No longer reading:
Advance Australia (Yawn) Where. It is intended as a sociological study of the changing patterns of work, society, gender, etc, blah, blah, blah, with some new phrases thrown in such as 'kaleidoscope nation'. Mainly of interest to academics and policy makers. It isn't of much use to a general public who have lived those changes directly as it is semi-empirical and quotes study after study which dilutes its readability for the disinterested reader.
In my opinion it is a book to skip. Not much chop. I think it falls into the category of the endless navel gazing Australia is capable of though. Are we good enough? We aren't quite sure? Maybe talking about ourselves incessantly will soothe our uncertain egos?
Currently Reading:
The Byzantine Empire by Charles W.C.Oman. Don't buy this book. It is long and useful for which monarch followed which, and that is about all. It seemed dated in its worldview and a quick glance at the inside page confirmed it: first published 1892.
It contained 19thC gems like:
They [Slavs] were rude races, far behind the Tuetons in civilization; they had hardly learnt as yet the simplest arts, knew nothing of defensive armor and could only use for boats tree-trunks - like the Australian savages of today.
Yet we learn that an army of 100,000 Slovenes and Antae besiege Constantinople which suggests they mastered numerous technologies such as military organization, siege engineering, maintaining supply lines and logistics to keep such a large army in the field, not to mention the politics in keeping a body of that size together. I think 19thC racism blinded the author to these capabilities.
The book continued on that theme in a similar manner. Lineage and hereditary blood was an indicator of character; noble emperors contained it in buckets, yet depraved and specious ones were of poor racial and hereditary make-up. The book also focused exclusively on the emperors of Constantinople and who followed whom. It contained no information on who people of the Byzantine Empire lived etc.
Fail.
Most Popular on South Sea Republic
The articles that have been viewed the most:
Most Popular Restaurants in Phoenix
Phoenix Eats Out is the restaurant review site for
Phoenix,
Scottsdale and
Old Town Scottsdale which lists the modernist and contemporary restaurants, taverns and bars in the greater Phoenix area.
This is the list of the most popular restaurants pages from phoenixeatsout.com that have been viewed the most;
My personal favourite restaurants in Phoenix are
AZ88,
Postinos,
Bomberos with
Grazie,
Humble Pie,
Orange Table,
The Vig,
Fez and others coming close behind. View the complete list with the photo-journalistic style images on
phoenixeatsout.com
Most Popular Hikes in Arizona
Arizona is an outdoor state and has lots of hiking in the city and around the state. Phoenix is unusual for most cities in having several large mountains in the center of the city with great hiking. Anyone who comes to Phoenix has to do the
Echo Canyon trail on Camelback and the
Summit Hike on Squaw Peak or Piesta Peak. The views of the city, suburbs and surrounding mountains are wonderful from Camelback and Piesta Peak.
For more experienced hikers there is the McDowell Mountains in North Scottsdale that has several difficult and strenuous hikes in
Tom's Thumb and
Bell Pass. Alternatively, you can hike the highest mountain in Arizona. At 12,600 feet
Humphrey's Peak is a long and difficult hike.
Alternate Australian Constitutions
Between 2004 and 2009 this site,
southsearepublic.org, was a constitutional blog based on scoop which focused on Australian and global constitutional issues.
One of the strongest aspects of it was the development of constitutions by those involved in the blog. These constitutions are the outcome:
The constitutions were built using principles from Montesquieu's separation of powers, the enlightnment's universal political rights and the ancient Athenian technology of sortition and choice by lot.
Archives For South Sea Republic
South Sea Republic started in 2004 as an Australian constitutional blog in 2004 based on scoop software. It was an immigrative outgrowth of Kuro5hin. The archives for each year since then;
The articles are ordered by views.
Who Is Cam Riley
I am an Australian living in the United States as a permanent resident.
I am a software developer by trade and mostly work in Java and jump between middleware and front end.
I originally worked in the New York area of the United States in telecommunications before moving to Washington DC and
working in a mix of telecommunications, energy and ITS. I started my own software company before heading out to
Arizona and working with Shutterfly. Since then I have joined a startup in the Phoenix area and am thoroughly enjoying myself.
I do a lot of photography which I post on this website, but also on flickr. I have a photo-journalistic website which lists
the modernist and contemporary restaurants in phoenix. I have a site on the
Australian Flying Corps [AFC] which has been around since the 1990s and which I unfortunately
lost the .org URL to during a life event; however, it is under the
www.australianflyingcorps.com URL now.
The AFC website has gone through several iterations since the 90s and the two most recent are
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2004-2002) and
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2002-1999) which are good places to start.
Websites Worth Reading
Websites of friends, colleagues and of interest;
