Memoir of a film producer (Titanic etc). I think the early parts tend to work better with the last third being less interesting. But in general worth reading. 4/5
As I have in previous years here is a quick analysis of the election vote and result. This is based on the Detail Report that was posted on the night of the election.
Background
The InternetNZ board was electing 2 board members in August 2026 via the STV method. There were a total of nine candidates.
Two of these were representing the “Free Speech Union” (FSU) who is in process of trying to take over the organisation. They were Douglas Brown and Jillaine Heather. The Free Speech Union has encouraged its members to sign up for Internetnz and vote for them.
Anti-FSU groups broadly encouraged their members to vote for Bianca Grizhar, Daniel Spector and Annette Culpan. They discouraged voting for Douglas, Jillaine and Jan Rivers (an anti-trans activist)
Round One – First Preferences
Here is a table for the 1st round votes in 2026 compared to 2025
Year
Total Votes
FSU R1
FSU R1 %
anti-FSU R1
anti-FSU R1 %
2025
2785
1046
38%
1724
62%
2026
3104
1923
62%
1172
38%
diff
+11%
+84%
-32%
The totals were almost the reverse of in 2025 with 62% going anti-FSU in 2025 while the FSU captures 62% in 2026. Note that I’ve excluded Brynn Neilson (in 2025) and Jan Rivers (in 2026) from either group but they are both under 1%.
The droop quota for a candidate to be elected was 1035 ( 3104 / 3 + 1 ). In the first round FSU candidate Douglas Brown exceeded this ( with 1822 votes ) and was elected.
Round Two – Part 1 Redistributing Douglas’ excess
In this round since Douglas greatly exceeded the quota his excess votes were redistributed. 1822 – 1035 = 787 were redistributed. Of Douglas’ 1822 voters it appears they allocated their votes as follows
Who
Number of 2nd preferences out of 1822
Jillaine
1810
Bianca
1
Daniel
2
Annette
1
Jan
4
No 2nd preference
4
The reallocation put Jillaine on 882.8 votes or 2nd place with Bianca on 695.43. This is very consistent with FSU voters listed their two candidates 1 and 2.
Round Two – Part 2 Candidates defeated
In the 2nd part of round 2 candidates were removed. Since the total votes for Daniel, Annette, Nabil, Keoni, David and Jan was 489 even if all them were transfered to a single candidate they would be less than Bianca (on 695). Therefore all of them were eliminated. Leaving just Jillaine and Bianca in the race
Round Three – Reallocation from defeated candidates
In this round 489 votes were reallocated from the defeated candidates according to the next preference ( out of Bianca, Jillaine or exhausted ). Of these 403 ( 82.4% ) went to Bianca, 21.73 ( 4.4%) went to Jillaine and 64.3 ( 13.1% ) were exhausted (ie did not list Bianca or Jillaine).
Note that the transfers to Jillaine were probably all of Jan River’s next preferences plus 10 votes out of the 175 that were for Nabil, Keoni and David. This would be consistent with Jan River’s voters being generally aligned with the FSU.
After the allocation which was consistent the pro and anti-FSU voting patterns Bianca had 1098 votes which was over the threshold of 1035 and she was elected.
Comments
Overall the result appears correct and makes sense. The biggest change was the drop off in anti-FSU voters compared to 2025 while the FSU significantly increased their supporters.
A fairly balanced biography of the 6 astronauts. Covering before and during the Astronaut careers and to an extent afterwards. Worth a read for space fans. 4/5
A bit dry and academic with a lot of “talking to my dataset” but some interesting bits on trends in modern warfare including early parts of Ukraine war. 3/5
$600 to Givewell Top Charities fund . I’ve been donating to Givewell as my main “help the poor” charity since they have fairly low overheads and try and get the most impact from their donations. They also get good reviews for living up to these goals.
My employer matched this donation so total given to Givewell was $1790.
Software and Internet Infrastructure Projects
The Software Freedom Conservancy use Paypal which is blocking charity donations from Asia/Pacific so I was unable to donate to them. Software in the Public Interest was previously not working but worked this year.
