New Zealand citizen, Peter Thiel, who is one of the world's richest men, and business associate of Elon Musk, has had his house application in Wanaka rejected on appeal by the Environment Court. Theil was the first investor in Shane Legg's company, Deep Mind, which started the Artificial Intelligence revolution. Legg is a former student of Rotorua Lakes High School. Theil once expressed huge enthusiasm about doing business in NZ - he loved how we fostered extreme sports in places like Queenstown and were into risk-taking and being different, with a freedom-loving edge, on top of being friendly and easy going at the same time. Not any more. In spite of his house being the most environmentally aware and most inconspicuous house I've ever seen proposed in NZ - it even has grass on the roof - unlike the typical Queenstown monstrosities and ugly junk that constitute Christchurch's skyline, an Environmental Court Judge called Prudence Steven has told him to go jump in Lake Wanaka. It has been reported he will not be lodging an appeal. Of course, libertarian Theil will vote with his feet. Rather than making NZ a tech and AI hub with the likes of his mates Elon Musk and Shane Legg, those guys will not involve NZ in their plans since our red-tape obsessed, small minded officials have made our country more trouble than its worth. Judge Prudence just cost NZ a new industry, being on the frontier of new technologies, higher productivity growth and the ability to eliminate poverty that comes with it. So I guess we're talking maybe a trillion dollars, all up. Oh, and her Court also cost us the ability to play a significant role in terms of inventing new technologies, including alternative green energy sources that will stop climate change. How ironic that Theil got rejected by Prudence, whose name reflects everything he stands against. Excessive prudence is what is holding us back.
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