TV Gives People Unrealistic Interoperability Expectations.
The effciency, effectiveness and reliability with which TV characters can perform all sorts of complex tasks with computers is making my life difficult and it's further weakening society's pansy grip on reality.

Lets take Jack Bauer in the TV show 24, top bloke and tough guy. He can get someone at the office to send some map of another office building of which he's about to kick the door in, with little red dots representing all the bad guys, to his electronic PDA updated in real-time without:

• Weak signals, drop outs, lack of call credit, blocked services, flat batteries etc..
• Having to remember his password that the I.T. dept insists he change every two weeks
• Having to call the person who's getting the map twice, send them an email and fax, only to get the 'what's address was it again?' -- 'oh that's on the old system.... You'll need to use the other software version 3.501.3.4765.6.2.6.8 to see the map properly, but its not compatible with your PDA'
• Having to sift through 145 other messages about viagra or earning cash fast.
• Waiting for virus updates to finish downloading so that the system can reboot and duplicate his contact list and forget all his appointments.

My problem is that some people are getting the idea that technology should be 100% reliable, seamless and easy to use and I reckon they're getting that idea from TV. The reality of finite reliability, cross compatibility and its relationship with cost and time is lost on what seems to be a vast swathe of the population that keeps asking me why some stuff doesn't work. I don't know whether to rail aganst the tide of believers in the 100% ideal, try to convert them to reality... or should I depart reality, join them in their glorious and impossible vision of the world and live a happier, and more ignorant life?

It's not meat... it's duck.
My latest favourite TV show genre has to be the Border Patrol/Security reality series following the daily activities of customs officers in Australia and New Zealand. In the same way that I never get sick of seeing some bloke getting his nuts smashed by a blindfolded kid flailing at a piñata, I never get sick of foreigners running the gantlet of customs officers, getting pulled up, then using exactly the same set of lame excuses. My favourite plot is:

• Foreigner plans on carrying food into the country, packs bags with food and flys to Australia or New Zealand.
• Foreigner ticks 'No' on the customs form declaring that they are not carrying food.
• Customs officer suspects that foreigner is in fact carrying food, asks foreigner if they are carrying food.
• Foreigner clearly says 'No, I'm not carrying food'
• Customs officer asks to see inside foreigner's bag... which invariably is full of food.
• Highlight: Foreigner angrily claims that food (duck, pork, sweetcorn, bananas, mangos, chicken feet etc) is not food -"This isn't food, it's duck/pork/sweetcorn/bananas/mangos/chicken feet" which in the case of chicken feet, monkey brains, and fish scrotums they'd at least be partially right.
• Customs officer then states that you could cop as little as a $200 fine or at max go to prison for six months. Checks the computer then find's out this same character has tried the same thing on 6 months ago when they last came to Australia/New Zealand. Asks what foreigner has to say in their defence.
• Foreigner either cries or gets really angry... "This would never happen where I came from"
• Customs officer and viewer then think to themselves 'Yeah, probably because where you come from is a corrupt shithole'.
• Customs officer slaps them with $200 fine... 'Next'

Reality TV gold.

Prediction: World War 3 to Start Thursday, Lunchtime.
WW3 Starts will start on Thursday for three reasons:
1. Italy won the World Cup and everyone else wanted France to win. So everyone is in a bad mood and just feels like punching on - this applies equally to states as it does to sports fans.
2. Italy won the World Cup so all the piles of out-of-date unused flares and other celebratory devices including MOABs and laser guided munitions that everyone was busting to let off with a French victory are just sitting in the garages of very disappointed and angry punters. This applies equally to states as it does to sports fans.
3. Israel and the neighbours just don't get along, this last week particularly so. Normally no one would care because that's just Middle Eastern culture at work. Though with all those Americans sick of policing Johnny terrorist in Iraq and itching to get into a good old fashioned state-on-state barney any invitation may just be too tempting.

This week's stock tips: Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics, Raytheon.

Dream Job: Destructive Testing.
When smashing a Benz into a concrete block to watch the air bags go off gets a bit tedious try crashing a chairlift. I don't know if these guys were selling tickets but I would have paid bigtime. Apparently there are videos somewhere.