Sorry Mr Cynical, read about this this morning (Australia time) on the front page of a 'popular news' site...
The Age
But please don't let me get in the way of a good anti-establishment rant...

Unfortunately I agree with you completely in principle, but your arguments aren't really correct...
a) We can do things about water. Such as Federalising Murray Darling water rights so that they aren't overallocated by the states, or stopping Australians farming water-heavy products like Cotton in dry areas.
b) Umm, can't do anything? Well you could adjust the tax differential between owner-occupied land and investment properties so there is lower demand for investment properties?
c)Agree with nuclear - people need to just grow up and accept that it's not like Chernobyl anymore! And nuclear is WAY better for the environment than the coal we currently use!
d)INTERNET IS AWESOME! Yeah, I agree with you in principle but some of your arguments were a bit off.

Finally - your last paragraph. Ironically, the Sydney NBN office is based just over the bridge in North Sydney - point in case?

Well, you're in luck, two fold!
a) I've done the research you couldn't be bothered to (google is so complicated, I know), to find out that there has indeed been an indication of minimum speeds!
a) as pointed out here, satellite and wireless are expected to be 12mbps (at peak usage, so a 'real' 12mbps). I've read a more authoratitive source than that, but I couldn't be bothered doing more research for you. Oh, and finally - I also read somewhere that optical will be cross subsidising satellite and wireless to the extent that Australia wide, you will be paying the same cost for xGB downloads on a 12mbit plan. The only difference between wireless & satellite is that higher bandwidth plans won't be available.

Actually, what's more interesting is the manner in which she was appointed (as opposed to elected). Internal party politics ousted Kevin Rudd, and appointed Gillard in his place - a few months before a likely Federal election.
It's in interesting idea!

I drink a lot of wine, with a wide range of prices, and disagree.
While it certainly isn't a linear relationship to price, or indeed certain, I have had a lot of very expensive wine which I am more than happy to pay for because I can taste the difference.

I can find a $15 I like and drink, a $30 a love and drink a lot, and a $70 I savour and purely enjoy. The >$300 bottles I've had (not paid for by me, I'm a young professional supporting a student wife!), are usually better than the lot - just not (say) 10 times better than the $30 bottle.

To translate into geekspeak: a top of the line i7 processor might cost 10 times what a midrange 775pin would cost, but doesn't perform the same as 10 of the cheaper processor. Indeed, the majority of users (i.e. browsing & word processing) may not notice the difference.
But some people who are into their computers will definitely notice the difference, and will pay the extra.
I know the metaphor isn't perfect, but you get the gist.

All of that being said - aging wine can be a bit of pot luck unless the conditions are perfect.

Were you drunk when he told you?
Because a *lot* of things sound 'reasonable' when you're drunk. Such as stripping naked and burying your sleeping bag (with you in it) in the middle of a sports field right before a big game.

So... yeah...

Whilst I agree with your comment that it won't deplete fresh water, your implication that it won't have a significant environmental impact is 'ridiculous, short-sighted, and causes more harm than good'.

Marine ecology is actually highly sensitive to salinity in the water - and this process increases relative salinity in the water. Whilst this won't affect the volume of fresh water available for human use, it will have significant impact on marine life living in the unique ecosystem that exists at a rivers mouth.

Rivers typically also wash a huge amount of nutrients into the ocean (from runoff, natural effluent and the like) - I have no idea how / if these plants will affect these nutrients, but as anyone who has ever fished at a river mouth will know, salt water fish follow that leading edge of 'brown' water to feed off the food washed down by it.

There will be an impact and - similar to Australian plans to pipe fresh water from parts of Australia with plenty to those parts with very little - there seems to have been very little analysis into the impact on marine ecology, and until that has been done, one can't say there won't be any impact. Why do people forget the fishies?!

Ummm you're a bit late... I think your counting should be closer to -32,768

A statistician friend of mine pointed me to a study (that I have now lost) which showed some very interesting figures.

The premise showed that basically, if you selected 100 investment portfolios at random (possibly with some basic rules, I'm not sure), exactly the same proportion would exceed to the same extent as if you the proportion of stock brokers who beat the market.

The point is, if you missed it, that successful investors are no more than stastical effects :)

Now, in reference to 'plenty of economists & analysts were predicting the impending doom', a lot weren't. Pick ANY situation, and you'll have plenty of analysts predicting both ways - and the ones who turn out to be correct are invariably labelled insightful, when no doubt a lot of them are just lucky.

Completely legal here - in fact, a lot of ISPs use it as a sales tool - they provide cheaper internet if you bundle it with their VoIP service to replace your home phone.

VoIPs becoming fairly widespread these days - many big companies especially are using it, and a growing proportion of home users.

When I was selling vacs (no, not door to door, my uni job was @ an upmarket department store), there were basically three ways of measuring power, in ascending order of relevance, and also the number of people (including sales people) who new about them:

• Motor power (watts). Doesn't tell you much at all.
• Suction power at motor (watts). Better, but doesn't factor in inefficiencies like bag & hose length
• Suction power at nozzle (watts)- best! But then things like nozzle size can obviously affect the actual suction power.

Most people didn't really know the difference, and many companies didn't publicise the last one because (a) people are dumb and might think 200 watt nozzle suction is worse than 1500watt engine power, and (b) because it'd show their machines are crap.

Example - dysons when I was selling them had lower engine power than, say, hoover(1200 vs 2000 watts iirc), but had comparable or higher suction power because the suction didn't need to get through the walls of a bag & a bunch of filters.

End my 2 cents.

An article in an Australian newspaper pointed out that it's costing us more to build a new ticketing system for public transport in Melbourne than it cost to send the Pheonix Lander to mars.
Quite amusing, really!