We went to see Iron Man at the Metreon tonight. We stumbled into the middle of the San Francisco MovieBears showing. So the cinema was packed with bearded men. Luckily these days I've got a well trimmed beard, so I fitted right in.

Movie was good. I didn't get the bit after the credits since I'm not that kind of nerd. Robert Downey Jr was as usual great. Jeff Bridges kept reminding me of The Dude which was a little distracting, but the problem was just that his voice is distinct - he played is role really well. The depiction of the brave American invaders vs the cowardly Afghan defenders was a little annoying, but predictable.

I've been taking photos of my tshirts every day. It's been quite an exercise but I finally ran out of shirts I was willing to wear out of the house. I guess I'll have to retire the few that were left. Anyway, here's all 93 for your amusement or horror.

Today is Anzac Day, the day that Australians and New Zealanders commemorate and remember the men and women who've given their lives in the defense of their country. Unlike other commemorations like November 11th, we're not celebrating a victory or the end of a war, we're remembering when Australian and New Zealand troops landed on the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey in 1915, where we were invading another country and were decimated.

Over the next nine months a hundred thousand people lost their lives and quarter of a million were wounded. The allies were defeated, nothing was gained. This is the side of war we need to remember. This and the brave men and women who go to defend their country in spite of the folly and futility of it.

This weekend in San Francisco there's a conference called Lug Radio Live. It's a Linux and Open Source related conference and I'll be speaking about Songbird and related things.

It's at the Metreon, it costs $10 to get in and it should be a ton of fun.

http://lugradio.org/live/USA2008/

Oh yeah - there's some Google sponsored drinking on Saturday night (details at the bottom of the "schedule" page). Have you ever wondered what beer paid for by those ads on your search results look like, come along.

I really need to finish my slides.

For Easter and Purim, Sharon and I decided to bake. Neither of us are actually religious but do miss the tasty baked goods from our childhood. She decided to cook hamentashen and I decided to cook hot cross buns. Neither of them turned out how we expected, but they were pretty tasty.


Then we sang karaoke all afternoon.I scored 100% on Material Girl.

PS: I made these with advice from here.

Clearly, in a point for point comparison of policies, qualifications and ideas we're going to hit some differences, but how about this list?

• nose
• chin
• ears
• mouth

Just sayin'

I keep listening to this:

I'm kind of terrified of public speaking. So I do it as much as possible.

I will be speaking at LUG Radio Live USA 2008 in San Francisco in April. I'm going to be talking about Songbird and the Open Media Web focusing on why what we're working on over at the nest is especially important to the Linux community. Then I'll probably show off a few cool things you can do once your digital media platform is open, standards based and extensible.
( the details )

You can see all this and more for just ten dollars on April 12th and 13th at the Metreon in San Francisco. I'm really excited to be part of the conference and really excited to get to hear and meet all the other participants. So if this sounds fun or interesting to you please join me and register.

I've been working through my many tshirts, one by one, taking photos, some have stories. Here are the first 26:

look at more flags in the series.


via robert love

Today the Australian parliament formally apologized to the Stolen Generation and their families. The Stolen Generation are Australian Aborigines and Torres Straight Islanders who were systematically removed from their families and children for over 100 years, into the 1970s.

The previous conservative government so strongly refused to say "sorry" that the word itself has taken on strong, emotional meaning in Australia. I'm proud and relieved that government now represents the mainstream of Australian society who feel sorrow and shame about how our brothers were treated.

The tricky part is working out what happens next. Aboriginal Australians are still largely a third world nation within our own. Their life expectancy is 17 years less than the national average, barely a third finish high school and they are 11 times as likely to be incarcerated as other Australians. Saying sorry is a good first step in the healing, but it's not going to end the inequality or fix the results of past injustice.

I don't know what the right answer is, but I do know that I'm sorry.

If this is the first you've heard of this you should go watch Rabbit Proof Fence and read more about the issue.

Paul Krugman just posted a blog post and an op-ed about the differences between Clinton's and Obama's health care reform plans. Essentially he points out that Obama's plan will cost almost as much and cover half as many people.

What really get's to me though is this from his blog entry:

Now, if I had my way I’d just go to single-payer, Medicare for All. But that’s politically impossible, at least for now.

As far as I'm concerned the lack of single-payer is the real issue here. The free market is delivering prices ten times higher to Americans than traditional single-payer health-care systems that the rest of the first world uses. This is why the American car industry spends more on health care than steel. This is why it costs us so much to care for the uninsured that turn up in emergency rooms. And fixing it is off the table. It's not even up for discussion. On the left we're arguing over different flawed plans to put more money into the health-care cartel so they can funnel more money back to corrupt politicians.

So I think about who I would support if I had the right to vote in a primary, and I really can't make up my mind. I'm lucky that I don't have to.



PS: Rebecca Traister has an interesting article on Salon.com about the tough Democratic primary decisions, but with a focus on the identity politics issues.

I own a lot of tee shirts, and I'm pretty attached to most of them. They remind me of something I worked on, or a concert I went to, or a comic I read. Or something. I just culled a fair chunk of them, but by my very rough calculation I still own enough to wear a different one each day of the week for three or four months. So I'm posting to Flickr:
http://flickr.com/photos/ianloic/sets/72157603808941448/

http://www.godhatesfags.com/written/fliers/20080122_heath-ledger-brokeback-mountain.pdf

So, if the funeral is back in Perth, can my I rely on my lads back there to rough them up?

rodcub I'm looking at you.

I'm lying on the floor of Newark Liberty International Airport, my head reading on my camera case, leeching power, paying for WiFi and trying to stay awake till my flight back to San Francisco boards. I've spent the past couple of weeks in Switzerland and France visiting family. It was great - I'll post pictures and perhaps even stories soon. Right now I'm just ready to see dearanxiety again.

So I haven't been on lj in a couple of weeks - did I miss anything?

I've been super busy with work, but it's been good busy. New, fun things to do, successful releases, etc, etc.

We went to Cirque du Soleil for our holiday party. Drinks + snacks + 3rd row seats - very good.

Now In ugh, 5 hrs we're off to the airport to fly to Geneva for Christmas. I'm excited to introduce Sharon to that half of my family (my mum's side) and excited to hang out with my mum, brother and sister for a while. We'll be spending Christmas and a few days after on Saleve. It should be beautiful. And cold.

Hillary Clinton is having a fund raiser a block and a half away from me right now (21st and Mission). Outside there are a few protectors marching back and forth chanting and handing out pink fliers saying in big letters HILLARY'S WAR BUCKS and lots of stuff in fine print that I didn't read. It's nice to see that this women-oriented peace group chooses to use the less respectful first-name form, like we normally use for our enemies (eg: Saddam for Saddam Hussein) to make them seem weaker.

The American presidential election is still a year away though and the Australian federal election is only a week away. Even though I'm living in the US and the American administration clearly has more power than the Australian I feel at least as concerned and excited about Australia's politics at the moment. I've been living in denial about the identity of the country I consider my homeland for the past few years. The refugees issues were just growing as I left. The Tampa and children overboard incidents happened while I wasn't really paying attention and I didn't keep up on the election campaigns that followed all that closely.

In my mind Australia was still Paul Keating's young, bright, modern nation. A country that was able to act as a bridge between Asia and Europe, that had the respect of the world for the humanitarian work its army did and a place that welcomed immigrants from every culture - asking them to celebrate their identities rather than assimilate. Perhaps that Australia never really existed but growing up in Fremantle in the early 1990s that's what I felt.

Over the past few years I've come to terms with the change that has occurred in Australia. The politics of fear and xenophobia have worked in a way they haven't since the 70s. The Liberal Party's completely unacceptable approaches to the refugee issues, indigenous issues and regional issues was accepted by the public. There was even the growth of a "christian" far right.

Ever since I started hearing with Kevin Rudd as a junior shadow minister I thought that he showed more potential than most. In particular an interview where he articulated his clear understanding and frank discussion of China / Taiwan issues impressed me. Basically since he became the opposition leader the Labor Party has led in the polls. They've consistently held a 5-10% two party preferred lead. But I'm scared now. It looks like they might not win enough of the marginal seats. Western Australia has even shown a swing to the Liberals in some marginals. I guess we'll know in a week.

Anyway, go vote for my friend Meryki in the WA Senate. I think she'd be awesome.

Last night Sharon and I were hit by a semi. Twice. It was unexpected.

Sharon wrote an account of it all.

Scratched my face. Now I cry tears of blood.

Welcome to Movember - the month formerly known as November.

For the past couple of years there has been a men's health awareness and fund raising campaign in Australia and New Zealand that involves the growing of fine mustaches. This year it has come to the USA.

I shaved my face this morning and for the next 30 days I will be grooming a fine stache. So why all the fuss? Prostate Cancer!

• Prostate cancer is the most common non-skin cancer in America.


• In 2007, more than 218,000 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer and more than 27,000 American men will die from the disease.

I'm 30 now, I'll need to start getting prostate exams when I'm 50. We've got 20 years people - it's time to cure this thing! You really should sponsor my mo. Donations are 501(c)(3) blah blah blah.

( some famous mustaches to inspire me and you )

I will be tracking my own mustache progress here on Flickr.