Perth gets half Telstra’s ‘foreign’ complaints

david ramli
The next time you get mad at Telstra’s call centre staff for having poor English there’s a 50 per cent chance you should aim your rage at Perth and not Mumbai or Manilla.
Telstra chief executive David Thodey told an Australian Institute of Company Director's lunch in Sydney on Wednesday that he often got complaints from irate customers about overseas call centres and their apparent failure to understand English.
But further investigations showed that Western Australians were just as bad as call centres in the Philippines and India.

Richard Branson calls for tougher bitcoin rules

Jessica Sier and Ruth Liew

Virgin Group founder Richard Branson has called for tougher regulation and taxation laws on the controversial Bitcoin industry in Australia and singled out next month’s G20 Summit as a key platform for discussions.
In an op-ed for Bitcoin lobby group Australian Digital Currency Commerce Association, Sir Richard said Bitcoin was disrupting the finance sector with ­customers not satisfied with current major payment networks.
“Making sure that conversations around this are happening at the highest level will hopefully result in common-sense reforms to areas such as taxation and law enforcement, which will be of real benefit to all concerned,” wrote Sir Richard on Tuesday.
“It’s crucial that everyone has the understanding and access to enable it [digital currencies] to work for them.”
Senator Sam Dastyari is heading a Senate inquiry into Bitcoin regulation and has said he will ask Sir Richard to appear at the committee.
Invitations to participate have been sent to 74 different organisations, including the big four Australian banks.
Sir Richard is understood to have pumped around $US30 million ($34 million) into Bitcoin ventures to date. Over $3 billion was poured into technology start ups and entrepreneurs last year alone, and the figure is expected to grow to $8  billion by 2018.
Nearly $11 million has been invested in Australian cryptocurrency ventures during the year to July.

'Selfie' might be worth a second look

If there's one thing we can use, it's a little Selfie-improvement.

After all, with the very happy exception of ABC's Black-ish, this has been a disappointing fall for new sitcoms. Manhattan Love Story has already vanished; Bad Judge and A to Z soon will; and Mulaney is certain to follow suit.

Russia Ditches

 Key Nuclear Security Meeting

Russia has failed to show up at a meeting planning the 2016 Nuclear Security Summit, U.S and European officials said Monday, in a potentially serious blow to efforts by President Barack Obama to cement his legacy as leaving the world safer from nuclear terrorism than when he took office.

The officials said it was not immediately clear whether Russia's absence meant that Moscow meant to boycott the summit itself or if it was a temporary show of displeasure over Washington's harsh condemnation of Moscow's role in Ukraine unrest and its lead in orchestrating Western sanctions and other punitive measures in response. But even if short-term, Russia's no-show is significant. Only three or four planning meetings are scheduled before the spring of 2016, when the summit is tentatively set to open. With Russia a key global player — and one of the world's five formally recognized nuclear powers — its input is crucial to setting an agenda.

The U.S. president initiated a string of summits in 2010 aimed at preventing terrorists from getting their hands on weapons-grade nuclear material. Since then, the number of countries that have enough material to build a nuclear weapon has fallen from 39 to 25.

 

Show Girls at the 2014 Auto Expo: In Pictures