Did any Aussies catch this a few months ago?

While looking for a show that A Current Affair apparantly did about Second Life, I came across this, a program by Australia's ABC, called Four Corners, who did a segment about Second Life. Sorry if it has been posted before! I actually found it hilarious in some parts, and was pleasantly surprised to hear so many Aussie's in there! I found it all pretty interesting, and it was interesting see many people behind the av's. I actually think it covered it all pretty well, if not a bit stereotypical ( but it REALLY annoyed me that she didn't de-newbify ). It mentioned Bragg as well. It's quite long, but what do you think?

http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/special_eds/20070319/

i missed this one.
i pretty much ignore news stories regarding sl. its been my experience that if youve seen one youve seen them all.

Well then, here's one for you:

I was listening to KDKA news radio last night, and during the Neil Bortz show he mentioned among other weird political news that in 2008 Australia was planning on banning Plasma & LCD Screens as they use more energy than CRTs and are therefore bad for the enviroment.

Whether or not that actually will happen is yet to be seen.

Pffft, I'd like to see that happen. And CRT's suck...........

Well, that's pretty stupid, because the actual difference between operational power requirements is pretty small. The real differences show up when the size goes up, or you examine the standby power requirements. If the government wanted to really contribute something, they could set size limits (as bigger sets require more power... do you really need that 50" tv?), or set maximum standby power consumption (amount of energy consumed when the unit is turned off), as that is where the real savings would be made. Not one style over the other:

LCD 0.29 watts / square inch
Plasma and CRT 0.34 / square inch

Maybe the aussie government should do some research before running off banning things before they know what's really up.

Well considering we havn't heard anything about this in the mainstream media, I think that is some sort of piss take/ misinformation.

they are considering using 'energy ratings' on tvs, similar to how its done on hot water heaters and clothes dryers and whatnot. it is likely that most current plasma screens would fail the test and would not be legal to sell.
it is all over the media in oz.

bear in mind that theres an election a couple of months away, the incumbant is VERY unpopular at the moment, and his government is very anti-green (denying global warming, refusing kyoto, etc) and has taken much criticism about that. this is likely a campaign stunt.

Yep with our election it's Dumb and bloody Dumber.

story about it:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/10/10/2055587.htm

this one has more detail, and says something similar is being discussed in the uk.
http://www.ecofriend.org/entry/energy-guzzling-lcd-behemoths-to-face-ban

That's it! Ban plasma tv's, but put a few nuclear reactors in our nackyard! Wewt! How smart they are.........

Back on topic though, I thought the Four Corners show was quite unbiased, compared to others I have sen. I would love to know what A Current Affair said though, I was speaking to my bank about my account, and the women asked what Second Life was, when I replied what it was, I may as well have said I joined the Manson family, the reaction she gave was so weird. She said she had seen something on ACA, and pretty much begged me to get off SL, ROFL!

current affair one was mainly about secondlife sex/escorts, etc with some mention of ageplay.

If the Australian gov works like it does here in the US, then the ban is probably from some one high up in the gov that owns a company that makes CRTs.