On 2008-11-22, amicus_curious <ACDC@xxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> "Gregory Shearman" <ZekeGregory@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> news:slrngif4a7.8rc.ZekeGregory@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> On 2008-11-21, amicus_curious <ACDC@xxxxxxx> wrote:
>>>
>>> "Terry Porter" <linux-2@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
>>> news:KZCdnTHHTqVeDrvUnZ2dnUVZ_gSdnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>>>
>>> Or maybe you folk out in the far bush struggle to get news from the
>>> civilized parts of the world! MS has been buying back stock for a couple
>>> of
>>> years now with, if I recall correctly without looking it up, some $40B or
>>> $50B dedicated to that purpose. Also, they have been paying dividend
>>> quarterly and paid a one-time $3 per share dividend. For 10 billion
>>> shares
>>> outstanding, that was another $30B in a lump sum. It is not much of a
>>> mystery if you are actually interested.
>>
>> It's not called "the far bush". It's called "The Outback",
>> four-wheel-drive access only. Take plenty of water or you'll die out
>> there.
>
> But does the news of the financial markets reach that far? People concerned
> about their next drink of water may be thought to not place adequate concern
> on such trends and so they are ignored or overlooked.
News goes everywhere. The downturn will hurt everyone and hurt the poor
most, as always. Typical human stupidity and greed. Water in Australia
is not only an economic concern it is also a *political* one. I won't
bore you with the Murray River Saga concerning four of our states and
the Federal Government (The Murray-Darling system runs through all of
them). Water is not only used for drinking, you know. It is used to grow
crops. Wheat and cotton and wool are all exported from this country so
that we can buy goodies such as electronic equipment from the rest of
the world and yes, it *is* stupid to export our water resources in this
manner.
>> Over 90% of Australians live in cities so I doubt Terry Porter lives in
>> the Outback. I also don't live in the Outback. You have to use
>> satellite to get internet access out there. You *might* be able to get
>> by with packet radio if you had a neighbour within a 100 kilometers or
>> so.
>
> Well he has to take a helicopter ride to find a wi-fi site, it seems, based
> on a post he made some weeks back. That is certainly being "out in the
> bush" as the term is used here in the USofA. We call it the "boondocks" or
> perhaps the "toolies". The "Outback", on the other hand, is a restaurant
> chain featuring mostly beef dishes with one or two seafood items usually and
> some chicken. Crocodile Dundee used to do their ads and talked about the
> "barbie" they used there.
Yep. "barbie" is a common term for BBQ here. "The bush", yep... that's a
collect term for the people who are not of the city, in other words, a
downtrodden minority). "The Far Bush" describes nowhere in Australia.
BTW, Paul Hogan grew up and worked in Sydney. He was a painter on the
Sydney Harbour Bridge for a while. He's got a nice house up in Byron
Bay, not far from Terry Porter.
Wifi is available usually in Motels and in some bars. In my city there
are whole streets, but it still isn't common. We have a very, very low
density of population outside of the cities. A "tyranny of distance" has
long been a bugbear with regard to communications in Australia. We've
only got 2 connections to the Internet outside of Australia. One goes
north to Singapore, the other across the Pacific to the USA. They are
currently building another one to pick up a major east-west undersea
cable travelling through Guam. This is hideously expensive for a nation
of only 20 million. Pity the poor Australian internet user.
>>> It is kind of amusing to see how the anti-MS crowd continues to try to
>>> belittle the MS successes while simultaneously whining about the unfair
>>> competition. To be effective, you are going to have to get on one side
>>> of
>>> the issue or another. Either they are chumps or they are champs, figure
>>> it
>>> out and stick with it.
>>
>> Microsoft's successes have come through unfair competition.
>>
> So they are the champs unfairly running up the score on their lesser rivals.
Illegally running up the score in some cases.
--
Regards,
Gregory.
Gentoo Linux - Penguin Power
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