Category Archives: General

Personal Information, Over Disclosure & Security

General, Life

These days too many businesses that we interact with on a daily basis require far too much personal information about each and every one of us. A prime example of this is signing up for a non-essential service at a shopping centre or local shop – some of those businesses require a comparable amount of information to that of a bank. Why do they need all that information?

I recently signed up at our local video store in Upper Coomera on the Gold Coast and they required a credit card or debit card, without one they simply wouldn’t sign you up for an account. I appreciate that they probably have issues getting money from clients who return videos late, however I’m not convinced that providing my credit card information is a reasonable measure and I’ll tell you why.

Every time I see someone pick up a pen and write down my personal information, especially if they aren’t an organisation who’s business is managing personal information, it worries me. Everytime a EFTPOS terminal is down and they take a manual imprint of a credit card, it worries me. In the case of the Upper Coomera video shop, the staff member wrote my credit card information down on a signup form – but once they’ve entered my information into the computer – what happens with that piece of paper? Is it simply scrunched up and put in the waste paper basket, burned, shredded or none of the above. What about once it is entered into the computer, is it encrypted or stored unencrypted for anyone to see. Can any staff member at the video store view my personal information, including my complete set of credit card details? Is the business and their staff adequately equipped and trained to handle that sort of sensitive information?

In my opinion, these are all good questions that the average person never thinks about. They assume that our personal information is handled with care, that businesses have reliable processes in place to minimise the potential risk of having their clients information disclosed or compromised.

These sorts of issues are being raised more and more frequently in the mainstream media, fueled by the unchecked rise in personal information and identity theft taking place. Getting this ugly secret out into the open is the only way to deal with it – people need to be made aware of it and what sort of measures they can put in place to reduce the likelihood of their information getting out into the wild.

The sad thing is, that while I read their terms of service and I know they are bound by the Australian Privacy Act – I still signed up for an account at my local Gold Coast video store. I pressed them to sign me up without that information but they wouldn’t budge and the alternative was a Video Ezy at Helensvale – a 15 minute drive away, hardly convenient.

If  you take anything away from this, let it be an increased awareness of what and how often you disclose your personal information and to what types of people, organisations or companies.

Danger, No Break Lights

General, Travel, Work

Earlier in the year I came very close to having an accident when the car in front of me had his break lights reversed. This meant that breaking turned off his tail lights – thus making red lights meaning go, no lights meaning stop. This afternoon on the way home, in a very very similar stretch of road I nearly came unstuck as the minivan in front of me had no break lights whatsoever.

I was heading west on Smith Street, approaching the intersection and traffic lights of Kumbari Avenue and was increasing speed heading down the hill. The lights had been green for a little while so the dozen or so cars in front of me were all accelerating, due to the decline, green light pressure and the faster speed zone on the other side of the lights. With less than 50 metres before we cleared the intersection, the car in front of me decided to break suddenly as soon as the light went amber – when the car to his left and four more went through on the orange.

Had at least one of the minivan’s break lights been working, I would have slowed down with plenty of time to spare. However, it took another fraction of a second before I closed enough distance to realise he was breaking and aggressively.

Fortunately, I allow a little more breaking distance when driving my Ford Telstar; which has a striking similarity to a small tank and even smaller breaks!

Paper Towels Are Not Created Equally

General

Without giving it a whole lot of thought, you’d assume that paper towel is paper towel. They are made of a similar fibre, can be used a general purpose cloth, generally good for cleaning up a spill and so on.

Well they aren’t created equally at all, in fact not even close. Case in point, the difference between a good quality tissue for blowing your nose versus using a couple sheets of good quality toilet paper are worlds apart.

Toilet paper just isn’t designed to deal with the high velocity air coming out of your nose and it inevitably rips. Compare that against a legitimate tissue and it will stand up to that pretty much every time.

That got me thinking, what does a toilet paper do that a facial tissue can’t?

Latte Art

General

Way back in August 2005, I stumbled across an amazing site that had fantastic photos of espresso being made – it was without a doubt porn for coffee lovers. Today I’ve come across another site, art in my coffee which is dedicated to latte art.

For those that aren’t familiar with latte art, its the process or act of decorating a freshly made espresso with a hand crafted pattern. The pattern can either be made through the pouring action of adding the milk to the cup or a combination of the former and some additional tools such as a fork, knife or spike.

One of my favourites on there so far is a dragon, however the same artist has an amazing array of creations which you can view on his own site, Vulcan & The Unicorn.

Cardinal Sins Of Demerging Traffic

General

In the past, I’ve written about how to merge in traffic and today I have another similar road travesty – not demerging from through lanes of traffic into additional lanes in an appropriate manner.

There isn’t a road rule that I’m aware of that says, if you are exiting or turning and an additional lane is provided that you must do so as soon as possible. In the majority of cases, drivers will pull into the additional lane provided as soon as it becomes available according to the shape of the road or the line markings – but from time to time you come across people that don’t do that.

While travelling west bound on the Smith Street Motorway on the back end of peak hour traffic, a driver wanted to turn right into Parklands Drive. As they approached the two newly added turn right lanes, they indicated their intention with ample time but when it came to actually change lanes – they were particularly tardy.

That wouldn’t be a problem if they’d kept up the same speed as the through traffic but they had already begun to break, slowing in traffic accelerating to 100kph down to a little under 60kph. As you can imagine, everyone in the right most through lane braked quickly and the long stream of traffic compressed directly behind me until the driver finally left the right lane and joined the two turning right lanes.

The moral of this particular story is simple, if you’re demerging from through traffic into additionally added lanes – do so as early as possible. If the road and traffic conditions permit, consider demerging at whatever speed the through traffic is doing and braking within the turning right lanes. If that isn’t possible, slow down only as much as you have to while in the through lanes and complete the braking in the additional lanes.

Follow those simple driving tips and your fellow motorists will have a much smoother commute and think the world of you for being considerate.