ICML'06: I like the Aussies

One nice thing at ICML was meeting all the Aussies. Some of them I’ve known for, well, decades. Hell, I meet Geoff Webb back in 1988.

Man, the Aussies can tell a good yarn. Much better than the Yankees (who are all to worried about offending God or getting sued).

And they can write, again in a very unAmerican way. Clarity is not rewarded in the U.S. of A. Here, the tradition is to find some murky complexity, split it two, and sell a bit of it to DARPA or the NSF.

The Aussies, on the other hand, have another approach. Something like: “nah mate, nah, leave it out”. The result? Simpler clearer prose and more novel ideas per kilometer than an under-populated desert island like Australia deserves.