Innovation & Science: Global Headlines

Recent headlines from the international media about New Zealand business innovators and scientists and their global ideas. Summaries of each story are at www.nzedge.com/media

• AKL Airport trials green landing technique via gliding on idle
• First Light ERA leads world in contextual advertising
• Geoff Vuleta in “white hot” NY-based Fahrenheit 212
• Auckland’s Wallflower Global in US$20m sale to Thailand
• Alpine Wasp rescue helicopter can scale Everest
• Txtstation takes real-time polling to US audiences
• Kerry Black’s Versareef emulating world’s best surf waves
• Wellington telco OpenCloud scores venture capital funding
• $200m wind farm contract for TrustPower in South Australia
• Margaret Brimble named UNESCO Science Laureate
• Palaeontologist Trevor Worthy: NZ had indigenous land mammal
• Massey U develops productive ultra-cheap solar energy solution
• NZ bio-fuels research helpful in addressing climate change
• Cellulosic ethanol production could reduce NZ oil consumption
• Auckland U solves eternal pigeon homing mystery
• 70 million possums form environmentally kosher fur trade
• Victoria U research may save black rhino from extinction
• Aquaflow’s bio-diesel: 5% liquid algae grown on human sewage

Crowded House and 'Time on Earth'

Neil Finn is in full voice, in more ways than one. The preview/webcast of Crowded House’s new 'Time On Earth' album due July shows him in crackling, lyrical, lilting form. Finn and Nick Seymour, with Mark Hart and Matt Sherrod, have reformed the band and announced dates in the US, Australia and the UK. ‘Time on Earth’ features Johnny Marr on two tracks and a Finn/Dixie Chicks song 'Silent House'. New songs include Don't Stop Now, Say That Again, Pour Le Monde, Heaven That I'm Making, Walked Her Way Down, Transit Lounge and You Are The One to Make Me Cry. For over two+ decades Neil Finn has written/sung of songs that are anthems for New Zealanders everywhere. His music is the backbone of university parties, beach barbeques and road journeys. The music of the late 70s/early 80s has traveled beautifully to 2007 – Neil and senior bro Tim Finn, Dave Dobbyn, Netherworld Dancing Toys, Jordan Luck, Hello Sailor and Dragon are heard by tens of thousands of New Zealanders every week in rugby stadiums around the country. Neil, however, is the only New Zealander you’ll hear in the Hermes store at 57th St in New York or a Ralphs in West Hollywood. I saw Neil win a talent quest at Mt Maunganui in about 1974 with an Arlo Guthrie song, we were both about 16; well judged by Benny Levin and Lew Pryme. Then the Split Enz tours from 75 on, I saw Neil open for Split Enz in the Tauranga Town Hall, as son Liam is doing in this new Crowded House. Four years in Hamilton was a long time but the band’s big-city homecoming concerts at the Founders Theatre helped form the view that raging talent can come from the most unanticipated places. I won a South Island leg with the band when I was representing the Topp Twins in the mid 1980s, they opened the shows. It was Paul Hester’s first tour. Dunedin Town Hall was a buzz but a sunset stadium show at QEII Park in Christchurch to end the tour showed all the world class this band had. Being a musician is a rare gift and the best radiate the love of singing and playing and the joy that comes from it for both performers and audience. After-show singalongs with scratch bands can be hilarious and infectious, as a combination of a Finn, two Twins, Mr Hester and Sharon O’Neill proved après-show in Nelson. At a birthday party at Long Island on the East River in New York a month ago I talked to a guy from Minnesota who had an encyclopedic knowledge of Split Enz and Crowded House. Some air miles from Te Awamutu and this conversation. Crowded House’s 1996 album ‘Recurring Dream’ has just gone 12 X Platinum in Australia. The first single off their new album, 'Don't Stop Now', will be released on 25 June as 7", CD and DVD. Rock on. Crowded House play the Beacon Theater New York August 8 and 9. http://www.crowdedhouseofficial.com/

New Zealanders in global headlines

New Zealanders featuring in this week's survey of global media including Wallpaper, ABC News, The Scotsman, Sydney Morning Herald, Open Democracy, MediaVillage, BBC, NZ News UK, New York Times and the Pittsburgh Observer-Reporter:

• Stevens Lawson Herne Bay house features in Wallpaper (pic)
• NZ cosmetics present pure, natural image to French retailers
• US CEO of Optimedia Antony Young’s new digital media book
• “Multilateral disarmament in rotten state” – Nzer Bob Rigg
• Marshall Day Acoustics wins big Paris concert hall contract
• WW2 flyer Carlisle Everiss of Te Kuiti memorialized in Scotland
• Tim Finn tours US to promote Imaginary Kingdom album
• NZ a 21st century treasure map–INC survey on global business
• Privy Council quash David Bain conviction, victory for Karam
• Peter Jackson to direct Tintin features with Steven Spielberg
• NZ-born war correspondent Kate Webb dies, 64, Sydney
• Frank Bateson, world respected astronomer, dies at 97
• 42 Below ads created by Saatchi win top print at US Clios
• Judge Ted Thomas (ret) finds against Blair was policies
• NZ pathologist Dr James Ferris gives serial killer evidence
• Antony Romano GM of Luna Rossa campaign in Valencia
• Oxfam activist Ingrid MacDonald campaigns for Darfur
• Evangelist Ray Comfort squares off for God on US TV
• Nelson Blue NZ gastro-pub opens in NYC’s Seaport
• Christchurch’s Reload opens first franchise in Glasgow
• “Competitive dudes” from Hell Pizza open in Fulham

See full stories at www.nzedge.com/media

Sunday Picture #3: Peter Blake

I took this picture of Peter Blake in 2000 in Wellington's beautiful Civic Square during the national tour of the America's Cup, won by Team New Zealand, the first non American team to successfully defend the America’s Cup, beating Prada’s 5-0. These two teams sail off for the Louis Vuitton final in Valencia starting June 1. Luna Rossa’s skipper Francesco de Angelis, who was standing behind Peter Blake in the picture, again leads the Italian team. We had our heads bowed in all sorts of ways after the 2004 Auckland regatta, but the point remains that for New Zealand the America’s Cup campaigning that began in 1987 has been a multi-billion dollar value-creator for the country: in terms of global nautical industries; nz global logistics; elevating our agrarian brand image to something more sophisticated; a showcase for design, engineering and craft excellence; global media coverage; employment; development (Auckland’s waterfront); visitation; teamship; reputation; respect. I theorize that the pivotal energizers of the New Zealand economy 1995-2000 and 2001-2005 were the “Two Peters” – Blake and Jackson. They and their teams and supporters juiced us onto on big, new, international, technological and creative possibilities. Their endeavors are both cake and icing. They are exemplars. There are others, and there will be more. The tickertape on Peter Blake’s shoulders was for a job well done, yet his unawareness of it as he focuses on a person in front of him, is what makes the picture, and the man.

Recommended: Flanders 1917

The story of Flanders, 1917

“Shoulder to shoulder with the Australians, the men of the New Zealand Division began their attack in gales and driving rain, faced with a morass of mud, uncut barbed wire up to 13 metres deep, an erratic and ineffectual artillery barrage to protect them and withering machine-gun fire. Slowed by the weather and struggling through thick mud, they died in their hundreds. In four hours on the morning of October 12, 1917, New Zealand suffered a casualty toll of 60% of those who took part - 3,296 men of whom 1,190 were killed. It took two and a half days to clear the New Zealand wounded from the battlefield.”

The website http://www.flanders1917.info/ has been created to tell the story of Messines and Passchendaele; their histories and their people; of the New Zealanders, the soldiers, the four New Zealand VCs in Flanders; and of the projects and commemorative events that will begin at Messines on Thursday June 7 - the day, 90 years ago, that the New Zealand Division captured the town. The site has been compiled by Steven Reynaert, of the Messines Council, Freddy Declerck, of the Passchendaele organising committee, and Martin O'Connor, a New Zealander who lives in Belgium.

“The battles of Messines and Passchendaele are among the most iconic events in New Zealand history. Less well known today than Gallipoli, they were, however, just as devastating if not more so. Flanders 1917 touched virtually every family the length and breadth of the land. It left a legacy that exists to this day. “Messines was a great victory - a rarity on the Western Front. It came at no small cost. In the three days historians assign to the battle, New Zealand alone, with a total population of just over one million, sustained 3,660 casualties, 700 of those killed. Many of those casualties occurred not in the attack itself, which was fast and successful, but from shell fire the following day.

“Four months later, just the other side of Ypres, there was another costly success - this time in the Battle of Broodseinde, part of the Third Battle of Ypres and the build-up to what is now known as Passchendaele. Eight days later, the First Battle of Passchendaele became the country's most tragic day. It remains so.”

Earthrace around the world

While the crew of NZL92 rest in Valencia after qualifying for the Louis Vuitton Cup against Luna Rossa, another stunning New Zealand-designed vessel is at sea audaciously attempting to break the world record for circumnavigation of the globe by a powerboat. The Earthrace 100% bio-fuelled, wave piercing trimaran must arrive in San Diego on or before 21 June to break the record of 75 days set by the British boat Cable & Wireless in 1998. The project, conceived and skippered by Peter Bethune, aims to show how renewable bio-fuels can, for example, power a revolutionary boat around the world in record time. The craft showcases environmentally friendly technologies such as low-emissions engines, non-toxic anti-foul and efficient hull design. Earthrace is a story of grit, guts and genius. It is undoubtedly a beautiful craft, a pretty monumental piece of design, and when on track it seems the fastest boat around the world. Apart from an immediate need for cash to keep the race going, Peter Bethune must be slightly zen at the present knowing that he has already experienced many of the worst scenarios the journey has faced: the death of Guatemalan fisherman Gonzales in a low-light accident; breakages; sea conditions; logistical nightmares; being shot at; people situations; fuel; the constant proverbial shoe-string. Earthrace is currently in the Suez Canal and then onto Malaga, the Canary Islands, Barbados, Panama, Acapulco and San Deigo – about 9,000 nautical miles left in a 24,500 nm circumnavigation. I know of Earthrace only from reading media reports and their website (check out the Captain’s Blog) and it seems to me that this campaign needs every support over the next 28 or so days to meet its mission. I had a variety of peripheral involvements in several America’s Cup campaigns including instigating the first “fax attacks” from New Zealand to San Deigo. Earthrace deserves this sort of attention. It’s a win-from-the-edge effort similar in ways to the 41-day Atlantic rowing record set by Rob Hamill and the late Phil Stubbs in 1997. At http://www.earthrace.net/ there are a variety of immediate ways you can give your financial support to pay for fuel and support, or you can contact John Allen at john@earthrace.net or David Perez at david@earthrace.net. Earthrace has been supported thus far from over 200 New Zealand companies, organizations and international brands, but they urgently need widespread showings of support (via credit card or PayPal). You can support for a minimum of US$15.

Doing Business in the USA

Stories from the Export Frontlines
New Zealand Export Decade 2007-2017 is well underway, initiated by the Government’s Export Year. Clearly a year is not enough to transform the country’s insular economy into one that earns the majority of its income from international sales in all forms. China has succeeded with 10 year planning. New Zealand must also commit to long-termism.

We have many outstanding exporters, big and small, all with the ability to grow because of the uniqueness and excellence of their product or service innovation. Many many more internationally-minded companies are needed, with a few really big breakthroughs desired. Ideas about export models are growing, including:

• What is made in NZ and what is actioned offshore
• The role of our creative and design edge
• The need for brand marketing of the country (which, excepting tourism, is largely non-existent, although a NZTE ad in the Australian Bulletin’s 22 May feature on NZ (“Tasman Tiger”) proposes that “If you’re looking for new thinking, look across the ditch”).

A key element in developing an international-looking culture in New Zealand is hearing from those people who are already doing it. As always, it comes back to people and stories. In early 2007 Kea Network and New Zealand Trade & Enterprise produced an excellent forum in New York with five international New Zealand companies, offering candid accounts of the challenges, insights and practicalities of doing business in the USA.

150 guests attended the forum at Saatchi & Saatchi’s Worldwide HQ at 375 Hudson St, moderated by NZTE's Beachheads Chair Bridget Liddell of Antipodean Capital, with speakers:

• Mark Eglinton of Tenon USA (wood construction products)
• Matt Williams of Glidepath (baggage-handling systems)
• Victoria Vandagriff of Bendon (lingerie)
• Stuart Gray of Methven (showers, taps), and
• Jane Vesty of SweeneyVestyUSA (communications)

Exclusively on the Kea website are nine podcasts of each speaker and the Q&A, each 4-9 minutes long, and each 2MB. They are fantastic to listen to…people and stories…each voice is unique.

Topics/themes/advice covered:

• Doing it the best
• Having purpose, attitude and big ideas
• Refining your uniqueness
• Proximity to consumers to gain insights
• Being committed for the long haul
• Having a sound business plan
• Having a maverick spirit
• The role of good timing and good luck
• Surviving your mistakes
• Revisiting and revising your strategy
• Checking, tuning and refining before expanding
• Doing it step-by-step, having patience
• Establishing trust, credibility, reputation
• Being observant about US cultural characteristics
• Finding, making, managing and exiting partnerships
• Having the financial resources to survive initially
• Conforming to rules, regulations, laws, protocols
• Integration of NZ and US operations
• How to weave in the New Zealand story
• The importance of design innovation
• Hiring experts – lawyers, accountants, IT
• Outsourcing, supply chains, sales infrastructures
• Insurance, health, visas, credit, ID theft
• Social protocols, seasons, conversations

The Q&A podcasts cover:

• Using "New Zealandness" to your advantage
• What Americans find surprising about New Zealanders
• Working with conservatism in America

Event sponsors were New Zealand Trade and Enterprise, Saatchi & Saatchi, Crossroads Winery Hawkes Bay, Spy Valley Wines Marlborough, Lion Nathan, Methven, SweeneyVesty, Bendon, Icebreaker and Oxygen Lightworks.

Posted from New York City.

Kevin Roberts on the Heart of Wellington

Invited by the Wellington City Council to address business leaders and influencers at Te Papa on creativity, in the context of being awarded a WCC-sponsored Kea/NZTE World Class New Zealander Award, Saatchi & Saatchi CEO Worldwide and nzedge.com co-founder Kevin Roberts commenced by revisiting the 1991 Saatchi-created Absolutely Positively Wellington campaign which put modern moxie into the beige government town.

Roberts observes that there are 428 metro areas in the world with populations of more than one million inhabitants. Cities are an organizing idea of the 21st century. How does Wellington – population 164,000 in the city and 424,000 in total regionally – become a global leader? People figure centrally; the city's reputation should start with its people. Nancy Wake (where is her statue?). Joseph Nathan (where is his statue?). The brilliant and recently-departed scientific trio of William Pickering, Maurice Wilkins and Alan MacDiarmid. KR favorites Earle Kirton and Ken Gray. Because of the fissure they broke in Wellington’s crust, Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh and Richard Taylor and their Wingnut/Weta crews have created a world-leading film industry. From magnetic resonance to Olympic composition to All Black HQ, southern harbour-jewelled Wellington knows how to cut a swathe from the edge.

The conundrum is that Wellington is the capital city; “contentedness is a problem for a capital; where is the burning platform? The challenge for Wellington is to radicalize the public sector. I’m talking about the difference between policy wonk and policy passionista. We have to radicalize the culture of incrementalism. It’s time to light the beacons of Gondor. There needs to be a rebellion against the prevailing orthodoxy of civil service. To be successful, companies have to create organic growth of 4-6%, year in, year out. That takes creative combustion that travels to customers at warp speed. It’s important for New Zealand to have a peak performing government sector, because it comprises about 40% of our economic activity. This is Wellington’s #1 job. All along The Terrace there should be outrageous goals that absolutely lift performance. Strategies, reports, plans and platforms are survival table stakes. Action comes from the “I” words – Imagination, Insight, Intuition, Inspiration and Ignition. One revolution beats a hundred resolutions. It starts with language…all revolution starts with language. Wellington is The Heart of the Edge of the World. That’s a hell of a draw card…here where the world starts.”

Text of the speech is here http://www.nzedge.com/speeches/come_to_the_edge.html



Video of presentation to Wellington City Council (4 April 2007 - 39 minutes, 89MB)

The Kiwi re-defined: it's the egg!

A meditation by Steve Braunias in the Sunday Star Times, 20 May on the godwit – a miraculous bird that flies en masse non-stop from the mudflats of Golden Bay to Korea (for food), then on to Alaska (for sex) – prompts enquiry about birds as symbols of national identity. To me, the kiwi has been pretty useless symbolically and evokes the unfortunate "she’ll be right" period of New Zealand. Braunias: "We are our most famous bird, that freak of nature known as a ratite or flightless bird…dour, modest, shy. Feet on the ground and happiest left alone to go about its chores and its rituals in the bush." Hardly the behavioral model for a modern society. The Kea network chose well for their branding – the cheeky, extroverted, South Island mountain parrot who loves tourists (or at least their motor vehicles). Painter Bill Hammond has spent a career deep into the primeval bird life of New Zealand – his mutant half-human, half-bird creatures are dark and edgy (versus the “good taste and regional appeal” of Don Binney’s iconic bird-works).

Evolutionist Charles Darwin would have made a prototypical New Zealander – reserved, socially conservative, slow to make up his mind but eventually pulling off the big kahuna. A new book on Darwin - The Kiwi’s Egg, by David Quammen, a Montana science, nature and travel writer – offers hope for a metaphorical makeover, one that puts the kiwi in the territory of innovation and big ideas, rather than hoodies and hunched shoulders. Thing is, a kiwi’s egg weighs almost a pound – constituting about 20 percent of the female’s total weight. Its relative, the female ostrich, by contrast, lays an egg weighing less than two percent as much as herself. Relative to her body size on a standard with other birds, the brown kiwi's egg is about six times as big as it should be. No other avian matches the kiwi. Quammen spends several pages on the pregnant kiwi: "An X-ray photo of a gravid female kiwi, taken fifteen hours before laying, shows this: a skull, with its long beak; a graceful S-shaped neck; an arched backbone; a pair of hunched up femurs; and at the center of it all, a huge smooth ovoid—her egg—like the moon during a full solar eclipse."

The term "punching above our weight" is hackneyed nowadays, but the thought is not. The juice is that it’s not the kiwi that should be the revered icon, but its egg: symbolic of big ideas and impressive scale-to-output ratio. Maybe evolution will deal the kiwi a favor and one day it will literally sprout wings.

In the meantime, we have the godwit to contemplate as the "eternal migrant". Robin Hyde’s The Godwit’s Fly (1939) about the process and emotions of expatriation is a seminal work of New Zealand-metaphor-as-novel. “Later she thought, most of us here are human godwits; our north is mostly England. Our youth, our best, our intelligent, brave and beautiful, must make the long migration, under a compulsion they hardly understand; or else be dissatisfied all their lives long. They are the godwits.”

New this week is How to Watch a Bird by said Steve Braunias: "This book is a personal journey – a beginner's guide to bird-watching by a beginner. It's also a New Zealand history, a geographical wandering, an affectionate look at the people who are captivated by birds. Mostly, I think, I hope, it's a book about birds. Birds, past – from the flightless ratites who had it good here, in a land without predators, until the arrival of the first humans. Birds, present – the introduced birds, common birds like the starling, the thrush, the blackbird. Birds, coming and going – migratory birds that fly incredible distances to get here every year. Birds, modern and now completely at home – the white-faced heron, the welcome swallows. Birds, everywhere."

NZ Literary: Global Headlines

Recent headlines (2007) regarding New Zealand writers and books - from The Times, The Guardian, The Telegraph, Shanghai Daily and others
• Mansfield: “a little savage from New Zealand”
• Tzeming Mok on globalization and displacement
• “Making poetry out of darkness” – CK Stead
• Charlotte Grimshaw nom’d for top short story prize
• Affluenza book stakes NZ obsession, individualism
• Elizabeth Smither reveals wild side in Malaysia
• Denis Dutton in NYTimes on outed piano plagiarist
• Robin Maconie’s new book The Way of Music
• Fay Weldon on the “tyranny of bestsellers”
http://www.nzedge.com/media/archives/archv-arts-writers.html

Sunday Picture #2: Cloud Dance above Cook Strait

From Raumati South, May 2007

NZ Art: Global Headlines

Julian Dashper "The Abstract Office"

Current and recent (2007) headlines about New Zealand artists exhibiting internationally
• Julian Dashper show “The Abstract Office" for NY
• Reg Mombassa in Oz doco on his iconic surrealist art
• Alexis Hunter's fem-erotic Object Series at LA's MoCA
• Horace Moore-Jones' Anzac painting sells in Sydney
• NZ artists exhibit at Agora Gallery, Chelsea New York
• Claire Fergusson featured artist in TriBeCa studio tour
• Donald McCarten in ColorField exhibition Washington DC
• Artist Peter Lyons compared to realist masters in US
• NZ seascapes star in Chip Hooper's NY photography show
• ArtUS features Michael Parekowhai in Sydney
• NZ-born war artist James Boswell rediscovered, celebrated
• Painter Angela Dwyer challenges abstractionism in Milan
• Lisa Ferguson’s “hurricane of colours” in Chelsea NY show
http://www.nzedge.com/media/archives/archv-arts-visual_museum.html

Nga Kupu Aroha #16: Denis O'Reilly

"Those that have ears let them hear"

The killing of Jhia Te Tua (2) in a drive-by shooting in Wanganui on May 5 has created grief among her family and iwi - and quite possibly a tipping point in New Zealand gang history. In the latest post in his Nga Kupu Aroha: Words of Love series, Denis O’Reilly tells of Jhia Te Tua’s tangi at Tukorehe marae at Kuku south of Levin (pictured); the talk of whanau and warriors; triangulation between gangs, police, officials; the geo-politics and zeitgeist of Black Power and other gangs; linkages between gangs, social development and criminality; factors, findings and recommendations of the latest Government report on youth gangs in Counties Manukau; a New Zealand gang timeline; international strategies for community-wide approaches to gang prevention (Divert; Contain; Redirect); and five “Maori stones” from James K Baxter – aroha, korero, matewa, mahi and mahuhiritanga – that set philosophical values for ways forward. 5,500 words of intel, analysis and advocacy. http://www.nzedge.com/features/ar-denis16.html

Says O’Reilly, “being in the trapped lifestyle of a gang is a waste of time and human potential.” He asks: “What would it take for the brothers to put down their patches? I don't just mean for an event or such - they'll generally do that if asked respectfully - but as a lifestyle. Well, what would it take for us as a nation to resolve this whole issue? If the brotherhood acknowledged that in fact they don't want a trapped lifestyle that means relative poverty, jail, and underachievement; if the brotherhood said we want to join in socially because we want our kids to succeed and we don't want them in jail, we don't want them to repeat our mistakes; as a nation what would we do?”

Denis O’Reilly is a Hawkes Bay social innovator, coach and businessman. He is a life member of Black Power. His methods of social development at the edges of our society have been honed by his experiences over three decades of mediating with gangs, working in State systems, academic research, and corporate business.

TED Conference: Edge Experience

BACK TO THE FUTURE: The genesis of the “New Zealand as Edge” metaphor was a conversation started at the TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) conference http://www.ted.com/ in California in 1996 with Kevin Kelly, then founding editor of Wired magazine, about biological constructs aka change in the species always starts at the margins, the fringes, the edges. Recently I have been been back in Monterey for my 10th TED and been boggled as usual by the range of presenters, from economists, demographers, architects, photographers, designers, space scientists, geeks, VCs, surgeons and singers. TED is like drinking from a firehose. Presenters included French designer Philippe Starck, physicist Murray Gell-Mann, biologist EO Wilson ("the Ant man"), basketball hero Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, singers Paul Simon and Tracy Chapman, bashful tycoon Richard Branson and passionate novelist Isabel Allende. President Bill Clinton was an experience in itself but even he bowed to the humility of war correspondent and photojournalist James Natchwey. Keynotes are 18 minutes, shorts are 3 mins – Sam Morgan presented a new design for dispensing pain relief medicine which can save lives the world over. TED aims to improve the world. TED can be for everyone, see the inspirational and sometimes world-changing presentations at http://www.ted.com/. See especially the presentation by Hans Rosling at the 2006 conference, it will change your world view of what is happening and what is possible. TED is billed as "Ideas worth spreading" as the conference assembles the "world's greatest thinkers and doers." I first went in 1994 after discovering the information architect Richard Saul Wurman, who created and owned the conference, and whose thinking and methods have been a major influence on my work. Chris Anderson now owns, curates, convenes, chairs and cajoles, and he has beautifully segued the original vision into a working/achieving movement. For me TED has been life-changing in terms of seeing ideas up close from the folk who had them. I don't have on my CV "invented the PC", but chances are the person standing next to you in Monterey did. The proximate location to Silicon Valley has always ensured cutting edge technology breakthroughs have been shown, but today's most important science - biology - is at its core - together with a rambunctious and irresistible humanity that has people constantly on their feet. My notes (50 speakers, 6 pages) on the 2007 meeting are at www.nzedge.com/features/TED.html.

Qualities of New Zealanders

Action in the nzedge.com mailbox: From Kim, Researcher, Australia: "I am doing research about NZ and what is unique about it in the modern world. It seems that NZ is known for its natural life, sheep, bungy jumping and rugby. Is this still the case in 2007 or are some of the innovations in film, fashion, technology etc creating a new face for NZ. If so, how has the perception of NZ changed throughout the world and what is the unique selling point of NZ now?...I am also interested in individual people's point of view on this topic. Thank you. From one kiwi to another."

Cathy Downes, a New Zealander at the National Defence University in Washington DC, replies, “Whether it is film, fashion, technology, rugby, bungy jumping there is a constant theme of novelness, innovation, of being small enough not to be bound by the inertia of bigger, larger, organizations and countries…And yet this is a country with nearly a sixth of its population not living in New Zealand. How much of New Zealand's image in the world is influenced by these Kiwis, or the Kiwis who work and live at home? If you ask a lot of ex-pats why they left, it is because they felt their creativity, innovation, get-up-and-go, can-do, want-to-make-things-happen, stop-standing-in-my-way passion was frustrated, damped-down, locked into mediocre-levelling, chop-the-tall-poppy, can't-do-anything-but-the- status-quo, type individuals who hold onto many leadership positions and are allowed to do so."

What do you think embodies the qualities of the New Zealand character - at home, and away? My own perspectives are shaped by living between local and global, edge and center - Wellington and New York. Things I like about New Yorkers are their directness, their hard-working ethos, their focused approach to thinking commercially, and their ability to think in scale. Getting your brilliant idea taken seriously in New York is a highly competitive exercise. New Zealand seems much less interested in ideas. As individuals we have very good ideas, some world-changing ones, but as a culture we seem more interested, for example, in our criminality rather than our creativity, in domestic contentedness rather than international competitiveness. The stench arising from our domestic behavior that pervades news media reporting in New Zealand is a counterweight to all efforts to be inspirational. What has become of us? For all the magnificent things about New Zealand and New Zealanders, I am not surprised that so many people choose to live away from their country of birth. From time to time there has been the candle of optimism and idealism in New Zealand public life; we work for its return.

Beautiful New Zealand: Global Headlines

SPECTACLE, SERENITY, SAFETY:
Attracting visitors to New Zealand, and sending them on their way with a smile on their faces and a promise to return, is our most important industry. We do this very well. Here are stories we have collected in our Travel & Tourism news pages in 2007, from The Guardian, The Observer, Discovery Channel, The Australian, Toronto Star, Cape Times and more.

• Wellington’s Matterhorn “fifth best bar in the world”
• Poor Knights Islands a world top-ten dive site
• Blanket Bay, Glenorchy “world’s best lodge” - Discovery
• Ruapehu volcanic lahar attracts ski enthusiasts
• Christchurch more English than England - Toronto Star
• Tourism NZ launches Be-Nice-to-Australians month
• Pinot Noir Festival draws red in Wellington
• “Bright and classy” - Martin Bosley’s restaurant in NY Times
• Great Barrier Island a one-stop “topographical spectacle”
• South Island’s Whare Kea Lodge: “ultimate mountain hut”
• New Zealand Travel Cafe opens in Roppongi, Japan
• Tourists reach 2.4m in '06 including 900,000 Australians
• NZ ranked second safest travel destination by US expert
• Vancouver paper visits Bay of Islands, urges readers to
• Wellington voted “city on the rise” by Lonely Planet
  

NZ Film: Global Headlines

NEW ZEALANDERS CUTTING UP THE SCREEN:
Stories recently published (2007) on the nzedge.com Film & Television page from the online editions of the Hollywood Reporter, Variety, NY Times, LA Times, The Guardian, Sydney Morning Herald and more...

• Cliff Curtis stars in visceral new Danny Boyle px Sunshine
• US film blog Greencine journeys through NZ cinema
• Phil Keoghan’s No Opportunity Wasted screens in Canada
• DreamWorks wins Peter Jackson’s Lovely Bones
• Jessica Rose named Best Webby Actress
• Black Sheep gores awards in France, Belgium
• Stuntmen Ben Cooke, Kirk Marshall up for Best Fight
• Jane Campion to write, direct film on John Keats and lover
• Sand Dancer doco of Peter Donnelly wins in US, Taiwan
• Jessica Rose makes switch from YouTube to Hollywood
• Miranda Harcourt coaches Bridge to Terabithia actors
• Variety names director Taika Waititi “one to watch”
• Park Rd’s re-made famous Expo 70 film wins at NY Festival
• Alan Dale has another US hit TV show in Ugly Betty
• Martin Henderson plays cop, dealer, pilot, protester
• Jessica Rose, AKA lonelygirl15, Forbes’ web celeb of the year
• Bruce McLaren Formula One heropic to be in Wellington works
• Weta Digital to create effects for James Cameron epic Avatar
• Russell Crowe to play a more noble Sheriff of Nottingham
• Bro’Town to Canada, Latin America, Caribbean; US next
  

http://www.nzedge.com/media/archives/film-tv_2007.html

Sunday Picture #1 Paradise Road

Paradise Valley, near Glenorchy, Central Otago, 1 January 2001

Saturday Sport: The Roar of World Championship

The Roar is a hard-hitting sports opinion website and e-newsletter which takes an informed look at some of the bigger issues and characters within Australian and New Zealand international competitions (including Union, League, Football, Cricket). The Roar is produced from Sydney by brothers Zac and Zolton Zavos, who produce the art, music, photography and fashion website, Lost At E Minor.

The Roar features some of Australia's best sports writers including (their father) Spiro Zavos, Wellington-born (Mount St) and recognised as one of the world’s most insightful rugby writers. A first-generation Greek New Zealander, Spiro saw his first rugby test in 1949 at Athletic Park when he was 12, and was struck with a lifelong passion for 'the perfect game'. His rugby column in The Sydney Morning Herald has run for 20+ years. Spiro has written on New Zealand politics, literature, sport and identity since the late 60s.

'Watching the Rugby World Cup' is Spiro's latest book, from Mary Varnham's invigorating Awa Press. "Over 44 drama-filled days, supporters will pour into rugby stadiums in France, Scotland and Wales to watch 47 matches leading up to the final on 20 October. An estimated 3.4 billion television viewers will take in the action...Zavos writes of the events that in 20 years have taken the Rugby World Cup from a pipedream to one of the world's top three sporting contests, equalled only by the Olympics and the Soccer World Cup." Spiro's pick for the most 'perfect game' ever played in the RWC is the 1987 France-Australia semi-final at Concord Oval, won by France after the lead changed five times. Of the 2007 All Blacks, he says the weight of expectation on any All Black team is their key challenge to manage. He cites the Roman saying "Go in Pope, come out Cardinal" as the monkey-on-the-back of previous AB semi-final crashes. Spiro has encouraged nzedge.com at key moments. Cheers mate.

My own sports commentary of the week: Being humble about the chance of being World Champions needs to be the All Blacks' zeitgeist. Underpromise and overdeliver, which is what Team New Zealand did at Valencia this week, where the best boats and best sailors in the world are competing for the America's Cup. I watched the races on TV1, and NZL 92's 94-second win over Oracle - strategically, tactically, emotionally and it seemed on sheer boat speed - was well executed. Still, as they will say, another day another yacht race; they are just one quarter of the way into their task. Team NZ have shown a low-scale emotional center of gravity eg no hype. Advertisers around the RWC should strive to similarly low-key the assumption that we're gonna win. Getting the nation into an emotional lather over a game that can only be won by our team on the field, puts us all on a hiding to nothing. Our emotional involvement in the All Blacks isn't going to help them play better, and let's not ascribe mystical powers of nationhood and manhood to a bunch of 15 ordinary guys with a job to do. Focusing on winning is fine, even assumed, but tasting it before the line invites hubris. Restraint, brand-builders. Restraint.

Time Magazine goes to the Edge

The Edge metaphor is used countless times everyday the world over to describe situations where people are seeking a competitive advantage. A nick, a tipping point, or the avoidance of crisis. At the left is a May 2007 ad for Time Magazine. A one-word equity. Time talked to nzedge.com in 2003 when they visited to do their five-yearly survey of New Zealand, titled:

"Cool Kiwis: Why it's suddenly hot on the edge of the world."

The Edge metaphor permeated Time's 50-page rave, taking an in-depth look at designers, scientists, exporters, film industry, Maori language revival, musicians, and winemakers, in a bid to discover "what makes NZ one of the world's edgiest countries." The verdict? "NZ is in the vanguard of a dynamic world - its human diversity, open spaces, wit, flexibility and sheer tenacity have taken a rugged, isolated country and positioned it on the cutting edge of adventure, knowledge and creativity ... its talented tall poppies are fast, savvy - and so hot, they're redefining cool."

How are we feeling in 2007? Time's 2003 description of New Zealand is far from our view of ourselves as presented in the daily headlines. How can Time's 2003 vision encompass all New Zealanders? Is this who we really are? Or is New Zealand really a "lifestyle island" where people principally want contentment? This blog will explore, celebrate, push and cajole solutions to question.

For 50 more images of Edge - book covers, magazines, posters, captions, people - go to http://www.nzedge.com/gallery/index-world-edge.htm

Global Community of New Zealanders

DIASPORA INC: Welcome to new New Zealand friends registered at nzedge.com, from Addis Ababa, Bangkok, Belfast, Brisbane, Brussels, Chicago, Cortez, Doncaster, Dubai, Forest Grove, Fort Collins, Geneva, Inverness, Kidderminster, Leeds, London, Marbella, Melbourne, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Misgav, New York, Northam, Oceanside, Perth, Phoenix, Port of Spain, Salt Lake City, Seattle, Singapore, Steilacoom, Sydney, Tehran, Tokyo, Toronto, Victoria, Washington DC and Wimborne; and from Aotearoa, Auckland, Christchurch, Dannevirke, Hamilton, Kapiti, Napier, North Shore, Onewhero, Takaka, Taupo, Te Puke, Upper Hutt, Waitakere and Wellington. For the full list of locations of subscribers to nzedge.com in 1000+ places in 87 countries) see http://www.nzedge.com/mailbox/about_you.html

NZ Obituaries: Global Headlines

• Don Selwyn, maestro of film, theater, television, 71, Taumaranui
• Marie Clay, reading innovator, educator, champion, 81, Auckland
• Alan MacDiarmid, Nobel Prize Winner in Chemistry, 79, Philadelphia
• John Feeney, photographer, Oscar nominee, 84, Wellington
• Leo McCarthy, Democratic politician, California, 76, San Francisco
• Peter Munz, philosopher, Victoria U professor, 85, Wellington
• John McMillan, economist, Stanford U professor, 56, San Francisco
• Jeannie Ferris, South Australian Liberal Senator, 66, Adelaide
• Brad McGann, director of In My Father's Den, 43, Auckland
  

http://www.nzedge.com/media/archives/archv-society-births_deaths.html

Challenges for New Zealand Rugby

When I was in Wellington a couple of weeks ago, I caught up with Steve Tew, the CEO designate of New Zealand Rugby Union. He’s an impressive guy, whose reputation continues to grow both in New Zealand and on the world scene. Steve will take over the reins after the World Cup when Chris Moller stands down. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Jock Hobbs stand down too and focus on the 2011 World Cup - so there will be a complete change at the top of New Zealand Rugby.

To New Zealanders, this is arguably more important than a change in government. Over the past five years, the NZRU have led the world and developed the game while still keeping connected to the grass roots. Further, driven by strong leadership at the top and great performance on the field by the All Blacks and Crusaders in particular, the Union has thrived commercially and in its reputation.

Critical things that make NZ Rugby the force it is in the world today are:

• On field performance by the All Blacks.
• The legacy of the All Black reputation and character.
• Our progressive willingness to embrace change.
• Strong leadership on and off the field.
  

Rugby football has been professional for just over a decade and now we are facing a major cluster of change. Southern Hemisphere versus Northern Hemisphere; club versus country; player burnout; French/English clubs poaching New Zealand players, and spectator apathy toward existing competitions.

In 1948, Cliff Gladwin, a Derbyshire medium pace bowler, was playing cricket for England. England were (as usual) in dire circumstances. As he trekked to the wicket, Cliff said to the South Africans waiting on the field, “Cometh the hour, cometh the man”. England won.

Steve Tew. Over to you.

New Zealand Edge goes daily

Greetings nzedge.com friends throughout NZ and in 86 countries.
After eight years of semi-regular publishing, we have moved daily.

Nzedge.com has enjoyed consistent and sometimes exponential growth in visitors and pageviews, and in the first part of 2007 we've experienced an acceleration of sign-ups.

The primary purpose of nzedge.com is storytelling about New Zealand and its role and initiatives in the world. Kevin Roberts and I started the idea of a New Zealand Diaspora (ie that we are a nation of five million people), and we have widely seeded the metaphor of “edge” to define our “reason for being”.

New Zealand has a complex and unique set of issues, and some simple opportunities. We seem a troubled country that is lacking a big picture. Despite our obvious blessings and many efforts, we are not a happy place, certainly not a resolved or aligned one, nor graced with a clear sense of articulated purpose. Cohesion is yet to be realized. We seem to be at our best when we're "winning the world from the edge" but too often we're stuck in the paradigm of small/distant/isolated/remote/irrelevant/dislocated. We need be none of these things, so how do we break free from domestic incrementalism, and put it all together in a global big picture way?

Since 1998, nzedge.com has sought to embroider a radically optimistic pathway to the New Zealand character, addressing the matters of big ideas, stellar individual and group performance, international connectedness, empowering the margins, and tapping energy from the past and the present. There are many other people and collectives focused on this in their own way. People have liked what we've created, we've grown globally and locally, and know we can be more engaging and indeed edgy if we publish more frequently.

Enter http://www.nzedge.blogspot.com/. Blogging is a fast and fun way to get stuff done. It’s personal, collaborative, and the interactive potential is rampant. Here’s how it will work:
• everyday we’ll publish something new or from our archive
• you can access this by going direct to the blog
• or you can register on the blog for the daily content to be sent to you direct by email or RSS
• each week we’ll send you a summary of what we have published
• if the frequency of publishing is too great for your appetite, you can delete or unsubscribe, and access the site at a more leisurely pace

There will be guest contributors; we will be tangentially topical; we will draw on the vast archive we have built over the past eight years; and on Sundays we will publish only pictures.

We open today with the latest entry in our “Heroes” gallery, the story of Ettie Rout, “guardian angel of the Anzacs” - a “scandalous woman” who was infamous for breaching social mores in sexual health and practice. A story from the edge. By Paul Ward and Ingrid Horrocks with thanks to Jane Tolerton. 1700 words.

In addition, we catch up with an early 2007 column in the Nga Kupu Aroha/Words of Love series by social innovator and activist Denis O'Reilly, this about Parihaka in Taranaki - the history, and the recent Festival. It's titled Arohamai (Forgive Me).

Rounding out is post by Kevin Roberts on the challenges facing New Zealand rugby (top two priorities are the on field performance of the All Blacks, and the legacy of the All Black reputation and character).

Please visit nzedge.blogspot.com now, and register for a daily supplement of inspirational news, insights, and provocations.

Brian Sweeney
Producer, New Zealand Edge
http://www.nzedge.com/
brian@nzedge.com

Ettie Rout: Guardian Angel of the Anzacs

The nzedge.com conversation started with Kevin Kelly on the road to Karekare in 1996. He was asking me a torrent of questions about New Zealand and I said "For some reason a disproportionate number of New Zealanders seems to have changed the world in some way or other." The Eureka Moment reply was that change happens on the edge of the species. Part of the edge storytelling process has been to research and publish definitive short biographies of these world-changers. There are about 35 on the site (out of an initial list of 100), from the automatic Rutherford, Hillary, Pearse, Mansfield, Sheppard, Lovelock and MacDiarmid, to people largely unsighted such as Joseph Sinel, Colin Murdoch, Nancy Wake and Alexander Aitken. Their stories are "heroic" simply because they are. Inspirational New Zealanders. Paul Ward and I have written most of the stories. I have wanted to include Ettie Rout's story because she is a role model who did it tough. BS.

Activist in the prevention of the scourge of WWI – venereal disease – Christchurch’s Ettie Rout was infamous for breaching social mores in sexual health and practice. An original career woman, socialist, nurse, equal rights campaigner, condom distributor, wartime Paris safe-sex brothel operator, banned author of “Safe Marriage”, a “wicked” and “scandalous woman” of the sisterhood. Ettie Rout was a focused, relentless and empathetic humanitarian who faced danger, opposition, ostracism and eventually self-exile. 1700 words. Illustrated. Story by Paul Ward and Ingrid Horrocks with thanks to biographer Jane Tolerton. www.nzedge.com/heroes/rout.html

Nga Kupu Aroha #14: Denis O'Reilly

Denis O'Reilly is a social innovator and activist based at Waiohiki Marae Napier. In 1977 I co-hosted him as a speaker in the inaugural University of Waikato Winter Lectures. He spoke, chanted and probably cursed in an address about gangs in New Zealand. The NZ situation was quite incendiary, and Denis triangulated between Black Power, the Mongrel Mob, others, and PM Muldoon. Many years later he has orchestrated major events involving New Zealand corporates and Maori. Three years ago I invited Denis to write a column for nzedge.com on the very dangerous edge of the methamphetamine epidemic in New Zealand, our incarceration culture, marginalized Maori - and his fresh ideas for creating ways out and ahead. This Irish Ngati Pakeha reports on events, people, protocols, local intel, highs, doubts and the occasional crisis, with a knowingness few New Zealanders have accumulated. BS

AROHAMAI (FORGIVE ME). Feeding the soul at Parihaka a century since the passing of Tohu Kakahi and Te Whiti o Rongomai, “the human pillars of passive resistance in New Zealand”; a Festival with 7000 people clustered in campsites; the formalities of powhiri and the beauty of korero and waiata; remembrances of confiscation of land, imprisonment of people, rape of women, looting, invasion, forcible ejection and illegal arrest in 1881; postering about P (“beware of P and seek help if hooked”); “start with bring peace to your house, to your street and onward”; meeting up with Te Ringa Mangu Dun Mihaka; Unity Pacific, Batacuda Sound Machine and Kora; and the forthcoming St Patrick’s Day Maori/Celtic Hui & Huilli at Waiohiki Marae Napier with Governor General Anand Satyanand, Lady Thea Muldoon and Sir Tipene O’Regan in attendance for long festivities. 5500 words. First published March 07. http://www.nzedge.com/features/ar-denis14.html