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Today's Topics:
1. Re: Is the share market headed toward a ?SaaS-pocalypse? (David)
2. Re: Contemporary Banking (David)
3. Datacenters in space are a terrible, horrible, no good idea.
(Kim Holburn)
4. Australian Internet Domain Names Licensing Review
(Tom Worthington)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2026 12:24:02 +1100
From: David <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: [LINK] Re: Is the share market headed toward a
?SaaS-pocalypse?
Message-ID: <4654992.niJfEyVGOH@ulysses>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
On Monday, 23 February 2026 10:41:53 AEDT Tom Worthington wrote:
> On 2/23/26 08:59, Roger Clarke wrote:
>> ... Investors, and execs in business and govt, are on a bandwagon. ...
>
> At least some of the computer professionals will be cautious. I am helping
> with the Software Construction course at ANU. Students have been told that
> they can use AI for their assessed work. But they have to provide the prompts
> they used and will only receive marks for their own work, not what the AI
> does. Also if it is not clear who did what, the student can be given an oral
> quiz and that be their mark.
Interesting... I worked part-time delivering the Software Engineering course
at UTS for 9 years, and we used TurnItIn to detect cheating & copying from
other students or the 'net. Those responsible for suspect "deliverables" were
then also subject to an intensive oral grilling.
This worked pretty well at the time. But that was well before AI became an
issue, and the course followed a traditional "waterfall" design & development
methodology for group work. However it seems TurnItIn has been keeping up with
the times and now also looks for AI-related cheating, not quite as difficult I
would think judging by some of the AI results I've seen; A Certain Party
inherited a book of crossword-puzzles not long ago which was obviously, and
sometimes laughably, the product of an LLM request.
Some students clearly enrolled with the idea they'd complete the subject by
lazily slouching at a cafe table, flipping open their laptop screen, and
sipping coffee while the code emerged! I think I could spend a whole afternoon
discussing the social aspects of a subject as dry as Software Engineering
...(:-)
(Just before I left, the Department attempted to modernise the course around
"agile" methodology. But IMO successful use of the agile development model
requires very skilled & experienced team leaders who thoroughly understand
waterfall methods. I strongly recommended the User Requirements deliverable be
retained as the first submission, at least. There's a story there, too...)
_DavidL_
------------------------------
Message: 2
Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2026 13:22:00 +1100
From: David <[email protected]>
To: link <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [LINK] Contemporary Banking
Message-ID: <5756166.rdbgypaU67@ulysses>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
On Tuesday, 24 February 2026 09:05:11 AEDT Roger Clarke wrote:
> Here's another wow! factor, in this case dating to the late 1990s:
>> ?Previously, someone would make a payment and then they'd have to refresh
>> the screen to see their balance update. Now that happens straight away.
> And here's the seer's vision:
>> ?We?re imagining what the next decade of agentic banking might mean, and
>> experimenting with Bedrock and AgentCore around what capabilities that will
>> give us to deliver more hyper-personalised behavioural banking [and]
>> intelligent experiences to our customers,? Davies said.
> I can't wait (literally) for "hyper-persona-ised behavioural banking [and]
> intelligent experiences".
When an organisation begins believing its' own bullshit I think it's time for
the rats to jump overboard ...(:-)
_DavidL_
------------------------------
Message: 3
Date: Wed, 25 Feb 2026 09:38:20 +1100
From: Kim Holburn <[email protected]>
To: Link mailing list <[email protected]>
Subject: [LINK] Datacenters in space are a terrible, horrible, no good
idea.
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
https://taranis.ie/datacenters-in-space-are-a-terrible-horrible-no-good-idea/
There is a rush for AI companies to team up with space launch/satellite
companies to build datacenters in space. TL;DR: It's not
going to work.
Problems:
. Power
. Thermal Regulation
. Radiation Tolerance
. Communications
--
Kim Holburn
IT Network & Security Consultant
+61 404072753
mailto:[email protected] aim://kimholburn
skype://kholburn - PGP Public Key on request
------------------------------
Message: 4
Date: Wed, 25 Feb 2026 11:37:59 +1100
From: Tom Worthington <[email protected]>
To: "[email protected]" <[email protected]>
Subject: [LINK] Australian Internet Domain Names Licensing Review
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"; Format="flowed"
Greetings from the .au Licensing Rules Review consultation in Canberra.
auDA is a not for profit organization with a legislated license to
administer Internet domain names which end in .au
https://www.auda.org.au/public-impact/have-your-say/policy-panels/au-licensing-rules-review-2025/
auDA will be holding face to face consultations in Brisbane, Sydney &
Melbourne, with online consultations as well. auDA is keen to get input.
I offered to help by coming up with controversial proposals, such as
dutch auctions for domain names: you want the name, you bid the most
first, you get it. ;-)
I am here because one of the auDA board suggest I come along. I was a
member of the "Internet Cabal" some decades ago, but have not had much
to do with it since, apart from paying my domain registration.
There is no proposal for changes, but key issues the panel has
identified in the discussion paper are:
1. Domain name monetisation
2. Allocation rules for com.au and net.au
3. Contested .au direct domain names
4. Bad faith and scam registrations
5. Complaint processes
6. Alignment of the .au Licensing Rules with global best practice
7. Anything else
https://files.auda.org.au/documents/au-Licensing-Rules-Review-2025-Issues-Paper.pdf
As an example of an issue, companies can make money selling domain names
for whatever they think the buyer will pay. Through auDA the public only
gets a small fixed amount of this. Perhaps, like mining royalties, there
should be a share, based on value, going to the public.
There was a review in 2018 and changes were made:
https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/media-communications-arts/internet/internet-governance/domain-names/2018-review-au-domain-administration
More at:
https://blog.tomw.net.au/2026/02/australian-internet-domain-names.html
--
Tom Worthington http://www.tomw.net.au
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