If you look at the US and UK initiatives its more about legislation that allows them to monitor you. The censorship agenda is somewhat of a red herring to mask the increasing intrusiveness into an individuals personal affairs.

The Wider Agenda Of Internet Control
The Digital Economy Bill is intrinsically linked to long term plans by the UK government to carry out an unprecedented extension of state powers by claiming the authority to monitor all emails, phone calls and internet activity nationwide.
IN 2008, the government announced its intention to create a massive central database, gathering details on every text sent, e-mail sent, phone call made and website visited by everyone in the UK.
The programme, known as the “Interception Modernisation Programme”, would allow spy chiefs at GCHQ, the government’s secret eavesdropping agency, the centre for Signal Intelligence (SIGINT) activities (pictured above), to effectively place a “live tap” on every electronic communication in Britain in the name of preventing terrorism.

The UK, Canada, Australia and NZ all have extensive communication surveillance system bases which are extensions of the NSA’s ECHELON global surveillance system. That’s being upgraded to a vastly larger more powerful system.

My guess is we will see public domain software (and commercial) rise to meet this challenge for personal privacy and security. I already use low level IP masking and encryption via VPN software. It’s early days yet and I’ve yet to get my head totally around it but this kind of software may become ubiquitous fairly quickly.

Very popular in China I believe.

Saw this product on the New Inventors show a year or so ago. As someone who used to build decks professionally a while back I thought the product was one of the best I’ve seen. The clip on system is much more accurate, generally reduces the affects of warping/cupping etc and produces a clean surface finish. Over all it would be more cost effective than individual nailing.

I suspect people like yourself will simply get bigger blinkers and cocoon themselves in make believe world where all is well.

Meanwhile people like myself are concerned about where government is going with many things. The Australian government is well and truly in bed with the yanks and adopting some of their tactics. That actually scares the hell out of me. There is absolutely nothing the US government will not do to its people to achieve its political, military and financial aims. It is aided and abetted by its suck-up friend Australia.

You have to worry when a guy like Julian Assange can’t get any support from his own govt/country. You’re better off being a Bali drug smuggler than anyone who fronts the US over its criminal activities.

While it’s debatable that it will help it’s almost certain it won’t hurt. You take what you can get and be thankful for small mercies.

2008 will seem like a non event compared to the next downturn Simple.

You have more than a blind spot Bardon but enjoy it while it lasts anyway. Ignorance may very well be bliss.

The Mickey Mouse games in Europe continue. They’ve kicked the can down the road once again and all the things in the world that keep coming back to screw us haven’t been fixed one jot.

The only positive I take from it is that it gives me a little more time to reinforce the defenses.

I’m reminded of the saying;

“My father rode a camel, I drive a car, my son flies a jet plane, his son will ride a camel.”

99 here’s something to contemplate.

Forget the 10% deposit. You’ll basically loose that in entry costs. Scratch $30k

Property in general is moving south but of course everyone remains optimistic to the point of delusion that somehow but somehow a miracle will happen in the world and the trillions in global debt that can’t be serviced let alone paid back will miraculously disappear somehow. But Australia is different even though it’s economy is about to officially go into recession in the coming months.

So if property continues to slide you could within 12 months have negative equity. It will only take a 3% move and you’ve done your doa!!

Here’s a simple risk assessment.

…hold onto your money = 100% guarantee you’ll still have it later

…buy now = $30k out the door, 80% chance property will loose value, 10% it will hold, 10% it will increase

Pretty simple really. Hold onto your money. Only fools buy before a crash.

I’m somewhat amused by these kind of threads and a little sad to be honest. Young guy, young family, focused, disciplined approach to developing a wealth plan and by all appearances has his (their) act together.

So why do people ignore the elephant in the room.

Right now I’d rather invest money in my nieces lemonade stand than put a dollar into property and someone slap me blind if I ever contemplate anything in SA let alone property.

The only option!!

Keep your money in your pocket and watch and wait. We’re approaching the event horizon for GFC v2. If it becomes as bad as some predict you might get 25c on the dollar for property you own today if your lucky.

Price growth has gone negative in Melton South. Given the current global problems and Vics economy in tatters I would be inclined to hold off and see how low it can go before I jump in with both feet. Kurunjang is showing the same trend as Melton West

http://www.domain.com.au/public/SuburbProfile.aspx?searchTerm=Melton%20West&mode=buy

More data

http://www.rs.realestate.com.au/cgi-bin/rsearch?a=sp&s=vic&u=melton

Just be careful reading too much into these data sets. Melton is small and a surge in sales, prices etc can easily distort prices either way. It’s the kind of place that requires a detailed assessment before committing

Seems to run alright on the old girls tablet. Actually I’m surprised how well it runs. This ones an Acer. It’s just gone through an update so I’m not sure what version it’s running .

It’s definitely not doing what Terry’s is doing so it may be a problem on his end