Bluey's Dad

Good point on the viability, but I think you're very light on the number of people who'd sign up. According to this: http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/more-people-are-signing-up-to-streaming-services-than-ever--but-foxtel-numbers-are-still-growing/news-story/4057ef1f490b118fd6b85db46f0af3a9 Foxtel had 5.3 million subscribers in 2016. $418 million / 5.3 million = $78.87 each per annum. Of course that's assuming every single Foxtel subscriber switches to the new theoretical internet alternative. But it also assumes zero takeup of non-fox customers to the new system. I would certainly do so at that price, as would many others I think. The truth is probably somewhere between your 1 million and my 5.3 million guestimates. We also assumed they make zero dollars on advertising/sponsorship and that the assumed subscription cost must cover the entire $418 million. I reckon they'd generate some pretty good advertising dollars on just banner adds within the app before/after the game or between quarters (not even between goals).

I would happily pay a small fee, on par with what the AFL app charges, to be able to watch Melbourne games live on my TV. But TV rights are apparently different to streaming rights, even though in my home there is no difference between an internet streaming device and my TV. My TV is an internet enabled device and should be treated as such by the relevant stakeholders. I do not watch free to air and will not pay extortionate 'package' rates to foxtel for content I will not watch to view 2 hours a week of content I do watch (1 Melbourne game per week). They're forcing an out-dated business model down the public's throat and frankly it makes me angry. I am a 32 year old male white collar worker with a family. I sit in a highly valued demographic for advertisers because of my disposable income and age. Their advertisers can't reach me because they're using this idiotic agreement that says internet streaming should be restricted to a 7 inch diagonal screen. In my house all screens are streaming devices. I am literally sitting here saying I am willing to pay for the AFL's content. Real dollars. Right now. But I want to watch it in HD on my TV screen, not on my piddly little tablet/phone. Let's have a little perspective here AFL. I pay $18 per month for a Netlix subscription, which provides 4 family members with countless hours of entertainment every week. Lets say, conservatively, 1 hour per day per person. 28 hours of TV per week for $18 a month. All I'm asking is 2 hours a week, for 1 person (1 MFC game per week). I'd even pay the same rate as I pay Netflix - $18 per month. The only way I can get this content is to pay Foxtel $50 a month. For one screen. For 2 hours a week, for content 1 person in the family will watch and a whole lot of crud mixed in. Or I can pay Telstra $100 ($12.50 per month for an 8 month season) to watch it on my goddamn phone. These are not options. These are carefully curated business practices designed to make me pay more (Foxtel) for less (2 hours a week).

"My favourite ruckman tackling my least favourite team mate" was gold Would love him commentating if he wasn't playing for us. A lot more genuine flavour and humour than the forced, boisterous, ego-inflated, obnoxious faux banter that's forced down our throats on a regular basis. *Cough* BT *cough*

Yeah Zooper Dooper is a kind of icy-pole. Ridiculous that they sponsor the super-goal and so it has to be called a "zooper goal". I feel like it undermined the fact that we were watching a SPORT, not a paid-for product placement. Or maybe that's exactly what it was. TBH I felt the entire AFLX experience was over-commercialised. Zooper goals, circus acts, smoke machines, LED goal posts. I think if you took away the superfluous gawdy crap and just played the game (seriously though, without most players going soft to avoid injury) it was actually OK. I actually enjoyed the game itself, when I could watch it and when the players were putting in the effort. I would have preferred some actual analysis of the tactics than the crap they had on. It was a new game and I think it would have been nice to see some experts break down some of it in real time. I realise that without a pause between score and kick-in, it's difficult, but it could have been included in the half time break. I also enjoyed watching sport without gambling ads and odds before every kick off. But then every 5 minutes they would do a split screen with the boundary ride. I could barely see the action whilst the interviews were going on. Astounding decision. If they MUST televise the interview during play, do a picture-in-picture thing with the field of play in the entire screen and the interview in the bottom right or left something, not obscuring the actual play.

Trump is an idiot. Repealed Obama's law that would have made it harder for the mentally ill to buy guns. Fact check Then he has the audacity to blame shooting on mental illness. As for Obama's 'lack of action' on gun laws, the Democrats had control of Congress from 2009-2011. This was the window for action, and from memory that window was used to pass the ACA. After that, The GOP took control of Congress, making meaningful changes to gun control legislation extremely difficult. Even during that window in 2009-2011, the Democrats had fewer than 60 seats in the Senate - which is generally what is required to avoid a filibuster. So any significant gun control legislation would have stalled at this point anyway. Sandy Hook happened in 2012. So America's greatest impetus for improving their gun control laws took place when the GOP controlled Congress - obviously nothing was going to pass. Make no mistake here, the GOP is the biggest impediment to meaningful reform in the USA on gun control. The NRA has donated millions to them in order to keep gun laws where they are: https://www.absentdata.com/blog/nra-politician-donations/

lol wtf is this? I assume this is some sort of doctored photo right? The AFL didn't seriously promote their new brainfart as a literal circus?

I hear some regimes pay China to send supporters to sporting events. Not that I would equate the AFL with North Korea. One is a totalitarian regime with a terrifying propaganda arm run by a madman, and the other is a totalitarian regime with a terrifying propaganda arm run by a FAT madman.

I think once Mueller finishes his investigation, we'll see that Page and Manafort at the very least colluded with the Russians. We already know Flynn was talking to Russians before the election, making promises he wasn't legally allowed to (promising to lift Obama's sanctions when Trump was elected). He's now co-operating with Mueller. Manafort and Papadopoulos also took deals. I agree Trump himself probably didn't collude, and left that stuff to his campaign staff. Also agreed Trump will probably end up getting done for obstruction of justice rather than collusion. He said on TV that he fired Comey because of the Russia investigation, but only a few days beforehand the White House released a statement saying the complete opposite. Since his campaign is the target of that investigation, he directly benefits by getting rid of Comey. It's obscene. His next target will be Rosenstein, as requesting the DAG to fire Mueller will [censored] off too many Republicans and lead to impeachment (or at least his own party demanding his resignation as with Nixon). If he gets rid of Rosenstein he can put someone else in place who'll restrict Mueller without having to fire him and deal with that fallout. Trump himself said that he would not have appointed Jeff Sessions as AG if he knew Sessions would recuse himself from overseeing the Russian investigation (he has a conflict of interest). The appointment and supervision of the special investigator fell to Rosenstein in Sesson's stead and Trump is very unhappy with this. He thought appointing Sessions would avoid this sort of thing, but Sessions was smart enough to realise that he couldn't oversee a special investigator if he was a possible target. I'm also pretty concerned that Trump chose not to place sanctions on the Russians for the election meddling, considering Congress passed that resolution something like 400 to 5 or whatever (can't remember the exact numbers). Even the Republicans want the Russians punished, but Trump flinched. The optics aren't good - Trump's campaign investigated for colluding with the Russians and then Trump decides not the punish them for the electoral manipulations. Today's been pretty interesting so far. Nunes claimed Trump never met with George Papadopoulos, and then the internet finds a tweet Trump made during the campaign that shows them at the same table. Nunes is a piece of work - releasing a memo calling into question that FISA application but refusing to release the Democratic rebuttal memo. Partisan BS. Hillary has absolutely nothing to do with this. This is all on Trump and his people. Maybe the only Hillary-related issue is that Trump promised to 'lock her up', but hasn't done it. I think he was shocked that being President doesn't actually give you direct control over law enforcement or the courts. I very much doubt he understands how the separation of powers in the US operates, which is why he's in this mess right now.

I feel like the worst of the 'unsportsman-like conduct' in AFL comes from the administration. The more commercial AFL gets, the less 'sporting' it becomes. 'Sporting' suggests an ethical, I suppose 'gentlemanly' approach to a contest - at least in my mind. The AFL itself has become so conflicted that it's not consistent with this principle. I think the players, on the field at least, are pretty good as a whole. The administration however is a different beast.

Yay avatar bets! I lost mine and have to wear this hat (Ethan made it for me). Need more people to join the misery!

Are you trolling? Jeez you know how to suck me back into this crap. 6% is a prediction made by Trump. Not an actual figure. If your 3% under Obama stated above correct (I don't know if it is or not), then it is above the 30 year long-term average of 2.5%. Source: http://fortune.com/2017/12/07/trump-us-gdp-growth-rate-economy-6-percent/ Now given the man can't keep his own government running atm, I'm not going to trust his economic forecasts. If he achieves 6% then good on him. I'll be happy. My super fund balance will be very happy. And before you go blaming the Democrats for the shutdown, Trump said in 2013 that government shutdowns are the responsibility of presidents: Trump spoke to “Fox & Friends” in 2013 and was asked who would be fired during a government shutdown, as shown in a clip posted by "Morning Joe." “Well, if you say who gets fired it always has to be the top,” Trump said. “I mean, problems start from the top and they have to get solved from the top and the president’s the leader. And he’s got to get everybody in a room and he’s got to lead.” He said that further down in history, “when they talk about the government shutdown, they’re going to be talking about the president of the United States, who the president was at that time.” “They’re not going to be talking about who was the head of the House, the head the Senate, who’s running things in Washington,” Trump said. “So I really think the pressure is on the president,” he added. Source: http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/369756-trumps-comments-blaming-obama-for-2013-government-shutdown-resurface Fact check on source: https://www.snopes.com/trump-criticize-obama-shutdown/ The man who campaigned on his ability to make deals could not make a deal to keep his government from shutting down, despite the GOP having a majority in both houses which makes the negotiation significantly easier than if one was in minority. Some more good quotes on the snopes page as well, Trump unleashes on Obama's lack of leadership, blaming the 2013 shut down on his inability to negotiate. Trump fails as a President by the standard he set himself while criticising his predecessor.

They just purchased OneCare insurance from ANZ Wealth. Will be interesting times, I think the deal makes them Australia's largest insurer now, overtaking TAL.

@Wrecker45 lol done

Yep, it's all because of the rectangular fields. I'm no expert, but surely there a bunch of cricket ovals dotted around the world? Surely England, India and NZ would be more viable international targets given they have the existing infrastructure to play AFL as it is and not requiring the expense of a concept trial. I'm pretty unexcited by the concept TBH. Even if it does get some traction internationally, it'll still be an "AFL-lite" product. The real thing will always be better. The only reason the AFL seems to want to ship an inferior product is field size.

Would use any of those @Ethan Tremblay but the bet was with Wrecker. Still awaiting his response.

Just checked, @Wrecker45 apparently. Pick your subject and I will upload. I concede defeat.

I forgot about this. Who did I say gets to pick?

We found out today that Jack Viney can benchpress 155 kg which was pretty cool. It was a good day. Until now.

Well there we go. That's a pretty short [censored] list. [censored].

Herald Sun: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/more-news/police-probe-afl-player-over-alleged-sexual-assault/news-story/eb922b5f21bb52e905cdce68535aefed EDIT: Bali in September. Don't know who went on that trip

Search result on the now missing url gives the following preview. Checked all the other Fairfax sites but all 404. I'd say it's MFC, not a "Melbourne Team" since the result actually has an MFC logo in the thumbail (not shown below) Melbourne player investigated for alleged sexual assault The Age-25 minutes ago In a statement, the Victoria Police said the complainant had not so far made a formal statement. The complainant was also advised that the investigation would need to be directed by police in the country where the offence is alleged to have occurred. The accused player has not been named but Melbourne ...

404 error. Brisbane times link also 404'd. Ruh Roh.

Well those photos make me feel better. Jack Viney for round 1!

The photo of Viney driving him into the ground a few years back is one of my all time favourites. I think it started the 'Jack Viney Made Me Cry' thread. Would love a repeat.

So round one we face the most intimidating lineup of midfield A+ graders I've ever seen. It reads like the mid line of a fantasy football team. Anyone else worried about getting pantsed here?