Five reasons to block Woz’s Australian citizenship

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just trolling A number of media outlets have reported this week that Apple co-founder and global technology sector luminary Steve Wozniak is attempting to become an Australian citizen. But is this really a good idea? Here’s five reasons why we should stop the Woz at the border and send him packing back to his home country of the United States.

He believes the NBN is a good idea: Wozniak told the Australian Financial Review newspaper this week that he supported Labor’s National Broadband Network project and was one of the reasons why he wanted to become an Australian – because the US’s deregulation of its telecommunications industry had led to poor outcomes for consumers.

Well, given the Financial Review’s history criticising the NBN recently, this must have been like waving a red flag at a bull, and we bet if Woz should move to Australia, that the rest of Australia’s conservative mainstream media outlets would also jump on to slam the Apple founder on a daily basis. Despite the technical benefits universal fibre will bring to Australia – benefits obvious to a tech visionary like Woz – and its mass popularity, the project’s not in vogue with the Coalition and much of the media at the moment. Woz is clearly out of step with Australian society and shouldn’t be allowed in.

He’s jumping the queue: Woz has consistently demonstrated a commitment to lining up for things over the past few years. Every time his Alma Mater Apple releases a new product, Woz hits up the closest Apple store (for the iPhone 5 it was Chermside in Brisbane) to chat with the locals and wait for his turn to purchase an Apple gadget. But when it comes to Australia’s immigration queue, Woz appears to be trying to game the system.

Instead of quietly and calmly waiting for his turn on Australia’s immigration queue, Woz appears to be trying to jumpstart the process by hobnobbing with ministers, talking to the media about his plans to become a citizen, giving high-profile speeches locally and demonstrating his employability through his history with Apple and his current affiliation with fast-growing storage company Fusion IO. Clearly, Woz believes that he should be given “special treatment” and not have to wait in line to join our great nation like everyone else.

His family has ‘ethnic’ origins: Everyone in Australia came from ‘somewhere’ – or at least their parents or grandparents did — but we don’t want more people coming from ‘somewhere’ to Australia. In an era where “stop the boats” is one of the most popular political slogan around, one has to suspect that Woz’s possibly Polish/German ancestry wouldn’t go down well. I mean, we’ve already got plenty of Australians with ‘multicultural’ backgrounds. Do we need any more? Stop the boats!

He’s an evangelist for entrepreneurs: Woz currently spends much of his time travelling around the world speaking to technology enthusiasts, especially entrepreneurs running technology startups. His rationale for this approach appears to be that since he has been able to achieve wealth and happiness through co-founding Apple and working in other early stage technology companies, that others should be able to do the same. He hopes to inspire young people to follow his path.

It’s hard to see what greater risk there could be to Australia’s national productivity and industry than people leaving highly paid positions in the mining and tourism sectors to start small technology companies to succeed and be happy. Australia’s future is clearly tied to the resources sector, and everything we do should be aligned to that aim. For those people who don’t want to work in Western Australia on a mine, there are a few acceptable alternatives, such as working in the tourism sector, or for one of the large duopolies. You know the ones I’m talking about – Woolworths and Coles, Telstra and Optus and so on. Working for one of the large four banks or the Government would also be acceptable. Just as long as it’s a major organisation where you can be unhappy alongside everyone else.

He doesn’t follow sport: According to Wikipedia, one of Woz’s main hobbies throughout the 1990’s was getting the highest possible scores on Tetris and submitting them to Nintendo Power magazine. He also travels with a huge accouterment of gadgets and loves to tinker with technology in his spare time. There is just no way that this kind of geek would be into going to the rugby or AFL on the weekend – and he’s American, so doubtless Woz has no idea what cricket even is.

Someone who doesn’t follow sport just has no basis to try and become an Australian citizen – clearly they are out of step with Australia’s national character. Woz’s geeky obsessions just wouldn’t fit in in a society which appears to believe that the pinnacle of national success is to be captain of the Wallabies or the national cricket side. This alone is a good reason to keep Woz out. And no, Segway Polo does not count as a sport.

Do I need to go further? Woz is a geek with ‘ethnic’ origins who doesn’t show any interest in sport, he will draw attention away from Australia’s mining industry, and is in favour of that great “white elephant”, the National Broadband Network. And to boot, he’s just another “illegal” attempting to jump the queue to get into Australia. Clearly, Woz’s application should be marked “rejected”, and he should be shipped offshore to Nauru for processing like everyone else trying to get into Australia illegitimately. Enough said.

If you haven’t realised by now, this article was tongue in cheek ;) Image credit: campuspartycolombia, Creative Commons

54 COMMENTS

  1. hmm Must not be in the groove today.. really didn’t find this terribly funny.

    btw is the whole thing fake or is Woz actually going for Aus citizenship

      • I know a couple of Americans that have taken out dual citizenship, adding Australian citizenship. Possibility some feel that can see the writing on the wall. And, maybe, Australia looks like a same place to go when the US ‘goes down the tube’?

        Disclaimer: Not that I am suggesting the USA is going that way. But it is my interpretation of other people’s comments.

  2. I didn’t really find this one THAT funny. Great attempt at humour though, mate. We don’t want Woz to get the impression that we DON’T want him here, should he read this fake article.

    • If Woz doesn’t know when the piss is being taken, perhaps he really isn’t welcome. And if he thinks this might be a bridgehead for bringing the rellies, he better think again.

  3. Congratulations. You’ve just given birth to The Republican Party in Australia.

    Seriously tho, I hope Woz becomes an Australian citizen. I’d be around at his joint with a 6-pack in no time.

  4. Thanks Renai. Had a good chuckle at your points. Shouldn’t being a “tall poppy” have been included?

  5. pretty dumb article. If it’s humour, that this is a total failure, if it’s not than the author should accept the fact that as an Aussie, Woz will do more for australia in one day than Lemay will do in a life time.

    • Don’t forget the first two words of the article: “Just Trolling”.

      I think Renai is (and most geeks are) keen to see him come to Australia as well.

    • So Woz thinks the NBN is a good idea? People who know me in the real world will tell you I’m not a fan of Americans and the last thing I’d want is Australia overrun with them however if even an American can see the importance of the NBN you have to wonder and question the intelligence of those opposed to it here. Perhaps they enjoy a mediocre lifestyle and would be happy if we never made any progress… yeah let him in.

  6. [quote=Wikipedia] In the 1990s [Wozniak] submitted so many high scores for [Tetris] to Nintendo Power that they would no longer print his scores, so he started sending them in under the alphabetically reversed “Evets Kainzow”.[/quote]

    My hero.

  7. Whilst not laugh out loud funny, I found this quite witty. Definitely something I would find coming out of the mouths of Abbott and Co.

  8. “I mean, we’ve already got plenty of Australians with ‘multicultural’ backgrounds. Do we need any more? Stop the boats!”

    How depressing people think like this. Australia was a generous and compassionate society for a time.

    • No, seriously … didn’t you know that Renai was a racist, anti-technology, homophobe (actually that’s the sixth reason … Woz is gay).

      • You forgot that he’s biased.

        Renai also hates Apple now since he’s moved onto Android.

  9. I reckon we should speed his application along… we need more immigrants like him in Oz!

    Imagine how much knowledge and connections he’d bring to Australia – having a super star amongst us would definitely help all of us trying to make some coin in the startup game.

  10. I thought the frivolity was cool for a change Renai…

    Lighten up guys FFS…

    Ooh BTW, since we now have another Alex (fancy that another Alex, who would ever have thunk it) now posting regularly here… me (the old NBN commenting Alex) will become err, NBNAlex… so as to dissimilate… so to speak.

    Cheers

  11. If we can convince Woz to turn up by boat, that makes him a boat person as well. Extra points if he does it on Christmas Island.

  12. You want to kill the NBN?? Hey Renai why don’t you go back to a 2-3mbps ADSL connection like a most of us are getting on the old sh!tty cooper can network for 12months and see if you still think the NBN isn’t worth it!!

    The only way people with crappy speeds will get an improvement is by a replacement link!

    BTW You know as cooper ages the ADSL sync speeds get lower and lower, I’ve lost ~2mbps in the last 4 years on my line! (Same provider)

  13. I freaked out when I first saw this headline in my RSS feed, then my brain clicked in when I realised who wrote it :)

    Love it Renai. And LOL to those that took this seriously. The Just Trolling in bold at the very beggining of the article should have given you a little clue..

  14. Good stuff, especially the Tetris bit from Wikipedia as quoted above. My hero indeed.

  15. Another reason why Wozniak shouldn’t be given Oz citizenship: By all accounts, he has a good sense of humour. Unlike some of the posters here. :)

  16. Some folk need to lighten up. Perhaps it is because too many of us have been reading too much about Malcolm Turnbull. Could we swap him?

    • He’s far too much of a progressive, honest and kind guy for the coalition. Maybe we need to recruit him as the NBN’s new spokesman. In fact in an unofficial sense I’m sure we already have :) He’s already got FiOS in the states so the man will need fibre!

        • Man please shoot me. The above “sorry, replied to the wrong person” comment was ironically meant for another thread, let alone another person, making it perhaps the stupidest comment ever posted on the internet! :) You were indeed the intended recipient of the initial comment.

          I’ve got too many tabs open and its been a long day ok? crawls into hole.

  17. @renai Slow news day? I’m assuming you write this in jest. It’s pretty bad so I have to ask….. Never mind, I’ll assume you were trying to be funny…

  18. It’s sad. You write a simple fun piece and it turns out to be an IQ test half your readers fail.

    Hmm… maybe we could sell them on a FTTN NBN….

    :P

  19. Tsk, Tsk, Tsk (shaking finger side to side)

    Renai, you do know torlling is a bannable offence, i am tempter to report you to sites administrator.

    Oh wait…

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