Reaching out to the world

For fun or profit, check out these links

[Sorry, I've left this stuff unchanged for a while as I sorted some other ideas. Will try to freshen it up soon - Ian Skinner]

It would be reckless to call the Federal election result at this stage, despite headline polls pointing to disaster for the Howard government. To win majority government Labor needs an additional 16 seats. This website analyses the polls, with detailed graphs including bookmakers' odds – perhaps the most reliable forecasting tool.
http://www.ozpolitics.info/blog/

There are many thousands of cooking blogs out there, but this by New York gal Mercedes stands out as lucid, informal, informative and somehow quite charming. Great for Middle Eastern food, a lot of it appealing to vegetarians. http://desertcandy.blogspot.com/

Google has fired up a philanthropy blog. Content is very American, but it may offer opportunities to the not-for-profit sector Down Under. http://www.google.org/

Links we've posted previously:

What's a slam poet? In this YouTube video, it's Taylor Mali combining the skills of a stand-up comedian with a passion for teaching. (For the benefit of a couple of my new readers I know to be computer tyros, the line on the RH side of the screen, beginning "High school teacher and slam poet . . ." will expand to tell you all about it if you click on "more".)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hw1MFobWD_o

Put together by friend Suzanne Fleming, this site displays the achievements of her students in Digital Movie Making: http://smart-teaching.blogspot.com/

If you want to try it at home, these tutorials explain how to use Windows Movie Maker in conjunction with YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Movie+Maker+Tutorial

It's 40 years since Australians voted overwhelmingly to change the Constitution to allow Aborigines to be counted in the Census, and to allow the Federal Government to make special laws regarding Aborigines. Today, the reconciliation movement may be looking for new impetus and perhaps new directions: http://www.reconciliation.org.au/i-cms.isp

Women enlivening the blogosphere. Here's a selection of Aussies : http://www.vitalingus.com/ , http://solidariti.com/ , http://she-sells-sanctuary.blogspot.com/

And an LA law professor http://kcsheehan.blogspot.com/ . And an international directory: http://blogher.org/ as well as http://www.blogsbywomen.org/

Searching for secondhand books, Advanced Book Exchange is a good place to start, listing the stock of 13,500 booksellers around the world, and covering new, used rare, and out-of-print books. A good representation of Australian booksellers and Aussie books, and its website is easy to use. http://www.abebooks.com/

If you want to shop around, this simple-to-use site compares prices on ABE and four other book-search sites. http://www.getonce.com.au/index.htm

Don't forget these bookselling sites: http://www.amazon.com/ http://www.dymocks.com.au/ http://www.angusrobertson.com.au/

Monitoring retail book sales: http://www.nielsenbookscan.com.au/index.html

Just as a real-life surfer sometimes enjoys a succession of top waves, so the web surfer can ride high too with one rewarding link leading to another, and then another. Let's start where I finished, with “Australia's e-journal of social and political debate”. http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/

I got there through the blogs of one of Australia's foremost writers, Kerryn Goldsworthy. Her “multifunction blog”: http://pavlovblog.blogspot.com/ Her literary blog: http://austlit.blogspot.com/ Her advice for writers blog: http://currerellisacton.blogspot.com/ Literature, media, culture from an Australian point of view (a shared blog): http://sarsaparillablog.net/

In turn, I got to Dr Goldsworthy's blogs via an excellent blogsite by Melbourne film writer David Tiley: http://barista.media2.org/

You may love Four Candles. You'll find a number of versions out there, with different people claiming copyright, but this will do. http://www.alighthouse.com/fourcandles.htm

A friend emailed to say she admired the ingenuity of SMS texting and would use it in future emails. I emailed back, “The Newspeak of the 21st Century, a language designed to remove subtlety and precision from human communication.” She sent me a list of texting and chatroom abbreviations. You may find it useful, but don 't use it to me. You'll make me grumpy. http://www.webopedia.com/quick_ref/textmessageabbreviations.asp

Peter Black, an associate lecturer in law at the Queensland University of Technology, offers www.freedomtodiffer.com/ And Queensland sociologist Mark Bahnisch, has set up Larvatus Prodeo (LP), an Australian group blog which discusses politics, sociology, culture, life, religion and science from a left-of-centre perspective. Descartes inspired the name. http://larvatusprodeo.net/

Philosophy, aesthetics, literature, criticism, history, music – every day this site lists dozens of items from around the world under the headings, “Articles of Note”, “New Books” and “Essays and Opinion”, and provides links to each. http://www.aldaily.com/