What's the German word for "the boner you get from too much Schadenfreude"? Speaking as an American expat living in NZ: fuck the US government and its thuggish international corporate rent-a-cop policies.

You and busyqth are both glass-half-empty sort of folks, aren't ya? Fair enough. My intended emphasis was on the requirement of electoral progress for politico-economic progress, in contrast to the Marxist-Leninist (big-c Communist) requirement of political violence. Violence it is then.

small-c communism is only possible with completely free and open elections and an informed, participatory electorate.

No, he means that the previous poster's defense of Sopa are the opening words of a text of a medieval manuscript or early printed book.

Citation needed. I can pull platitudes out of my ass too.

I don't see how that has anything to do with racism in modern Rastafari faith. Haile Selassie wasn't a Rasta either, but his positive (and anti-racist) influence on the movement is patently obvious. There are a vocal few who claim to follow Rasta who also propagate hatred against gay people and/or whites, but in general the movement is pacifistic and vehemently anti-racist. Garvey died in 1940, a time when the KKK still rode strong in the US. It's short-sighted to look at his beliefs through modern eyes, and it's equally short-sighted to paint modern Rastafari with the same brush.

Wow. That's an incredibly reductionist point of view. Never mind the fact that Garvey WASN'T RASTAFARIAN, and that Haile Selassie (considered the earthly manifestation of Jah[God]) frequently spoke out against racism. You might want to actually speak to a devout Rasta before smearing the faith with such a generalization. On second thought, reasoning with a Ras might force you to reconsider some of your misconceptions. Never mind.

Having lived in Thailand, land of software piracy and smiles, I can tell you that people there would rather buy a pirated disc, EVEN IF IT COST MORE than than the legitimate version. Thai-produced software is extremely inexpensive, but people are so used to buying knock-offs it's a force of habit. Not sure if that speaks to the point you were making but it's an interesting anecdote, AFAIC.

I seriously doubt there is a a writer in this day and age that possesses the linguistic skills Tolkien had. At least with the first 4 (oh wait, 5) movies there was a plot extant to diverge from. And it was obvious that Peter Jackson et al took more care making the cuts than some would have.

I expect the next several movies will an abortion of Star-Wars-esque proportions. Ooh, rhyme.

I don't doubt they've got a bad rep. However, they do sell data blocks if you exceed your monthly cap, and if you don't want to buy them they scale you back to "dialup speed". Off-peak time (2am-8am for my plan) is free, so that's when I schedule my torrent client, etc. As far as customer service goes, they've all been Kiwi so far. It's just a shame I've needed to call them so often!

I'm right smack in Auckland CBD. I can burn through my monthly data cap like shit through a goose. Woohoo.

Zo

Actually if you factor in the landline (who uses those anymore?) it's pushing $100 NZ. I've got a package for $80/mo. using a dedicated VoIP line. It's not a big savings, but it's better than nothing. The upside is that the speed's uncapped, so I get 12 mbps or so down. It's a big contrast with Thailand, where they don't really have data caps but the fastest DSL sub they offer is around 8 mbps, severely bottlenecked outside SE Asia.

Having recently moved to NZ, I'm still not used to having a 25 gig/month data cap, but at least my ISP (Slingshot) has taken a stance against the filter. We'll see how long that lasts. Having dealt with numerous account issues (overcharges, undercharges, VoIP issues, you name it) in the two months I've had it, I have a pretty dim view of their professionalism. At least I can reach an actual human being in customer service. They're usually quite polite and helpful (I make it a point to be also). Gotta give them kudos for that, at least.

Remarkably, yes. Coming from a couple years in Bangkok, where 2.5 mbit, unlimited access is around $40 NZ (25-30 US) from a monolithic turd of a monopoly. Despite blacklisting anti-monarchy sites, True Internet doesn't give a tinker's cuss how much bandwidth you use file-sharing. I was routinely over 200 gigs/month. 25 gigs/month here in Auckland is crippling!

As a recent immigrant to Auckland, I was actually surprised that there are so many companies to choose from. Not only ISPs but power and phone as well. Of course, I pay $80 NZ for a 25 gig monthly data cap with speeds up to 10-12 mbps, but off-peak hours are free...