Sportpunter

Last year, the Australian Labor party introduced an internet filtering system which it plans to implement to all Internet companies, thus making it illegal and impossible to view certain websites.

The main idea of the internet filtering service, or Great Australian Firewall, as it has been called, is to restrict access to child pornography, bestiality and violent sexual acts like rape. The morality and reasoning of such restrictions are debateable, but that is not the purpose of this article.

On March 18, 2009, Wikileaks published a list of websites that it claimed was the list of sites that the ACMA (Australian Communications and Media Authority) planned to ban, which was then adjusted some 6 days later.

On the internet forum Whirpool which discusses internet connections and companies, a post was made by a member linking to the Wikileaks published list of banned websites. The ACMA threatened Whirpool with $11,000 of fines per day if the link was not removed.

Outrage ensued as people started to realise that the list contained not only illegal sexual acts as described above, but also other websites like anti-abortion, poker and gambling websites.

Several other websites apparently on the list of banned websites were standard pornography sites, youtube links, certain Wikipedia pages, euthanasia websites and certain fringe religious sites like satanic, anti-Christian  and fetish sites.

The Labor Federal Government said that of the 1370 blocked websites, 674 were related to child pornography and 506 of the websites were classified as either R18+ or X18+, which is actually perfectly legal to view in Australia.

So why are we being restricted from perfectly legal adult sites that might not fit in with the Labor parties morality code? And what is it with gambling websites?

Is gambling online illegal in Australia? Well actually no. It is illegal for companies outside Australia to offer gambling to Australians, but not illegal for Australian companies to offer gambling to Australians because the Australian Government can regulate it.

Hence it is not illegal for Australians to play poker, but illegal for international poker companies to allow Australians to play. Betfair for example, in order to obtain a gambling licence in Australia had to disallow Australians from playing poker on their website. So this means that the internet filtering system aims to stop overseas companies doing illegal activity (even though they have no jurisdiction for them there) and stops Australians doing perfectly legal activities.

Word is, although I can’t say for sure, that the list of banned websites includes some of the biggest poker websites and casinos on the internet. You know the ones. It also bans a website that merely lists the possible poker websites that there are.

So not only is the Australian government possibly banning websites that are perfectly legal, but they are also possibly banning websites that list other websites that are perfectly legal.

What is the next stage? Banning websites that criticise the government? One has to wonder why certain youtube videos (which never display violence or sexual acts) or Wikipedia pages are presumably on the banned list.

But why stop there? It seems that the government are intent on banning any website that they can’t financially or moralistically regulate. Will UK bookies be the next to be on the banned list? Will we able to bet at Pinnacle or Olympic?

Will Australia do the same thing in reverse, as in ban Australian websites that show illegal activity in other countries? Perhaps we should ban all Australian websites that show females wearing pants, because it is illegal to do so in Sudan and is still today punishable by 40 lashes? Its laughable, but once a filtering system is in, who knows what webpages will be put on the list. Perhaps this article will not be able to be viewed in the future.

This has to stop. Whilst the banning of illegal activities like child pornography, bestiality and violent sexual acts is – as mentioned before – a debatable step, banning websites that are perfectly legal should be in itself, illegal.

As punters, some of us earn either a living or a livelihood from gambling. Others use it for making a little cash on the side or making the sports we watch more entertaining. Every punter should be strongly against such communist style internet censorship, and everyone of us should protest against this regulation with a loud voice.

Censorship of legal activates is a step against our democratic ways and freedom of life.

Got an opinion on Australian Internet Censorship? Place your comments below.

Everyone has been talking about the new draw that has been released for the soccer world cup and who has the hardest group. Like every year, the Australians are complaining that we have the toughest group. Even the FIFA world cup website suggests that Germany and Brazil are in arguably the toughest two groups. Perhaps the other teams in those groups don’t have it tough for some reason.

But who has the toughest group? And who has the easiest run? Well we can roughly work that out once and for all. Using the World Football Elo Ratings, we can add up all the rankings for all the teams and determine which group will be the hardest.

Results are shown below:

So there we have it, according to the Elo ratings, Group H which consists of Spain, Switzerland, Honduras and Chile have the toughest group, whilst group F which consists of Italy, Paraguay, New Zealand and Slovakia have the easiest draw.

And Australia? Germany and Brazil? Group D and G are listed as third and fourth. A little tough, but nothing to write home about.

Check out all the free sportpunter soccer predictions here.

The number one sportsperson of the last ten years is none other than Swiss champion Roger Federer. It’s taken a lot of research and heated discussion amongst friends, but sportpunter believes that the Fed is well deserved of the number one position. Let me tell you why.

Roger Federer has won a record 15 Grand Slams, breaking the record of 14 held by Pete Sampras at Wimbledon in 2009. He is only one of six tennis players to achieve a career grand slam which is winning at least one of every major tennis tournament. He achieved this after winning the French Open this year. Federer and Agassi are the only two players to achieve this feat in the open era.

Since 2003 Federer has won at least one grand slam in every single year. He has reached the grand slam final 21 times, more than any other player, and is currently on a roll of reaching the semi-finals or better in his last 22 grand slams. That roll goes back to the Wimbledon in 2004. He has reached the final in 17 of the last 18 grand slams.

Federer is currently ranked number one in the world, and held that status for an all time record of 237 weeks from February 2004 to August 2008. Steffi Graf has the next longest streak with 186 consecutive weeks.

His record on the green top is spectacular. He equalled Bjorn Borg’s record of winning the most consecutive Wimbledon’s in the open era from 2003 to 2007. From 2002 to 2008 Federer did not lose a game in grass. Sixty-five matches in a row.

Along with the success comes the money and awards. He has made the most prize money than any other tennis player, and has been awarded the Laurens Sportsman of the year four times since the year 2000 (other winners were Tiger Woods and Michael Schumacher twice, Lance Armstrong and Usain Bolt once).

Every one of his grand slam victories were in the last decade. Federer is, in sportpunter’s opinion, the best sportsperson in the last ten years. Who do you think was the best sportsperson this decade? Make your comments below.

The next article will be the people who missed out on the top then and why.

Check out Sportpunter’s tennis betting model and record here.

Previous Top 10 Sportspeople

2. Tiger Woods

3. Michael Phelps

4. Lance Armstrong

5. Valentino Rossi

6. Michael Schumacher

7. Zinedine Zidane

8. Serena Williams

9. Kenenisa Bekele

10. Shaquille O’Neal

Coming in at number two in sportpunter’s Top 10 sportspeople of the last decade is American golfer Tiger Woods.

Eldrick “Tiger” Woods has won in total 71 PGA Tour events, the third highest of all time, and 14 major golf tournaments, four behind legend Jack Nicklaus. Since 1986, when gold rankings appeared, he has accumulated the most number of weeks at number 1 position, a total of 576 weeks. He currently is ranked number 1 in the world and has held that position since June 12 2005.

Awards for his success seems to follow. He has been awarded PGA player of the year for a record ten times, The Bryon Nelson award (lowest average score) a record eight times and has led the money earning list in the golf calendar year for a record nine seasons.

Along with all this success comes a fairly hefty pay check. In the year 2008 he was the worlds highest earning athlete, earning approximately $110 Million from winnings and endorsements.

Whilst Woods announced himself on the playing field in 1999/2000, winning five tournaments in a row, it was his sixth victory in a row at the Pebble Beach that was to be mostly remembered. Woods was behind by seven shots with only seven holes to play. He achieved four under par for the last four holes to record a massive come from behind two stroke victory.

In the same year at the 2000 US Open, Woods led by ten shots coming into the final round. Even the Open Championship of the same year, Woods won by eight shots. He continued to win the 2000 PGA Championship after coming from behind again, making seven under par from his last 12 holes. He joined Ben Hogan as being the only player in golf history to win three major tournaments in any calendar year.

Woods hadn’t just announced his appearance, he told everybody else they had better catch up to his standards. Never before had odds for a player to win a golf tournament been so low. Woods dramatically popularised the sport, and being one of the only black people to grace the courses, opened up a completely new demographic into watching and playing.

It didn’t stop there. 2001 saw him win the Masters, which meant he was the only person of all time that had held all four major golf championships at the one time. 2002 saw Woods defend his Masters title, but the following couple of years Woods took a little slump.

In changing some small adjustments to his swing to reduce stress on one of his knees, he fell behind Vijay Singh who overtook Woods on the money list and Golf Rankings.

He bounced back in 2005, but in 2006 his father and long term mentor died. Woods took some time off and then came back and failed to make the cut at the US Open. This being the first time in his career and broke the record of 39 consecutive cuts made at major championships.

However he came back again to win the PGA Championship and Open Championship that same year.

Of course sometimes greats can slip up. On November 27, 2009, Woods was taken to hospital after an early morning car accident near his home. His car ran into a fire hydrant and tree at a speed less than 33mph. Woods retired from his own charity golf tournament and any other tournament for the rest of the year. After the press has got a hold of certain “family” matters, Woods apologist to the public and his wife for certain “transgressions.”

Shortly we will be making a list of the top 10 sports scandals of the last decade. Perhaps this one will make it?

Either way, Woods has dominated the sport, changed the way the game is played and that tells me that he is a worthy pick for the top 10 sportspeople of the last decade. So who will be number one? Tomorrow we shall see.

Previous Top 10 Sportspeople

3. Michael Phelps

4. Lance Armstrong

5. Valentino Rossi

6. Michael Schumacher

7. Zinedine Zidane

8. Serena Williams

9. Kenenisa Bekele

10. Shaquille O’Neal