Xcf456 @ Xcf456 @lemmy.nz

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159

Joined

2 yr. ago

The Science Media Centre got comment from bunch of scientists on this and it's a really interesting read. There's a couple of positive takes I there, but mostly skeptical it will actually happen and if they do is it really a moa.

The point that resonated with me most is the risk that these big claims are picked up and used to undermine actual conversation work and protecting endangered species as "we can always just resurrect them later"

https://www.sciencemediacentre.co.nz/2025/07/09/moa-de-extinction-plans-announced-expert-reaction/

We got the project 2025 test run when a three party far right coalition got elected in 2023. Most regressive, cruel and mean sprited government in a generation.

USA, NZ, Australia, Canada, UK and beyond. They all coordinate, they use the same consultants, the same messages, their AstroTurf political advocacy groups all share info and coordinate policy to make our lives worse and the rich richer. Tailored slightly for local conditions but the same overall goal.

Yes we've been through multiple housing crises although it's gotten truly ridiculous in the last couple decades.

The crowning achievement of the first labour government when they were elected in 1935 was to create a massive state house building programme due to the huge shortages and miserable state of the stock at the time. This continued until the 1980s when we went full neoliberal, privatised everything and sold off most of the state houses and private landlords and speculation now dominate.

Anything built between early 1990s and 2004ish is prone to leaks due to the deregulated building code at the time and is basically trash.

Wellington is a particularly bad case, and has always had a worse housing situation than the rest of the country (although Auckland is more expensive). Hilly topography has meant lack of space to build and lots of damp hovels that get little sun. Add in character/heritage protection that made it effectively illegal to alter or demolish the draughty and falling apart 1920s wooden villas that make up most of inner Wellington and there you go.

This place is fucked, and now we know Australia won't shoot themselves in the head for another three years at least people will continue to leave in droves.

When the bloodbath government budget here hits in two weeks time it will turn into a torrent.

To an extent, choice isn't a huge feature of our housing market. That will certainly change eventually if theres a big increase in supply, but therell be a lot of poorly thought out stuff in the housing stock to get to that point

He says ugly buildings, implying what they look like aesthetically from the outside, but he actually seems to be talking about designing apartments to actually be functional to live in, which I agree with. It gets even more important the smaller the size I reckon

There's a huge difference between ones done by private developers and kainga ora/kiwibuild imo. The former are more often investment units to extract tenant wages first and foremost. Storage, building amenities, light etc all non considerations. People I know in kiwibuild apartments love them.

The rest of what he says is the same old garbage and speaks to the risks of the govts approach. If nimby councils reject density around transport hubs as theyll be able to do under this, theyll push lower density sprawl further out and it'll be worse and more expensive for everyone.

Oh, is that the sound of a free market correction?

I get where you're coming from, Retail NZ and the sector they represent (which is not all retailers of course) always come off as incredibly self absorbed and uncaring imo, particularly when they comment on employment stuff. Bunch of small business tyrants.

But that lets the govt off the hook a bit I think. A lot of the article is Wellington focused, and talks about the link to the job cuts in the public sector and the way that's been done. They've actively cratered things on top of a downturn that was already happening.

Oh that's a pain, yeah there's a bit of a mix of places where you have to confirm the surcharge on the machine and others that just have a sign and you get automatically charged for credit/contactless.

It's all a bit of a mess and I can see that could lead some to just go back to cash, although there'll be other reasons I'm sure

I don't use a lot of cash, but I like to keep some on me cause it comes in handy every so often.

I am switching back more and more to eftpos over my credit card though, as so many places are either not accepting credit cards and/or contactless, or adding the extra charge that irks me (yes, I do blame the banks/payment providers for that, not the businesses).

"Hey guys, so I just did a bit of returning off screen and made 10,000 death star ships"

Asshole government making life harder and costing the health system more money in the long term.

Yes I think so, that rings a bell. Something like that would be cool, I downloaded beeper earlier to give it a go and it immediately wants an email and privacy policy and I assume collects data on what clients you use and so on.

Something like pigdin that's just a front end that doesn't phone home anywhere or collect your data and you just log in through it would be awesome.

Right I see, could be useful if you're constantly switching between conversations on multiple platforms I guess. Which come to think of it I am. I only have the Instagram app because typing goes nuts when I try to message on their web interface.

Way back when I was running Ubuntu (like over a decade ago) there were a chat application that would combine Facebook chat, MSN (lol) and a bunch of others and it was very handy to have it right there on the desktop.

Oh damn that's a shame, I use Facebook calls quite a lot. Sounds like for me it could be one app to rule them all just resulting in yet another app on top the others lol.

On a related note, this is the first I'm hearing of beeper.

Is the main draw just being able to combine messaging across different apps into one, or are there other benefits too?

Oh no. Great that the government abruptly cancelled the new ferries with no plan to replace these ones that keep having massive failures. This one is the only rail ferry too

Ah right that's fair enough, SOEs definitely are a blindspot from an OIA perspective. I thought you meant in comparison to a private company, which would be the same if not worse.

I think in this case a combination of the huge public interest and the heavily regulated environment transpower operates under the causes will come out. But I guess we'll see

That's not a thing at all. SOEs face investigations like any other company. Kiwibank for example is getting prosecuted at the moment by the commerce commission for fair trading act breaches

It's not supposed to look like that

I'll say it. He's a real Clown