Posts by linger
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Speaker: The real problem with the ‘Kiwimeter’, in reply to steve black,
I think xkcd has the right answer to that claim:
http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/free_speech.png
I would embed the image itself here but I don’t see how.Download; convert to jpg; attach to comment … et voila
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Speaker: The Future, in reply to Brent Jackson,
The framing of the question makes a huge difference. Was it an open-ended question, or was it a list of selected nominees?
In the latter case, the list would presumably be drawn up based on name recognition, e.g. a count of media references within the preceding year.
(It might also be informative to add a complete outsider, e.g. some inoffensive Labour backbencher, to check the limitations of name recognition.)Also, the question is a hypothetical, so the answer is not guaranteed to be meaningful. A lot could change as soon as some other candidate is introduced as a potential new leader. Would anyone have named John Key as a preferred leader in 2005?
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Hard News: The flagging referendum, in reply to Rich of Observationz,
NZ speakers of Dutch and German are overwhelmingly bilingual in English, so there isn't a strong need to provide support. Otherwise the general rule seems to be that languages spoken by more than 0.25% of the population are included. There are also a few languages on the list that don't meet that criterion; probably, in those cases, community members have offered to provide translations.
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When they remind us to pay our subs, we say “You first”...
Clippings like clan are common in journalism, but do produce ambiguity, and subediting is necessary to catch these problems. But of course, that works both ways: lack of paying subscribers --> subediting cut. -
Hard News: The flagging referendum, in reply to Alfie,
Russian usually omits the copula verb (except in past tense), so that may well be the closest possible idiomatic translation.
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Hard News: Friday Music: The Beatles'…, in reply to Joe Wylie,
Anything directly involving George Martin’s production, I meant;
covers are not being subjected to takedowns.
E.g. here’s the Brainchilds: -
No worries; confirms our host’s taste, eh.
(Aside: Blue Monday is resilient, but doesn’t survive everything that’s thrown at it; there’s a surprisingly bad version by Nouveau Vague out there, complete with mistimed faux-amis pronunciations of the lyrics, that I am not going to link to, on the grounds that it’s kinder to all concerned that way.)Meanwhile: dunno how you’re doing in Aotearoa, but all deconstructions of “Tomorrow Never Knows” are geoblocked in Japan – and now are being systematically taken off YouTube altogether; note that the link in the original post now reads “This video does not exist”. Utter, utter bastards.
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Hard News: The flagging referendum, in reply to Sacha,
You're probably right at that, because having unusual personal predilections is obviously so much worse than treating people abominably. *headdesk*
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Hard News: The flagging referendum, in reply to izogi,
I think the point is valid in that ponytailgate got more traction among the public, and was less ambiguously down to Key alone. (And yes, it may seem a strange set of priorities: but ultimately, being some sort of shadowy wheeler-dealer doesn’t harm Key’s media image in the way being an arrogant jerk and bully does.)
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Hard News: Friday Music: The Beatles'…, in reply to Gareth,
Referenced in the original post. Remarkable, eh? I listened to it and thought: paging Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra…
Unsurprisingly, there are already some ukulele arrangements out there, e.g.:
