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Showing posts from July, 2013

I have a dream of no discrimination

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Australia appears to be reaching a discrimination epidemic. According to the ABC , recent research once again confirmed suspicions that employers prefer to hire men with no family or social commitments. And CLEO magazine has been interviewing high profile women about the discrimination they experienced throughout their careers. Such distressing behaviour is of course illegal. And it happens anyway. But the mass media is only focused on one of many existing types of discrimination. As a young woman starting out in a career, I have seen discrimination for a reason you would not expect. Employers had more of an issue with my condition which is technically a 'disability.' I feel perfectly able, just different. I have Asperger's Syndrome. People panic when discovering it is on the Autism Spectrum. But it is actually the high functioning version. My skills and sociability grew so much through getting involved in organisations wherever possible. And now it is barely noticeable

News Should Not Be Restricted

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The Sydney Morning Herald has implemented a monthly charge for users to access articles on their web site. Only the first 30 articles are free. Under the current system, readers would pay up to $300 a year. This dollar value assumes such a news source is not substitutable. Or is it? There was talk of this being planned for quite a while. But it is still a massive shock to the loyal readers. The good old SMH has kept a flow of revenue from advertisements for some time. That should be enough. Sometimes a pop up would grab our attention before being closed. A banner in the footer of the home page (that is an attempt at descriptive techie lingo) is all about American Express. Links on the right hand side promoted anything and everything. That should have been enough. Our favourite brands would have paid big bucks for exposure on a very popular online site. Let's hope there is a very good reason for the SMH to suddenly restrict the site to subscriptions. A monthly payment is too muc