Posts by damonism@aus.social
(DIR) Post #ApT3Uk8wTQctTiakpk by damonism@aus.social
2024-12-27T09:33:18Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@_elena It’s not just you – copy and paste on Linux is a nightmare (wait until you find out how many apps have their own copy/paste buffers which they don’t share with other apps by default). But full points for persisting.
(DIR) Post #ApT3UmF2fih5zDSecS by damonism@aus.social
2024-12-27T09:45:50Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@_elena I suspect it comes from a legacy of Unix being a bunch of small terminal programs with a graphical interface, and concept of a Universal clipboard, only coming much later. But what it means in practice is I have used Linux on and off for 30 years and I still have no idea how to copy from Emacs and paste into another app (see, for eg https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/CopyAndPaste).
(DIR) Post #ApT3UuB5AKHQbFfbYe by damonism@aus.social
2024-12-27T09:55:29Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@_elena Also there is an app (I think it’s gnome-tweak-tool) that, if you’re using a gnome-based desktop, will let you swap ctrl and cmd keys, so in apps that have somewhat sensible copy and paste keys, you can use cmd-c and cmd-v instead of control. This makes life much easier as a Mac user.
(DIR) Post #AtEC5iYlJlSeolkxFo by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-18T20:43:39Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
With the Australian federal election coming up, do you have any questions about how elections work, or how voting works, or how to correctly fill in your ballot, or anything like that? Not the politics, just the process. I worked in elections for most of the last decade and Antony Green isn’t here, so why not ask me.
(DIR) Post #AtEToP3WNUaaa02MLY by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-18T22:20:47Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
Australian election fact check: You are the one who decides where your preferences go in Australian elections. The only way a party can direct your preferences is through a how to vote card. When the media talks about one party preferencing another, they just mean their how to vote card has that preference. You don’t need to follow anyone’s how to vote card – your preferences are yours.
(DIR) Post #AtEToQKZdZp8XB1UZ6 by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-19T00:16:45Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
Australian election fact check: You really should vote – in Australia, voting is a right and a duty. But if you don’t vote (and you don’t have a valid excuse) and the AEC sends you a $20 fine, you really should pay that fine. Because if you don’t the AEC will take you to court and the fine there is $330 and the AEC can ask for costs, so it could be a lot more. Paying the $20 fine is really the cheapest option.
(DIR) Post #AtEToY8ScUt6jvPvnM by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-19T00:35:25Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
Fun election fact: We use how to vote cards in Australia because before 1984 we didn’t print the party name on ballot paper, only the candidate name. If a party wanted you to vote for their candidate they’d have to tell you who it was with a how to vote. Turns out they’re also really handy for suggesting preferences to a voter, but the party name thing is why they exist at all.
(DIR) Post #AtGiP1vZ7PnFEmawiG by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-19T21:12:00Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
Fun election fact: Why did we start putting party names on ballot papers in 1984? Because before 1984 political parties didn’t officially exist in Australia (even though in 1904 Australia had the world’s first national Labor government). Why did we start registering political parties in 1984 if they had always existed? Because we wanted to give them taxpayer money to run for election. And we still do this. Every party or candidate that receives at least 4 per cent of the first preference vote can get a refund for election expenditure at the rate of $3.386 per first preference vote. In a preferential voting system your first preference is mostly only special because the party you give it to gets money because of it. https://www.aec.gov.au/Parties_and_Representatives/public_funding/Current_Funding_Rate.htm
(DIR) Post #AtVKrzdReGNawhBvhQ by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-22T08:50:09Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
Fun election fact: Early voting has just started for the federal election and last election was the first time that more than half of all votes were early. Early voting has increased in an essentially linear fashion since pre-poll ordinary votes were introduced, and so this year it will probably be well over 50 per cent.
(DIR) Post #AtVKs0hNh77eFC2aTQ by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-22T10:39:27Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
Voters love pre-poll voting, but political parties really don't, because they have to staff hundreds of early voting centres for weeks before the election. In 2021 legislation was passed to restrict the early voting period to no more than two weeks – previously it depended on the length of the election period.
(DIR) Post #AtVKs1Wmc0Esoc5daq by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-22T10:42:52Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
Schedule 2 of the Commonwealth Electoral Act provides the grounds for application for a pre-poll or postal vote. Convenience is not one of the acceptable reasons. If you're pre-poll voting just because that seemed easier than queuing on election day, technically you're in breach of the Act and could be refused a vote. In practice, that happens very rarely (but I have seen it happen).
(DIR) Post #AtVKs2Q5IOTVa7xnn6 by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-25T03:18:34Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
Early voting for the 2025 Australian federal election has only been going for three days and is already looking pretty strong. No early voting today, so maybe people have been getting in early. Would not be surprised if it overtook 2022 at this rate.
(DIR) Post #AtVKs38Oddv7nYhBrM by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-27T00:03:30Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
The early voting line is still going up at quite a steep incline. Seven days to the election and almost 2.4 million early votes.
(DIR) Post #AtZaE5vZUqzjAhfPJQ by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-29T04:28:08Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
The Canadian election being so close to the Australian election and the differences between the two Liberal parties in this countries has led to some headline confusion. Let’s all be thankful to King O’Malley for his prescience in screwing up the spelling of the Australian Labor Party.
(DIR) Post #AthiR1IGD7kfKyGjke by damonism@aus.social
2025-04-29T07:19:29Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
As of yesterday early voting for the 2025 Australian federal election was up to 3.2 million votes or almost 18 per cent of the enrolled population, pulling comfortably ahead from previous elections.
(DIR) Post #AthiR2NcAhd2hrmWjg by damonism@aus.social
2025-05-01T09:55:28Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
For anyone who is still interested in the early voting trend.
(DIR) Post #AthiR3Q8IpElvxy3Ie by damonism@aus.social
2025-05-03T02:56:43Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
Last daily early voting chart of the 2025 federal election. The final number was just under 6.8 million, or 37.4 per cent of enrolments, which is almost 5 percentage points more than 2022.
(DIR) Post #AthiRBm3FDWVqGHfZg by damonism@aus.social
2025-05-03T02:59:29Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
On the last day of early voting, 1.1 million people voted. That's the biggest non-election day voting day in Australian history. The biggest day for 2022 (also the last day) was about 920,000.
(DIR) Post #Ats0QB0iL4lTwLPOdc by damonism@aus.social
2025-05-08T02:19:32Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
Getting emails from ServiceNSW to add multi-factor authentication to my account and I have no idea why I even have an account with ServiceNSW, never having lived there.
(DIR) Post #Av2CMEjRkRSdi0hnUG by damonism@aus.social
2025-06-11T21:22:27Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
The phone camera did not do justice to how dark and foggy it was this morning.