Posts Tagged ‘whistle blower’
Kieran Trass: “I was lied to by ‘locusts’ ”
Judging by his latest informercial/newsletter, Property Guru/Property Genie Kieran Trass is not a happy camper … in fact he now says he ‘strongly regrets’ his involvement in a Spruiker Express-type seminar, presumably NZ Property Gurus which we discussed here earlier this year. It’s an interesting read, as you’ll see. I’ve left this extensive quote out […]
Picked up in the Howick Library … Crimestoppers
This eye-catching card, um, caught my eye at the Howick Public Library this afternoon. It reminded me of my post: Why speak up? — in part because it assumes a public duty to report crime, or at least share information about it … and recognises there’s a ‘risk’ in standing up. It only makes me […]
Pattern recognition
An ADHD friend of mine, a medical doctor from New York, once described medical diagnosis as ‘pattern recognition’. That’s why, he said, a competently written computer-based questionnaire can actually be more effective at diagnosing medical conditions than a human being: because the computer will ask ALL the relevant questions, not skipping some that don’t seem […]
Impressive
Blimey! Kiwi super hacker wows Vegas By Alice Neville | NZ Herald Thursday Jul 29, 2010 Kiwi Barnaby Jack wowed an American crowd this week by making cash spew out of an ATM machine like magic. But although he was in Las Vegas, Mr Jack is no magician – he’s a super hacker. … A […]
Why speak up?
Recent events have seen me revisiting a theme (or meme?) of this blog — and central to my own thinking: WHY SHOULD one speak up about perceived wrongdoing? Let me start by saying this: Life is complicated. Sometimes people and things can appear to be one thing on the surface but as you look closer, […]
Ode to a whistleblower
I’ve only met Bruce Sheppard once — at a Howick school gala one wet Saturday, but I’ve read his columns and long admired his outspoken advocacy for small shareholders. Now, apparently, he’s been snaffled up to be part of the new Financial Markets Authority’s establishment board and is leaving the Shareholders’ Association. Sheppard said he […]
Say goodbye to Paul Henry the abusive try-hard
TV breakfast shock jock Paul Henry was over the line with his “retarded” comments about Susan Boyle the Broadcasting Standards Authority found, and TVNZ didn’t do enough to rectify the matter. The BSA ordered the broadcaster to “read an agreed summary-of-decision statement on Breakfast within a month.” Given his history, Paul Henry appears to believe […]
Heads must roll! (Not really)
Move over General McChrystal, here’s someone else who has been fired for expressing his opinion outside of his authority … “I must be the only guy ever to have been fired in New Zealand for telling the truth,” Gibbs said. “It was a big call to go with what I thought was right or upset […]
‘Friends’ and enemies …
This looks like it could be a good movie. We’ve discussed Mark Zuckerberg‘s [alleged] personality issues before, and the ‘inside story’ on the [alleged] treachery and deceit at the core of the Facebook extravaganza has, as they say, all the elements of a ripping yarn — sort of a Raymond-Chandler-meets-Bill-Gates thriller. (Bill Gates has skeletons […]
Misleading and deceptive
In an previous post OK, so it’s not a hopeless quest … I celebrated action being taken by the Commerce Commission against an outfit that, it seemed to me, was dubious in its operation. This evening I read the news that the Securities Commission has taken the novel step of banning a financial advisor — […]
On the courthouse steps
My own meagre experience is that a court date focusses the mind of the ‘offending’ party. ‘Out-of-court settlement reached on the courthouse steps’ has acquired cliché status. So it seems to have been with Cabinet Minister Nick Smith who (finally, after five years) issued an apology to a company suing him for defamation over ‘incorrect’ […]
Speak up
REAL ESTATE ALERT from Neil Jenman Thursday May 27, 2010 Dear Subscriber A few weeks ago, my wife and I got an extortion demand – take down your web sites, abandon the publication of your book, Stitched! or your children will be targeted. On Friday May 14, Channel Seven ran a story about the threats […]
Ranting and raving? Oh yes, but sooo right!
I had lunch with my good friend Graeme today after he picked ‘the best song ever written’ on National Radio … and he hadn’t yet seen this absolutely wonderful recent rant and rave, telling-the-truth criticism of Glenn Beck by The Daily Show’s acerbic commentator, my hero Lewis Black …
True or false doesn’t seem to matter to liars
This is a really good essay about dishonest argument — which is one of my bugbears, as we have discussed before. It’s about US politics, but many of the points apply to the business of selling as well. Salon’s Gene Lyons examines the tactics deceivers use — repeatedly telling bare-faced lies or claiming the exact opposite […]
Exaggeration not just limited to property spruikers
Have a look at this: Verizon Claims To Cover More Countries Than Actually Exist via http://consumerist.com Oops!
