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Brett Debritz, Brisbane, Australia

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State of the arts

As I predicted when the poll was called, precious little has been said about the arts in this Queensland election campaign. Shadow Arts Minister Stuart Copeland was a late entrant with his comments that the new $100 million Gallery of Modern Art would be a white elephant. Time will tell on that, I guess, but the decision to build the gallery fits in with what a senior arts bureaucrat told me many years ago: "Governments are good on arts infrastructure but not good on art." We certainly have lots of impressive arts structures that cost a lot of money, provided by many state governments stretching back to Joh Bjelke-Petersen's (which also allowed the deomolition of many old theatres and Cloudland ballroom). We also have plenty of arts bureaucrats, both working directly for the government and for its many funded agencies. But do we have a sensible arts policy that will carry us forward?

Captain Kirk's not so bold

"I'm interested in man's march into the unknown but to vomit in space is not my idea of a good time. Neither is a fiery crash with the vomit hovering over me." That, apparently, is why Captain Kirk actor William Shatner turned down Virgin Galactic boss Richard Branson's offer of a berth on the first passenger space flight, set to take off in 2008. He added: "I do want to go up but I need guarantees I'll definitely come back." The Daily Mail has more here.

Not the same old story

As somebody once said, nostalgia sure ain't what it used to be. If you still haven't kept up with the news from, say, 1848, you can now find it on Google. The search engine company has launched a new service, the Google News Archive Search, which allows selected news story searches back to the mid-1700s. At the moment, that selection doesn't include stories I wrote in the 1980s, however.

Blog news

There's news about The Ten Tenors, James Blunt, Sarah McLeod and The Veronicas on the ie blog and a new post on the Away blog.

Minor interruption

A notice at the South Brisbane railway station this evening warned of delays of "up to 30 minutes" during upcoming trackwork on the Ferny Grove line. Since the trains come half-an-hour apart anyway, why not just keep the delay to 30 minutes? Then nobody would know the difference.

Clever chimps

Why did the chimpanzee family cross the road? To get to the other side, of course. And, according to this BBC report, they've learnt how to do it safely. Apparently the males take up forward and rear defensive positions to spot vehicles while the females and younger chimps cross in the middle.

Germaine Greer on Steve Irwin

For an intelligent (although not necessarily correct in everyone's eyes) alternative view on the life and death of Steve Irwin, read what Germaine Greer had to say for The Guardian here. If you can't be bothered, or don't have the time, to read the whole things, here's her punchline:

The animal world has finally taken its revenge on Irwin, but probably not before a whole generation of kids in shorts seven sizes too small has learned to shout in the ears of animals with hearing 10 times more acute than theirs, determined to become millionaire animal-loving zoo-owners in their turn.

Drug stop

Did you know that London (and England) only has one 24-hours-a-day pharmacy? Well, that's what thelondonpaper says. I remember when Brisbane had at least two all-night pharmacies - one on the edges of the CBD and one in Albion. I don't think we have one now, let alone a 24-hour doctor. Why is it that we're constantly told things are getting better when we are always losing services?

A sting felt around the world

From Aljezeera to Le Monde; from the BBC and USA Today to the Frankfurter Allgemeine. Almost every major global news service has reported on the death of Steve Irwin. Google News points to 1504 stories and, despite the short news cycle on the internet, it is still the major story on CNN.com as I write. As Premier Peter Beattie said last night, in America they know Steve Irwin but they don't know who the prime minister of Australia is.

RIP: Crocodile hunter Steve Irwin

"Hey, did you here about Steve Irwin?"
"Yeah."
"How about that? What a spinout."
That carpark conversation this afternoon between two young Australians is proof that Irwin, TV's larger-than-life Crocodile Hunter, made a huge impression.
People everywhere - in Australia and overseas - have been talking about him since the news broke. This afternoon, the ABC News website has gone into a minimalist mode to try to keep up with the demand for traffic.
As I said on the ie blog, Irwin will be remembered not just as a showman but as a person who shared his enthusiasm for nature with the world. He was also a great ambassador for this country. As one shopper was overheard to say, "they'll have to hold his funeral at a cricket ground" because so many people will want to come along and pay their respects. There's no doubt Irwin's family will be offered a state funeral. Exactly what arrangement they make is, of course, up to them.

Steve Irwin dead

Crocodile hunter Steve Irwin has died. It appears he was stung through the heart by a stingray. The Courier-Mail has details here.

Hilton prank: is it art?

"Guerilla artist" Banksy has struck again. He has replaced Paris Hilton CDs in record stores with discs featuring his own songs, including tracks titled Why am I Famous?, What Have I Done? and What Am I For?. So far, record stores have received no complaints from people who bought one the doctored CDs. Maybe it is better than the original.

Fire alert

Just about everybody likes fireworks. But is half and hour of them, topped and tailed by expensive fuel dump-and-burns by RAAF F111s, just a bit over the top? It occured to me that last night's Riverfire could have been about a third of its length, use maybe half the number of fireworks and have been twice as impressive.

On their best behaviour

We read and hear a lot in the media about how badly behaved some young people are and what a dangerous place the Brisbane CBD is at night. Well, I travelled by bus from South Bank to the Valley well after last night's fireworks show, and everybody was in a bouyant mood but there wasn't a hint of bad behaviour. People were singing, joking with strangers and generally having a good time without hurting anybody else. I hope it wasn't the exception that dissproves the rule.

Save the planet

I haven't seen the film yet, but I'm happy to share this e-card from the Australian distributors of Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth. It gives 10 practical suggests to help you fight global warming on a local scale.

Jana who?


What a difference a day makes. Sometime soon after Jana Wendt went from Nine, the logo on the website for her former program, Sunday, was changed. Although the website does refer to the "new-look Sunday, it doesn't yet feature pictures or profiles of the people tipped to replace her, Ellen Fanning, Ross Greenwood and Stephanie Brantz. In fact, at the time of writing, Wendt's profile is still there.

Fantastic film festival publicity

Congratulations to the people behind the Gold Coast Film Fantastic festival on their innovative marketing approach. There's a post on the ie blog that points to a funny promotional video for one of the event's free highlights. Some other festivals with lots more money to spend could learn a thing of two about simple, effective ways to spread the message.

Wendt leaves Nine

Sunday host Jana Wendt has followed Rick Burnett and a host of others out the door at Channel 9. Would the last to leave ...

On the air again

It's been a busy week of broadcasting for me, with spots on ABC Coast FM on Wednesday (now a regular weekly gig with Mary-Lou Stephens) and Thursday (a half-time report last night on Dusty) and this morning's chat on 612 ABC with Spencer Howson. Spencer and I spoke about the sacking of Extra host Rick Burnett, the Dusty opening night and what happens when you type "Windsor Station" into the Translink site.

No seat for me

I now know how Papa Bear felt after the Goldilocks home invasion. Someone not only had been sitting in my chair for the opening night of Dusty at the Lyric Theatre last night, they were still in it - and they weren't going to budge because they had a ticket for the very same seat on the very same night. Nobody could tell me how it happened and the usher, who was overstretched as it was looking after two doors, was clueless as to what to do (so she just started looking after other people instead). I'm just glad a friend of mine was also there, and that his wife had got sick at the last moment and was unable to come. I sat in her place instead.