However, representative or participatory, one thing's for sure. The baby-boomers would still get a massive say. And…

I was away from Auckland for most of 89,90 and half of 91…

This is a democracy after all.

But you have to admit that there has to be more to it than one person one vote.
For a start not everyone is fully up to speed on all the issues and the points of difference that make one choice or the other…

Nor should you. This is a democracy after all.

No worries, Ben – as you might recall, when murmurings were raised a while back about arch-boomer J. Tizard's eligibility to be rendered down for soylent green, Mr. Brown mounted a spirited defence.

You actually can't ignore the baby-boomers

Nor should you. This is a democracy after all.

my perennial heritage hobbyhorse?
It is this: a modest contestable fund for the digitisation of works held in public archives

You should mount it more often.
I would just add actively getting it out into the public domain.

You actually can't ignore the baby-boomers: that cohort moves through the national…

Summer of Love didn't get here till the 60s.

Oh, well, that explains a lot, as it got to San Francisco in '67..oh, wait...

Per capita crime, for example, was highest when the boomers were at crime committing age.

What age would that be? I'd hate to discover that my criminal heyday is behind me.

You actually can't ignore the baby-boomers: that cohort moves through the national statistics like the juggernaut it is. Per capita crime, for example, was highest when the boomers were at crime committing age.

At the other end, the funding of that cohort's retirement years represents the…

To name but a couple, I wonder if Barney or Kane could do domething similar with Pavement and Stamp?

Is this the right to to get back on my perennial heritage hobbyhorse?

It is this: a modest contestable fund for the digitisation of works held in public archives (where copyright…

Now I'm flinching involuntarily at the thought of your next post.

Thats the spirit!

Russell, do you still have any originals of the photos from Planet?

No, but you've got me going now.

It would be nice to be able to present not just the photos but some of the pages, including the ads.

As of now, I have no idea what still lives…

We all have a lot to be thankful for. Thanks also to your helpers for getting a copy back out there.

I think it's fantastic that I have no idea what generation i'm supposed to be in, apart from the perennial whine that we are the "lazy" generation which is easy to ignore (perhaps because i'm lazy).

As someone who left secondary a year later than you, I…

Kapisi an atheist, dont think that can be called irrelevant.

It's a part of that family's identity, really. The Urales were among the 5% of Samoans who didn't go to church in the 1970s.

Good on him. He played at the Orientation last year at Waikato and was bloody good.…

It's a terrible idea to use Wikipedia for satire. On top of all the other filters you need to run to assess an article, asking people to spot and parse irony is just going to end in tears.

Well it hurts the main purpose, for people to find what Emma…

Emma, lol classic. I guess Wikipedia's got a problem with people using it for satire, though?

It's a terrible idea to use Wikipedia for satire. On top of all the other filters you need to run to assess an article, asking people to spot and parse irony is just going…

I guess Wikipedia's got a problem with people using it for satire, though? Especially since the satire is more about Wikipedia than it is about Russell.

Actually, Ben, I think it's a classic example of how well Wikipedia heals 'damage'. That version lasted twelve days before it was replaced by…

Wikipedia now says you were born in Lower Hutt.

The stub about me does, but I'm still claimed as one of Timaru's own in the Timaru article. I get fidgety about something that might have been a joke by one of my friends standing as fact. (Although it's cool to…

Wikipedia now says you were born in Lower Hutt.

My favourite version is this one:

Initial reports indicate that the success of Hard News was partially predicated on Brown's alarming ability to sound exactly like Bill Ralston, a then-popular TV show host.

Did your knee just jerk then Ben?

Yes! How did you know? I also salivated when you wrote Kapisi. Not really sure why. Now I'm flinching involuntarily at the thought of your next post.

It must be true if it says so in Wikipedia ...

Wikipedia now says you were born in Lower Hutt.

Brown was born in Lower Hutt, New Zealand, and now lives in Auckland, New Zealand with his long-term partner, journalist Fiona Rae, and their two sons.

...and why would you ???

The ministers used to yell and scream and rant trying their damndest to put the fear of god into you then alternate that with sweet humble pie.

No wonder…

...oh i'm chill and yeah if i saw him i'd say it to his face too. We gots history

and if i did have a complaint,…

Kapisi an atheist, dont think that can be called irrelevant.

It's a part of that family's identity, really. The Urales were among the 5% of Samoans who didn't go to church in the 1970s.

where did you come from if not Auckland?

Timaru! :)

It must be true if it says so in Wikipedia ...

Actually, dubmugga and I were teenagers in the same town.

Last i heard, kapisi was a fat old atheist irrelevent to the current generation.

Just saw him at Pasifika flogging his clothing line. He seemed in good form.

Yes, I prefer "bourgeois ninnies" myself.

Go Craig!

I, for one, welcome the baby boomers as my overlord.

Did your knee just jerk then Ben?

And having observed the baby boomer phenomenon close up. At a time when the moribund state of a section of this thing called humanity (thats western culture, the thing thats going tits up…

where did you come from if not Auckland?

Timaru! :)

*sigh* if only you werent just brown in name only what a different story you'd tell...

Well, yes. If your complaint is that my experience isn't your experience, I can't do much about that ...

Not bad for a native of milton sth otago.

Indeed. Nicely done.

PS: I took…

I lived the 90's in aux and what started out full of promise soon became a nightmare. Nice token reference to that greatest of polynesian contributions to the cultural wealth and heritage...rapsingers heh. The…

yes. baby boomers, gen-x, gen-y, gen-jones (???), blah, blah, bollahh. 95% meaningless bollocks

Yes, I prefer "bourgeois ninnies" myself.

Whatever, but it'd be nice to be able to move beyond the hype-ridden and dehumanising language of marketing.

Indeed. I don't think of them as baby-boomers. I think of each individual person I know, by their name. OK, there are some similarities amongst my parent's generation, but mostly, I see…

I've been in and out of Auckland since my 1st OE in '83 and the glass half full/empty view of the Seaside Village(s) swings to and fro. Recently, I made the mistake of reading this Herald message board which was a forceful reminder of one element of…

My dial up connection with xtra was certainly quicker than my Freeserve one in 2002 edinburgh, but cheap pervasive…

Whatever, but it'd be nice to be able to move beyond the hype-ridden and dehumanising language of marketing.

yes. baby boomers, gen-x, gen-y, gen-jones (???), blah, blah, bollahh. 95% meaningless bollocks, imho. and essentially US-driven bollocks, too. and btw, the 1981 tour broke the "old national consensus"? ah, the consensus…

I, for one, welcome the baby boomers as my overlord.

Whatever, but it'd be nice to be able to move beyond the hype-ridden and dehumanising language of marketing.

There are other factors in the destruction of Telecom's shareholders' wealth, like the AAPT disaster, but the general short-term attitude of the management should be sheeted home to the short-term attitude of the owners.

I agree. And for a long time, that short-term attitude was actually applauded. I keep coming…

You know, Gattung did what she was paid to do. Her strategy was approved and encouraged by her board. Her board prioritised dividends over long term returns, and she delivered.

If we are going to point fingers and…

When you see people in their context, it's hard to hate them. When they are your family, who gave you life and raised you, it's doubly hard. When they are your children, it's just plain stupid.

Yessss!!!

after all – who would throw stones in glass houses??

]]> Fri, 13 Mar 2009 18:51:29 +1300 https://publicaddress.net/system/cafe/hard-news-funky-seaside-village-revisited/?p=98424#post98424 https://publicaddress.net/system/cafe/hard-news-funky-seaside-village-revisited/?p=98424#post98424

A fine bit of writing RB I look forward to the up dated version.

Ditto. I remember that bit of 'fluff' when it arrived originally, and thought well of it then as I do now. It holds up. Russell and I come from a similar time, similar place, have run…

Which isn't at all to say it was a response. His story was a j'accuse directed at the dreary right-on uniformity…

Seriously, I've never been able to get that bitter on my parent's generation just because of the accident of their birth-time, any more than my grannies' generation who perfected the art of slaughter, despite many of the best intentions. Nor…

As the stunt unfolded, there came the depressing realisation that it was really the Baby Boomers back again. Roger Kerr, pulling the strings, paying the bills. Paul Holmes, for whatever reason – ratings, realisation, simple ego –

I fucking hate it that by the accident of birth dates I get…

What on earth possessed you to re-publish an 8 year old navel-gazing fluff piece like that? That type of writing proves that you are Gen X and that Gen X is a lot closer to baby boomerism than you would probably care to admit.

I did it to annoy you.…

It was all.... yellow. And BTW (completely OT) does anyone else substitute the word yellow for white in that Coldplay song about snow?

I can't listen to any Coldplay song without wanting to make some yellow snow and have sleepy bye-bye time. Was Chris Martin genetically engineered to be a…

By 1991, the place seemed desolate. A new government, no jobs and not much fun.

And for so many of us, the term of the Fourth Labour Government was the multiple fun-gasm that never ended. And it's also a matter of POV: 1991 was a year when I wasn't either…

My favourite line though has to…

then later, stuff like this (also drawing confidently on the club music and traditional forms of the largest Pacific city on the planet):

That's brilliant eh? Funny how bright our skies are for a place so dark.

Che Fu, Salmonella Dub and others released great albums after I left Auckland…

Apparently Ms G. had a knee operated button under her desk that summoned a minion to interrupt her when she didn't like how a meeting was going. Allegedly.

But Rod Deane's operated the trapdoor over the croc pit.

Apparently Ms G. had a knee operated button under her desk that summoned a minion to interrupt her when she didn't…

is this Rich Poole the one from Fine Wine Delivery?

Pretty sure he's not. Here's our friend in 2005, and more recently enjoying the fruits of hanging in the golden eastern suburbs.

My memory had conveniently removed that chirpy crapola. By contrast...

It was all.... yellow. And BTW (completely OT) does anyone else substitute the word yellow for white in that Coldplay song about snow?

In my mind of course, in my mind.

Nol' Rolled

My memory had conveniently removed that chirpy crapola. By contrast...

walking down Queen Street at about 10pm on a Friday night in 1984 and seeing all the break-dancers performing outside the storefronts

which by the mid 90s,…

As for me, I'm not a Gen-X'er. I'm a member of Generation 8-bit.

life is always boring, everything is always kind of shitty and just getting worse, and the human race just strengthens the case that God should have gone with the roaches, but you keep buggering on regardless...

and *then* The Nolans.

Shameless like for those 2 posts. Nice.

I enjoyed Ak…

She got quite shirty when I noted that she was back in NZ & had been for some time.

ALOL.

And is this Rich Poole the one from Fine Wine Delivery?

the best city in the world in 20 years time – as long as the visionless souls running things now don't screw it up too much

So would Aucklanders please stop voting them in. Especially if we get one big Council.

the depths of EwwwTube!

Egad! I've been Nol' Rolled.

He's actually named in the paragraph right above that one – Rich Poole. He put a full-page ad in the Herald in 2000 moaning about how all his friends had gone overseas because NZ was so shit.

Thanks – I remember Poole, but I didn't put 2 & 2 together Robyn.…

Meanwhile, I'm rather happy living in another funky seaside village down the other end of the island.

Hold on: aren't you supposed to abjure Auckland in order to be accepted anywhere else? The national narrative demands it!

being born in '68 myself, I've always found it strange there was no name for us..... too young to be a boomer and too old the be an X..... fallen through the gaps?

Thank God for the Internet and Wikipedia: Gen Jones.

Unfortunately Fletch – you most assuredly are a…

I remember the "Funky Seaside Village" article when it was first published, and it's one I've often thought about over the years. I remember how wonderful it was to read something about Auckland that was so optimistic.

Thanks Robyn. You'll recall that at the time, the media agenda was being…

Chris Knox, the old square peg, won with the beautiful “My Only Friend” whose gorgeous video may one day be screened on TV.

Why isn't this available on the intertubes?!

That's great. Out of interest, who was the 27 year old still working for his father?

He's actually named in the paragraph right above that one – Rich Poole. He put a full-page ad in the Herald in 2000 moaning about how all his friends had gone overseas because NZ was…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42Xu8zHbgAM

She didn't seem to have taken offence at the crack about The (Landmark) Forum, despite it being a covert reference to her fondness for sending her management teams to that particular rescue service for people who forgot to have a life when they were 23.

EEEEEK!! I wonder if any…

Oh how the mighty have fallen. Look upon ye works, Ms Gattung, and kindly go kill yourself!

Keep it seemly, Matthew. That's a little untoward.

Oddly enough, among the people to contact me in appreciation of the original essay was ... Theresa Gattung. We had a cordial exchange of emails.…

Yes. Shall we talk about Brian Edwards complaining the the country was boring?

If you insist... :) Perhaps it's just my quirky temperament, but life is always boring, everything is always kind of shitty and just getting worse, and the human race just strengthens the case that God should have…

"Self-obsessed blow-hard" doesn't even come close.

Look upon ye works, Ms Gattung, and kindly go kill yourself!

Beer o'clock come a little early in your corner of the world, Matthew? Would be nice if the Demoness Gattung was personally responsible for everything wrong with Telecom, but we both know that's just not true.

I have some of the fastest and cheapest internet service in the world

Oh how the mighty have fallen. Look upon ye works, Ms Gattung, and kindly go kill yourself!

Russell, with the benefit of seeing just how much of a Deane clone – ignoring the obvious anatomical differences -…

Some of the cheapest and fastest internet in the world?
Wow, how things have changed.... :D

Funny thing is, it was true at the time. I was probably the first DSL customer in Pt Chev, and Telecom was actually ahead of the game with 2Mbit/s service. Then it all stood…

Wow, how things have changed.... :D

And yes, being born in '68 myself, I've always found it strange there was no name for us..... too young to be a boomer and too old the be an X..... fallen through the…

(great piece, really looking forward to the 2009 version)

That's great – always good to have a perspective on things. How about an update? I'd like you to review where you see things NOW! Puh-leeze?

That's the plan, along with a discussion here. I'll just need a little time to get things done.

Apart from anything else, my iMac's…