Auckland City Council - City Scene

The Sullivan family have decided not to have 'just another New Year's party' this year. Instead, three generations of the family will be on board their launch, The Diplomat at dawn on 1 January 2000, sailing in the Day One millennium flotilla.

Wendy Sullivan says her husband David and children Jack and Greer needed no persuading when she suggested the flotilla venture after picking up an information pamphlet at the local library.

"We knew we weren't going to get a babysitter, so we were looking for some way to do something different with the whole family' she says."Everybody immediately agreed it was a great idea."

The Diplomat, with the Sullivans on board, will join other launches off St Leonard's beach, Takapuna at 4.30am. Lining up behind the Royal New Zealand Navy vessel, Hinau, they will meet up with other sailing craft and waka as they depart from Narrowneck and Cheltenham.

The flotilla will arrive off Okahu Bay as the sun rises over Bastion Pt. A huge haka on the beach will welcome the fleet - and the new millennium.

Everyone is welcome to join the haka or the flotilla.

© Scoop Media

Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>