Category: General

Goodwin’s Law

Billy/ / Evolution in reverse hypothesis, Free Speech, General, Questions with obvious answers

Anyone with more than 5,000 followers on Creepbook for Business is most likely to be a purveyor of vacuous bollocks.

Followers, rather than connections. And there’s a clue in that adjective; these charlatans rely on the ovine nature of many users of the networking site electronic Rolodex of people you met at work.

Obviously, Goodwin’s Law is not to be confused with Godwin’s Law, which states:

“As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches”. That is, if an online discussion goes on long enough, sooner or later someone will compare someone or something to Adolf Hitler or his deeds, the point at which effectively the discussion or thread ends.

Goodwin’s Law is, instead, named after this prolific onanist, Tom Goodwin. As well as posting his utter shite on Creepbook for Business, he liberally sprays his brain diarrhoea on Twitter, here.

From what one can gather by a quick MBA at the University of Duck Duck Go, he’s a British expat living in the Miami area.

As an aside, speaking as someone who also has an English accent and has spent time working in the USA, it isn’t hard to understand the reason behind an element of his success: many Americans, bless ’em, seem to assume a magical extra 20 IQ points just because someone sounds a bit like Hugh Grant. Fair enough if he’s leveraging that advantage.

What type of bollocks does Tom Goodwin spout?

Well, there’s this drivel, replete with supernumerary apostrophes:

Sometimes he comes up with insightful business ideas like these two niche opportunities which might be already be filled by things called “hotels”, “taxis“, Airbnb and Zip Car:

Sometimes, after a few glasses of Paul Masson rosé, we are lucky enough to gain an insight in to The Tao of Tom, such as this deep enquiry into the human psyche:

Bill’s Opinion

When somebody posts this type of tosspottery into your LI timeline, do yourself a favour; click the three little dots to the side of their name and select, “unfollow but stay connected“.

Repeat until the pollution ceases.

If Tom Goodwin (or Brigette and Oleg) can make a coin from this nebulous wankery, best of luck to him. After all, the effort and cost is minimal, it only requires suspension of the duty of care for his soul.

How long have you got?

Billy/ / Australia; Frontier Nation, General, Questions with obvious answers

  1. Underarm bowling.
  2. Ansett Airways.
  3. Russell Crowe.
  4. Pavlova.
  5. Crowded House.
  6. Welfare tourism.
  7. Phar Lap.
  8. Raising the IQ of both countries.
  9. Four more years, boys.
  10. Brenton Tarrant.

Bill’s Opinion

Frankly, it’s a wonder the two countries aren’t already at war.

Actually, it’s not; New Zealand has evolved into a thumb-sucking safe space for virtue signalling purple-haired wokistanis who value feelings over facts.

We should offer asylum to Buck Shelford and his generation of All Blacks. They must surely not recognise Head Girl, Jacinda’s country:

Pole Position Patronising

Billy/ / General, Hashtag Diversity, Identity Politics

Motorsports don’t float my boat; I would rather repeatedly slam my dick in a drawer for an hour instead of expending time and money to watch other people drive around a track.

However, some people must think it has merit.

Consequently, there’s an event in the USA called The Daytona 500. Cars, driving around a track for a long time, that kind of thing.

Fascinating, I’m sure.

Quite rightly, the sports network, ESPN, report on it.

Here’s an article, for example:

The headline may confuse you. Let me explain; a driver, who happens to be of a particular ethnicity, was briefly in the lead in a 200 lap, 800 mile race. He subsequently finished 17th.

This, apparently, is historic and very much worthy of being written about on a global sports website.

Bill’s Opinion

Is it possible to write a more patronising and condescending article?

I don’t know anything about Bubba Wallace (see my admission above about how uninterested I am in motor sports) but, if he’s like every adult human I’ve ever met, I imagine he would be hugely embarrassed by this article.

Perhaps the only way this would have been more infantilising would be if ESPN had created a special participation award for Bubba’s 1 in 200 lap lead.

In 2021, we are constantly chided for our apparent racism by the sort of people who write these articles. Yet it has seemingly never crossed the author’s mind that, by treating Bubba Wallace like a small child participating in a Primary School sports day, they are demonstrating extreme racism; the racism of low expectations.

I sincerely wish Bubba all the best and hope he one day learns how to drive fast enough to beat drivers of other ethnicities.

I won’t be watching the race though, as I have an urgent appointment with a chest of drawers.

You’re all winners!

Jenna Hates MOPs

Billy/ / Australia; Frontier Nation, Gender Politics, General, Incentives Matter, Jenna hates..., Too much government

Today’s target of stern disapproval is a piece of legislation that performs no function other than enabling Ministers to hire staff.

The emerging facts as we know them:

Yet another Liberal Party staffer has alleged she was sexually assaulted by a parliamentary colleague, this time in Parliament House.

Yeah, that’s bad. It’s only 18 months since a similar alleged incident occurred in the offices of the same political party.

To be fair to Jenna Hates, she nearly continues along a non-partisan route of argument as if she might be interested in seeking truth:

Is the Liberal Party the worst workplace in the world? Is Labor any better? Can women only speak out after they leave?

That’s the second last time we hear about Jenna Hates’ side of the aisle though.

At the beginning of 2020, the Liberal Party released its National Code of Conduct, which insists any victim of criminal conduct should report the complaint to the police and parliamentary staffers should refer the matter to Parliament or government departments. Labor is in the final stages of updating its code of conduct and harassment policies and procedures. In its draft form, it at least says it will support the victim through the complaints process.

So, in summary; the code of conduct says “if the law is broken, tell the police“. Labor’s forthcoming version may add the coda, “and we will support you“. Lovely.

Jenna Hates seems to have also spotted a reversal of William Wilberforce’s famous campaign success:

Parliamentary staffers are the Uber drivers of the political process – they have no rights at work. They are hired and fired at the whim of the member of Parliament, under the Members of Parliament (Staff) Act (MOPS).

The staff have no rights at work?

Wait. What??

What is this legislation that makes indentured labourers out of political staffers? Has anyone informed the UN or the International Court of Justice in The Hague?

This is the act of parliament she’s referring to. It may be worth a few moments of your time reading it (which would be more effort than Jenna Hates bothered to invest). The spoiler is, there’s nothing in the legislation giving immunity of prosecution for criminal acts nor overturning existing workers’ rights. It’s basically a vehicle allowing Ministers to use public funds to employ staff. That’s it.

Sadly, the premise Jenna Hates has wasted a column to assert is simply not true; the staff have all the protections any other junior employee has in the workplace.

The problem Jenna Hates has missed is these simply aren’t effective when very junior staff with huge ambitions are put in an environment with more senior staff with bad intentions and these two elements are mixed with alcohol. Taxpayer funded free alcohol too.

What has been alleged to have happened is simply what is always a risk in every workplace across the country when the edges are blurred between professional life and social life.

Bill’s Opinion

If Jenna Hates could think in a non-partisan way for just five minutes she would realise the alleged rapes and sexual assaults are not a problem unique to one political party, one parliament, one city or even just one country.

This is a uniquely human problem which can be reduced but is unlikely to ever be completely avoided.

If she were serious about preventing rape in the Federal Parliament, she’d write a column calling for an end to taxpayer funded parliamentary piss ups rather than trying to suggest the staff in Canberra are plantation workers being abused by the slave owners.

Then at least she wouldn’t be guilty of knowingly funding a rape culture with her taxes if that change were then to occur.*

* That’s a joke, I don’t really think she’s funding rapes, I’m just playing by her idiotic debating rules.

Betteridge’s Law of Wokery

Billy/ / Cultural Marxism, General, Identity Politics, The end is nigh, Vifence

The Buccaneers embody Tampa’s love of pirates. Is that a problem?

No.

But wait, there’s more:

When the National Football League expanded to 28 teams in 1973, the league awarded Tampa an expansion team, prompting a name-the-team contest in 1975. “Buccaneers” won, a reference to the pirates who frequented the coasts of Florida in the 17th and 18th centuries. But team executives wanted the logo to be a “classy” pirate — a cross between Robin Hood, Errol Flynn, the musketeer D’Artagnan and pirate Jean Lafitte. It was a logo the team maintained until 1997 when they switched to a more aggressive, menacing Jolly Roger.

The last time the Jolly Roger was aggressive and menacing rather than a mildly amusing children’s joke, the year started with “18”.

Yet, while this celebration of piracy seems like innocent fun and pride in a local culture, there is danger in romanticizing ruthless cutthroats who created a crisis in world trade when they captured and plundered thousands of ships on Atlantic trade routes between the Americas, Africa and Great Britain.

Stop right there. Just stop.

Why? Because it takes these murderous thieves who did terrible things — like locking women and children in a burning church — and makes them a symbol of freedom and adventure, erasing their wicked deeds from historical memory. These were men (and women) who willingly participated in murder, torture and the brutal enslavement of Africans and Indigenous peoples.

Ok, there we go. You’re a racist. We’re all racist.

Is there a Microsoft Word macro thingy to run to automatically churn this formulaic bollocks out?

Start Menu/Setttings/System Updates/Install Microsoft Word Wokerator Plug-in.

There then follows a potted summary of some selected elements of nautical history, utterly irrelevant to a game of American Football.

Perhaps time has dulled us to the atrocities committed by these 17th and 18th century outlaws. Or perhaps it’s the fact that if pirates of the Golden Age were bloodthirsty, so too were the nations who opposed them. They willingly and purposefully massacred millions of African and Indigenous peoples in the name of colonization. Pirates, then, are seen as romantic heroes — the underdogs fighting the establishment — whom historian Marcus Rediker refers to as proto-democratic, egalitarian and multicultural.

Should we celebrate their complicated legacy? It’s a question Tampa Bay has to contend with as we collectively contemplate other major sports mascots with dubious legacies, like their Super Bowl rivals in Kansas City.

Bill’s Opinion

Don’t invite Jamie H. Goodall to a Superbowl Party and for fucksake don’t ask for her opinion about Halloween.

Jenna Hates…..

Billy/ / Australia; Frontier Nation, China Flu, Free Speech, General, Jenna hates..., Legacy Press (c)

.…the Australian David Icke.

Don’t bother clicking the link; it’s little more than an emotional rant about MP Craig Kelly whilst cheering her favourite female MP.

Jenna Hates has written the definition of a Canberra circle jerk about the most “inside the beltway” story of the year. Literally nobody with a life outside of Canberra or the media gives a damn about it.

In fact, the reporting on Kelly is the epitome of laziness.

Why?

Because the media have a wild eyed conspiracy theorist to report on, they don’t have to be inconvenienced to ask any of the questions more curious minds would like to hear the answers to.

Sure, the Aussie version of Alex Jones is an annoying tool, but why is he the only person with a platform taking about treatments for the virus?

I’ve not read a single report anywhere about the therapeutic treatments of the virus since about June last year when we were all working out how to build a ventilator using parts available from the hardware store. Remember when the supermarkets ran out of paracetamol?

Think for a moment; when was the last time you read or heard a news report about treatments? Is it not strange that dog isn’t barking?

How is it being treated around the world and what’s proven to be effective? The medics in the UK and USA must have learned a load of lessons now.

Is nobody other than MP Craig Kelly curious about what works?

When did medical treatment become a political litmus test?

Bill’s Opinion

I hate all media. Loathe them. The industry is no longer fit for purpose. The vast majority of journalists are low IQ, low rent automatons at best, partisan mendacious hacks more likely

I can count on the fingers of one foot the number of objective good faith and intelligent people working in the news industry.

Their adherence without question to a received narrative shows a lack of imagination and curiosity of mind. There is simply no room for nuance and we are all the poorer for it.

As for Jenna Price, one imagines the last time an original thought entered her head, it was politely but firmly shown the door.

Everyone back in the trees!

Billy/ / Australia; Frontier Nation, Economics, Evolution in reverse hypothesis, General, Incentives Matter, Too much government

Observed evidence suggests a possible hypothesis; in some pockets of the human species, evolution has stopped and has gone in to reverse.

The human species has reached a level of such great technological advance, the resulting inventions and indeed much of everyday life contains too much detail for the vast majority of people to fully comprehend. For many, it could be indistinguishable from witchcraft, to borrow a theme by Arthur C. Clarke.

This idea is neatly demonstrated by the excellent book and subsequent short animated video, “I, Pencil“. Although we take a pencil for granted, no one individual is capable of making one or even has the complete knowledge of how to make one.

Many of us are able to understand the principles behind much of the process though.

William of Ockham’s evolution in reverse hypothesis suggests we’ve left some people behind in this ability to understand complexity at a high level.

Today, I will offer two items of evidence for this but there will no doubt be plenty more over the coming weeks and months. Once seen, this phenomenon becomes visible everywhere.

Item 1: A CEO, whose entire business model is to offer sage advice to other organisations, couldn’t predict there would be any significant problems with paying exactly the same wage to every employee, regardless of age, skill level and skill value. In fact, the poor love seemed almost childlike in his wonder when he discovered a web developer in central London won’t work for the same wage as the office receptionist.

His brain hasn’t quite made the leap to the realisation other humans might have agency and will make choices that best suit their personal circumstances. Imagine reaching adulthood and not being even vaguely aware of that?

Item 2. A Senator of 14 years longevity in the Federal Parliament, who has spent her entire career sitting in vehement opposition to the government on the often inferred basis that it is a combination of corrupt, incompetent or even evil, believes a Government-developed internet search engine would be a useful project for taxpayer dollars.

This, despite the not entirely irrelevant facts there are already a dozen alternative free search engines which, between them, spend perhaps more than $3bn every year on research and development.

Yet she still believes we should trust the bureaucracy that brought you the NBN, CovidSafe App, expensive national firewalls to block websites such as PirateBay without understanding what a VPN is and countless examples of IT procurement and development with quadrupled budgets and minuscule realised benefits. This time they’ll get it right though, surely?

Bill’s Opinion

That they walk amongst us without their jaws wide open in amazement at the miracle of electric light bulbs, coffee machines, bicycles and adhesive stamps on envelopes, says much about these people’s lack of imagination or introspection.

Without getting all eugenics on the subject, it’s a bit of a worry for the species these genes are still washing around the system.

Somewhere in the world there is a tree working really hard. I think Calvin Benton and Sarah Two Dads owe it an apology.

Camembert Voltaire

Billy/ / Australia; Frontier Nation, General, Incentives Matter, Legacy Press (c), Too much government
I may disapprove of what you search, but I defend to the death your right to search it.
Evelyn Beatrice Hall
François-Marie Arouet
Voltaire
Guys, guys, let’s not break how search works.

I don’t know about you, but just like Voltaire, I’ve spent my life defending how search works.

It’s right up there in my list of priorities along with freedom of speech, the non-aggression pact and a commitment to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all.

After all, when I offer my friend directions to a coffee shop, it’s unreasonable for me to have to pay a fee to all of the other coffee shops they didn’t visit. Or at least I think that’s what she said whilst sincerely looking to camera.

If you can fake sincerity, you’ve got life sorted.

Bill’s Opinion

To summarise my earlier statement on this kitchen sink drama between Google, what remains of the Australian news industry and the government:

Two things can be true at the same time; Google can be a bunch of cunts and the Australian news industry can be a village populated by a collection of the entire nation’s village idiots.

I just don’t understand why we have to pay for either of those facts in a massively inefficient transfer of money via the Australian Tax Office.

Oh, and before anyone points out she was doing this media and Senate merry go round whilst heavily pregnant, I have been present at the birth of enough children to know there are plenty of women in this world who are equally, if not more, stunning and brave.

UPDATE: It’s been pointed out that the ATO aren’t involved in the proposed levy on Google, et al. It’s still not zero cost to the Australian public though, as new laws will need to be written and policed.

Masquerading as the enemy of the people

Billy/ / Australia; Frontier Nation, Cultural Marxism, Free Speech, General, Jenna hates..., Legacy Press (c)

Today is Australia Day, the national holiday celebrating the arrival of of the First Fleet of convicts to Australia in 1788.

Over the years, there have been calls to change the date, celebrate something other than the start of multiple harsh prison sentences or make it a day of national mourning on behalf of the people who were already here and were subsequently subjugated.

It can sometimes be bit controversial, to say the least.

However, it’s currently Australia’s national day. The weather is usually pretty good and workers get a day off to go to the beach, barbecue and drink beer. Most Australians you talk to are pretty happy about the national holiday and see no reason for it to change.

How do I know most Australians feel this way?

Because a survey in 2019 showed exactly that. 72% of the Australians surveyed don’t care enough to support a change. Plenty of similar surveys repeat these findings.

Hold that thought in your head for a moment.

Now try this thought experiment; imagine you were the agent of an enemy country and you had managed to gain influence on the editorial decisions of a national newspaper. What would be the theme of the news articles and opinion pieces you would commission on the host country’s national day?

Would it look something like this?

As at 11am this morning, those were the headlines, in order, on the Sydney Morning Herald’s front page.

Nation building stuff, eh?

Now, please don’t misunderstand me or place words in my mouth. I am not saying the SMH editors should not be allowed to commission so many articles of such a similar theme, I’m also not saying the editors are traitors or unpatriotic.

I am, however, pointing out the massive disconnect between the views of the overwhelming majority of the country and the very obvious theme being presented by this newspaper. Nobody can be in any doubt as to where the SMH sits on the “whither Oz Day?” question.

Meanwhile, most Australians don’t actually even consider it a question worth asking.

Bill’s Opinion

If President Xi wanted to run a subversion operation in the Australian media, it would probably not look very different to today’s Sydney Morning Herald.

I doubt that is what this is, but it’s remarkable how much similarity is hiding in plain sight.

I’m sure the writers of these articles have the best of motivations, they would genuinely like to see significant improvements to the welfare and lives of indigenous Australians. Writing these articles probably makes them feel they have helped.

One might cynically ask them, “What tangible actions have you personally taken, such as donating money or time to an Aboriginal charity, or did you think banging out 300 words about the morals of people long dead was enough?“.

As for the commissioning editor, I would ask the following question, “Are you getting paid by President Xi or is this just pro-bono?”

Just duck duck go and call their bluff

Billy/ / Australia; Frontier Nation, Economics, Free Speech, General, Incentives Matter, Legacy Press (c), Too much government

Executives from Google and Facebook’s Australian offices were dragged in front of a Senate hearing where they were savaged by Green politician Sarah Two Dads, which must have been scary for them.

If you missed the story, the chronology can be summarised as follows:

1989 Tim Berners-Lee invents the World Wide Web

1998 Larry Page created Google

2020 The Australian news industry discovered the internet

2021 Australian politicians tried to tax the internet

Ok, there’s a bit more to it than that….but not much.

To get a completely unbiased version of events, read this article published by the Sydney Morning Herald, an organisation whose entire raison d’être was to write about new stuff, yet has failed to change its business model every year since 1998.

Bill’s Opinion

As Ben Shapiro is fond of saying, two things can be true at once. Google and Facebook can be ruthless and unscrupulous operators, willing to steal content and commoditise everything they touch AND the Australian news media can be guilty of failing to adapt their business model to make money and not have to keep firing journalists.

In the unlikely event Google switch off their search engine in Australia, nobody should care. Other search engines are available and some, such as Duck Duck Go claim not to track you like a Stasi surveillance team.

I suspect the politicians will blink first, but who really cares anyway.

What is most amusing is the news outlets most exercised by this. Outlets like The Australian and, in the UK, The Times, Telegraph and Spectator have all made a success of the paywall model. This Australian spat says more about the outlets who haven’t, doesn’t it?

Newspapers such as the Sydney Morning Herald are desperate for a government handout, nominally paid for by Google. To understand why, one only needs to answer the following question; “where would a Sydney Morning Herald reader go for free news if they locked the paywall?”.

The answer is, of course, the government news agency, The ABC.

The SMH can’t compete because they have no Unique Selling Point to offer to someone whose politics leans towards the left.

Yet don’t expect to see calls in the SMH for The ABC to be defunded.

It’s the Australian equivalent of Stockholm Syndrome.

As for losing the Google search option in Australia…. I’m reminded of this exchange in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy:

Prosser: Mr. Dent, have you any idea how much damage that bulldozer would suffer if I just let it roll straight over you?

Dent: How much?

Prosser: None at all.