Denis O'Reilly Blog #17: Looking through a kaleidescope

Angela Davis, 1974

“It must be a beautiful feeling to fly halfway around the world, touch down in a seemingly contented society, and discover a body of people who have been enacting your disobedient thinking for over 30 years.”

Blog #17 of Denis O’Reilly’s series Nga Kupu Aroha, from the flipside of the edge; “Looking through a kaleidoscope” (4,750 words):

• The meaning of Maori tangi; tangi for Mick the Aussie biker in Wellington, and Rangi Tareha at Waiohiki Marae after a 500-strong funeral in Redfern Sydney; the Hamuera Morehu Silver Band
• Arthur Young’s The Reflexive Universe and his explanation of the seven stages of evolution (Theory of Process)
• Edge-dwelling and the brink of disobedience
• The visit by Angela Davis (“the candle of social resistance”) to New Zealand with a radical agenda: the process of decarceration and introduction of restorative justice; her influence on the Polynesian Panthers in Auckland, capital of Nesia
• Definitions of “organised crime” in New Zealand; distinctions between venial and mortal sin; discontinuity of the 1980s economic reforms resulting in a 3:1 Maori/Pakeha unemployment rate; moral panic and the perspicaciousness of policy makers in regard to the criminal justice system
• “Can we reverse the trend and steer those people who are caught up in crime back to legitimate pursuits?”
• Time magazine’s cover story “New Zealand: A Culture of Violence” and Zeppelins sighted in Southland
• A good reason to get upset – the grand denial of potential; imprisonment becoming the standard expectation of our underclass, our lumpenproletariat, our nga mokai; Law & Order Select Committee submissions by Principal Youth Judge Andrew Beecroft and Children’s Commissioner Cindy Kiro
• “Could we agree on having a decarcerated nation within which the indigenous people are proportionally the least imprisoned population segment?’; tut-tutting at Australia
• “Police dragnets can criminalize whole communities and land large numbers of non-violent children in jail and don’t reduce gang involvement or gang violence…Once jailed these children will inevitably become hardened criminals and spend the rest of their lives in and out of prison…The emphasis needs to be on changing children’s behavior by getting them involved in community and school-based programs that essentially keep them out of gangs.” New York Times, 19 July 2007, “The Wrong Approach to Gangs”
• Celebration of life for daughter Kaylene; prayerful and profound intervention of a tohunga; respect and admiration for an ICU doc
• Maatariki – planted shallots, garlic, onions and chives and now time to dig in mustard so it can enrich the soil for Maori spuds: Tuteakuri, Moemoe and Perepuru
• A week ahead of politics and difficult engagements dissuading people from one path and persuading them to take another.

Posted. Raumati South

Top 10 for New Zealand

nzedge.com is commencing a series of “Top 10s” from New Zealanders who will offer their ideas, forecasts, strategies and projections for New Zealand 2007-2010 and beyond.

Initiating the series is John Williams, former owner of the Marton company PEC (New Zealand) Ltd, which was internationally respected as the world's first organization to design and market microprocessor-based petrol pumps and service station POS terminals. John is a passionate advocate for an inclusive export-based vision for New Zealand. John has presented his vision and strategy to all senior politicians over the past decade.

We will invite all readers of this blog to create their own Top 10 for New Zealand and send them to us brian@nzedge.com

John William's Top 10 Strategies for New Zealand (see full text):

1. Maximise growth in the sectors where we currently produce world-class products and/or services. The growth sectors, which have already chosen themselves by their success in export are: Tourism, Dairying, Food & Beverage, Information Technology/ Communications/Software, Education, Bio-technology and Niche Sectors (which would include Film, SuperYachts and Forestry).

2. Ensure that at least 25,000 New Zealanders (net) return annually to settle in New Zealand and play a vital role in growing an export-led sustainable growth economy.

3. Increase exports by making New Zealand organizations aware that if they are successfully marketing their products in this country they must be world-class and therefore have significant export potential; and by introducing support programmes to assist organizations to maximise their exports

4. Introduce the “Kiwi Can” programme to all Primary and Intermediate schools to reverse the continuous drop in values that has occurred in the past 50 years.

5. Re-create the University of New Zealand to compete with the much larger and significantly better resourced US, European and Asian universities.

6. Market New Zealand as “Innovative New Zealand” to increase exports. New Zealanders are among the most entrepreneurial and innovative people in the world.

7. Ensure that the contribution to economic growth from the Maori and Pacific Island ethnic groups (50% of New Zealand’s population by 2050) is significantly and continuously increased.

8. Demonstrate the amazing innovation of New Zealanders by creating a newzealandinnovation.com website, which would detail all our world-class products, services, and ideas.

9. Establish a “Centre of Excellence” for Innovation and Entrepreneurship whose role would be to provide world-class product development, marketing and intellectual property protection advice.

10. Create and widely publicise a “Vision” for New Zealand: “To ensure New Zealand’s future as one of the world’s most socially cohesive, prosperous, and innovative countries, which is sustained by a dynamic, wealth creating, export economy.”

For the full text of John's Top 10, see http://www.nzedge.com/features/john_williams_top10.html

Risk Rd, by Ohinerau St, Greenlane, Auckland. Photo: Sweeney

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

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.

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.

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.