There’s a storm in a tea cup going on between our erstwhile leader, Paul Keating, and his erstwhile speech-writer, Don Watson. In the big scheme of things, I doubt it matters much.

But I’ve no idea what Mr Keating meant when he wrote this:

There is no doubt some of these moments when juxtaposed each to the other provide a matrix of a kind that helps paint a more nuanced picture of Australia in a way that people can both relate to and better understand.

Let me try: Some of these moments provide a matrix, and that kind of matrix helps paint a nuanced picture, and people can relate to and understand the *way* in which the picture is painted (not, note, the picture itself).

What does that mean?

48 hours ago, I don’t think I’d heard of Wyatt Roy.

Turns out he was the Libs’—sorry, Liberal National Party, aka LNP—candidate for the Queensland seat of Longman in last weekend’s federal election. He won. He is the youngest member ever elected to Australia’s federal parliament.

He’s 20. Until a minute ago he was a political science student at the University of Queensland. He’d never voted in a federal election.

I spent 24 hours completely bamboozled by this. How did he win pre-selection? Is it truly the case that the Liberal—sorry, LNP—party could find no-one with more experience or skills to stand as its candidate?

“But it’s good to have young people’s opinions”

You might say that it’s a good thing for federal parliament to include in its number someone who can bring a young person’s opinions to politics.

But that makes no sense.

1. Opinions are cheap. Gathering them is the role of pollsters. You don’t need a 20 year old in your midst to know what 20 year olds think.
2. There’s no evidence that Mr Roy can somehow speak for all 20 year olds.
3. His website suggests that Mr Roy has opinions no differerent from his older parliamentary colleagues. The site could have been constructed from a party template, where someone did a search’n'replace for the name of the seat and the name of the candidate. I found no original thought, and nothing could not equally apply to a 60 year old.

   In a Brisbane Courier-mail newspaper article, copied in its entirety on Mr Roy’s web site, there is a section ‘The thoughts of candidate Roy’. It sounds exactly like the mantras uttered during the election campaign by Tony Abbott and other coalition candidates.

All in all, the old grump in me thought the idea of a 20 year old in parliament was ludicrous. We need knowledge and skills in parliament and (at the risk of massive stereotyping), 20 year olds don’t have much of either. That’s why they’re students.

But I have changed my mind completely

I am suddenly delighted that a 20 year old has been elected to federal parliament.

His generation has caused worry amongst old grumps like me. Too many of his generation seem to take things for granted, are uninterested in work that provides even the least inconvenience, and believe that it’s OK to spend till you’re 30 bumming around, relying on parents and trying to work out what you want to do.

Not any more, folks!

Wyatt Roy has raised the bar.

Now, young friends, we know that, if you’re 20, you can be a student, stand for pre-selection, go through an election campaign, and be elected to parliament.

No more excuses!

Get back to work. Get back to university. Pull your finger out and get on with it. Put up with work (it’s why they pay you money for it). Study. Save some money. Get on a plane. See the world. Others can. Others have. No more excuses!

No, not sandy beaches and the bush.

Tomorrow is the federal election. A month of political advertising and news got me thinking about what’s good and bad about this country.

Seven things about Australian life and people that I love:

1. We are a secular society.
2. We are a multi-cultural society. If you want proof, catch the number 86 tram from Collingwood to the Melbourne CBD and note the variety of cultures of the passengers.
3. The Trade Practices Act 1974. While the Trade Practices Commission sometimes goes off the rails, it talks loudly and carries a big stick. Together, the legislation and the Commission have encouraged a culture of fair play in business.
4. A comprehensive, reasonably well-organized, high-quality, government-funded health care system that ensures that people get care regardless of their ability to pay.
   
5. SBS and the ABC. Where else is there a 24-hour TV channel that broadcasts almost nothing but news in languages other than English? Today’s lineup includes news in Chinese, French, Hindi, Arabic, Russian, Turkish, Korean, Japanese, Filipino, German, Spanish and Italian. And venerable old Aunty has made extraordinary use of new technologies: it was podcasting almost before the word had been invented; iview has revolutionized television in this country; and Aunty now produces things like the news widget shown here.
6. We are a nation of travellers. I know only one adult Australian who has never been off this continent. Most of us have had the courage to save up a bit and get on a plane and go and have a look at the rest of the world. I even have some facts to support this:
   

   Australian residents made a record 6.8 million short-term trips [ie trips of less than a year] overseas in 2009-10
   …
   During the 2009–10 period, Australian residents on short-term trips stated their average time overseas was 15 days.

   The movement rate (number of international movements per 1,000 state or territory population) for short-term resident departures varied considerably across the states and territories. In 2009-10, Western Australia had the highest movement rate (434 movements per 1,000 population), followed by the Australian Capital Territory (429) and New South Wales (331). The lowest movement rate was in Tasmania, with 150 movements per 1,000 population.

   That’s right: over 40% of people in WA got on a plane and flew across an ocean to another country. Overall, 6.8m trips for roughly 22m people is 31% of the population. We’re a nation of travellers.

7. We are an informal nation. When an Australian Prime Minister appears on a radio talk-back show, the general public can ring up and say “Hi John, I want to talk about education…” or “G’day Kevin. I want to talk about health…” or “Hello Julia. I want to talk about infrastructure planning.” Can we really imagine a US President or UK Prime Minister doing that?
8. Oh, yes. And the sandy beaches and the bush.

1. A 404 page is the page that a web site shows if you try to view a page that doesn’t exist.

   People have lots of fun with 404 pages and Smashing Magazine has great examples of 404 pages: from Heinz tomato sauce to a lonely hearts ad.

2. We’re in the middle of a federal election campaign. The Sex Party reported that the Family First party wanted to trade preferences. Not, I think, a love match made in heaven.

   This led to a bizarre TV debate between representatives of the two parties.

3. Taste.com.au provides a recipe for caramel sauce that involves sugar, more sugar and cream. It then suggests that it be poured over low-fat icecream. Hello?

VH-UPY photographed on a mobile phone camera.

VH-CGT back in the hangar at Royal Victorian Aero Club after the mid-air incident.

VH-TRV on the ground. The man in the plane is my instructor, Davide Ierkic.

VH-KKW on the ground in Moorabbin.

A few years ago I started to learn to fly. I gave up in the middle of last year, largely because I wasn’t any good at it.

During my time flying there were two crashes involving 3 planes that I had flown. This weekend there was another.

1. In August 2008, two planes, both from Royal Victorian Aero Club, where I was learning, collided in mid-air near Moorabbin airport.
   • One plane was VH-UPY. The pilot was a student on a solo flight. He died in the crash. I’d flown VH-UPY lots of times. I did my second solo flight away from the airport in that plane. I really enjoyed that flight because I finally felt like I was getting somewhere with my flying (I was wrong; but I didn’t know that then).
   • The other plane in the August 2008 incident was VH-CGT. It was badly damaged, but landed safely and the instructor and student on board were not injured. I did my second cross-country flight (to Bendigo and thereabouts) in CGT.

   That incident has been the subject of an investigation by the Australian Transport Safety Board. I do find it odd that, two years after the event, they have still only filed a Preliminary report.

2. In November 2008 VH-TRV had an engine failure and landed in a quarry south of Moorabbin airport. On board were a student and his instructor. I didn’t know that student, but his instructor was my instructor. And I’d flown in TRV with that same instructor.
3. This last weekend VH-KKW crashed into a house short of the runway at Moorabbin. At one time KKW was my favourite plane. I don’t really know why, but I always felt better in KKW than any almost any other of the planes I flew.

CGT was repaired and returned to active service. UPY and TRV were written off; I assume KKW will be, too.

There is something just a little spooky about having 4 planes one has flown being involved in incidents like this. Especially KKW. I was very fond of it.

It is one of the great regrets of my life that I failed to learn to fly. I had the world’s best instructor; I loved it; but it wasn’t to be.

Pictures from:

VH-UPY: Surviving air-crash pilot to be quizzed, The Age, 28 August 2008

VH-CGT: No mechanical fault in plane: report, ABC Online, 22 October 2008.

VH-TRV: Crash landing in Langwarrin, Frankston Standard Leader, 21 November 2008.

VH-KKW: Probe underway into backyard plane crash, ABC Online, 8 August 2010; Royal Victorian Aero Club.

About a year ago, Google launched Wave, an application for on-line real-time collaboration. Kind of IM on steroids. While it never reached a Facebook-level frenzy, it was at least partly supported by some big names: SAP, SalesForce, Novell.

This week, Google announced it was ending the project.

Mashable writer Christina Warren lists lessons that Google can learn from closing down its Wave application:

Lesson 1: Keep Expectations in Check

Lesson 2: Make Your Product Clear

Lesson 3: Launch When Ready

Lesson 4: Have Real Value

Learn From the Past

Warren implies that Google rushed to market and did not explain the product.

And where have we seen that before?!

Software manufacturers must balance the tension between the need to roll out new products (and new versions of existing products) to keep the money rolling in; some customers wanting the latest thing; and the other customers needs for stable products that deliver value.

Too often, in my view, Microsoft rushes to market with remarks like “this is the first release; we know it’s not completely finished; wait for v2″. But by the time the next version rolls around the keen person who started the idea has gone off to a new job, and a feature—or a whole product—becomes abandonware.

Footnotes:

Any number of other people are also writing ‘lessons learned’ pieces.

How many puns can headline writers write? ‘Wave crashing’, ‘Wave goodbye’, ‘it’s a wipeout’.

Why would ANZ Bank do this?

Displaying the word ‘Demo’ on a keyboard was, maybe, a good idea.

Executing that idea was not so successful.

Why would a designer mis-represent the layout of a keyboard? Unfamiliarity with the device? The triumph of style over substance? Or an attempt to force an idea through that should have been let die as a good idea that didn’t work?