Lemmy NZ

$2.5m in donations from the property industry to political parties since 2021. 97% of which has gone to National, Act & NZ First.

Hello peeps. I wear specs and usually update my prescription every 2 years. This means I have quite a few sets of quality spectacles laying around in the desk drawer that I no longer use. This got me thinking: there must be heaps of people who can't afford specs who could benefit from some free ones. Where can I donate these specs? It must be to some organisation that gives them out for free. People must NOT have to pay for them! I'm in Auckland.

Any ideas welcomed, thanks.

Welcome to today’s daily kōrero!

Anyone can make the thread, first in first served. If you are here on a day and there’s no daily thread, feel free to create it!

Anyway, it’s just a chance to talk about your day, what you have planned, what you have done, etc.

So, how’s it going?

Hi everyone,

Me and my SO are flying on Monday to your beautiful country to drive around in a campervan for 3 months. We booked 3 great walks, and are super excited to check out your nature, culture, wines and dines.

I am a little bit anxious to buying a campervan though. Like, what if takes weeks to find a good one? What if we find a good one after some days which breaks down a few days afterwards? You know, standard stuff.

If any of you have any tips for buying a used 2-birth campervan around Auckland, I'd love you forever. Is it better to go to a dealer, or get one from Trademe or Facebook? Should we wait a few days to get the AA pre-purchase check? Which dealers are good or infamously bad?

Thanks!

Great weather for it

I bought two tickets to a show from Ticketek (for Isaac Theatre in CHCH). It says in the email that I need to print them off but... do I reaaaally? Or can I just show them on my screen?

I didn't know the final report had been released already, but after an interview on RNZ National today I went looking for the actual report.

Some very interesting recommendations. Here are some highlights:

Policy settings

1. We recommend that the Government adopt policy settings to encourage developments in digital assets and blockchain in New Zealand.

Regulatory frameworks 2. Because it is early in the development of digital assets and blockchain, we recommend that the Government and regulatory agencies proceed carefully and do not design and implement a fully integrated and consistent regulatory framework for digital assets at this point in time.

Primary regulator role 8. We recommend that there should be no primary regulator for digital assets, as digital assets cover a spectrum of use cases, well beyond investment.

“Blockchain-sprints” 11. We recommend that the Digital Assets Cross-Agency Working Group hold “blockchain-sprint” equivalent or similar events to develop new ideas and strategies for industry growth.

Education 14. We recommend that secondary and tertiary educational institutions consider developing courses in relation to digital assets, blockchain, and the broader Web3 context, as part of a wider focus on technology (and its place in New Zealand’s future).

Central bank digital currency 22. We recommend that the Reserve Bank continue with design work on its central bank digital currency.

Interesting things here. Clearly the recommendation is for the government to embrace and encourage Blockchain technology, and not to regulate it too heavily.

I'm curious to see what comes of this.

Vince shows the numbers on how much a person must earn in order to buy a house in New Zealand

CCP pushing the "official" doctrine that Mandarin is the only Chinese language to NZ, despite the fact that the vast majority of NZ Chinese immigrants speak Cantonese as a primary language. Especially the early ones.

Welcome to today’s daily kōrero!

Anyone can make the thread, first in first served. If you are here on a day and there’s no daily thread, feel free to create it!

Anyway, it’s just a chance to talk about your day, what you have planned, what you have done, etc.

So, how’s it going?

Has everyone got theirs by now? Wife and parents have, mine's nowhere to be seen...

TL;DR: road closures starting from tonight until midday Friday

"Interest in Kiwi homes from the United Arab Emirates has increased sharply ​ in the weeks following National’s proposal to lift the foreign buyers ban on high-end homes"

National was going to allow foreign investment into the housing market??? Yeah, that's really going to help with our crises. I get it's only 'high-end homes' but more buyers inevitably means less supply.

Really interesting article which serves as a good background to the current problem with state housing.

Tl;dr: Did National sell off state housing? Yes, but the net loss was only a few hundred. However, if you factor in the proportion of the total housing stoke owned by the state, we are short 43,000 state homes, and that's only for the rather meagre 5.4% of total stock.

I was driving out of a quiet street in Christchurch around noon today when two SUVs approached from the right-hand side. I waiting for them because I thought they would go pass, but they had a different idea. Both SUVs pulled into the street which I was coming out of, and they were using it to compensate for their poor turning-circle, instead of attempting a 3-point-turn which would've been safer.

So there I was trying to turn right, with the first SUV sneaking up behind me, waiting for me to go, then there was a second SUV that also wanted to use the side-street to swing around, but they were waiting for me, and I was hesitant, because they were blocking my view from my right and I couldn't see oncoming traffic.

I paused in confusion and then crept forward, saw it was clear, and moved along.

It was a stupid situation to be in, it made me wonder why they don't do a 3-point-turn, or just go one vehicle at a time, instead of blocking the road with their SUV convoy. I call these women soccer moms because they are exactly the same as their American counter-part. They drive their SUVs together to go to the local park with their family. There is no other word for it besides soccer mom.

This is what happens when Karen from accounts makes friends with Becky from HR, and they discover that they both have sons, and both live in the same suburb. They drive their SUVs for an outing down to the local park.

When they swung around and went to the park, they were still there half an hour later. They didn't seem to have any sports gear with them. We are becoming more like America with each passing day.

My 15 year old sister informed me last night that someone is pretending to be her on Instagram. The impersonator uses her photo as their profile picture and uploaded insta stories and photos of her with penises drawn on her face. This is probably the work of an teenager who dislikes her.

This person also contacts her friends through messaging service and harrasses them.

Instagram had declined her request to shut the account down on multiple occasions. I have tried to contact several grey hats online to locate and identify the impersonator but we're finding out that such service isn't cheap at all.

What should we do in this case? Thanks in advance.

EDIT: 30/9/23 Thank you for all of your advice and recommendations. We took screenshots and made a report on Netsafe's website They scheduled a phone call with her where she was able to explain what happened.

The bully account was finally taken down and Netsafe had 100% to do with it. They sent my sister a text message with updates on the case.

We think we know who the culprit is. They're a group of boys from a school in South Auckland. All of them covers their faces when posting on Instagram, we think we know why.

Anyways, I've made sure that my sister is keeping herself safe when online especially when it comes to posting photos.

Thanks again everyone.

How do you not notice there's no steering wheel in front of the "driver"?