Go for it, Harry

Say what you will about Prince Harry making millions from his book and TV appearances. What if it’s to help fund the destruction of one Keith Rupert Murdoch and News Corp., and save the very fabric of democracy itself in the UK? It’s not going to be cheap, but the dude is out for blood. […]

Read More… from Go for it, Harry



Where democratizing technology got the better of us

From the start, I’ve been a supporter of the democratization of design. Everyone has the right to access it, because fundamentally good design is something that makes the world a better place. A lot of websites are founded on this, such as Shopify, which has enough flexibility to give most of the stores we visit […]

Read More… from Where democratizing technology got the better of us



Like communist dictatorships, Google and Facebook threaten Australia

You know the US tech giants have way too much power, unencumbered by their own government and their own country’s laws, when they think they can strong-arm another nation.    From Reuter: Alphabet Inc’s Google said on Friday it would block its search engine in Australia if the government proceeds with a new code that […]

Read More… from Like communist dictatorships, Google and Facebook threaten Australia



Back on RNZ’s The Panel: on Hong Kong’s new national security legislation

Public domain/Pxhere What a pleasure it was to be back on The Panel on Radio New Zealand National today, my first appearance in a decade. That last time was about the Wellywood sign and how I had involved the Hollywood Sign Trust. I’ve done a couple of interviews since then on RNZ (thank you to […]

Read More… from Back on RNZ’s The Panel: on Hong Kong’s new national security legislation



Capitalism falls down when it’s rigged

Martin Wolf, writing in the Financial Times, touches on a few points that resonate with my readings over the years.    He believes capitalism, as a system, is not a bad one, but it is bad when it is ‘rigged’; and that Aristotle was indeed right (as history has since proved) that a sizeable middle […]

Read More… from Capitalism falls down when it’s rigged



We need to change how we consume and share media as Sir Tim Berners-Lee warns us about privacy and ‘fake news’

Paul Clarke/CC BY-SA 4.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=37435469 Above: Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web. Earlier this month, Sir Tim Berners-Lee wrote an open letter expressing his concerns about the evolution of his invention, the World Wide Web. (Interestingly, he writes the term all in lowercase.)    It wasn’t just about ‘fake news’, which […]

Read More… from We need to change how we consume and share media as Sir Tim Berners-Lee warns us about privacy and ‘fake news’



An expatriate’s view of Occupy Central and what Hong Kong wants

Equal access: an audio recording of this blog post can be found here. I know I’m not alone among expats watching the Occupy Central movements in Hong Kong. More than the handover in 1997, it’s been making very compelling live television, because this isn’t about politicians and royalty, but about everyday Hong Kong people.   […]

Read More… from An expatriate’s view of Occupy Central and what Hong Kong wants



Fighting the politics of division

Loving this excerpt from Nancy J. Adler’s ‘Leading Beautifully: the Creative Economy and Beyond’ in the Journal of Management Inquiry, vol. 20, pp. 208–22, at p. 211, which my fellow Medinge Group director Nicholas Ind referred to me: McGill University strategy professor Henry Mintzberg asked the people in his native Quebec to see the world […]

Read More… from Fighting the politics of division



Intellectual property doesn’t deserve a black mark, but some powers-that-be do

After being interviewed about the outcome of the ‘Wellywood’ sign vote yesterday (a summary of what I told Newstalk ZB can be found on my Facebook fan page) I was reminded about how a few Wellingtonians, who supported my quest to stop the sign in 2010 and 2011, were not that thrilled that I used […]

Read More… from Intellectual property doesn’t deserve a black mark, but some powers-that-be do



Surely something all Chinese can agree on

It’s 2011, which, by my calculations, is the centenary of China kicking out the corrupt Ching dynasty.    It’s the one event that both Republicans and Communists can agree on as being positive. It’s why Dr Sun Yat-sen is such a uniting figure for all Chinese, as the father of the nation.    I can’t […]

Read More… from Surely something all Chinese can agree on