Political polling

image007Labour Senator John Faulkner on federal Labor’s reliance on focus groups

“There is, however, something deeply wrong when we use polling to determine our party’s policies, and even our values”

Unfortunately this is a natural consequence of a society that has become obsessed with surveys that seek to measure perceptions rather than facts.People of the world, let’s fight back. The next time you’re invited to participate in any kind of subjective survey, just say no.

[This content was originally posted to Google Buzz, #148]

Herculean reasoning

I’m feeling rather pleased with myself today. Last night I finished reading Agatha Christie’s “The ABC Murders” and confirmed that I had correctly deduced the murderer halfway through the story, by applying the same psychological reasoning that Hercule Poirot used toward the end of the story. Wow. Imagine how pleased I’d be with myself if I actually achieved something meaningful.

[This content was originally posted to Google Buzz, #147]

iOS 5 expectations

Apple iOS 5 announced. Five things I’m looking forward to:

  1. Reminders/ToDo – synced with Outlook
  2. Able to send messages to groups (I assume this includes SMS – but not clear yet)
  3. Syncing with iTunes over WiFi
  4. Quick access to the Camera when the iPhone is locked
  5. Week view in Calendar

Update 20 Feb 2015: It’s interesting, nearly four years on looking back at what I wished for, and was it worth it?

  1. I don’t use this feature (I no longer sync with Outlook)
  2. I use this feature quite a bit.
  3. This feature turned out to be a dud. For it to work the phone had to be plugged into a power source, like a docking station, but as I only ever charge my phone via a cable connection from my PC …
  4. I use this almost every day. It’s hard to imagine iOS without this.
  5. It turns out that although I wanted this, when I got it, I never actually used it.

So it turns out that I only use two of the five things I was looking forward to. I guess the lesson here is the things you wish for are not necessarily the things you need.

[This content was originally posted to Google Buzz, #146]