Senator Bartlett speaks to supporters, originally uploaded by David.

Senator Bartlett of the Australian Democrats speaks to supporters in the foyer of the Gardens Theatre at Queensland University of Technology, Gardens Point campus, Brisbane city, after launching his reelection campaign earlier today.

Senator Bartlett asks for reelection, originally uploaded by David.

Senator Andrew Bartlett is now speaking at the launch of his reelection campaign. Stay tuned for an interview live from the scene at about 10 minutes to 1pm and photos and video later on this evening.

UPDATE: Sorry, technical problems mean the interview recording didn’t work out. But you can see a full report, including videos and photos, here.

Senator Andrew Bartlett, of the Australian Democrats, is launching his re-election campaign tomorrow, Sunday July 8th 2007, at 11am, at the Gardens Theatre, at Queensland University of Technology’s (QUT) Gardens Point campus in the city. You can click here for a Google Map showing the exact location.

If you can’t make it there, Brisbane Is Home will be sending live reports from the scene. I’m planning to send in live photos and sound recordings, including an interview with Senator Bartlett. There will also be non-live high-quality photos (that is, not from a cameraphone) and a video of part of the Senator’s speech.

UPDATE: Sorry, the ‘live sounds’ part of the plan didn’t work out. But you can see the report here, which includes photos and a video from the launch, and there are photos sent in live from the launch via cameraphone here and here.

So keep an eye on Brisbane Is Home tomorrow for live news from the scene. And have a look at Senator Bartlett’s blog, where he actually talks with people. Even if you don’t like his politics, it’s very different from most political blogs.

Do you want to get live SMS updates on your mobile phone when Brisbane Is Home releases new stories? Then subscribe to Brisbane Is Home at twitter - just sign up for a twitter account and add http://twitter.com/brisbaneishome as a friend.

If you have the internet on your phone, you’ll be able to surf directly to new stories at Brisbane Is Home. And if you don’t, you’ll get an SMS letting you know what’s waiting for you when you get to a computer.

Powered by ScribeFire.

If you’re into LAN gaming - hooking up some PCs in a network and using them to play games against other people - you’ll love LanSmash. Its on from 9am - 11pm on Saturday July 14th at the Arena at the Sleeman Centre, Chandler.

JB, one of the organisers, says:

LS Arena is Brisbane’s largest computer gaming event ever. With over 300 player LAN, console competitions, prizes, and a whole bunch of computer gaming fun!

LanSmash is a computer gaming group running LAN’s for over 7 years in then Brisbane community. In 2007 they’re stepping it up a notch jump-starting Queensland’s biggest and best gaming event.
Local developer Auran will be there to show gamers their latest game, Fury.

All LS Arena gamers are handed out free Beta passes for Fury to play the game before its release at the end of this year!
In brief:

*  $15 Participant Ticket
* 300 gamer BYOC LAN Party
* Console competitions
* Game developer presentations
* AINC CounterStrike-Source pre-qualifiers, winners are flown to Melbourne finals!

For more info, including online booking and a list of what you need to bring, have a look at the LanSmash website. It’s on at the indoor arena at the Sleeman Sports Centre in Chandler (you can click here for a Google Map showing exactly where the Arena is).

EDIT: Welcome to everyone dropping in from www.unofficialdarrenhayes.com Also, someone has dugg this story, so please head on by and vote for it.

An article in today’s Sunday Mail, owned by Mr Rupert Murdoch’s News Ltd, attacked former Savage Garden singer Darren Hayes for saying that Brisbane is ’self-consciously butch’.

Unfortunately for Ms Lucy Carne, the author of the article, Mr Hayes never actually said that. Mr Hayes released an ‘open letter’ to the Sunday Mail on his myspace page, which begins:

In response to the article in your news paper that suggests I ‘dissed’ the town I grew up in I have to say I’m appalled. The story is completely false and you didn’t even get my Father’s name right. You just printed a lie.

The opinions you expressed as mine are not even my words. They have been lifted from press release written by a U.K journalist.

For the record, Peter is my brother. Not my father. So much for getting basic facts straight.

Hat Tip: Livejournal user tuberuse in the brisneyland LJ community

However, the damage has been done. The article in the Sunday Mail has many comments hostile to Mr Hayes.

Another News Ltd employee, Brett Debritz, has altered a story on his Sunday Mail blog, apparently after having the Hayes letter brought to his attention by tuberuse . There is no acknowledgement of the fact that the original story was incorrect - it has just disappeared down the ‘memory hole’.

The story now has two unrelated YouTube clips, but the URL of the story still contains the words ‘get_real_darren’.

Mr Debritz also submitted his own story to Digg. He also entitled the Digg submission ‘Get Real Darren’.

Just another reason to take Brisbane’s monopoly media company with a pinch of salt.