Sponsor's Message

Yes, that's right -- this device used to be the universal joke used to mock equally ridiculous ideas.

But take a look in The Warehouse sometime and you'll see that we now have solar-powered garden-lights that sell for a song and actually work surprisingly well.

Who'd have thought that advances in photovoltaics and LEDs, combined with outrageously low labour rates in China would have made this ludicrous idea not only possible, but also economically viable?

I've bought several of these little devices and found them to be worth far less than the sum of their parts.

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Not only do you get a nice little solar panel capable of generating around 20-50mA at nearly 3 volts, but they also contain two AA-sized NiCd cells and a white LED.

The Warehouse regularly has these things on sale for less than $5 and, when I look at the individual cost of these components I see that this is a real steal!

Already I've seen evidence that many folks are buying these things simply to pull them apart and repurpose the components.

Everyone has a use for rechargeable AA-cells, even if they're relatively low capacity (500mAH) ones and over at DSE they charge $5.45 PER CELL for something similar.

A white LED from DSE (albeit somewhat more powerful) rings in at $4.35 and if this page is anything to go by, their solar cells are also pretty pricey.

In fact, I figure that there's easily $10-$15 worth of parts in one of those solar garden lights, if you were to buy equivalent components from tricky Dicky's.

Then there's the amount of really useful stuff that gets binned every time someone chucks out a PC, monitor or other electronic device -- what a waste!

I wonder if there's money to be made by recycling components from consumer electronics devices -- even on a relatively small scale?

Certainly companies such as Surplustronics are doing a roaring trade in reselling "used" or surplus electronic components and assemblies -- but are there others?

Maybe many of our youngest and brightest are being put off delving into the wonderful world of electronics engineering by the cost and difficulties associated with buying the parts they need. Certainly a wander through the component bins at DSE is enough to discourage any kid on a budget.

I'd bet even money it'd be dead-easy to get government funding to subsidise the cost of stripping old PCBs of their more valuable components and making them available at a cheaper price to electronics enthusiasts and schools.

So why isn't this happening on a larger scale?

A miracle cure!
Well my hat is off to the government and the way they're slashing waiting lists for specialist medical treatment.

I've long-suffered from bouts of chronic and acute sinus infection which can be hugely debilitating. Recently I went to my doctor (again) for some incredibly expensive antibiotics. The reason these pills are so expensive is that they're only subsidised by the health system if they're prescribed by a specialist. When your GP writes out a script, they're about $40-$80 per course of treatment.

The obvious course of action was to have me referred to an ENT specialist so that the cause of these infections could be identified and remedied or, at the very least, I could save myself a *lot* of money on medication. So my doctor sent off a referral and I waited.

Well the other day I got a very nice letter back from Health Waikato which informed me of the good news and bad news.

The good news: I wasn't going to have to sit for months on a waiting list for the expert attention and treatment I so sorely need.

The bad news: I'm just not going to get to see an ENT specialist. Health Waikato advise me that (in order to ensure that they don't have embarrassingly long waiting lists for treatment) I'm not going to be added to the list and I should simply keep visiting my GP for treatment.

Hell, a lot of the time I'm crook enough to qualify for a sickness benefit that would cost the taxpayer a small fortune -- but instead of receiving treatment I'm basically told "go away, we're too busy to see you".

Next time the government crows about how they're slashing waiting lists -- remember that they're doing this by simply refusing treatment to cases that preivously would have been tacked on the end. Surely that's cheating!

Let's hope they don't apply the same approach to dealing a ballooning prison population -- or they'd simply legalise murder, rape, theft and everything else then turn around and claim the problem was solved.

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