Monthly Archives: August 2009

Nothing is Ever 'Good Enough'

There’s a long, rather drawn out thread on Slashdot right now, wherein an apparently endless queue of geeks are lined up to take Wired to task for their discovery that Good Enough trumps Excellence every time. Quelle Surprise.

But not one of them has observed something that was recently made obvious to me: As technology advances, quality inevitably improves. The world, pace Microsoft, is not so awash in the mediocrity that Wired’s editors have decided to tout as the next big thing. Nothing is ever Good Enough.

What matters more than anything else is Convenience.

My eyes were opened to this a couple of months ago, when, in the course of pillaging my landord’s extensive library of books of and about photography, I came across a truly startling collection of photos from Papua New Guinea taken in the early 1920s. The almost liquid tones and gorgeous, lush light in his portraits capture the smoky, dusky interiors of village huts better than anything I’d ever seen before.

When I voiced my admiration to Ben, he observed, “Photography hasn’t significantly improved since the early years. It’s just become more convenient.”

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The Bigman Syndrome

[Originally published in the Vanuatu Daily Post’s Weekender Edition.]

Friday’s Daily Post featured a story that would be comical if it weren’t true. Vanuatu Ombudsman Peter Taurakoto released a report recommending the prosecution of 188 public figures for their failure to submit financial reports for the year 2007. Taurakoto also recommended that the Clerk of Parliament be prosecuted, apparently for not performing due diligence with regards to these reports.

According to the Leadership Code Act, ‘leaders’ include Members of Parliament and their political advisors, the Malvatumauri National Council of Chiefs, the VMF Commander, various officers of the provincial and national governments, as well as town clerks and the Ombudsman himself.

Given the astounding number of leaders listed in the Ombudsman’s report, one is led to ask if any leaders actually did submit a statement.

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Sound and Vision

[Originally published in the Vanuatu Daily Post’s Weekender Edition.]

On no less than three occasions in the last couple of months, we’ve seen complaints in the media over the activities of some Christian groups. In every case the problem was ostensibly noise. And in every case, we’re left with the distinct impression that, while volume might be a problem, people objected to the content, too.

Now, I would be amazed if there were more than a handful of individuals in the entire country who actively object to the basic lessons of the New Testament. Love thy neighbour and live peaceably with him; turn the other cheek when struck; forgive others for their actions – these values and others underlie virtually everything we as a society hold dear.

So why, then, do some begin to feel uncomfortable when others celebrate these lessons joyfully, loudly and at length?

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Principles of Policy Making

[This week’s Communications column for the Vanuatu Independent.]

Over the last couple of weeks, there’s been an increasing amount of discussion amongst the IT community over the need for a national ICT policy. We were all encouraged when someone from the Prime Minister’s Office spontaneously responded, suggesting that the best way to get things moving was to start moving ourselves.

One of the key points that came out of the discussion so far is that ni-Vanuatu feel that it’s time start taking issues of national policy in their own hands. That’s really heartening news. It’s always good to see a healthy amount of impatience when it comes to technical issues. Unless and until people are willing to invest something of themselves in the process, there’s little chance that the policy will take a meaningful or useful form.

In the interests of helping move the process along, I’m going to repeat a few lessons I’ve learned myself over the years….

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Action and Reaction

[Originally published in the Vanuatu Daily Post’s Weekender Edition.]

For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

When Isaac Newton first formulated his third law of motion, he codified a long-observed phenomenon. Wits have suggested a fourth law: ‘No good deed goes unpunished.’

At the Lowy Institute’s recent conference, The Pacific Islands and the World, attendees witnessed two contrasting views of Vanuatu. The gathering, timed to coincide with the Pacific Forum, was attended by dignitaries from major global institutions as well as government leaders from throughout the region. It was billed as an opportunity to discuss the impact of the global economic crisis on vulnerable Pacific Island nations.

By all accounts, though, Vanuatu has been less affected than the global economic giants. Mid-year numbers do indicate a slight slow-down, but in real terms, our economy’s still growing fairly well. In a recently published briefing paper by the Pacific Institute of Public Policy, Nikunj Soni and the Australian National University’s professor Stephen Howes point to tourism and construction as the leading drivers of this growth.

But they are quick to note that the environment is as critical to this success as the actual business opportunities. One noteworthy chart clearly shows the rise in economic activity starting in 2003, about the same time as major budgetary and macro-economic reforms began to take hold in Vanuatu.

The briefing paper goes on to highlight the fact that none of this growth would have been possible without social stability. That may seem like so much common sense to some. Civil disturbance and political turmoil are seldom on a tourist’s must-see list. Likewise with home buyers.

But what brings this stability about?

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Begging the Question

[Originally published in the Vanuatu Daily Post’s Weekender Edition.]

I’m a bit of a curmudgeon when it comes to language. It’s partly because I value clear expression, partly because it’s just my nature. One of my pet peeves is the habit shown by some to co-opt certain words and phrases in order to make themselves sound smart or virtuous.

One of the most common sins is the misuse of the phrase ‘begging the question’. Begging the question is what’s known as a logical fallacy – it’s something that sounds reasonable, but uses false logic to achieve its argument. Where begging the question is concerned, the logical flaw is in the assumption behind the question. The stock example of this tactic is of a courtroom lawyer who asks the defendant, “When did you stop beating your wife?”

Now, you can see the problem here. There’s an unspoken assumption behind the question, one that we in Vanuatu know to be false: Quite obviously the defendant has never actually stopped beating his wife. The illogic is made even clearer by the laughable assumption that an abusive husband might somehow end up in court.

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