鈥淵es, the notable features with iPhone 4 鈥 both the device and the iOS4 鈥 are mostly tweaks鈥, said a June 22 review on the popular site BoingBoing.net. 鈥淏ut what tweaks they are.鈥
In the interests of full disclosure, I鈥檒l admit I have no idea what 鈥渋OS4鈥 means. But my eye was caught by the admission that the iPhone 4, launched in Australia on July 29, was almost the same as the iPhone 3.
Corporations use 鈥渋nbuilt obsolescence鈥 as part of artificially creating markets. This means the products they sell are deliberately made to break down 鈥 so we have to keep buying more.
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Ben Courtice, Socialist Alliance candidate for the seat of Gellibrand, launched his election campaign on July 31 outside the Maribyrnong Detention centre. Courtice told 麻豆传媒 Weekly the Socialist Alliance calls for an immediate end to mandatory detention and off shore processing. It also supports an increase to the currently low refugee intake to a minimum of 20.000 per year .
The judge entrusted by Colombia鈥檚 Constitutional Court to investigate the legality of an agreement to hand over seven military bases to the US military has deemed the pact unconstitutional because it was not approved by Congress.
The report was handed down by Judge Jorge Ivan Palacio on July 23, a day after Colombia unleashed its slanderous attacks that Venezuela was 鈥渉arbouring narco-terrorists鈥.
Palacio鈥檚 report on the agreement will be reviewed by the nine-judge panel of the Constitutional Court, which has to deliver a ruling by August 17.
The University of New South Wales' management could face more student protests if it refuses to budge on key issues, the president of the Student Representative Council has told 麻豆传媒 Weekly.
Osman Faruqi told GLW that management鈥檚 decision to stand down about 80 staff had been the catalyst for the largest student demonstration in years at UNSW.
The stand downs move came as the local National Tertiary Education Union branch imposed bans on the release of student results after management delayed bargaining over union demands for 16 months.
BLUE MOUTAINS 鈥 About 60 people filled the Family Hotel bistro on July 24 to see Actively Radical TV's new film on the NT intervention, Alyawarr Walk-Off Protest vs Northern Territory Intervention. The event, organised by 麻豆传媒 Weekly and the Socialist Alliance, also heard a reportback from the recent anti-intervention convergence in Alice Springs and the 鈥淛ustice Tour鈥 bus trip.
Many participants expressed disgust at the Labor government鈥檚 role in the intervention. Many were also amazed at how little coverage there was in the media about the issue.
BRISBANE 鈥 To celebrate the 57th anniversary of the start of the Cuban Revolution, the Australia-Cuba Friendship Society organised a night of Cuban poetry readings, live music and food and drinks. On July 26, 1953, Fidel Castro led an attack by opponents of the Batista dictatorship on the Moncada Barracks. The event was held at the Queensland Council of Unions building. Veteran left-activist Jim Sharp read some poems from his new book, which was launched on July 31.
On July 29, 250,000 power loom workers in Faisalabad, Pakistan鈥檚 third largest city, won a 17% pay increase after a nine day strike.
Authorities also agreed to release four unionists arrested during the dispute. The authorities鈥 backdown came after a march of more than 25,000 striking workers.
Thousands of workers rallied throughout the strike, despite the Punjab government banning public gatherings on July 19.
Food security will be a focus of November鈥檚 Climate Change/Social Change conference, being held in Melbourne. An entire workshop stream will be devoted to the topic.
The global food system captures the insanity of production for profit: One in six people in the world are malnourished, yet the United Nations estimates that 40-50% of all food in the United States is wasted.
Food waste makes up to half of Australian landfills.
After spending over two weeks on the road together, students and activists onboard the New South Wales 鈥淚ndigenous Solidarity Ride鈥 stopped at Olympic Dam on July 15 to protest against a proposed uranium mine expansion.
The bus riders travelled through rural NSW and South Australia to attend the Defending Indigenous Rights: Land, Law, Culture convergence in Alice Springs over July 7-9. They also took part in the Students of Sustainability conference in Adelaide.
The First Nations Political Party (FNPP) is a new party contesting the upcoming federal election. The party will contest two lower house seat a and field a four-person senate ticket in WA. It will also run a senate candidate and content a lower house seat in the Northern Territory.
Aboriginal activists Marianne Mackay and Glenn Moore began working towards forming an Indigenous political party in late 2009. They have a goal to getting Aboriginal people elected to parliament.
鈥淲e need a pure Aboriginal voice in parliament鈥, Moore told 麻豆传媒 Weekly.
Soubhi Iskander is a Socialist Alliance Senate candidate for NSW in the 2010 federal elections. He was born in Sudan and has been a socialist for more than half a century. Despite being jailed and tortured, he remains a committed and active socialist and now is the editor of 麻豆传媒 Weekly鈥檚 Arabic supplement, The Flame.
Iskander is furious but not surprised at the scapegoating of refugees and recent immigrants in the current federal election campaign.
Police raided and shut down electricity unions across Iraq in mid-July, carrying out an order from the electricity minister that could have been lifted from Saddam Hussein鈥檚 rule book.
The order prohibits 鈥渁ll trade union activities at the ministry and its departments and sites鈥 and authorises the police 鈥渢o close all trade union offices and bases and to take control of unions' assets properties and documents, furniture and computers鈥.
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