Blogotariat

Extraction from a coal seam gas well in the Hunter Valley has been suspended by the government after testing uncovered elevated levels of toxic chemicals.

The Internet's already inextricably intertwined with our everyday lives, and it's only going to become more and more prevalent as the so-called "Internet of Things" takes off. Everything from wearables to home appliances to medical devices are going to be connected to the net, and the U.S.'s Federal Trade Commission wants manufacturers to make sure that the security and privacy of consumers is paramount.

There's a new island in the Pacific Ocean, thanks to an underwater volcano eruption that's been going on for the past month.

Drop pure sodium into water, and you'll get some explosive results. You might have even seen this yourself. Sodium-in-water is a common chemistry class demonstration and scientists have a solid grasp of what's happening during the reaction. Yet one team recently discovered an additional step to the process. Just before the explosion occurs, spikes of sodium metal shoot out into the water, a team of chemists from the Czech Republic and Germany discovered.

About 25,000 to 3,000 years ago, land mammals died out in massive numbers from the Arctic to the Caribbean, which scientists have attributed variously to climate change and human activity. Bats weren't as susceptible as their non-flying cousins — in the Caribbean, about 18 percent of bat species died out, compared to about 80 percent of land mammals — but still, several species disappeared from entire islands.

A famed physicist who was among the creators of lasers died yesterday. Charles Townes invented the MASER--short for Microwave Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation, instead of LASER's Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation--and filed patents for lasers as well. As implied by the name, masers amplify microwaves by using [hard crystals and powerful magnetic fields]; they often serve as key components of atomic clocks and radio telescopes.

Every time a new action film or animated movie comes out, we marvel at the amazing computer-generated effects. But those effects can be even more impressive on a small, quiet scale. Artist Benoît Dereau has created a 3D walkthrough of a Paris apartment that's mind-blowing in its sheer attention to detail and subtlety.

It’s a lockout, a sit in, a picket writes Jerome Small in Red Flag. It’s a rolling conversation. It’s woodsmoke, and chairs that fall apart. It’s the most ordinary thing that could happen, on an ordinary street, in an industrial suburb, in any city you care to name. In an ordinary, everyday way, it has paralysed the Australian operations of one of the biggest corporations on the planet.

It’s a lesson that I never get tired of learning. When workers stop working, it’s the most powerful thing on Earth.

By Paul Egan, Philip Soos & Lindsay David Introduction Following our analysis of Federal and Victorian Parliamentarians’ real estate holdings, attention turns to Queensland, where Premier Campbell Newman has called a snap early election for 31st January, 2015. Australia, including Queensland, is facing a chronic housing affordability crisis. Housing price inflation has outstripped both rents […]

The post QLD politicians’ $91 million property holdings appeared first on MacroBusiness.

[[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

I had not thought Paper Planes would be as good as this, better I think than Storm Boy, and like that classic emotionally available to audiences of all ages.

Dylan, an eleven-year-old country boy whose mum has lately died in a car accident, lives in a rundown shack on a dustblown farm with his glum dad Jack, who does not go to work any more, but watches recorded football games on the flatscreen. Dylan lives on tinned spaghetti, feeds an eagle bacon each morning and rides his bike to the school. The eagle, his friend, looks down on him benignly, far below.

Taking a second twirl around the Australian reaction to Anthony John Abbott’s latest political gaffe and cultural cringe - discovering howls of laughter alongside expressions of disgust.The newspaper front page mocking the Prime Minister:

The post RBA rate hawks screech into abyss appeared first on MacroBusiness.

[[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

The RBNZ is never caught on the hop, from Westpac: The RBNZ’s OCR Review this morning kept the OCR unchanged at 3.50% as expected, but shifted from an explicit tightening bias to an explicit neutral bias with an allowance for rate cuts – a dovish market surprise. The most important change, from the market’s point […]

The post RBNZ doves hammer Aussie dollar appeared first on MacroBusiness.

[[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]