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I suggest the government abandon its misguided plan for web filtering, and instead launch an information campaign and instruction leaflet to ask parents to use the free service OpenDNS to monitor and block sites on their children's internet connections. Parents can put a password on their router so that DNS settings can not be changed. There will then be the same level of security as the government's proposed solution. The kids might figure out how to use IPs directly (typing IP addresses directly into the browser) or other DNS traversal methods, but this free filter is no worse than the government's expensive filter.

This solution will keep everyone happy - people that don't want filtering don't need to use it, as well as this, children will be protected (to the same degree as the government's solution). As has happened before, any filter the government sets up can be bypassed by people that have the time and motivation to do it.

I would then appreciate the government making a donation to OpenDNS, as well as giving me a $450k job for my worthwhile advice.

David Kiely, a Macquarie stockbroker, has been caught red-handed doing something that happens quite a lot at work - the viewing of risque images on computers.

I know that many company policies are absolutely strict to the letter that all electronic means of communication are owned by the company, and that employees have no right to privacy whatsoever. Where should companies draw the line ? Do employees have a reasonable right to privacy when communicating electronically ? Didn't the company also have a similar responsibly to inform David Kiely that he and his computer screen were being filmed ?

For example, how would David Kiely have been treated if he was reading Ralph magazine ? How would it have been treated if the genders were reversed ?

A federal court decision was handed down today not to compel ISPs to pursue their customers use of the BitTorrent protocol to download content illegally.

How they find the users
The film industry capture the IP addresses of users that are using BitTorrent to download their movies. They do this by setting up fake bittorrent trackers that pretend to host the content. One way around this is to use PeerBlock - this blocks film industry bittorrent trackers.

Legal systems can and do work
The Apple iPhone apps store has shown that legal software can work, if:

• it is easy to use and download
• it is priced at a level that most users are willing to pay

I remember that the full version of Microsoft Office used to cost around $900. This was blatant profiteering by Microsoft. I thought this was analogous to a rock band releasing a music CD, charging $900 for it, and requiring all businesses to buy it.

Once again, the movie companies just don't get it. Ever since content went digital and easily copiable, the game has changed fundamentally. The movie companies should follow Apple's lead and get back in the game.

It had to happen - since people have been developing second online virtual lives, now you have the opportunity to commit online 'suicide'. You can use Suicide Machine to delete all your information from Facebook and other social sites.

Myki, the new transport ticketing system in Victoria, Australia, is costing taxpayers $1 350 000 000. This is way over one thousand million dollars. It is $300 for every man, woman and child in Victoria. Just for tickets.

You would think for $1 350 000 000:

• on opening day, the transport minister would know the telephone number for customers to ring (by the way, the number is 13 MYKI) .
• the transport minister would not laugh at a demonstration when one of the ticketing machines falls apart.
• the transport minister would have some idea when the tickets can be used on trams and buses.
• the Myki website would not be overloaded on opening day.
• the Myki website would not have problems with entering standard addresses when registering.
• Myki machines could clearly show customers how to insert their credit/eftpos card.
• station staff could assist with loading money into Myki cards.

Unfortunately not.

Myki is costing $1350 million, compared with Perth's fully-functioning $35 million SmartRider ticketing system. The government has thrown good money after bad. This has been a looming disaster for years.

1. Crappy Presents. It’s hard to get excited about a small bottle of Avon talcum powder and a hankie, especially if you still have the one from last year.

2. Family arguments. Potentially they involve decades of history and people are quite happy to suppress them for 364 days (365 for a leap year), then why bring them up on the Big Day?

3. Shopping as a contact sport. Not deliberately, just because there are too many people searching for the perfect last minute gift.

4. Tacky Christmas decorations. I don’t think the fat man takes any notice of “Santa Please Stop Here” signs in someone’s front yard.

5. People who insist on the traditional Northern Hemisphere Christmas dinner, even when it’s over 30 degrees in the Antipodes in December.

6. People who dress their dogs up in an attempt to include them in the festivities. Dogs don’t need antlers. (especially Rottweilers)

7. The memory of the Christmas party when you had one too many apricot schnapps and did something you regret.

8. TV Sitcoms do a Christmas show with the plot stolen from a classic story. Although Michael J Fox is a fabulous actor, Family Ties' Alex P Keaton was just not believable as Scrooge.

9. Lame (American of course) Christmas Movies, especially ones that give rise to even lamer sequels.

10. The thing I hate most – I’m not a kid anymore, so there are no surprises from Santa on Christmas morning. What’s the point of getting up?

Thanks to Kathryn for this post!

The Australian Government is well intentioned, but hopelessly misinformed in its continuing intention to apply web filtering technology. The government will not stop the type of people that want to access extreme illegal pornographic material.

People that want to look at the illegal extreme pornographic sites can bypass the government web filtering technology using encrypted VPNs (Virtual Private Networks).

Ironically, forcing these people to use VPNs will make it more difficult for law enforcement agencies to detect illegal activity. Also, inevitably once an automated cross match between an Australian Government sanctioned DNS server is done with an external DNS server, perverts will have a handy list of illegal sites to visit, kindly selected by the Australian Government!

Learn from past experience?

Example 1. When Facebook was blocked in Vietnam recently, many users just changed their DNS settings (eg OpenDNS).

Example 2. The Howard government's million-dollar expenditure on its "net nanny" software available for free download to the public. This quickly became embarrasing when a teenager cracked the software soon after release. On one estimation, the taxpayer-paid software ended up costing hundreds, if not thousands, per installation.

Example 3. High definition DVD decryption was cracked despite the industry's best efforts.

Last week when I logged into Facebook, I saw a privacy dialog come up. Not having time to read the dialog, I clicked through, assuming that as I had not changed my security settings, that none would be made.

Guess what! Facebook has changed its privacy settings to default to profiles being visible to the public internet. Users now need to specifically tell Facebook to keep their profile private. This is a sneaky and underhand method by Facebook to expose more of its users' content to the public internet, increasing Facebook's search engine results. Facebook should have learnt from the last security uproar when it tried to change its Terms of Service to state that all users' content was owned by Facebook. Facebook fails to understand that one of the core reasons its users use it rather than MySpace is because of privacy reasons.

Along similar lines, Google's Eric Schmidt has stated that privacy should only be the concern of users that have something to hide.

It seems that George Orwell was right, privacy cannot be left in the hand of corporations or it will be abused. Please keep vigilant on this.

For every bad programmer, two good programmers are hired - to fix what the bad programmer has done. How you write code represents how well your brain is ordered, and how clearly you like to communicate to others.

A tutorial on how to confuse your code is at this link. You can use this to learn what not to do.

I am really enjoying the series of The Apprentice Australia. I think that Morello has shown to be the most competent, whilst also maintaining his integrity. Gerry Harvey and Sabrina have both backed him as worthy. Go Morello!