. Jolly holidays everyone.

Interesting article, but not much more...... Except perhaps dated.

Freedom of speech is a given right to all people, no matter what the political climate, race, language, whatever. Unless there is a form of mind control that governs what sounds a person can produce from his or her mouth, then any human, can make any sound they want, or possibly can.... Nothing is literally stopping anybody, from saying anything they want. What stops people from saying whatever they want, is fear from the concequences. I could quite possibly dish out racial slurs to anyone I want, declare to every government in the world that I want to blow up the world and everyone on it, yell out 'Fire!' in a cinema, call my boss an incompetent fool or whatever. Nothing, other than my conscience, is stopping me from saying anything, but for various reasons, I fear the concequences of saying such things, or simply don't want to come off to people as an asshole. But if I don't fear the concequences, there are no limitations to what can be said. Whether or not people will give racists, extremists or whateverists the soapbox to stand on and shout rhetoric, and whether or not someone will attempt to shut anyone up via various means for any given rhetoric is an entirely different thing. But anyone can say anything about anything. The level of offense taken by others dictates what the concequences will be for that person as a result of what was said.

Hear, hear!

You're right, and they should have. But, the NSW Police don't actually have the power to do that, which is why the New South Wales Parliament has been recalled in order to give police greater powers to deal with racial violence. This should include the power to close bootle shops and pubs, the power to search and impound vehicles travelling in convoy, and removal of the right of bail for rioters, during times of unrest. Parliament will sit on Thursday to debate the new laws. Edit: And Eizei.........The Hoff.......Flat out no.

Without a doubt, the actions of those who took part in the riots on Sunday, was an absolute national disgrace. The NSW government had an entire week to plan for an enormous Police response, and while 100 or so Police were situated in Cronulla in the event of rioting, I doubt anyone saw it getting anywhere near as out of hand as it did on Sunday. Since then, the police presence has been ramped up even more, and any scenes similar to those seen on sunday would probably be dealt with much more diligently. The climax of the riots (so far) was on Sunday, where a crowd 5,000, who could only be described as 'drunk, racist, redneck, yobbos'; basically attacked anyone who 'looked more arab than aussie', without provocation. Those unfortunate enough to be targeted by the crowd had to be saved by Police, and were wisked away in ambulances under police guard. Retalitory attacks from youths of middle eastern decent came on Sunday night, and while Police did their best to stop troublemakers with roadblocks and identification checks, around a hundred cars were vandalised to various degrees, with reports of a few bashings, & most notably a stabbing. Monday night saw a crowd numbering in the hundreds surround a mosque in support of the muslim community, whilist youths once again caused significant property damage. John Howard's apparent refusal to acknowledge the riots as racially fueled, shows just how blind he is to the problems that started these riots. Ethnic gangs are as much of a problem in Australia as they are anywhere else, and the apparent bashing of two lifeguards, which are seen as an Aussie icon, last weekend by men of Lebanese decent, was the straw that broke the camels back, and erupted in the riots on sunday. The locals claim they are sick of being intimidated by the gangs, which would be partly right. Compound the problem with widespread general xenophobia, the various terrorist attacks by muslim extremists in which Australians have died, the fact that some cultures haven't assimilated into mainstream society as well as others, and the incidents where the media were targeted on the streets by associates of those caught in the terror raids during court hearings.....It was a timebomb waiting just waiting for a detonator. As for what comes next, it won't be suprising if more ugly scenes of rioting shed light next weekend, when the drunk yobbos are likely to come back out to play.

Wish you all the best with your business venture. Toyota sure were ahead of the times if they were producing Celica convertibles like that back in 1978! Anywho, keep the site updated, cause I'll be keen to come back once in a while.

Brings back memories of the downloadable version of 'Red Hammer' through Codemasters. But.... So long as I can buy a hardcopy CD / DVD & manual through my local gaming store, I couldn't care less if they released it via morse code, carrier pidgeons or whatever. There's only one way I intend to purchase my games, it's not via steam, or similar.

Correct me if I'm wrong... But aren't those F-14's the "downgraded" ones for export-version? As far as I know, the Iraninans recieved F-14A's with basically the same specifications as the run of the mill USN F-14A of the time, with TF-30-P-414 engines and the AN/AWG-9 weapons system. If there were differences, they were have been minor, with the ommision of classified equiptment. The AIM-54 missiles that were supplied, were slightly less capable than the American versions, and it's believed that departing Grumman technicians covertly disabled the Iranian F-14's ability to fire the Pheonix missile once the iranian revolution took place. In essence, there was no 'export' versions of the F-14, as it was never intended for export... The US prefering to export the F-15 instead.

Is the death penalty still warranted in first world nations? edit: Very weird post layout fixed.

Congratulations to you and your family, MilitiaSniper.

Police Officer ozanzac joined the fray, and took part in the beating of a zombie outside the Culling Auto Repair in Roftwood.... Supposed HQ for the new Malton PD. Now hiding inside for protection.

We(America) might hand out obsolete small-arms by the box full, but we don't sell multi-million dollar weapon systems to just anybody. It's not like we just tossed a Javelin to Afghani Rebels or handed some third-world nobody the keys to our Abrams. We don't even handle obsolete aircraft that liberally, much less the weapons that go on them. We also don't hand off weapons like that to someone who could easily end up as our enemy(READ: Unstable Governments). Judging by the hands we've seen Exosets in, the French Army is likely going to end up fighting it's own state of the art equipment someday. Yeah, the Iranian government was far more stable than the Argentinians when America handed over F-4's, F-14's, their associated weaponry and the Hawk SAM system....

Sounds like a childish over-reaction to me. Sure. I've hunted sparrows before. As a kid, I used to get $2.50 from my uncle for every sparrow I shot for him on his property, because they're regarded as pests come vintage. But to shoot it just because it knocked down some useless dominoes.... Talk about having a tantrum! It's a shame the sparrow didn't knock all the dominoes down, then shit all over them for good measure.

NFS: High Stakes has always been my favourite from the NFS series, but I was never pleased enough with the latest incarnations to go buy them. But...... I quite like the look of that 'Pursuit Duration' time! If it takes half an hour to get caught on one pursuit, then damn, I could see myself spending alot of time running from the law in this game!

It wasn't a tip off from the public. Wrong.... Read Avon's article find above. There's a hell of alot more to it than what's given in the mainstream headlines. [edit] Bugger it, I'll post the article for you. [/edit]

It's comforting to know the government acted before anything was allowed to happen..... Little Johnies 'Be alert, not alarmed' terror hotline seems to have worked!

He, he, he… The Hot Coffee content of GTA:SA, once discovered, went largely unnoticed by the Australian media, despite the fact the game was banned for sale & hire in Australia after the contents discovery. I didn’t even know it was banned until a month after it was banned! I haven’t bothered to check if it’s still purchasable in nearby gaming stores, but I’m dead certain I could purchase another copy under the counter in a matter of minutes. It is, however, quite concerning that such a change of face could happen after the game had already been released, and is quite symptomatic of the nanny state that Australia has become. What irks me is that MTV would have an equal, if not greater social impact (and that’s if there is any to begin with! than a violent or disturbing game, by turning a great percentage of teenage girls into mimicking the next nasty little slag to have a hit, and teenage boys into emulating jackasses, but does anyone really care about that? To be quite honest, the day the Nintendo generation penetrates politics in Australia will be the day that such quibbling over stupid matters such as the content within a game will end… A day that many of my generation would breathe a sigh of relief. Anywho, Maddox seemed to sum it up well here:

You could probably write the purchase off on tax too, as a 'work expendature'. Are those objects recycled engines? Very cool, the way they appear almost as plants in a greenhouse.

CNNNN...... Awesome TV!

Placebo, just out of interest (having run into posts of yours outside of this forum), of all the gaming forums you visit, how many posts have you amassed, and approximatly how many e-mails per day do you respond too from the average Joe Gamer? And of those posts, what percentage of them would be based on 'spreading the word' for BIS products? The fact I noted your presence 'outside' of these forums, kinda says you spend a hell of alot of time in forums, fufilling your PR / community liason role. Though I haven't yet made up my mind if what you do qualifies as work (you lucky bastard), I don't see too many other developer representatives active in other forums, so whatever it is you 'do', keep it up!