Sharing a thought on Internet censorship which landed on my desk.....

Oi! Senator Conroy - it's September already. Where's that promised report on your Internet filtering trial?

Colin Jacobs in The Australian this week Conroy won't tame 'wild west' web

A brief history of Australian Internet censorship proposals at Libertus.

If Frank Sartor becomes the next NSW premier......

If 'Cranky Frankie' Sartor were to become Premier of New South Wales then I would seriously have to consider voting for a (gulp) Nat at the next state election!

Nonimouse
James Creek

Guest Speak is a North Coast Voices segment allowing serious or satirical comment from NSW Northern Rivers residents.
Email ncvguestpeak at live dot com dot au to submit comment for consideration.

Iluka hotel denies donation purchased jetty rights

Sedgers Reef Hotel emphatically denies a rumour that its $50,000 dollar donation to Clarence Valley Council gives it mooring rights for hotel patrons on the jetty being built adjacent to this hotel.

The Daily Examiner, 28 August 2009, p.3

Baby Boomers: keeping dementia in mind

On Tuesday Alzheimers Australia released a report by Access Economics Keeping Dementia Front of Mind: Incidence and Prevalence 2009 - 2050.

This report highlights the fact that by 2050 1.1 million Australians are expected to have been diagnosed with some form of dementia and by 2020 there will be an estimated 75,000 baby boomers with dementia.

"Every week there are more than 1,300 new cases of dementia. By 2030 there will be more than 3,600 and by 2050, about 7,400 new cases each week. The dementia epidemic is here. Dementia is a fatal disease and as yet there is no cure.".....

Dementia is predicted to become the third greatest source of health and residential aged care spending within two decades, costing 1% of GDP based on Australian Institute of Health and Welfare calculations.

"If current trends continue through to 2060 spending on dementia will outstrip that of any other health condition, reaching $83 billion (in 2006-07 dollars) and representing around 11% of all health and aged care expenditure.

Probably time we baby boomers started thinking of the best way to avoid becoming one of these cited statistics and learn all about those health measures which can be adopted to lessen the possibility that it will be us who will suffer from Alzheimers or another dementia of old age.

Executive Summary - Keeping Dementia Front of Mind: Incidence and Prevalence 2009 - 2050

Report Keeping Dementia Front of Mind: Incidence and Prevalence 2009 - 2050

Appendices - Keeping Dementia Front of Mind: Incidence and Prevalence 2009 - 2050

'Keystone' Keelty goes out on the heels of yet another bungle

AFP Commissioner Mick Keelty must wonder why his last day as head of the Aussie federal police will not be remembered for praises sung in his honour, but instead for the fact that a national security breach became very public and his force was placed in the position of trying to deny that it had a surveillance plane with heat seeking technology.
It seems no-one in the AFP thought to tell Vic police that this small plane was a s-e-c-r-e-t.
Just another blunder to remind us all of the many which occurred under his watch.
Over to you, Tony Negus....

The Herald Sun has all the laughs here.

Another APN newspaper gets it in the neck from ABC TV 's Media Watch

ABC TV Media Watch on 31 August 2009 featured an assessment of last Saturday's Tweed Daily News exploitative front page, which targeted a vulnerable person with a disability and allegedly resulted in that person's hospital admission.

Media Watch received no answer when it contacted Tweed Daily News with the usual invitation to supply justification.

What could the newspaper say? After all: by taking advantage of the confusion and distress of an ordinary person; by needlessly identifying him in a frontpage photograph and exposing him to condemnation, ridicule or gossip; by focussing on the supposed alarmed reaction of its female journalists; the newspaper was only obeying APN News & Media's Readers First guidelines which in practice pander to ignorance and dumb down the news.

With circulation figures and advertising income the principal drivers for this 'new' journalism, what better way to boost its supposed Saturday circulation of 10,000 sold papers than having a full monty on Page One.

The Media Watch presenter called the 120 year-old Tweed Daily News a wretched little rag.

Perhaps he should have also taken APN to task for the very flawed publication philosophy it has foisted on its editors, may of whom cannot always walk the frequently fine line between exploitative and ethical news reporting.

Daily Examiner editor leaves the building: don't slam the door on the way out