It's interesting that you were both looking for a call to action or similar. I've got a whole bunch of similar backgrounders that are among the most popular posts on my site. None of them make calls. On the other hand there are plenty of posts where I do make judgement calls.

Useful feedback thanks.

Yes, It is a backgrounder. I mention the topic occasionally in my journalism and point readers to this rather than explain the ideas at length in a news story.

I'm looking into the dark mode strangeness. I suspect it's because I dropped some HTML and CSS into the page without planning for dark mode (I'm not a coder).

"this is what house prices should be."

Should?

Right now the average house price across New Zealand is around 6 times the average income. "Affordable" is when the ratio is below 3. That's what they SHOULD be.

Not entirely sure what POS is supposed to mean in that comment. It could go one of two ways. ;)

The point about revitalising city centre hospitality is a complete red herring.

6500 public servants were sacked earlier this year. Most of them were in Wellington, a city of 200k souls. Even you add in the Hutt Valley and Kapiti Coast, that's maybe 400k people. So a working population of maybe 200k. Not all the sacked public servants were in Wellington, but that still means around 3% of those who were working are now not. That automatically translates to a 3% cut in spending.

Given that many more public servants are now concerned about joining the dole queue and have cut discretionary spending to the bone, you can see that a 10% fall in spending is a direct consequence of the government's job cuts. That won't be spread evenly, so we can expect to see fewer shops, cafes and bars in town - and that means even more unemployment which in turn means less spending.

That's what's killing the Wellington hospitality trade.

I've spent time with an AI laptop the past couple of weeks and 'overinflated' seems a generous description of where end user AI is today.

There's no specific date in the Commerce Commission notification, it just says 12 months from today. I'd read that as by September 5, 2025.

Usually the Commnerce Commission goes through a consulting or engagement stage before setting down rules. That appears to have been done, so the mobile companies have 12 months to fix their maps.

In that context, it's not really piracy, it's cultural preservation.

Sure... I know lawyers say otherwise,

It's my theory that when all the externalities are taken into account, cruise ships cost New Zealand's economy far more than they contribute.

Of course there are the environmental costs. They probably outweigh any income on their own. But also, and it's just a 'for instance' every time a big ship docks in Auckland, the ferries are disrupted. On some days they are cancelled for hours which means hundreds of people have to make alternative travel arrangements. If that was fully costed, it would come to thousands of dollars for each docking.

And then there is the admin needed... I'm certain the cost of customs and passport control works out at more than $20 per passenger.

File this one under: How to win friends and influence people