Posts by Russell Brown
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Hard News: Friday Music: Asking the…, in reply to Hugh Wilson,
Those were tough questions, I couldn’t answer any!
I was worried I'd gone a bit hard there ...
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Hard News: Rugby Now, in reply to Gaz Tayler,
one day over a beer Russell I'll tell you all about why it does not work
Flash, innit.
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Wow: Dunne just announced that doctors will be able to prescribe cannabidiol without restriction.
I went through the technical argument behind the scenes in January. The Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs – which has been sitting on this for a year – came through. Sue Grey's a champ.
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Hard News: Rugby Now, in reply to Gaz Tayler,
at the end of the day NZRU will probably stick with dealing with a single broadcasting partner, but may force them to start “on-selling content” to other channels
Or split broadcast and online rights, given Sky’s lack of aptitude or interest in providing an online service.
Its not just FanPass, btw. I now can't get Sky Go to work at all – a service for which I am paying. It's a fucking disgrace.
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Hard News: Rugby Now, in reply to Bart Janssen,
When the super teams were created they were given identities that were independent of location. This allows for a super team to move location without loss of identity and most importantly allows the team to be SOLD.
I’m sure some suit wearer at union headquarters had wet dreams about selling The Crusaders to Los Angeles.
Not actually true. The teams were geographically-named (i.e.: The Canterbury Crusaders, Auckland Blues, etc) until 2000. And I can’t really see a scenario where the teams would move, although clearly the addition of the Jaguares and Sunwolves was an attempt to increase the value of the broadcast deal by bringing in new audiences. That’s why Steve Tew rejected a reversion to a trans-Tasman competition – they needed the South African audience.
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Hard News: Rugby Now, in reply to dave stewart,
One assertion he makes I believe is accurate: that limiting TV sports coverage to pay-to-view results in a smaller audience than if it were free.
Undoubtedly true. We’ve seen it with netball and cricket. It’s the difficult bargain those sports find themselves having to strike – losing currency in order to gain revenue.
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Hard News: Rugby Now, in reply to Rob Stowell,
From a production point of view, that’s at least a headache (unless one production company gets the contract to produce all the different games, it could get very messy) and at worst, only the bigger games are covered (and then ‘on the cheap’ – not necessarily a bad thing. It costs sh*tloads the way it’s currently done – and there’s a big fixed cost in equipment.)
Funny thing is, it was largely done by one company, until Sky cut Moving Pictures out of the deal.
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Hard News: Drugs and why Dunne did it, in reply to Kumara Republic,
And his prohibitionist views on cannabis are largely emotional and driven by family tragedies. On the other hand…
It's a bit of a persistent factoid that Philippa Anderton's death was drug-related. It was deeply tragic, but it was related to mental illness rather than drug use. His son did suffer a lasting physical impairment as a result of heroin use, which I think played some role in Anderton's embrace of harm reduction.
He remained a prohibitionist, but a lot of countries dream of having prohibitionist politicians who nonetheless throw their weight behind needle exchanges to save lives. It really isn't like that in many other countries.
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Hard News: Drugs and why Dunne did it, in reply to Joe Wylie,
I’d have thought that it’s the incongruity of Anderton’s more throwback views with his wider supposed progressiveness that’s historically riled and exasperated many of his critics. While I get that politicians may feel unjustly maligned, my squeamishness is triggered when you weigh in to dismiss their ordinary constituents as a bunch of ill-informed dupes.
Yeah, fair enough – I had the odd run-in with Anderton myself.
But the fact that he won funding (as a Progressive party bid) to make needle exchange free in 2004 – after receiving a report that changed his mind – has saved lives.
That same year he also proposed the amendment to MoDA that reversed the onus of proof on possession of needles, which helped the exchange system work better.
When the amendment was being debated in Parliament, Tony Ryall attacked it as “all part of a politically correct, liberal agenda being pushed by this Government and the health authorities under the name of harm minimisation”, which was the most despicable, destructive politicking over people’s lives.
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Hard News: Drugs and why Dunne did it, in reply to Geoff Lealand,
Ah yes – here it is:
I just finished reading Chasing the Scream by Johann Hari. It makes a compelling case for drug law reform which has really given me something to think about although I still have issues with decriminalisation.
Seems he might have a way to go yet. I do have some issues with Chasing the Scream's theory of addiction (it's not chemical, we're just lonely!), but it does make a persuasive case for why our drug laws are wrong.