Riley has been an enthusiastic supporter of the clubs industry for many years, and works in partnership with them to do good charitable work. The clubs, in return, have been enthusiastic supporters of Youth Off the Streets. But just how enthusiastic have they been?

To counter the criticism that Riley is a shill for the clubs, he came prepared with a statistic to show how minimal their involvement was. Clubs’ donations to the charity were variously reported as 0.5% of total donations or 0.2% of the total budget. Insignificant, right? In a radio interview with Adam Spencer, he said the figure was 2%. Funny that it’s not the same figure, but it’s still no big deal.

In his submission to the Productivity Commission’s gambling inquiry, Riley proudly revealed his charity had received more than $3.5 million in funding from the clubs industry in the eight years from its inception to the submission in March 2009. That’s about $435,000 a year. Suddenly it’s not such small change.

For this figure to be 0.5% of total donations, Youth Off the Streets would have to be pulling in around $87.5 million a year. Sounds like a lot. And it is. In the 2009 financial year Youth Off the Streets received $8.3 million in donations and $6.8 million in 2008. One assumes they were lower in previous years, rather than higher.

It took me about five minutes of Google and high-school maths to discover, by its own figures, Youth Off the Streets did not receive 0.5% of total donations from the clubs industry. In fact, it was more than 5%. (I’m indebted to blogger cyenne for the link to the Productivity Commission submission.) If someone threatened to take away more than 5% of your income, you’d think twice, wouldn’t you?

So let’s be clear. Riley is spruiking for the clubs industry and lying about the extent to which said industry bankrolls the charity he runs. The information that proves he is lying is publicly available and easy to find. Does any of this get a run in the Australian media? Of course not.

Meanwhile, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has used the Big Four banks’ current (at time of writing) silence about cutting interest rates in line with the Reserve Bank’s cash rate as an excuse to beat up the government.

“(The banks) should be passing on rate cuts in full,” he said. “That’s what happened under the former government.”

Is that right? Not according to George Megalogenis, who wrote in today’s Australian:

Former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd wholeheartedly supported the idea of a ‘big Australia’, with a projected population of 36 million by 2050. As a means of differentiating herself from her predecessor, Prime Minister Julia Gillard said she wanted a “sustainable” population, although she has been unwilling to give a number.

In the current election campaign, the issue has devolved into a race to the bottom, with the Opposition claiming its population goals are even lower – thus more sustainable – than the Government’s.

At the same time, population-control viewpoints have been much more prominent in the media. Next week, the ABC will screen Dick Smith’s Population Puzzle, a documentary in which the entrepreneur will air his views on the potential dangers of Australian and global population growth.

Recently ABC News 24 interviewed Mark O’Connor, co-author of Overloading Australia, member of the Stable Population Party of Australia and a candidate for the Senate in the upcoming federal election. (Mark was also the celebrant at my wedding and I have a great deal of admiration for him.) Dick Smith bought a crateload of copies of Overloading Australia and posted them to all state and federal politicians and mayors around the country.

By limiting immigration, sustainable population activists aim to ensure Australia’s population will top out at around 26 million people. But even this may be too many; Professor Tim Flannery believes the long-term human carrying capacity of the Australian continent and Tasmania could be as low as 8 million people.

This notion of ‘carrying capacity’ – that we will simply run out of resources to sustain current levels of population growth – has been thoroughly discredited. Brendan O’Neill in Spiked provides an excellent summary.

Thomas Malthus was wrong in the early 19th century when he predicted “epidemics, pestilence and plagues” would “sweep off tens of thousands” if we didn’t get working-class birth rates under control.

Paul Ehrlich was wrong in the early 1970s when he predicted “hundreds of millions of people [would] starve to death” in India by 1980 or so.

Malthus and Ehrlich backed up their arguments with scientific-sounding factoids, but what actually drove their views was a deep hatred of other humans (those of lower class or darker skin, respectively) and a failure to grasp our species’ amazing ability to adapt and overcome problems.

This is why today’s green-tinged neo-Malthusians are wrong when they claim our current population growth is ecologically unsustainable, or can only occur at the expense of living standards. Despite the exponential growth of the world’s population, living standards are higher now than they have ever been in history.

They claim to eschew China-style coercive population control practices but fail to explain how education campaigns or handing out condoms could possibly achieve their goals, especially given the spread of anti-contraception religions across the developing world.

It is also a total failure of imagination to believe that even if we can’t solve all the potential problems of population growth with today’s technology, we will not find ways to do so in the future. History has shown, again and again, that we could and we did. There is no reason to believe we can not or will not in future.

As population grows, so do technology and society. We find ways to cope. We find alternatives to scarce resources. We come up with brilliant ways of feeding and housing ourselves and living with each other.

The fact is, we’re not doing those things well at the moment. We’re not developing renewable energy or building the infrastructure to cope with the pressures of population growth.

But to claim the answer to crowded trains or traffic jams or water shortages or even global warming is sealing off our borders or having fewer babies, rather than using all our intelligence and industriousness to fix the problems, smacks of a Luddite hatred of progress and a deep misanthropy.

I don’t get it.

But after a lengthy comparison of iPhone cases online and at a local retailer, I found one which seemed to fit the bill: the Belkin Light Protect Rock (or LightProtectRock), also known as the Shield Flex, for 40 bucks.

First off, let’s clarify why you might need to protect the iPhone screen.

Here’s the back of the iPhone. Note the shiny, white, hard plastic.

Next, let’s look at the front of the iPhone. While this is also relatively robust, note it is made out of softer, more bendy plastic.

Now let’s look at a variety of objects you might find in the average pocket or handbag. Note how they are quite hard and pointy.

OK, so we have a combination of hard, pointy objects and soft, bendy plastic. Note how combining the two seems like a fairly bad idea.

Thus the need for a case for the iPhone which offers some kind of protection to prevent the soft, bendy plastic screen coming into contact with hard, pointy objects in your pocket or bag.

Now observe the box of the LightProtectRockWhatever. Witness how it clearly says ‘screen protection’.

Would a reasonable person, seeing this, assume this product provided some form of screen protection? Something to prevent the soft, bendy plastic screen coming into contact with hard, pointy objects? I think so.

Now observe the Belkin LightProtectRockRipoff once removed from the box.

Ponder how such a device would, in fact, provide any form of screen protection. Now place the iPhone inside the device.

Note how the screen actually protrudes from the device by a couple of millimetres.

So there you have it: a product which promises to provide screen protection actually provides no screen protection whatsoever.

Australian law is pretty clear on this. A company is not allowed to make false claims about “the sponsorship, performance characteristics, accessories, benefits and uses of goods and services”.

Seems like an open and shut case.

Some very clever online businesses have sprung up based on this premise, making it easier for men to find clothes they want without having to go through an embarrassing ordeal.

I’m not like that, generally. Over the years I’ve found a few good shops and clothing labels that usually have stuff I like that fits me, where they don’t have crappy dance music at eardrum-bursting volume and where the staff are helpful and unpretentious.

Most of the time.

Not so this weekend, though, when I visited a very large department store in the CBD, renowned for its quality products and customer service.

Me: This is a nice shirt. Do you have one in my size?

Fashion retail person #1: (Flips through rack) No.

Me: Yes, I already looked there, that’s why I asked you. (Waits for fashion retail person to make helpful suggestion.)

Fashion retail person #1: (Starts sorting clothes hangers.)

In case you’re wondering, yes, at this point I checked if I could buy it online. The manufacturer had very pretty website that took 10 minutes to load on the iPhone (Yay Vodafone!) and, of course, no ecommerce capability. So, half an hour of fruitless shirt shopping later, I was back where I started, with a different person.

Me: This is a nice shirt. Could you please check if you have it in my size?

Fashion retail person #2: Yes, but I’m pretty sure all the stock we have is on the rack. I’ll check. (Goes out back)

Me: Well?

Fashion retail person #2: No.

Me: That’s a pity. Do any of your other stores have it in my size?

Fashion retail person #2: Let me see. (Twiddles computer) Yes, Chatswood. Can you get to Chatswood?

Me: It is not convenient. Can the Chatswood store send it here?

Fashion retail person #2: No. (Complicated explanation, I didn’t really pay attention after ‘no’.)

Me: Alright, I will take some time out of my work day to pick it up from Chatswood tomorrow, but only if they put it away so someone else doesn’t buy it before I get there.

Fashion retail person #2: (Spends 15 minutes on phone trying to find person in Chatswood store) I spoke to Alex, he said he’ll put it aside, but you have to get it tomorrow.

Me: OK.

The next day, in Chatswood…

Me: I had a shirt put away yesterday. Could you get it for me?

Fashion retail person #3: Hmm… I can’t find it. Was it a BRAND A shirt?

Me: No, it was BRAND B.

Fashion retail person #3: Oh! You need to go over to the BRAND C counter!

Me: (Goes to next counter) I had a shirt put away yesterday. Could you get it for me?

Fashion retail person #4: I can’t find it anywhere. Who put it away for you?

Me: I think his name was Alex.

Fashion retail person #4: Oh, ALEX. It doesn’t look like he put it away.

Me: (Speaking in the spirit of Homer Simpson trying not to swear, “Oh, fudge. That’s . . . broken. Fiddle dee dee. That will require a tetanus shot.” ) That is . . . unfortunate. I can see it over there on the shelf. Perhaps there’s still one in my size.

Fashion retail person #4: Here’s one.

Me: This has “XL” written in biro on the cardboard label but “L” on the shirt label. Are you sure it’s XL?

Fashion retail person #4: Oh yes, they found it was the wrong size and it’s really XL.

Me: Wouldn’t I better off getting this one over here that says “XL” on both labels?

Fashion retail person #4: Sure, if you like.

This is the hardest I have ever had to work to buy something, other than a car or property. Can anyone spot the dozen or so places along the way where the retailer made it harder for me to buy the shirt than it needed to be? And was it really such a nice shirt that it was worth all the aggro to get it?

How do businesses survive, treating customers with contempt? Is it only because all their competitors do the same? Surely there must be a huge opportunity for shops that sell clothes and help their customers buy them!

The last issue of Nett with my mug on the editor’s page came out last Friday, including my interview with twin brothers Brian and Vincent Wu, founders of clothing retailer Incu.

The best interviews to do are the ones that defy your expectations. Plenty of small business owners aren’t shy about telling you how great they are, which gives you plenty of material for the story, but leaves you feeling a bit cheap and dirty at the end of it. Not these guys! You definitely don’t expect successful fashionistas to be friendly, humble and modest, but Brian and Vincent really are and I’m sure that has a lot to do with their success.

Over the last year, Incu managed to land a coveted deal: the rights to distribute UK brand Topshop in Australia. Considering how many Australian women buy from Topshop UK online, this is very big. The guys from Incu also told me exclusively about their plans to (finally) open an online store next year, and once again I think they have exactly the right approach.

I’ve also been doing some exciting news stories for ZDNet on stuff like telecommunications tenders, state government IT policies, how bad state governments are at looking after our personal data and ERP consolidation projects.

Aside from this, it’s all been about making clients happy by meeting their insane deadlines, finding somewhere to live and even showing up at the odd IT industry Christmas party. Phew!

Technology vendors aren’t hugely worried about interest rates, but most tech is bought and sold in US dollars. When the Australian dollar was doing badly, local prices went up. The Australian dollar is in a very strong position now but local prices have mostly remained static.

Does this spell profiteering? In a competitive market, vendors wouldn’t be able to get away with it…

Here’s a piece I wrote for CRN: The great Australian ripoff.

Speaking of mobile, here’s a quick story I wrote for iTnews about local firm Digislide scoring $18 million in funding from UK investors. Digislide makes pocket-sized video/data projectors, which are just astounding. I’m not that old, but I can remember when the smallest video projector was the size of a large suitcase and had to be carried by two people.

But is it at all surprising that Digislide had to go overseas to get the money?

Client win stories are usually very, very dull. People in the industry care because they want to know what their competitors are up to, nobody else is bothered. But in this case, the good people at NBN Co were quite surprised to find that Data #3 had announced this win. And there are some interesting questions about it being a closed bid, when the government is committed to open tenders for all its IT procurement.

Soon after it was elected the Rudd Government asked UK public-sector efficiency expert Sir Peter Gershon to examine how the government and public service used information technology. This review, completed in August 2008, estimated the Government could save about $1 billion over four years just by rationalising its ‘business-as-usual’ or day-to-day IT spending. All this, apparently, without having to fire lots of people or reduce the number of IT services or the quality of delivery. (The Gershon review also cures warts and reunites long-lost lovers.)

This hasn’t gone without hiccups: Gershon estimated the Government would save $140 million in the first year, which turned out to be more like $109 million in reality. But with round one already in train, the government is pressing ahead with round two.

If it all works, in about four years’ time, the budget will be $1 billion leaner. Or $500 million at least, because half the savings will be put back into more IT stuff, which will generate more efficiency. Before you know it, the whole of government IT will be run on a couple of recycled desktops running Ubuntu!

This website will serve as my online portfolio and first point of contact for information on my freelance work, how to contact me and what I can do for you.

I’ve been blogging for nearly a decade on various defunct and still-existing sites. This blog will tell you all about my professional freelance work and thoughts on the media, technology and business landscapes. There will probably be a fair amount of pimping and self-promotion; don’t say I didn’t warn you.

If you’re after more personal, political or plain silly thoughts, head over to my vealmince blog.

I’m sitting here at the dining table with the radio burbling away in the background, looking out at the garden and thinking, this isn’t such a bad way to earn a living. I wonder how long that will last…